User blog:Kaihedgie/What's a fan to do

Just something to ponder about. At one point, I used to be quite an avid follower of Mega Man. I watched the TV series, watched the OVA, played most of the main series with the exception of Legends and even made MM versions of my two main characters. I attributed quite bit to the wiki and was promoted to mod because of it. I pretty much became fixated on the franchise and while there were some bad apples in the group, I found myself in good company with the fanbase

Just several years later, I know stand on edge with it all. It had come to a point where meeting a fan or fellow of the franchise did not welcome a pleasant conversation about old times or asking what's your favorite iteration of the series, what do you like about it and what more did you want to see from it. Now all I can expect is fear and dread whenever a Mega Man fan shows up and all I can expect to hear are the words "betrayal", "hate" or some derogatory variant of the word Capcom while pretending that Inafune was some innocent god-like figure who was wronged by his peers. It's come to a point where I've barely looked at anything regarding Mega Man anymore and in fact, not only fear nothing but dread and misery, but I can't even attempt to try and slap on my Mega Man X Collection disc and have a grand time playing old school games that people loved. That dread, misery and fear and distaste for a fandom's attitude becomes so great and terrible that it begins to affect the way you view those games you once love as nothing more than some vehicle of justification for those fans' hatred and somehow you feel dirty for playing them after trying to see through and ignore all of that and simply have fun.

This is pretty much how I feel. I probably won't ever play Mega Man again, not because of Capcom or whatever slip ups and development issues they ran into. I can't pretend to know what goes on in a company I don't work for nor whatever effort I invest in whatever unrelated activity I commit myself to should have any bearing on them whatsoever, but I do know one thing:

Because of the nasty side of the fanbase which has tried to encompass the entire community, I'm contemplating on leaving and never going back or even attempting to take a look at anything Mega Man related for development of new games. Any games I have will end up collecting dust for a long while. I might play a game once in a while, only to have it slip back into the shelf and not be touched for a long while again. I'm surely not going to go looking for anymore civil forums, if they exist at all and I can barely tell who here has a sane and less dirty mind about Capcom's workings. Just seeing an icon or avatar related to the franchise just gives me a chill down my spine because I just know that reading the comment belonging to the poster using that avatar is not going to contribute to the conversation about a game in question, but instead complain about how Mega Man is dead or how Capcom isn't listening to the fans and how they only care about money or how they somehow hate Inafune for reasons they never actually explain or indulge, just that they hate him. I know things have quieted down somewhat, but after going through some history of videos and posts, plus the recent reveal of a Mega Man being playable in an upcoming fighting game...and then again outright lashing at Capcom again and claiming it to be an act of trolling.

In light of all that, what is a fan who kept his/her head on and cool and calm preserved, and only wanted nothing but to reason, is suppose to do in this situation? I refuse to be part of a fanbase that only knows how to communicate through hate and death threats and I don't want to be part of something that tries to manipulate and cheat to win.