I think I may have to make something clear here for users who may not be familiar with the concept of a ‘Pretendo.’
Nintendo, as one of the most iconic brands in the industry, as a long history of developing innovative content in a wide variety of genres, for all sorts of different audiences. They were not the first video game company, but they are the one that has stayed successful the longest, and has therefore had a part to play in three decades worth of gamers, serious or no. Writing off the long history of quality content, much of which is considered among the best content ever produced in the medium, is completely laughable.
So how do people who aren’t Nintendo fans, but want to criticize and ridicule their products for their own gain, handle this situation? They ‘Pretend’ to be long time fans of the company that are extremely disappointed with the company’s recent decisions in order to come off as more sincere and genuine. If you’ve been following the Youtube Nintendo community at all in the past few years, you may have noticed that certain users love to act as if Nintendo is this failure of a company, that they are doing everything wrong compared to their competition, and that the company is doomed because they aren’t pandering to their REAL fans, twenty to thirty year old men.
It’s simply all too easy to gain traction on YouTube and social media by having negative opinions towards the company, no matter the situation they are in. People act as if the Wii U is the source of the issue, but a lot of the loudest complainers didn’t like the Wii either. These people are simply ‘Pretending’ to be upset with Nintendo for views and attention.
I think a big part of this site, going forward, is to take a look in depth at certain people guilty of this kind of attitude, people who seem to hate a company that they claim means a lot to them. People who are clearly playing it up for clicks.
So today, I’d like to focus on a big offender, one that has caught my attention for quite some time but has never really merited a response. TheGamingBritShow.
Nintendo fans know that there is absolutely no group of people on the planet who know less about Nintendo than those wankers, but I’ve constantly seen TGBS pop up quite a few times in the past few months whenever he makes a particularly insane statement. I wrote up a short response piece to his allegation that Platinum Games was going downhill, a claim that I found laughable, but this time has seen him go completely off the deep end and claim that Nintendo games no longer have any merit to them whatsoever. TGBS’s ‘Savage Nintendo Rant’ is, quite frankly, a piece of shit. Like his complaints lobbied at Platinum, none of his claims hold up against any scrutiny, and I find myself baffled at just how plain stupid he is at uploading a video talking about how Color Splash doesn’t have a personality… three days after it came out and blew everyone away.
His first complaint is the fact that Nintendo…
- Makes Empty games about nothing!
A broad statement that honestly doesn’t really make much sense to me, especially since he shows clips from Super Mario 3d World (A well received game in it’s own right, even if I personally am not too fond of it) and Color Splash, a game I am in love with because of it’s writing, humor, and characters… things he specifically says the game lacks.
Keep in mind, this video was uploaded today, which means that he almost certainly didn’t actually play Color Splash before he started bitching about it. A lot of Color Splash’s charm wasn’t evident until people actually started playing it, and I think this points out a core problem with Pretendos in general: They love complaining about games they obviously haven’t actually played. You may have seen this with complaints about Star Fox Zero controls, in which they spent months trying to pretend as if they were downright unusable, but this is just another example of it.
Speaking of Star Fox, he goes on to bitch about Zero being ‘merely’ a remake of 64, in and of itself a laughably ridiculous statement, and complain about Federation Force merely existing. FF is amazing, by the way. Great co-op shooter. He also whines about how 3D world isn’t in an open environment, and I just roll my eyes. It’s almost like I’ve stepped back in time to the first trailer reveal. I don’t even LIKE 3D world and I am telling you he is full of shit.
“Yeah, BOTW looks okay, but it’s too bad that they had to sacrifice everything itself to not make it terrible!” *Shows Skyward Sword*
I’m not even sure what to say to this. This enrages me so much. Like… what? BOTW, just ‘okay?’ That’s possibly going to be the game that redefines open world gameplay. Sacrifice everything else? All of the best games in the past five years have all been Nintendo exclusive! Skyward Sword, bad? What are you talking about? To this day, no one can say anything really bad about it besides Fi.
He goes on talk about the prices for Wind Waker and Twilight Princess HD. Nothing interesting to see here, he’s ignoring all the genuine improvements and real changes they made in order to whine about something no one really cares about.
And that brings us to his number 2 complaint…
2. Pussy ass censorship!
I didn’t know I was dealing with a Nichegamer poster here. I wonder if he has a little anime girl having an orgasm as his desk top wall paper.
