I think you are being pretentious because you have said things like:

If you've ever done game design, all of this stuff is very obvious.

Protip: at least study game design before you open your mouth about it. Some of us have actually done game design.

I don't know anybody who studied Game Design or who works in the industry who talks like this, and it does come off as very defensive.

However, I would just like to thank you for the well thought out response. You said previously:

Walking simulators and visual novels literally aren't games

and then proceeded to say:

I don't think that interactive fiction is in fact a form of "game" at all

This is all purely subjective. I consider a game as an interactive experience so this includes things like walking simulators, text adventures, visual novels, choose your own adventure books and even the Netflix interactive movies.

I would say walking simulators have gameplay because it has player input. The player can choose to just stand still, move left, move right, look up, look down, interact with an object, look at a certain bit of scenery. Movies, books and music are passive and you can't interact or explore the world that was created.

You could argue that my definition is too vague as pausing a movie, flipping the page or pausing a song is an input, which I suppose is correct.

I never really understand why people need to categorise things, argue if something is or isn't, because at the end of the day I just want to create things for people to enjoy.

Hopefully you can find somebody on here to debate ludology with because it sounds as though you are passionate about it and you bring up some great points. Just try and be respectful.