LEX'S PROFILE

This is interesting, although I usually don't understand expressions with "creative" in them. Too vague.
But I read the article anyway, and HEY, this is like psychology! I always liked to analyze other people and doing this through the games they make is fun to read.
It's true, that you don't go too deep, and I wouldn't mind reading a more detailed version of it, though it may be true, that others with such perversions are few in number. Well, if you ever feel like it, go ahead.
Oh and it seems I read the article too late to read it, but analyzing yourself is usually an...interesting idea. It's like trying to draw you neghbourhood from above without ever seeing it from there (forget google maps). Certainly, who knows it better than you, but still, you never saw it. Yields interesting results, especially when you include someon else's analysis of yourself. Well it's a shame you removed it, but peace has it's price.

Well it is a waste of time, or rather, something that actually makes up a decent portion of the game time. Most games have a story no longer than a huge short story (that's about 100 pages, which might be long in itself, but not compared to the actual game time).
What I mean is, everything is relative. If I don't feel like my time is being wasted, then my time is well spent, because I'm feeling useful or enjoying myself. A perfect (and obviously non-existent) developer is able to make the player feel like that every single battle he fights is very important, even if it is just grinding.
Of course, if someone has enough ideas for the game time they planned for their project, then all is good, but if that time is more than a few hours, what is very likely*, (especially in commercial games, so that the costumers won't feel like they wasted their money) then the plethoria of creative ideas needed probably won't be available. So there has to be some parts where the game becomes a bit repetitive. It's these parts that need to be made bearable.
We can also look at repetitivness on different scales. I for one, never liked when I receive the usual "get the 3-4-6-9 etc. crystall balls so that you can do whatever" type quests. They are like a big sign saying "YOU WILL BE DOING THE SAME THING OVER AND OVER". And well...that sucks. But the truth can be that each of these is a very different experience with the stroy progressing with each "crystal ball" you get. It still feels a bit repeptitive. And then, there is the reverse version, when the main quests are more colorful, but you actually do the same thing in them. You can go deeper than this and, for example look at the individual battles, and how much they differ from each other, even if they have the same types of enemies.
A good game would not feel repepetitive in any way, but that doesn't mean you won't do the same bits over and over with slight changes. If you would simply play through these parts with nothing in between them, they would feel repetitive, but with the story/etc. in between them and the slight changes, they suddenly became nearly unique events.
The least elegant (and effective) way to get this effect is to do the stuff I mentioned in my previous post. Better methods are usually the combination of these, carefully crafted, so that they won't feel out of place, or forced, with additional graphical and sound effects, if needed (and/or possible).

*(I know, it's only logical to make the game shorter if you are out of ideas, but shortness, being too "dense" and the lack of gameplay~battles come up from time to time in reviews. If one makes an enjoyable game, it is most unfortunate if it simply feels too short.)

While I tend to write these thing as if they were facts, I'm only theorizing, of course.

There is also the question of quantity. Getting in one fight or a hundred might be fun, but after that, it's not so entertaining anymore, even if it's a great battle system.
It's actually a very hard thing to make a dungeon or some other part of the game where you get into fights long enough for the player to feel that he/she is challanged and is achiving something, WHILE still enjoying her/him-selves. Depending on how fun the battles are, this can be sort or long, but obviously, people are different, so the developer has to find the length (or amount) which is optimal for the most players, and accaptable for the rest, or, like mentioned above me, implement an option to short down (or skip) the fights. This, on the other hand can lead to some people skiping fights and then complaining about the game being too short, or unchallanging...what is lame, but nevertheless, that's how it is.

On the other hand, I disagree with the statment that indie game developers who offer their games for free shoul especially consider what is written in the article. While every game developer (or story writer for that matter) should take these advices to heart, non-commercial games actually have a little more freedom in this area, since the developers usually don't expect to gain too much (apart from experience) from their projects. It's nice to have the public opinion in favor of the game, sure, but since the developer is not depending on it, (for livelihood at least) it might not be his/her first priority.
Then again, it's kinda pointless to develop a game that no one likes...

Oh and if you feel like writing about the rest of the 8 rules, please do! This was an interesting article.
(And sorry if my writing style seems like that of a stuck up idiot. English is actually not my native language and I can't use it as freely as I might want to.)