[cuddlybacon]

When choosing whether to do A or B, "this game is fun" usually leads to "why not both?".

> I feel like concentrating on the game being fun would help avoid repetitive mechanics that would be tiresome or tedious (inventory management), frequent non-skippable dialogue, etc.

These things are fun to many people. Just not you. Sometimes they are fun to me, usually not. I think "this game is fun" would lead to including more of this stuff, not less.

YouTubers in particular seem to like this kind of stuff.