Moreno, I've come to think of Illusionism as the negative extreme, with any "in the know" indicating some degree of Participationism.
The distinction you're drawing is very finely-drawn, as I see it, perhaps too finely to matter. I see almost, perhaps complete identity between your two phrases: "the player's knowlege of being in a 'story before' situation" and "on the use of the 'Black Veil' by the GM." Well, maybe not complete. But very nearly complete.
It's no surprise that the author of Under Illefarn was Steve Perrin, no stranger to devotees of early RuneQuest. In fact, I recognize most of the authors of that series, notably Aaron Allston, one of the heavy hitters of early Champions.
Alessandro, I agree with Moreno. Not all settings are suitable, not intrinsically. I think it's possible to invent certain depth or details into a printed setting to make it more interesting; I found myself doing this when I was reading the Al-Qadim material, for example. The only problem with doing this is implementing it for actual role-playing, when I discovered that (whenever I tried) I was forced actually to re-write the whole setting.
My personal list of settings in the three relevant categories include
Powerful as written, play as written, bask in the wonderfulness: DeGenesis, Center Space, Glorantha (in a class by itself), Venus 2141
Plenty of potential but the authors didn't use it, highlight it, or perhaps even know it, or if they did, it was dodged or buried under crusts of other nonsense: Justifiers, Planescape, Underground, Fading Suns, The Whispering Vault, Tribe 8, The End
Very pretty but ultimately unusable for Story Now play, needs to be rewritten and profoundly re-focused in order to be played in this fashion: Al-Qadim, Jorune, Space: 1889
Please note that the above lists refer to the settings as written, without reference to the systems or instructions for play. Also note that I have omitted certain settings which are very good but require specific input from the GM (Zero, Lacuna), or any games in which setting is built by the group in some way (shock;, Sign in Stranger, In a Wicked Age, Sorcerer). Finally, the lists are not complete, merely intended as a snapshot.
Leonardo, I think the step you've raised deserves deep discussion in an Actual Play thread. It is, I think, an issue specific to this particular kind of play, both socially and procedurally.
... I feel that what makes a setting-centric Story Now game click in the long run and what makes some players interested in the game at first doesn't always coincide.
I agree. What that means to me is, my priority is not to make as many people in my gaming group attracted to this particular project for play, but rather to play it only with people who are.
... if you want the game to be even possible, you better put your project on hold or find someone who is almost as excited as you are.
Yes. Again, I think you should start a thread about how this was actually brought into practical, functional role-playing activity. I'd love to contribute to a discussion about that issue.
Best, Ron