M Dornbrook
United States
Arizona
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Hello fanboy. I am responding to your post regarding my negative review of your -insert favorite game here-. I understand that you highly value this game and I respect your appreciation for its subtle nuances. I believe that, because I am not attached to this game, I am capable of objectively observing your emotional attachment to this game. I understand that you have incorporated this game into your identity and hold it close to your core beliefs. There there.
When I titled my piece –Your Favorite Game-: A negative review, I wholly understood that you would construe my writing as a personal attack and respond accordingly. This is why I carefully constructed my assertion to delineate the reasons for which I do not find this game compelling, entertaining, or challenging. It is my hope that you will read this and be able to see my side of the argument and be able to respect my dissenting opinion. By rating this game a – rating somewhere between 2 and 6- I hope that you understand that this is, in no way whatsoever, a shill rating. You will note the careful justification in both my review and in my game comments section.
In the event that you do not agree with my argument and logic or believe that my logic is flawed, it is my preference that you engage my argument, civilly. If my logic is flawed or I am playing the game incorrectly, I would appreciate it if you would take me to task gently. Educate me kindly, do not berate me. I am not a bad person for disliking (or misinterpreting the rules to) –the game which you have enshrined in the tabernacle of gaming holiness- nor am I nonsensical for speaking poorly of a game for which you can only think of positives. Actually, do not use the words “nonsense” or “wrong” in your response to my opinion piece at all. It is rude and invalidating and, frankly, beneath you.
I understand that you find my comments inflammatory and infuriating. However, I wonder why. Does my disregard for –your pedestalized ideal of gaming- cause you to question the heights to which you have elevated this game? Does it challenge your most intimate conceptualizations of yourself? Do you feel that if one person speaks negatively about –the game that satisfies your every need- that it invalidates your love for the game or lessens it significantly? If you value my opinion so highly, I would like to recommend that you make an effort to avoid any of my posts that potentially could damage your self-esteem or very identity. If one stranger’s opinion is enough to threaten your love of one game, I suspect that you are already questioning your love for that game.
When writing my negative review about –your most grandiose concrete exemplification of your idealized game- it was my intent to make public the reasons that I do not enjoy it. This, I believe, is for the welfare of the community. Each gamer is unique and has different tastes and if you believe, like I do, that some gamers are like me and some are like you, then there may be a group of people who will not, in fact, enjoy a single session of –the best game since Dune, more classic than Civilization, more elegant than Go and likely to be longer lived-.
My negative review does not demean people who love to play –the game that is your zenith of games- and it does not slander or insult the game designer, publisher, or distributor. I do not question your competence, intelligence, or passion for –the game that towers with ultimate authority over all others, in your opinion-. There is no need for you to engage in personal attacks, no matter how well you know the designer or how involved you were in the play test process.
I am a friendly person. I respond to reasonable requests. I acknowledge when I am wrong. I will defend my opinion as it is the result of personal experience that cannot be duplicated and, therefore, cannot be wrong (or right). And, I will spit fiery vituperation in your face if my friendly, well intentioned negative review that is carefully reasoned and devoid of personal attacks is met with hostility, anger, and/or slander. Though, I am more likely to just flag your comments as inappropriate and ignore you altogether.
Your friend,
-person who has written a negative review-
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Nils Ropertz
Germany
Aachen
Nordrhein Westfalen
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Amen!
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♪ Isaäc Bickërstaff ♫
United States
Greer
South Carolina
Entropy Seminar:
The results of a five yeer studee ntu the sekund lw uf thurmodynamiks aand itz inevibl fxt hon shewb rt nslpn raq liot.
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I agree completely.*
*Unless you're talking about Age of Steam.
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Chris Hanratty
Scotland
Prestonpans
East Lothian
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I'm taking this personally, you asshole.
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Cpl. Sadler 8-0
United States
Rockville
Maryland
Hey, MMP! I want Marines, not Finns! RISING SUN NOW! HAAKAKAKAKA PALAAAAAAA LATER!
