Do fandoms ruin series for you?

[Masonicon]

If I ever do any fandoms, all that I do is mixes all of my favorite series in a single Mega-Crossover

and HTF, Sonic, and MLP:FIM fanbases are no less FUBAR than Warhammer 40k Galaxy

not to mention Kingdom Hearts fanbase nearly ruins Kingdom Hearts for me with their Yaoi Organization XIII pairings

 

[AT God]

I don't think fans themselves have ever driven me from a series I already liked. A good example of this is Portal, which is a game I bought and played around the time of its launch and thoroughly enjoyed. As most of us know, the Cake aspect of the game became a meme that was ran into the ground by various people, some of whom I assume are fans. I never thought the cake thing was that funny and the meme didn't make me dislike Portal in any notable way, it merely just made me dislike the concept of memes and the internet.

However, I think fandoms can and have prevented me from seeking out new entertainment I may actually like. There are lots of animated shows that are on right now that I may enjoy because I still love animated TV, even ones designed for kids. However the weird fanbases for those series do leave me wanting to avoid them like the plague for fear of being associated with them. Also, I think fans of some genres of games also kept me from getting an interest in them. I really like RTS games like Star Craft but I never play them online because I know many people take them very seriously and the idea of joining a random game and not being very good keeps me from giving it a shot. Similarly, I have never even tried any MOBA games because I know as a new player, I would need to learn a lot to become helpful and the seemingly hostile nature of the fans has lead me to just skip over the genre that I may actually enjoy.

I don't think the fans actually drive me away from anything I already liked, but they can often be a barrier to entry for new people and probably do affect others as well. Not knowing what drama the OP is referring to, I think it is unfair to get angry at the creators for their fan's behaviors in general. If the creators knowingly and intentionally rile up people, there may be some comment to be had but that still implies that those acting poorly aren't acting on their own which I think is incorrect.

 

[RaikuFA]

Depends. That SU example has made me sour for the show. Yet I refuse to play MOBA's anymore because of the fanbases. Same goes for Monster Hunter for years. Till 4 came out, that series had a fanbase that put MOBA's to shame.

I'm hoping anything I make dosen't get that treatment. If I hear that a fan nearly kills themself over being harrassed I'd cancel any further development of it until people who were harrasing get arrested.

 

[Dreiko_v1legacy]

It's irrelevant if the intended way is one that is dumb according to people's opinions for various reasons, some of which may actually be valid.


The only thing that matters is if it works or not.

I disagree.

It's hardly irrelevant. If the intended way isn't enjoyed, then that is a flaw in the game's design to the person who didn't enjoy it. Whether or not it works is certainly not the only thing that matters. A guillotine works very well, but if I call it "barbaric" to chop people's heads off like that, does the statement, "Well, that's how they designed to work" disqualify or discredit my opinion that it is a barbaric machine? Certainly not. My opinion is perfectly valid. "That's how it was designed" doesn't matter.

You like the story and it doesn't bother you at all that you had to read all the extra stuff to fully understand and appreciate the story. That's perfectly fine.

I, and so many others, did not like the fact that the story was not fully self-contained within the core game--especially since that was the standard that every other main series game in the series maintained through FFXII--and it bothered me greatly that I was expected read the extra stuff to fully understand and appreciate the story.

There's nothing wrong with your opinion or your enjoyment of the game, but you have the air of someone who is looking down on those of us who didn't like it and dismissing our reasons for not liking it.

I think you misunderstand what I mean when I say it "worked". I meant "it was really awesome". Not just that it functioned. If you had read the novels, playing the game was really amazing, they enhanced the experience to a great degree.



I have the air of someone who doesn't see the point of games being self contained and nobody makes a case for why it's better for games to be self contained that not. All I see people list is "just because that's how it's always been". I also don't understand why people being "expected to read" is talked about as though it's a negative thing. It's more good stuff to enjoy. I don't get why everyone wouldn't be ecstatic there's more of this content to enjoy.


I just don't understand why it would "bother" anyone to read all this extra stuff. Reading this stuff is just like playing the game. You're in that world and experiencing the story and learning the characters. If you enjoy FF you'd should enjoy reading these novels. Even without the benefits of their relating to the game.

I'd argue not being self contained in this case was a bad thing, because if you make a game not self contained within its own product and medium without telling most of the customers, you get a bunch of people who assume it works just every other game, book or movie they've ever bought and end of disliking the game because a massive chunk of the story is missing, which ends up aggravating certain people and making them dislike the whole fandom.

And personally I dont usually read prologues or expanded universe novellas to games because the writers they hire for them are (in my experience) almost always garbage and I prefer getting a games story communicated to me through the medium of a game, and i'll always assume the game is capable of that unless it actually tells me otherwise. And since it's a prologue, you have no reason to be excited about having more content because you haven't even played the main game yet.

