• 6Jun 07

  Fanboyism: Justified

  Its inevitable.  Any gaming site you go to, you are going to encounter that dreaded word: fanboyism.  Any forum you go to, you'll see it.  People screaming for their system to win.  People prophesysing the horrible flaming demise of their rival system.  In 2007, the systems war rages on hotter than ever.

  But something I've noticed is that fanboys seem to receive nothing but negativity in return for their opinions.  Even the name fanboy is very demeaning.  Nobody wants to be called a fanboy, even if they are a diehard supporter of one system. Never have I ever seen anyone raise a supporting voice in their defense.  Sure many fanboys can be very obnoxious, but is it nessisarily bad to root for one system?

  Now I'm not saying fanboyism is right, but I think that it exists for a lot of good and very understandable reasons.  I think one of the main ones (perhaps obviously) is simply because people only own one system.  You may say, "well why don't they just buy both systems!"  I hear that so many times it makes me sick.  Sure, some people can afford both systems, no problem.  Some people have their parents spoiling them rotten.  Some people just have lots of money.  But not everybody.  Especially in our "next gen" day and age where new systems costs as much as $700 dollars. 
  
  Now you might say, "well thats fine, but why do they have to root for the other system to loose? why can't they just be happy with both systems doing good?"  I think the reason for this, as with most things that involve competition, is because the success of one system usually comes at the expense of the others.  Last gen the ps2 did exceedingly well, to say the least.  What happend to other systems that gen? Xbox for instance?  It got crushed.  Developers flocked to the ps2 and anyone who had an Xbox had a limited selection of games. 

  So because of this, people who own just one system have to adopt a kill or be killed sort of mentality.  So I think this is why you see a lot of people saying "Down with ps3!" or "Down with 360!".  Simply because they want their system to win.  They want their system to get all the exclusives.  They want their system to have an extensive library.  They don't want to have to shell out another $700 right now for another system and they certainly don't want to wait 2 to 3 years for prices to go down and buy another system later.  Add in our natural competative instinct, the same instinct that compells people to root for a sports team or bet on a race horse, and you have fanboyism.  Granted, if the fanboys got their wish, and only one system dominated it would be bad for the industry as a whole as it would create a monopoly, but I think fanboys receive a lot of flack for opinions that are very understandable.

  • Posted Jun 6, 2007 1:00 am PT
  • Category: Editorial
  • 0 Comments
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