So yes, the censorship issue is something I actually have a bit of history with, and it’s something I genuinely look down on people for. Specifically, fact that it only ever seems to be a problem when Nintendo does it. It is a practice in the industry that’s very important to make games appealing to a wider audience. A simple cut and paste translation does not work.
It’s also funny how he specifically claims Nintendo hates sexy outfits when he shows footage of Xenoblade… which DOES have plenty of sexy outfits. I believe Fatal Frame was adjusted due to licensing issues, and Atlus (Not Nintendo) adjusted TMS due to characters being underage and Gravure modeling having a really negative image in the west. In short, the idea that changes are made in localization are made primarily to keep people from being offended is incorrect, and not something anyone with any real knowledge of the process would try to claim. Keep in mind a big part of this argument is the idea that it’s a part of the ‘creator’s vision’ for them to be in the game, when I know for a fact that the devs for both Xenoblade and FFV came out and praised the localization efforts. That conspiracy theory that some anon on 8chan’s /v/ made up about how NOA is ripping off the company by charging for needless censorship is nonsense.
Reason 3… I think? Is the region lock complaint. I say ‘I think’ because he doesn’t really elaborate on why. Personally, I feel this is a non issue that people try to use to pretend that Nintendo is anti consumer. I simply don’t CARE that some games are released at different times around the world, and even I could, I wouldn’t import a copy of Yakuza 1 and 2 HD without a proper localization because I wouldn’t be able to understand anything anyone was saying.
Reason 4… the eshop.
At first, he praises the Wii U for having BC, surprisingly, but then goes on to imply that Wii doesn’t have any good games to play. Keep in mind to this day I’m still finding new gems, it’s easily the best console last gen and I would very much like to start covering that in depth sometime soon.
But then he says something unforgivable: The virtual console, according to him, is the worst.
I’m sorry, can you say that again? You mean to tell me that the service with games with games from nearly every Nintendo console ever made is bad? Xbox One, to this day, doesn’t have shit for it (WHERE IS MY NINJA GAIDEN BLACK?) and PS3 just has… well, a pretty good selection of classic PS1 and PS2 titles that generally pale in comparison to their Nintendo equivalents. I’ve had my PS3 for longer than my Wii U, and have far fewer games on it, and very few have aged all that well.
“When Nintendo does release a game…”
Every Thursday. A big part of why I laugh at the ‘Wii U has no games’ crowd.
‘We don’t get releases at the same time as other places in the world!”
Not an issue.
‘You would think they would have all these games slapped out day one for you…’
Again, not an issue. They’re using the Disney Vault method. Things increase in value if they aren’t available all the time. Despite complaints from people like this, it’s actually led me to find lots of hidden gems that get buried in between big releases, like Freedom Planet, Stealth 2, Circle of the Moon, and Battle Network.
Reason 5… Copyright bullshit!
It’s been a long time since I’ve talked about this, and I think I need to address this once more since my move to the new site.
I cannot stand YouTubers who think they can use Nintendo products to pay their bills. It reeks of entitlement to me, and I think it leads to lots of bad practices, like this recent trend where people think they can experience a game without ever having played it.
No, TGBS… Nintendo isn’t coming to come after me for talking about their games. You know why? Because I talk about games in a way that doesn’t infringe on their copyright. I also find it funny how you imply that Youtubers in general are getting slammed by them for this. In reality, they have pretty good relationships with more credible people, like The Completionist and Jwittz, and even invite them to do things with them.
Oh, and he talks about AM2R and sucks up to that, too. “Nintendo doesn’t care about Metroid!” They released a new game not even two weeks later, jackass. I haven’t palyed AM2R, but just looking at it makes me laugh. A ‘better’ Metroid game? Really? I’ve noticed people stopped talking about it like, a week later, and I can see. There’s nothing all that inspired about it. It’s just a fan remake of a game that already exists.
No, AM2R is not better than Federation Force.
“Nintendo never announced big new games after the Wii!”
And there is is. One of the most popular statements used to write off the success of the Wii. It wasn’t popular with REAL gamers, so it wasn’t REALLY a success!”
Let me tell you something: People go on about the casual vs hardcore dynamic when it comes to Wii vs PS360, but in reality, it was young men vs everyone. What I mean by that is that Nintendo made games for everyone and their grandma. Games like Sin and Punishment, The Last Story, Pandora’s Tower, Endless Ocean, Style Savvy, and others were all things that could never have happened on other pieces of hardware. But somehow, being in HD was seen as being much more important by the media, which led to this weird stigma of the Wii not having much serious with young men… despite people like me loving games like Skyward Sword, Sin and Punishment, and No More Heroes.