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How DARE you! You obviously aren't smart enough to understand it. It is perfect and subtle in ways that you slope-browed, mouth-breathing, cheeto-fingered masses will never understand or appreciate. My appreciation of it is actually a sign of my intellect and discernment. There are only two kinds of people in the world. Those who get it and idiots like you.
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It's perfectly all right. All versions of D&D have sucked and were flawed in their mechanics.
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Bruce Murphy
Australia
Pyrmont
NSW
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But how do you feel about animeeples?
B>
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Mike Jones
United States
Gainesville
Florida
Yeah it's here! Really it's right here.
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All I know is I now have a deep desire to go write a negative review of Twilight Struggle.
Nah!
Happy Gaming,
Mike
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Joseph
Spain
Today, we're all Spaniards!
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Every negative review of ((My favorite game)) diminishes my enjoyment of said game, and its expansions. My world gets a little bit smaller and less shiny each time somebody says an unkind word.
It's obvious that you're incapable of percieving the subtleties of ((My favorite game)) due to the fact that ((Your favorite game)) is in your top ten on your profile.
Why don't you leave the rest of us alone, and go back to playing with your (Choose whichever applies best)
[] Meeples
[] Buckets of dice
[] Card drafting and hand management
[] Wooden cubes
[] Warhammer figures
[] Pokemon cards
[] Self
Sincerely,
(Check one)
[] Guy you've never heard of.
[] Someone you thought was cool until now.
[] The local threadcrapper.
[] One of your buddies playing an inside joke.
[] Your stalker.
[] The guy you thought was banned, but he's not.
[] Guy who rated all of you favorite games a "1" in retaliation.
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Erik D
United States
Elmhurst
New York
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I read the first paragraph and made a choice: I could either finish reading the post or I could save time, hit "reply" now and tell you how wrong you are...
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Ben Cole
United Kingdom
Bristol
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To the OP - well said.
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M Dornbrook
United States
Arizona
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Oh crap, I always forget something. I was going to talk about distancing language. I may go back and add that in later.
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Guy Riessen
United States
petaluma
California
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Just out of curiosity, why do you want to write negative reviews? Usually I can muster just enough effort to write a comment to go with a low rating I might give a game, but a whole review? No way, I'm going to waste my time doing that--so I wonder why you do? What does a review achieve that is not just as well served by comments and ratings--something which the "geek buddy" system makes use of. Why would someone who is "like you" stumble across your review and not your ratings/comments and somehow know that they are "like you?"
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Flying Arrow
United States
Pennsylvania
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I fail to see how this is a negative review when no game was mentioned.
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Steve Duff
Canada
Ottawa
Ontario
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Amusing, but a whole lot of assumptions there. Just because someone disagrees with a review doesn't make them a "fanboy". And a review may not be as logically sound as the poster believes, I've read a whole lot of cool logical rebuttals that blew the negative reviews out of the water.
Of course, the reviewer is often so cocksure of themselves and their prose that they simply dismiss the valid rebuttals as ravings of a fanboy.  A great many folks cannot tell the difference when they're involved in the discussion.
Yes, there are valid negative reviews and rabid fanboy defenses. But there are also invalid negative reviews, and valid defenses.
One of my favourites was this review of Roma where the others systematically showed the reviewer was playing the game completely wrong. Sadly, the original review is gone, but some of the better snippets remain quoted.
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Diane Close
United States
St. Paul
Minnesota
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VERY well written! Bravo whether I agree with the sentiment expressed or not.
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Flying Arrow
United States
Pennsylvania
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UnknownParkerBrother wrote: Amusing, but a whole lot of assumptions there. Just because someone disagrees with a review doesn't make them a "fanboy". And a review may not be as logically sound as the poster believes, I've read a whole lot of cool logical rebuttals that blew the negative reviews out of the water. Of course, the reviewer is often so cocksure of themselves and their prose that they simply dismiss the valid rebuttals as ravings of a fanboy. A great many folks cannot tell the difference when they're involved in the discussion. Yes, there are valid negative reviews and rabid fanboy defenses. But there are also invalid negative reviews, and valid defenses. One of my favourites was this review of Roma where the others systematically showed the reviewer was playing the game completely wrong. Sadly, the original review is gone, but some of the better snippets remain quoted.
