Here's a wrinkle: playing a video game, as opposed to watching someone else play a video game, i.e., are video games inherently more subjective than film?

Part of the enjoyment of video games is that the player is creating the experience as they go.  They dictate the pacing, where, when and how a character goes or solves a puzzle or defeats a foe.  If they stop playing, the experience stops.  While one player might take a long time to figure out a puzzle in Portal, another might figure it out right away, and yet another has already figured it out on previous play-throughs and is on to the next puzzle in no time.

In each case, the player is still deriving a level of enjoyment from the experience, because they are the ones creating it.

So what about observing someone else play?  I would posit that it depends on the observer's familiarity with the game in question.  A new player might find watching an experienced player enjoyable, and indeed helpful if they're stuck.  I remember getting stuck a few times in Portal 2 and was grateful for the wealth of game play-throughs available on YouTube these days.

On the other hand, an experienced player might not find watching a new player stumble around to be as enjoyable.  The theory I posit is that because the experienced player has defined the outline for their experience of that game, perhaps watching someone else with a different outline, or someone figuring things out for the first time, could be frustrating, particularly if there were no opportunity to offer advise when the new player get stuck.

With film (or T.V.), every "play-through" is exactly the same, and yet a room full of viewers can have vastly differing subjective experiences, and those experiences can change over time.  With video games, even with an experienced player, each play-through can be slightly different, and offer a slightly different experience. Granted, in a game like Portal, there is a very clear through-line in terms of how any one player move from beginning to end, so most players will likely have a very similar experience.  This is by design of course, so perhaps in the broad strokes, there really isn't that much difference between the two mediums as it might appear.  If that's the case, then it brings up the questions of whether a non-player could enjoy watching someone play a game, and whether they would be more inclined to watch a game with a story as opposed to one without.

So I guess my questions are:

A.) Does the fact that each player creates their own experience as they go with a video game make that experience inherently more subjective than film or T.V.?
B.) How does that experience translate when watching a new player, or simply another player?
C.) Can a non-player enjoy watching others play a video game?
D.) Would they be more inlined to do so if that game had a story?

The final idea I will posit is this: if a non-player can enjoy watching someone else play a video game, particularly if that game has a story they can invest in, how is that experience any different from watching a film?