How is that not as fun? I mean, even though there are no real restrictions, we know know how we see the characters in our heads...I guess what I mean is, even beyond being "in character", we can have the characters in whatever houses we want, have them become and be whatever we want. They can be friends, they can hate each other, Scorpius could date Lily or Rose, or hell, James II! There's no preconceived notion about where they're going in their lives, since we barely caught a glimpse of them in the last book. Not that I don't mind ignoring the epilogue every once and a while, but it's nice to sort of grow up with another set of children, I guess. Shaping their lives.