Really, the Sulu audios were more like audiobooks than full dramas. They had multiple actors, but they apparently weren't allowed to have actual interactive dialogue between them; rather, they each performed separate monologues that were presented as log entries or the like. So they were only sort of half-dramatized, trying to fake being dramas as closely as they could come within what was technically a narrated format.
This exact same comment was made in another thread on audio dramas back in 2018, and as I said then, I'll say now: that definition lacks nuance. If the work is a text being read (usually by a single voice actor) from a pre-existing source, with little or no music and effects, that's generally accepted to be defined as an audiobook.
The
Sulu stories are very clearly performances that were written and originated
specifically for the audio medium, they make full use of it for dramatic effect, and the interaction between the characters or lack thereof is irrelevant. A work with a cast of actors, music, effects, and in some cases narration, that's an audio drama.
(Additionally, regarding the
Sulu audios, where does this idea that "they apparently weren't allowed to have actual interactive dialogue" come from? Citation, please.)
GraphicAudio, the company that's publishing my Tangent Knights trilogy and adapted my novels Only Superhuman and Spider-Man: Drowned in Thunder, uses a format that's a hybrid of the two, full-cast dramatizations with novelistic narration and description. So they're basically audio novels and audio dramas at the same time.
The word "dramatization" is key; what's being described here sounds like an audio drama - in this case, an adaptation of a text into a dramatic format for audio, not just a reading.
I'm not sure there's one accepted set of formal definitions.
Quite so, it's a broad church, and
YMMV, as they say.
But as someone who has been writing audio dramas for almost 20 (!) years, I personally feel it's important to draw a line between "this is someone reading a book" and "this is full-on dramatic production" because I see the terms used interchangeably and that can be a problem for creators in the marketplace.
Audible is especially to blame for this, with it's system of "credits", as often subscribers will see a 20-hour audio book and a 2-hour audio drama and go for the book because it is perceived as better value for money, when the difference is one of quality, not quantity. I've already seen comments to that effect regarding
No Man's Land, and I'd hate to see this audio do poorly because it's seen as too short.
tl;dr - audio books and audio dramas aren't the same thing, they should be taken on their own merits and are equally valid entertainment experiences.