See, I named three games right there. You faggot. And there are many more.
“Nintendo needs to drop the gimmicks and get more power, everything will be BETTER!”
No, that isn’t true, and I think I should go into depth as to why that is. Power is simply not all that important from a development standpoint. It’s not going to make their games be seen as being ‘cooler’ or get third parties to magically start supporting the console. It’s just going to be too expensive for what it is.
No one wants gimmicks? Ha. Just like no one wanted the d-pad, just like no one wanted the analog stick, just like no one wanted motion controls. You can’t know what you want until you have it. And I think NX, from a design standpoint, will be something that people sorely want, without having to resort to simply taking the PS4 Pro approach, which is proving itself to NOT FUCKING WORK.
All in all, I found his complaints about Nintendo petty and not at all in line with the reality of the situation. I feel as if Nintendo has already addressed their most pressing concern (The rise of mobile) more than adequately, and I’m confident in seeing NX take the industry by storm, as we already know that game library is not going to be at all lacking.
So yes, I think the GamingBritShow is a fag and I was sure to let him know on Twitter. 🙂 Nothing like calling people out in public spaces, and I think he sorely deserves it, like any other Pretendo out there. Speaking of twitter, be sure to follow me at @CodyCoyote64. I’ll be glad to take any questions and requests for the site in the future, and I’ll see you next time!
The Heroes 7 
Yikes. What a site to stumble upon this morning.
Okay, look. You’re right that some people love to hop on the Nintendo hate train whenever they can. They make arguments that make no sense, and purposely twist everything to turn it into a negative that will be ‘the ruin of Nintendo.’ TGBS is quite clearly a hype train youtuber who hops onto anything that’s getting views at the moment. Nobody who’s opinion is worth hearing listens to him, or even bothers to watch his stuff. But the only thing worse than those kinds of ‘fans’ is fans that twist everything into a positive, and think that their company of choice is always the best and can do no wrong.
Regarding your first item on the list:
Color Splash is a great game, filled with plenty of charm held back by it’s pointless and honestly garbage battle system. It’s a shame that people are hanging onto their pride and not playing it, though.
Star Fox Zero though, does have an issue. The controls are bad, no matter how much fans of the game try to defend them. It’s always ‘Oh but I can get gold medals on all the missions, you’re clearly just bad and not spending the time to get used to the game.’ No. That’s just wrong. Just because a select few can master the game, doesn’t mean that the controls are good, simple as that. The people that defend this game are the same people that say that the Wii was the best console because it had controls that were easy to grasp for everyone. It’s incredibly hypocritical. The controls aren’t hard to grasp. It takes a total of about 15 minutes to be able to successfully use them, and maybe about an hour or so to use them fluently. That doesn’t change the fact that they’re stupid controls that are unnecessary and have no actual purpose other than being different for the sake of being different. The fact that they try to convince people that it’s a good idea to have two different screens in an action game like that is ridiculous. It makes no sense to have to detract yourself from the game whenever you need to change your view like that. Why make it mandatory to have to change your view at all? Not to mention that every vehicle other than the Arwing, and arguably the Landmaster, are terrible. They’re slow, jerky, and imprecise. It’s too bad too, because if the game had a control scheme that didn’t detract from the experience then it would be a near flawless action game.
“All of the best games in the past five years have all been Nintendo exclusive! Skyward Sword, bad? What are you talking about? To this day, no one can say anything really bad about it besides Fi.”
Holy shit. The first sentence is just so fucking fan boy I’m not even going to begin to criticize it. And Skyward Sword wasn’t bad at all. It was a superb game. But there were some clear flaws, and if the only flaw you’re only going to acknowledge is Fi, then you’re just plugging your ears and ignoring the many other complaints that we see all over. Far too much backtracking, annoying reminders every time you pick up an item, off pacing, empty excuse of an overworld in Skyloft, and fighting the Imprisoned 3 (or 4, I don’t remember at this point) are all there.
