Actually, what you're talking about here (the 'save game' fix) is exactly the thing I think modern games, no matter the genre, should try to work around. I can't come up with any story-driven game who'd fit the bill (procedural games à la Mount & Blade are a different breed alltogether), but the possibilities are hinted at in Fahrenheit. (Spoilers, but this is all in the demo so go play it): In the first scene, after the murder, the player is given the opportunity to either try to clean up after himself and coolly walk out the front door, or simply rush, covered in blood, out through the back and into the streets in a panic. In the following scene, the detectives have to piece together the murder - finding the weapon if it was hidden, interview the waitress, find other clues etc. Since both of these opposing forces (fugitive and hunter) are played by the player, there's an element of choice: how many clues should I leave for them to find? Unfortunately, it ends up not really mattering at all, aside from aesthetic differences (e.g. the accounts given by the waitress and the police), but the IDEA is there.
Imagine if almost every act you perform in some way influences the future - to the extent that to go back to "undo" something you've done would require a load to a save hours and hours back in time. In Dragon Age, at the cusp of some important decision, I'd simply save, then check out one option, come to the conclusion I didn't like it and then check out the other. In DA:O (SPOILERS), your decisions during the main quest affected exactly one thing: what kind of armies you'd have at your disposal during the final attack. I did not use more than ONE of those 'armies' - the whole thing last fight was a joke in how easy it was.
I guess my problem is the easy way out most games take - decision A leads to conclusion B. It's immediately apparent what the consequences of your decision is, the end. The Fallouts, and in a limited manner DA:O (in the end narration), as well as many other games (such as Bioshock) do give your decisions more long-term consequences, but these are also simple A to B progressions. After one playthrough you know which decisions are going to give the 'good' ending and which the 'bad' ending. Furthermore, they're post-game, they're no longer a part of the central experience. I want a complicated world (like our own) in which decisions taken lightly will later come back and bite you in the ass - or not. The idea would be that everything would be so complicated that you might as well just rush in and do everything as your character/you would see fit, and leave the consequences behind your savegame. You don't quicksave every time before you build a powerplant in Sim City either, do you?
Anyway, long rant and not very coherent, but vaguely on-topic as to the article. Which was an interesting read, by the way!
