A series of posts where I’ll be putting some thoughts that aren’t worth their own post (or, more likely, I haven’t thought out in-depth enough to give them one) but I still want to put out there.
WARNING: LANGUAGE.
- Fans of giant robot/mecha anime shows, such as myself, wouldn’t have had to deal with people who have never seen a mecha show in their lives crowing “Oh, [the only mecha show they like] is the only good one because it’s not like the other mecha shows that only focus on the robots, this one focuses on the characters” if an embarrassingly too damn high amount of us, as soon as a series shows an interest in exploring the human drama of its characters, did not start whining to the beat of “WHO CARES? I JUST WANNA SEE THE ROBOTS!!”. Because then people see that and assume that the “ideal” mecha show is nothing but robots with no plot or character development whatsoever. There are other factors, of course, but a great deal of the genre’s disheartening lack of respect is brought upon ourselves by ourselves, and it’s past time we started fixing that. The same thing happens to Godzilla fans, BTW.
- Japanese RPGs are the graphic adventure games of consoles (or graphic adventure games are the Japanese RPGs of computers, whichever you prefer). Both are more concerned with story than action, and both were popular for a brief while before eventually becoming stagnant, because both were cursed with an extremely rigid-minded fanbase that resisted any and all attempts at making it more accessible or diversified and cried foul about any installments of it that weren’t 100% exactly like the ones they played when they got started in it as kids; now both genres have been reduced to footnotes in the books of “things that no Good PersonTM such as me would like” and their fanbases have retreated into permanent resentment.
- For that matter, JRPGs are Schrödinger’s Video Game Genre: massively popular and mostly obscure at the same time. Depending on who you ask, a ton of JRPGs came out on Super Nintendo (not counting the ones that never left Japan), to the point that the back of the boxes started using the term “RPG” as something that people would recognize and look for, but at the same time not a single one of them sold any copies. No two people agree on whether or not Final Fantasy VII was the one that made the genre “mainstream” or whether it never was or whether it is but only in the case of one or two specific big-name franchises. Nobody and everybody plays and doesn’t play JRPGs. No one can make up their mind. Not to mention, as mentioned above, it’s gotten stuck with fans that don’t like anything that tries to break out of the FF7 mold.
- I do not like “deconstructions”. In theory, a “deconstruction” is a piece of work that takes apart the narrative conventions of a genre and tries to figure out how they work together. In practice, it’s the author screaming in your ear “THIS IS WHY THE THING YOU LIKE WOULD BE BAD AND HARMFUL AND OPPRESSIVE AND IMMORAL AND EVIL IN REAL LIFE, YOU ASSHOLE, YOU FUCKING JERK, YOU ABSOLUTE BLOODY FUCKING CHILD MURDERER. STOP HAVING FUN!“.
- People who say “It’s okay to like what you like! You don’t have to be ashamed! Be you!” who otherwise spend 25/8 bashing, very loudly and very publicly, on stuff they don’t like and on the people who do like it, always dismissing them out of hand as foolish, whiny, fragile nerds (“Can’t you take criticism?” “Boy, if you can’t accept that some people just don’t like the same things as you then you’re gonna have problems!” “I wasn’t talking about you, but obviously if you feel targeted by this, that’s your problem, maybe examine why is it that me making sweeping generalizations about stuff I don’t like and people who do like it triggers you so much?”), are, always, the first to take on the same attitude when the same thing happens to something they like (“Whoa, wait! You have to respect other people’s opinions! That’s how it works!” “Nah man, you just don’t get it, it’s not nostalgia goggles when I say the G1 Transformers is the greatest cartoon ever made, it’s because it really is!” “Okay, so who cares if Some Like It Hot is transphobic? It’s so funny! It’s a classic!” “Who cares if I want to eat breakfast cereal, man, let people enjoy things!” “I think we as a collective of fandoms really need to learn to stop shitting on people for liking what they like!”).
- The same kind of people hate “nostalgia goggles”, and any time someone likes something older than the current decade that they don’t, they accuse them of that, but when it’s something older than the current decade that they do like, it’s justified. Often, it’s something older than the current decade that they do like but is still pretty dang old by now. No, people, neither Beast Wars nor Sonic Adventure nor the Star Wars prequels were made yesterday; they’re going on twenty years of age now. What’s happening to you is what happens to the same people you hate and antagonize so much.
- To those of you who are points 5 and 6: Please realize that you’re guilty of points 5 and 6 so that you may stop looking like a bunch of hypocrites. Unless you are a bunch of hypocrites, in which case you may carry on. That way, intelligent people will see through you and you’ll end up disgraced and alone, like you deserve.
That should be all for now…
Ognimod in English! 