You're obviously a fanboy of every game in the universe.
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Thomas Taylor
United States
Pleasanton
California
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People who write negative reviews are assholes.
http://www.boardgamegeek.com/thread/314367
http://www.boardgamegeek.com/thread/207674
Well, awesome assholes.
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Bruce Murphy
Australia
Pyrmont
NSW
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Sprydle wrote: Just out of curiosity, why do you want to write negative reviews? Usually I can muster just enough effort to write a comment to go with a low rating I might give a game, but a whole review? No way, I'm going to waste my time doing that--so I wonder why you do? What does a review achieve that is not just as well served by comments and ratings--something which the "geek buddy" system makes use of. Why would someone who is "like you" stumble across your review and not your ratings/comments and somehow know that they are "like you?"
If you have review-sized things to say about what parts didn't work or why it didn't work for you, that's something I'd be happy to consider with more weight than a 'sucks, it was to dry' comment. Obviously the distribution of reviews will be towards positive purely because of motivation.
B>
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Guy Riessen
United States
petaluma
California
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thepackrat wrote: Sprydle wrote: Just out of curiosity, why do you want to write negative reviews? Usually I can muster just enough effort to write a comment to go with a low rating I might give a game, but a whole review? No way, I'm going to waste my time doing that--so I wonder why you do? What does a review achieve that is not just as well served by comments and ratings--something which the "geek buddy" system makes use of. Why would someone who is "like you" stumble across your review and not your ratings/comments and somehow know that they are "like you?" If you have review-sized things to say about what parts didn't work or why it didn't work for you, that's something I'd be happy to consider with more weight than a 'sucks, it was to dry' comment. Obviously the distribution of reviews will be towards positive purely because of motivation. B>
I don't understand that--why would you use a long, negative review from someone, when you don't even know where they stand in relation to your own preferences? A good review is more likely to tell me if I have similar tastes to the reviewer, than a negative one is. Good reviews tend to make ample use of comparatives with other games' mechanics and play, so I'm able to place the reviewers gaming-likes into a potential range.
If there were mechanics I outright disliked, then sure, a negative review would stop me from buying the game...but then so would a good review, since the mechanic I disliked would be mentioned there as well.
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erak wrote: I read the first paragraph and made a choice: I could either finish reading the post or I could save time, hit "reply" now and tell you how wrong you are...
Me too. I don't read what people actually say, but instead reply to my gut instict of what I think they said. So, you're dead buddy for picking on my mommy.
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Dane Peacock
United States
Stansbury Park
Utah
That tickles
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Here is my defense of fanboyism:
http://boardgamegeek.com/geeklist/29153
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M Dornbrook
United States
Arizona
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Quote:
Hey, I thumbed that geeklist! That was a great list!
Edit: I also added an item, too!
Edit2: Could I use more exclamation marks!!!!?
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Guy Riessen
United States
petaluma
California
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Okay, I went and read mdornbrook's review of Shogun so I could maybe understand what he's so hurt by. And...I don't. He gave a negative review of Shogun, which is fine, and he illustrated the things that he didn't like and gave the reasons why he didn't like those things. Fine.
The review was responded to by almost universally respectful responses which offered counterpoints to his arguments. I guess by what he would call "fanboys."
I only read the first pages of responses, but there was only one, which stooped so low as to call the review a "rant." Rant was perhaps too strong a word, but it was indeed an expository on how the game mostly let him down because it wasn't what he expected.
I recommend folks go read his review http://www.boardgamegeek.com/thread/195339
and the responding comments before hopping on this supposed anti-fanboy wagon.
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John Burt
Canada
Saskatoon
Saskatchewan
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Screw you Mendon Dornbrook! I am going to mark everything you write as objectionable from now on.
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