Censorship:
Just the name censorship is enough to tell you that it’s too much. Localization is obviously needed, and some things are going to need to change about a game before it can be released outside of Japan. For example, Paper Mario would be nothing to western gamer’s if we took it word for word from the Japanese version. But when companies such as Nintendo, Square, and Atlus begin changing characters completely (Henry from FE:Fates), changing anatomy of the human body (TMS hip bones, Xenoblade bust slider), and removing gameplay elements entirely (FE:Fates My Room, Fatal Frame alternate costumes), it’s ridiculous. My favorite thing to hear from this is ‘SORRY I’M NOT INTO HENTAI YOU STUPID PERV’, but that’s not it at all. It’s literally changing the game because they think that social justice warriors will pounce on anything that might seem sexual. Like holy shit, I’m sorry that girls have different sized breasts and have hip bones. Why does it have to be sexualized? It’s the human body, and people in the west need to learn how to deal with it. Also, if you think that people only rag on Nintendo for this, then it’s clear that you only look for these ‘Nintendo haters’ and ignore all of the other censorship going on.
Region Locking:
Region locking is the stupidest thing I’ve ever heard of, and your argument for it is ‘Well I DON’T CARE.’ Great. That probably means that no one else wants it… It’s a pointless thing to have on a console, and would benefit a ton of people who are interested in games released in other regions if Nintendo would just remove it.
eShop:
The virtual console for the Wii U IS bad compared to the Wii. The Wii had an unbelievable VC. Why doesn’t the Wii U? They’ve been incredibly lazy with releasing VC games. There are less games from less consoles than what the Wii had. Why isn’t the VC on the console after the Wii at least even AS GOOD as it? It’s literally a step backwards, so I don’t know why you’re defending it.
“Xbox One, to this day, doesn’t have shit for it (WHERE IS MY NINJA GAIDEN BLACK?)”
> XBOX ONE DOESN’T HAVE A GAME THAT I WANT, SO IT SUCKS.
XBox One has plenty of backwards compatible games at this point, many of which were fan requested games. Besides, it’s up to the individual publisher to get it working with BC, so you can blame Tecmo and Team Ninja for that.
“Every Thursday. A big part of why I laugh at the ‘Wii U has no games’ crowd.”
Largely shovelware and shovelware VC games. Every other week or so there will be at least one noteworthy release, but for the most part, it’s nothing worth looking at. That’s how it is on every console. But if you’re using this argument, I sure as hell hope you say the same thing for XBox One and PS4 in regards to having games to play on those consoles.
Copyright Bullshit:
“No, AM2R is not better than Federation Force”
Bold claim coming from someone who, in the same article, knocked people for judging a game before they played it (Color Splash). Federation Force isn’t a bad game, but it’s most certainly not a good one. It’s repetitive, slow, doesn’t require any amount of thought, and honestly just ugly to look at. I’m not one to complain about graphics, but it looks like a fuzzy DS game. There was way too much outrage about this game, but it by no means deserves the amount of praise that certain people are giving it.
“You can’t know what you want until you have it.”
Also just a wrong statement. I’m all for defending Nintendo and their innovations, but try to come up with an actual argument. People can know what they want before they have it. People can also not know they want something until they see it/have it.
It’s clear that the word ‘Pretendo’ just means anyone that criticizes Nintendo for anything they’ve done. It’s kind of funny that you think that these Pretendo’s are fake fans of Nintendo, when in reality, fans that blindly accept anything Nintendo does are the worst thing that can happen to Nintendo. I’m willing to bet that most of the people that you deem Pretendo’s are just fans who expect the best from Nintendo, and are disappointed with their releases as of late. It really shows your maturity level, as does your continual use of the word ‘fag.’ It’s a word that’s used by either 5th graders who just discovered the word, or angry kids aged 13 – 17 trying to sound tough.
I suggest that if you want this site to appeal to more than just a total of 15 Nintendo fanboys, you seriously change the way that you talk and think about games. Try to get a hobby other than searching the Internet for people criticizing Nintendo, proceeding to tell them they’re wrong, and throwing around adult words like fag, bitch, and pretendo.
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That’s funny, considering I just published another article criticizing Earthbound Beginnings. It’s almost like I’m not actually as zealous as you think I am.
The people criticizing Nintendo today are wrong. There is no getting around this, and it’s a big reason as to why I take the time to search them out and talk about why I think they’re wrong. It has nothing to do with liking certain games (I mentioned in the article that I dislike 3D World) but the attitude in covering those games. There’s this mindset in the community at large that everything Nintendo does is disappointing, in some way, and they go to ludicrous lengths to try and justify that sort of thinking.
That is something I strongly want to change.
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