Reviewer Rodeo: Don’t be a Hater

Welcome to the ZTGD Reviewer Rodeo. Each week, we’ll grab on to the hottest issue, hold on for dear life, and wrassle it to the ground.

Are gamers spoiled? Are there games that people refuse to play for stupid reasons? Are there any aspects of gaming that people just love to hate? The ZTGameDomain crew takes a look at our least favorite instances of game snobbery.

Drew “Frustrated Fury” Leachman
I. Can’t. Stand. Console. Fanboys. They have been around since the SNES vs. Genesis days. Now that the internet is readily available to most of the public, they have all come out of the woodwork, and you get to hear them on any and every site, forum, and blog out there. If you believe that your console should be the only console to get a certain game, you need to stop playing video games. All fanboys try to do is justify a purchase by wanting exclusives. If it were up to me, there would be no exclusives. Halo could be enjoyed on the PS3, Uncharted could be played on the 360. It’s not just console fanboys either. There’s Japanese elitists as well. I know many gamers that only play JRPG’s because it came from Japan. Completely disregard great Western RPG’s like Dragon Age, Mass Effect, and Diablo, or even downright bash on them, even though they have never played them before. Fanboys, your village called. They’re missing their idiots.

Of course, there is a large group that loves to hate on the popular thing. Call of Duty, Halo, and many other hype machines get a bad rap all because they’re popular. It seems like long term gamers have this notion that their hobby is supposed to be exclusive to them, and it angers them to know that the “Bro’s” are enjoying their Call of Dutys, which, in turn make the game very popular. Just because you don’t like it, doesn’t mean it’s not good.


John “Dubya” Whitehouse
I think that it isn’t being spoilt that causes gamers to hate a game for no reason, I think it is mainly down to fanboyism.

The main reason people hate on a game or refuse to play it is because they only have the one console and they are trying to defend their purchase. Most people who legitimately have reasons for not playing a popular game normally have those reasons because of an earlier experience. Even then, they tend to just steer clear of the game, rather than publicly bash it (unless it’s Ken and Fallout 3/New Vegas!).

Take me for example, I won’t be going anywhere near one of this years most anticipated releases, Skyrim. Not because I hate it, but because I really didn’t like Oblivion. It just wasn’t a game that I could get on with. You won’t see me hate on Skyrim, or call it out as a rubbish game. I will just not play it.

Hating on a game comes from people who just want to look clever and opinionated. Whether that’s because they are fanboys, or because they want to stand out from the crowd. Either way it is daft, because you cannot show real hate for a game unless you have played it and in most cases, they haven’t.

Page 1 of 3Next
Written by
This is the collective account for the site. This is for when multiple editors are contributing to the article or posting news.

2 Comments

  1. 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!

  2. * 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.

Comments are now closed for this post.