[jmiskovic]

Lua has chosen a minimalistic 'batteries-excluded' strategy to ease the integration into host platforms. That strategy worked wonderfully - Lua was always a popular choice for embedding into various platforms (Roblox, Ngnix, Neovim, VLC, Wireshark...).

Python made interfacing just about anything a simple job, which is why it succeeded as "glue" language and automation tool. It is a completely different area than what Lua was designed for even though they are both called a scripting language.

In an alternate timeline Lua could have been used in JavaScript's place though. The web would have benefited from Lua's simplicity and speed.