Can you really not imagine an animal halfway between a dog and Wolverine and wonder what kind of environment might have produced it? There’s nothing in the theory of evolution that suggests such an animal is impossible afterall.
As I said, I don't know what you and
@clearstream mean by "possible". Do you mean ecologically possible? Biochemically possible? Something else?
Anyway, once you've constructed your dog-to-wolverine continuum, where do thylacines fit on it?
Mostly this, I’d just note the continuum need not be 1 dimensional. if you want to say all the real world animals ever in actual existence do not form a continuum then I agree. Far too many gaps. But I’m not likening what I speak of to being all the real world animals currently to have ever existed. The explanatory likening would be more, what all theoretical animals could be produced by the evolution process in earthlike environments. Would you say this is a continuum?
Is there an actual, ecologically and biochemically possible pathway from (say) humans to (say) octopuses, or to (say) bats? My understanding - coming from treatments of evolution and biology in philosophy of science (in which I am educated), not from the study of science itself (in which my education finished with high school) - is that the answer is
no, because both in ecology and in biochemical development
the actual trajectory taken is relevant.
So while it is presumably true that bats and humans have some common ancestor, and that octopuses and humans have some far more remote common ancestor, I don't think it is true that there is some imaginary intermediate stage between humans and bats that is ecologically or biochemically possible; nor between humans and octopuses.
This is the same ‘let’s limit discussion to games in actual existence’ instead of to ‘any theoretical game that could exist’. The first is not a continuum. The second almost certainly is.
If the ‘theory’ is not applicable to theoretical games that could exist but don’t currently then it’s not really a very good explanatory theory.
There is no reason to think that "any theoretical RPG that could exist" is on a continuum. As
@AbdulAlhazred said, these games may be more like watches. Or they may be more like animals, with ecological and biochemical explanations for their natures.
In any event, what RPG are you imagining that Vincent Baker or Ron Edwards is confused about?