@auspice There's also the technobabble problem. If it was reality, yes, all the science would have to make sense, and you'd need all the nitty gritty technical details to function in daily life.
We are not all technicians, programmers, etc. and for some, myself included, feeling like an engineering degree is required to get through a basic setting document turns something into an immediate 'not just no, but hell no'.
Just like people playing doctors on a modern day game need not know the technical ins and outs of heart surgery, there needs to be some leeway for handwavium.
You, RL, may or may not know exactly how your phone works down to the circuits and signals and so on, but you do know how to call on it, tinker with an app, send a text, and so on. This is the best 'target', I think, for people to stick with in terms of defining tech, and the best target you can expect players to understand. (Ex: 'Phone: makes calls, sends text messages, sends email, sometimes has silly games or other generic utilities available on it.' 'Zapper: small hand-held self-defense device resembling a RL TV remote control that emits a brief pulse of energy at settings of warning shock, stun, injure, kill.' And so on.)
Too many folks (and by this I really mean even one of these on your game is one too many) want to pry into how the circuit board is laid out and will not for the love of all things holy ever let it go until there's some specific answer that better check out as legit engineering and... this is really just not helpful, unless they want to come up with something cool that adds to the game world in a nifty way without giving them some kind of IC advantage (Ex: 'maybe that special fuel is the stuff that's only found in the caves on my character's property in alien land!' and so on), and contribute it to the game files.
It just makes things difficult, and I really wish there was some sensible solution to it.
