Quote Originally Posted by iblix
Being "not too different" because they have the same slavic roots is not the same as being actually one and the same language with just some regional differences...

I'm a french speaking belgian.
Though French has the same roots as Italian, so that italian sounds very familiar to me, i cannot have a conversation with someone speaking italian.
Whereas I can speak with someone from France even tough we have a different accent and sometimes use different words or expressions.
I guess that's the way it is between croatian, serbian, bosnian...
I know, you're right, i have the same thing, Russian is my native language, but even Ukrainian, just because it's so close to Russian, I can say I don't understand it, so I can't talk with someone who speak Ukrainian to me, not to talk of Serbian.