Again, its fine that this method worked well in your case, but what people are taking issue with is you characterizing anyone who it didnt work for as "annoying" and not true fans because they dont drink the kool aid from Squares mistakes.

The things you describe really aren't what these novels were like. The same writer who wrote the game wrote the novels too. It's all one big narrative told throughout all these things, one which was conceived as a cohesive piece, rather than one which was expanded upon after the fact by some random third party as an afterthought.


It's nothing to do with the kool aid or whatever, I don't actually like everything SE puts out. I see this argument a lot and the fact of the matter is I didn't like FFXII much at all so it's flat out incorrect. XIII on the other hand, I loved. It really is just due to it being great rather than me being some kind of fanatic and the mere implication alone is silly.


Acknowledge reality. Reality is FF is Japanese. Japanese games are developed with Japan first and foremost in their eyes. Acknowledged? Good.


What does a fan who realizes the above do so as to ensure they're getting the most out of their FFs and to make sure they're not given the scraps that the out-of-touch Japanese execs think mainstream westerners like? Fact of the matter is most of these things are released in the west as an afterthought, this is why there's delay. Surely they can manage to coordinate a worldwide release but very few games do that, since most aren't even considering the western audiences when contemplating what kind of game they're gonna make. That's just how their business model works, they have to pitch something which is projected to be a hit in Japan and Japan alone to get approval to go on and create it. So, what is a fan who realizes this to do to avoid being out of the loop? Well, of course, follow the Japanese side of things without paying attention to the western side of things. If you did that, there'd be no way for you to not know there's these novels, as they had been put up on the official website periodically over multiple months. This I think deals with the problem you mention regarding people not knowing of them.

I literally didn't do anything spectacular or out of the ordinary. I discussed the game in forums like this one here and eventually found out about the novels and then went to read them. It doesn't take some kind of super-fan level of devotion to do this much.

 

[Dreiko_v1legacy]

That kind of argument goes both ways. Just because you don't do these things, that doesn't make not doing them "normal" either.


I just look at the result. The result of the fans who are informed and do these things tends to be a higher degree of satisfaction with the game, a greater degree of joy derived from the game. To hell with it being "average" or "normal", it's flat out the way to go if you actually want to like the game and be satisfied lol.

 

[circularlogic88]

I somehow instinctively knew this topic would devolve into a FFXIII discussion. lol

OT: I don't see an inherent problem with fanbases in general. I find it problematic when when certain people within fanbases transcend being a fan and instead become enforcers or bullies to those more casual fans or people with reasonably valid differeing opinions on aspects of a fandom's subject matter. You know the type: they have a sense of smugness about being more knowledgeable in the lore. They buy up anything with the brand logo on it. They read/watched/played the "original" unmolested version of a book/show/movie/videogame before it was butchered for the "casuals'" sake. Nothing their company does can be at fault. The people in charge of a given franchise are brilliant and if you "don't get it" then it's your fault for not understanding or "it's cool to hate on them now because they're popular."

I'm a fan of things in the sense that I will support what I like and not support what I don't like. I loved Pokemon Gold/Silver/Crystal. I hated Pokemon Ruby/Sapphire/Emerald. I still like the Pokemon franchise and have bought other iterations of the game in spite of me not liking that particular version series. A certain subset of Pokemon fandom would cry heresey and chew me out for not accepting R/S/E and instantly start a laundry list of how many features and improvements were made between them and G/S/C.

All in all the main problem with a fandom is that any time you get a large group of people with like-minded thoughts and ideas, they're going to hear any kind of dissent as being an attack on their way of thinking, and whether intentional or not, a minority of that group will go out of their way to defend or justify their opinions or discredit dissenting opinions.

 

[FuzzyRaccoon]

Well, I'll probably never touch Doctor who cause of the fandom. The last thing I need is to watch it, enjoy it, then have people ask me if I liked it. If I say no, I'm lying. If I say yes, god save me if I say yes to someone who's way too into it. Not like the show really interests me to begin with, but... I don't wanna deal with it

God THIS. If I had to think of one show that was ruined for me it'd be Dr. Who. People lose their minds over this show. It's not particularly suited for someone like me anyway (someone that grew up on Asimov and Herbert) but will fans listen? Urggggh.

Did like 9 a bit but once people started getting ridiculous about it I just had to tap out.

Incidentally there's a series that I actually liked BECAUSE of the fandom. They were fun, everyone was accepting of alternate pairings for characters (for the most part), and there was a lot of brainstorming that was just great. Too bad the show was actually not very good and then went from actually watchable to a steaming pile all over again.

