Ken “ZeroTolerance” McKown
Well, considering this was my topic I felt that not weighing in would be such a lost opportunity. I have spent the last few years watching gamers across the world becoming more and more snobbish when it comes to the games they play. Hearing phrases such as “with that frame rate, I would never play that” and watching so many games fall into the budget bin for the stupidest reasons imaginable. Sure, I am not a spokesman for lazy game development, and I certainly don’t want a sea of broken games to be released, but a little screen tearing is not going to hinder your game experience to a degree that you shouldn’t play it.
This topic is also spawned from watching the hate wars increase. Having to listen to people gripe over which series will be the better game is honestly getting old. Whatever happened to being able to enjoy more than one game of one type? For crying out loud, most of the classics we hold so dear are exactly the same game skinned differently. I sat through the commotion between rhythm games and now military FPS titles are apparently the hot button. I have one scary piece of realism for you: both of these games are going to be extremely similar. Just because you don’t like the practices of a company or the fact that you are tired of said franchise, doesn’t mean that just picking up another similar game from a different company, with a different name is going to completely change your experience. It is all ridiculous in the large scheme of things and honestly all you are doing is causing yourself to miss out on two great experiences.
Finally, this new trend of justifying your game decisions by telling people they are a lesser breed of human than you is just plain insanity. This is the same thing console fanboys tend to try and, let’s be honest, no one considers them the top of the intellectual food chain by any stretch of the imagination. Gaming has always been a social event where competition of skills should be the only thing we butt heads about. Instead, we have become so spoiled that we rarely appreciate what is right in front of us. It seems almost every week there is a new game to play along with downloadable titles, fantastic sales on tons of websites and simply so much content out there that no one who truly enjoys gaming should ever be without. Let’s spend more time playing the games as opposed to worrying about the small, inconsequential problems, and let’s certainly not turn our love for the games themselves into another gamer war that nobody wins.
That’s all for this edition of the ZTGD Reviewer Rodeo. Join us next week as we grab onto another bucking bronco of controversy and beat it into submission.
Got questions or comments? Drop ’em in the comment section below or hit us up via email. Suggestions for Reviewer Rodeo topics that you want our opinions on? Hit Mike up at michaelfutter@ztgamedomain.com.
MK24ever
Interesting read all around…
But I don’t think hating on haters/fanboys will lead us to any conclusion or explain anything, hating makes part of any human being, some hate other races, some hate different soccer teams, others hate gamers, other hate politics, etc etc etc…
We can’t expect people to stop hating, I’m no saint, I didn’t liked at all the way Microsoft handed their marketing when PS3 launched on Europe, they were plain rude and uncivilized, I didn’t liked the way many many US sites criticized the PS3 Sony console in the first years, there was no professionalism, there was just a trend to bash Sony, journalist were pure haters, I hated them for not being professional and in consequence I hated Microsoft and their console because it seemed obvious US community was just pushing for their US made console at the time , when I was young a NES costed SO much in the Portuguese coin that it was impossible for me to buy one, same thing about the games, we had similar consoles at half the price, I hated on Nintendo because I believed at the time they were just to greedy and didn’t care for the people who had less money like me.
My point is, when something goes against what we believe is correct/fair or against our ideals, we answer that with critics, you guys just hated on fanboys because the way they think goes against your way you think. So are you fanboys of anti-fanboysm?
Another point is age, and I think many times fanboysm/hating/preferences is mixed with pure simple childish, we can’t expect from most kids between 8 and 16 to be reasonable, they are kids, they love everything and they hate everything for no apparent reason, makes part of their age, they want to feel grown up so they believe that having a strong opinion makes them more “man” and less “kid”. They won’t want to understand, they don’t accept being wrong and they have the “internet” to go crazy and to make their “macho performance”.
Concluding, we all hate (despite the literal translation of this word to Portuguese is something I don’t really tend to use since it’s a really strong word, I don’t really HATE anything), I only own a PS3 not because I hate the other consoles, I just relate more to that brand philosophy overall and to Sony franchises, that didn’t stopped me from buying a DS or using Windows OS. Do I still prefer SONY? yes! Am I a fanboy? Depends on what you see as a fanboy, do you have a preference for Pepsi or Coca-Cola? Do you prefer MAC or PC? Do you have a favorite football team? If you have to explain on why you prefer something you must probably say what you feel is wrong with the opposite thing, if you feel yore preferred thing is being bashed with no justifiable reason you feel motivated to defend it. On that regard I’m a fanboy, on that regard you are a fanboy, if you still say you’re not, you should check your pulse, you’re probably dead!
Being childish (un-depending on your age really) is the real problem with gamers, I don’t think hating on haters and childish attitudes will help, if we can realize how stupid and moronic these people can be… we should be thankful for understanding something they can’t!
MK!
MK24ever
* PS English isn’t my first language and I already spotted some typos and bad syntax, and there’s no edit button so…. nothing I can do there. I hope people can understand.