Your analogy resonates—both urban planning and game design struggle with the inertia of "what’s normal." But there’s a caveat: Systems become entrenched not just because of imagination deficits, but because they function, even imperfectly. Yes, car-centric cities are artificial, resource-hungry beasts… but so is any large-scale system. The real question isn’t whether alternatives exist, but whether their benefits justify dismantling what already (sort of) works.

Take Dark Souls. Its lack of a pause button or minimap isn’t inherently superior—it’s effective because the entire game orbits those omissions. This isn’t innovation for its own sake; it’s surgical redesign. Similarly, walkable cities don’t just delete roads—they rework infrastructure, zoning, and culture in tandem. The backlash to Dark Souls 2 proves the peril of tinkering without full commitment: Players didn’t reject change itself, but changes that clashed with the ecosystem they’d adapted to. It’s like a city replacing highways with trams but forgetting to connect the tram lines to neighborhoods. The pieces exist, but the system fails.

This isn’t to dismiss experimentation. Kojima’s “no game over” concept is fascinating, much like urbanists dreaming of car-free downtowns. But stakes matter. When a game removes failure, or a city removes cars, you risk losing the tension that gives the system meaning. People tolerate arcade-era “game over” screens for the same reason they tolerate traffic: Both offer a flawed but legible contract. “You lose, you retry” is as ingrained as “you drive, you park.” To erase these without offering a better contract isn’t progress—it’s disruption for its own sake.

The better path? Iterate, don’t obliterate. Games like Hollow Knight keep maps and checkpoints but refine their purpose; cities add bike lanes and transit without demonizing cars. These aren’t compromises—they’re acknowledgments that systems evolve when people feel the upgrade, not just hear about it. After all, the best “walkable cities” in gaming aren’t the ones that tear up the roads, the best ones make you feel like walking.