 

[remnant_phoenix]

It's irrelevant if the intended way is one that is dumb according to people's opinions for various reasons, some of which may actually be valid.


The only thing that matters is if it works or not.

I disagree.

It's hardly irrelevant. If the intended way isn't enjoyed, then that is a flaw in the game's design to the person who didn't enjoy it. Whether or not it works is certainly not the only thing that matters. A guillotine works very well, but if I call it "barbaric" to chop people's heads off like that, does the statement, "Well, that's how they designed to work" disqualify or discredit my opinion that it is a barbaric machine? Certainly not. My opinion is perfectly valid. "That's how it was designed" doesn't matter.

You like the story and it doesn't bother you at all that you had to read all the extra stuff to fully understand and appreciate the story. That's perfectly fine.

I, and so many others, did not like the fact that the story was not fully self-contained within the core game--especially since that was the standard that every other main series game in the series maintained through FFXII--and it bothered me greatly that I was expected read the extra stuff to fully understand and appreciate the story.

There's nothing wrong with your opinion or your enjoyment of the game, but you have the air of someone who is looking down on those of us who didn't like it and dismissing our reasons for not liking it.

I think you misunderstand what I mean when I say it "worked". I meant "it was really awesome". Not just that it functioned. If you had read the novels, playing the game was really amazing, they enhanced the experience to a great degree.



I have the air of someone who doesn't see the point of games being self contained and nobody makes a case for why it's better for games to be self contained that not. All I see people list is "just because that's how it's always been". I also don't understand why people being "expected to read" is talked about as though it's a negative thing. It's more good stuff to enjoy. I don't get why everyone wouldn't be ecstatic there's more of this content to enjoy.


I just don't understand why it would "bother" anyone to read all this extra stuff. Reading this stuff is just like playing the game. You're in that world and experiencing the story and learning the characters. If you enjoy FF you'd should enjoy reading these novels. Even without the benefits of their relating to the game.

For me, it doesn't come down to "that's the way it's always been;" it's a matter of preference.

I prefer my video game stories to be self-contained and fully experienced through the standard playing-though-the-game experience, and then any extra reading to be supplemental, rather than essential. Yes, this the way that "it's always been" in most RPGs and every main series FF that came before XIII, but that's not why I like it. I like it because, in my opinion, that it's a superior way to present a story.

At the very least, I feel that some kind of heads-up would be a appropriate. Some sort of "Hey! If you don't read the Datalog or any of the online novellas, the plot will be confusing and the characters will be poorly developed!" would have been nice. I wasn't aware that this was a problem until AFTER I played the game. Because every FF that came before was self-contained, I had no reason to expect that XIII wouldn't be.

So yeah, that's what's bothersome about it, for me anyway. The self-contained approach is, in my view, the superior way to tell a story, and I had every reason to believe, based on RPG and FF conventions, that that is what would happen with XIII.

 

[Christemo]

While not specifically an entire series, rabid fans of certain Fate/Stay Night or Tsukihime characters have made me go completely back on my previously good or neutral opinions on them. This includes basically the three main heroines of Fate/Stay Night (particularly Saber, but in general all 3 of them are poorly written, especially in comparison to Kinoku Nasu's best written ones) and Archer, all of whom I was relatively neutral on (and I'll admit to even liking Saber in Fate/Zero, where Urobuchi handled her better in every way), and now I despise them all.

So yeah, it's perfectly possible for other people in a fandom to ruin it or parts of it for me.

 

[Wolf Hagen]

Let's just say: I learned that enjoying a thing and staying the heck away from the weird fans like the devil from the holy water became an acceptable sollution, otherwise I could prolly never have enjoyed things like Trygun or Death Note.

On the other thing: If you don't get a thing, don't let ANY kind of Fanboy know about it.

Thats a can of worms that ruins your believe in Humanity like nothing else.

 

[Dreiko_v1legacy]

For me, it doesn't come down to "that's the way it's always been;" it's a matter of preference.

I prefer my video game stories to be self-contained and fully experienced through the standard playing-though-the-game experience, and then any extra reading to be supplemental, rather than essential. Yes, this the way that "it's always been" in most RPGs and every main series FF that came before XIII, but that's not why I like it. I like it because, in my opinion, that it's a superior way to present a story.

At the very least, I feel that some kind of heads-up would be a appropriate. Some sort of "Hey! If you don't read the Datalog or any of the online novellas, the plot will be confusing and the characters will be poorly developed!" would have been nice. I wasn't aware that this was a problem until AFTER I played the game. Because every FF that came before was self-contained, I had no reason to expect that XIII wouldn't be.

So yeah, that's what's bothersome about it, for me anyway. The self-contained approach is, in my view, the superior way to tell a story, and I had every reason to believe, based on RPG and FF conventions, that that is what would happen with XIII.

