I understand what you say, I just wanted to express that while I'm actually a fan of C&C above everything, (And actually agree with the non-meaningful choices in the Russel story), I think that there's actually ways to have a "forced" outcome, with meaningful choices.
You see, the 1-5 are actually VERY linear, and you have the same outcome, despite of your choices... But you actually feel like you made a choice.
All that because you said "(...)but at the very least, you should be able to affect the general outcome of things."
What I really wanted to say, is that you actually CAN create the illusion of choice in a way that mean something, without affecting the general outcome. Like Lee's last words to his brother in Ep. 1, just to have an example.
Just because Russel is a poorly written wreck, doesn't mean that forcing something is always as bad... you can have choices that don't affect the outcome AT ALL, but are still choices.... Even if they're meaningless in the "Consequence" way, they can be very powerful in the narrative point of view.
I hope you can understand what I mean...
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Sorry if I don't express myself very well, I'm not a native english speaker... And while I can easily understand everything I read or listen, it's somewhat hard to me to express, especially when writing