Stupid people

[farla]

One of the interesting things about my heavily gamebased fanfics is that anything that accuses the player of not caring about pokemon seems to inevitably lead to a spat of reviews in which other people claim it's not true.

These usually disturb me because the reviewers sound batshit insane, and I'd like to go on with my life without the knowledge there are actually nutcases who form deep bonds with their little pixels. I can see liking the game, liking certain pokemon species, even liking a particular pokemon that wins a lot. Start talking about how they're your actual friends though, and I start hoping you're already institutionalized.

But after getting back from a conversation with the most recent of these, I find there's another alternative which seems more plausible.

Basically, when I say something to the effect of 'So let's admit it everyone, we're just playing a game, and all that stuff it says about caring and kindness isn't true because none of us really act like that', people take it as a personal attack and promptly deny it. It's never occurred to them before, they've never done anything contrary to this, but the moment I suggest it, their hearts fill with love for their pokemon and hurt that I could think otherwise.

I'd like to take a moment to thank the comics industry for their incompetence that led to the creation of the perfect word to describe this, as otherwise I'd be left flailing about for a description.

The reviewers are trying to retcon their beliefs and actions. Over a stupid story.

Comments

[wintersheir]

It's probably tied into the whole "OMG my Mary Sue is soooooooooooooo nice to pokeymans adn tehy love her alot!!!1 she nevar catchs them cuz taht iz MEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEN!!1 she finds tehm when thay R hurt adn heals them!!!1" etc. etc. thing.

I know I'm terrible; I make my pokémon fight until they faint, at which point I send out a trash non-combatant or an HM slave and revive the fainted one while the cannon fodder gets OHKO'd. They get a break when they gain a level. It's cheaper to hit them with a lemonade, of course, but sometimes I forget.

This is pretty much how I treat my pets in WoW, too. ^_^ La!

(I feel bad when my pet dies in WoW, though, 'cause they both have such sad little corpses. And I need to stuff them full of food to make them happy again. Piggies.)

[farla.livejournal.com]

See, I'm not even that nice. I battle them until they drop, then I switch in the next and battle that one until it drops. My preferred training method is to fight wild pokemon until five of my six have fainted, and I see gym battles with injured pokemon as a fun challenge.

[nakitamanomiko.livejournal.com]

For awhile I used to train till all my pokemon fainted getting ready for the first badge in that grass before Pewter. Then I realized that wasn't exactly a very cost efficient method of training. My only real problem is once I beat the game there's not much to do, but I never restart the game because I don't want to lose 1 or 2 that did pretty much all the battling, and that I worked on for like 40 hours.

[farla.livejournal.com]

Yeah, the pokemon games don't leave much to do after the main quest. I can trade my pokemon, so I restart all the time. It's a lot more fun that way.

[nakitamanomiko.livejournal.com]

I have no way of trading mine, so I'm basically training apprentices in Emerald. I'm on like my fifth, apparently I'm too good at telling them what to use as they always seem to destroy me. Talk about gratitude.

[farla.livejournal.com]

Start screwing with them, then!