That's fair and if you go (way) back in this topic you'll see I mentioned I played the JP version back when the USA version wasn't out yet so that is what I based my experience on. It is fair to take these issues with it I agree. The thing though is that this is not what FFXIII was for me due to all of these aspects that we have already fleshed out too much as is. For me it all was done well and I was informed and everything, which resulted in the awesome experience I describe.


When I ask you why you like it, telling me you like it because you believe it's the superior way to tell a story doesn't actually explain why that is. I'm asking what it is that makes it superior in your eyes. Obviously you prefer it cause you think it to be superior, why do you think so?

I was (and still am) neutral about this. I just judge on a game by game basis. XIII did it in its own way and it worked, so I like it in that instance. I don't try to come up with a maxim to say that all game stories are better told in fashion X because that in my eyes is needlessly restrictive. I just take each game for what it is with an open mind and see what comes out of it. This is how I approached XIII. Also, back then since the game wasn't even out yet, reading the novels was a great way to quench the thirst and make the wait til the release a lot more bearable. That's honestly what lead me to them in the first place.

 

[FalloutJack]

Overall, not really. Can't say that they have. Why? Are they getting bad again?

 

[Something Amyss]

The worst a fanbase can do is delay me watching a show. When I get around to watching, if I don't like it, it's not because fans overhyped it or were asses. And then I just avoid the community as much as is possible.

for me its been more general..gaming and nerd culture has done a pretty good job of turning me off recently

there were always bad elements to put it mildly but lately ive noticed its going from bad to out right vicious and batshit

someone says mean things about your hobby and people send death threats and plan to murder your kids

While I certainly agree, does this impact your enjoyment of those things? Like actual gaming?

 

[RaikuFA]

Overall, not really. Can't say that they have. Why? Are they getting bad again?

The fanbase for Steven Universe harrassed a girl till she tried to kill herself. Then when some people who work on SU called these people out, the fanbase tried getting them arrested for shit.

 

[thewatergamer]

Never had that happen to me before tbh, mostly because I find fandoms are full of pretty nice people aside from a few vocal jackasses who I question if they even actually like the thing the fandom is based around, so I have to say, no I've never had a fanbase ruin something for me

 

[Drops a Sweet Katana]

Overall, not really. Can't say that they have. Why? Are they getting bad again?

The fanbase for Steven Universe harrassed a girl till she tried to kill herself. Then when some people who work on SU called these people out, the fanbase tried getting them arrested for shit.

Wait. Are you saying that people tried to get the show runners arrested? Because that's not a thing to my knowledge. I know some of the harassers were allegedly arrested, but that's it.

 

[Valkrex]

After the shit that happened with Zamii and Steven Universe I find it hard to continue the show... gonna need a bit before I can get back into it.

 

[verdant monkai]

Yes.

Dr Who: Possibly the most cringe worthy collection of people on the planet. Although admittedly the low budget and the Doctors foolish and downright idiotic refusal to kill anything would have ruined it too.

Footbal or Soccer if you live in the US: Football fans can be summed up as screaming and violent, and sometimes boring when they aren't screaming at football or being violent because of football. Admittedly a lot of football fans can be interesting when discussing something else, but most will insist on screaming when presented with a goal. As for the violence... have you heard of someone being beaten/trampled/stabbed to death over say lord of the rings? Of course not all football fans are violent thugs but there are enough brutish Neanderthals who follow the sport to completely put me off it.

 

[Jei-chan]

Fandoms can make me incredibly disinclined to seek out a thing, especially movies. I don't usually go to the theatres, except for the Hobbit and LotR movies, so when literally every person on the planet was going "ZOMFG AVENGERRRRRRS" it really put me off it. I watched it on a plane to America over Christmas last year and was unimpressed with it, which sort of validated my original feelings about how I didn't want anything to do with something so ubiquitous I couldn't find a single person who wouldn't tell me I was mad for not having watched it.

Not sure whether my experience with the fandom trying to badger/shame me into watching it made me less impressed.

I'll second what a few people have said here about Undertale. Looks like something I might be interested in, except that 90% of the people on the internet are asking me why I haven't played it yet. That sort of thing is only likely to make me not want to play it, to spite people trying to tell me what to do *shrugs*

It also put me off the new Doctor Who series. They played the entirety of the old shows on TV in the afternoons here so I've seen the whole of it. The new ones were so hyped up I didn't want anything to do with them.

 

[FalloutJack]

Overall, not really. Can't say that they have. Why? Are they getting bad again?

The fanbase for Steven Universe harrassed a girl till she tried to kill herself. Then when some people who work on SU called these people out, the fanbase tried getting them arrested for shit.

Well fuck. I don't even watch this show. Guess that just shows how much meaning their lives have.