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They Changed It Now It Sucks
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In cases where as long as it's still the same basic story and keeps all the best bits and characters intact, then it doesn't matter too much that Bob's bald, Alice doesn't die, the football game was changed to a horse race and they cut the watermelon scene, right? It's a bit of a shame they screwed that bit up, but really, it's not as if the entire work is Ruined FOREVER, right?
Wrong!
...or so you would be told by many, many a fan.
To some people, the very act of adaptation is decay. A Film version of something should be a direct word-for-word transcription, with utmost care that the sets, costumes and people be reproduced in every detail. If a character who wears a homburg in the original now wears a fedora, that will be enough to ruin the character, and therefore ruin the film. It will be all you will hear about from these fans on message boards, with them going on at length to explain how his homburg visually defined his entire personality in a way that a fedora never could.
Oh, and it just gets worse the bigger and more complicated the original work is. Make a film version of a popular comic book, and you had better not contradict a single thing that took place in any of the three-hundred issues of the comic, or the comic's spin-off, or indeed the entire Expanded Universe that the comic took place in. Yes, even if the comics contradict themselves.
And don't you dare suggest that in changing it, they made it better. The Fan Dumb isn't listening.
The inverse can occasionally be true as well, that It Is The Same Now It Sucks. In this case, however, it is because they don't want the same thing as before. When you have both It Is The Same Now It Sucks and They Changed It Now It Sucks, you wind up with an Unpleasable Fanbase.
See also Translation Style Choices, Replacement Scrappy, and Ruined FOREVER. Contrast Woolseyism. May overlap with They Don't Make Them Like They Used To.
A common complaint about The Film Of The Book. Of course, some changes really are for the worse: see They Just Didnt Care for the times when this is a legitimate complaint.
First, a special note to tropers: please, please resist the urge to add Justifying Edits and/or Natter below. They're unnecessary, unwelcome, and likely to spark an Internet Backdraft. Remember, Smokey The Bear says, "Only you can prevent flame wars!"
Also, this isn't a universal shield against criticism of changes. "You just don't like change" can be as weak an argument as the points stated by those who rail against minor changes.
Examples
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Anime
- Inverted on Anime Nano Podcast
. Hinano complains that the Genshiken anime and manga were exactly the same, and that watching for changes is the only reason to see the same story twice.
- A bit more patience would have paid off, since the second season of the anime diverges from the manga quite a bit.
- In the Digimon fandom, the torches and pitchforks came out when, in the dubbed version, Takato Matsuda's name had been horrendously Macekred into the horror that is... "Takato Matsuki." And the fact that "Takato" is pronounced with the stress on the wrong syllable, well, that's "rape" and "butchery."
- And on a semi-related note, it's stylish to call something by its Katakana spelling (eg; the cool kids know it's "Dejitaru Monsutaa," not "Digital Monsters." You see it most with attack names, though.) when it comes to names and attacks, even the ones written in English. But let the dubbers do it (eg. Diablomon becomes Diaboromon) and again... butchery.
- Not to mention that since Japanese is a pitch-accent language, where every word has a pattern of high and low tones, and not a stress-accent language, there was never any such thing as "stressing the right syllable" in the first place.
- This editor ran into someone who was totally unhappy with the fact that Naruto Uzumaki is, in the dub, voiced by a female. Then this editor pointed out that, in the Japanese, Naruto is voiced by the very female Junko Takeuchi...
- As are MOST preadolescent male characters in anime, and also many in Western animation. They're referred to in the industry as "breeches roles".
- Naruto as a whole is practically littered with Fan Dumb (they don't call 'em "Narutards" for nothing). This Troper ran into one who was upset that the dub pronounced the main character's name "wrong" - apparently the fan had been calling him "Nuh-ROO-doh" and was upset that the dub (and the Japanese version, for that matter) didn't conform to his preference. Another was a Yaoi Fangirl and was absolutely livid that the dub didn't make explicit the Ho Yay between Naruto and Sasuke, the "Official Couple" of the series as far as she was concerned. Still another tried to tell me that the dub was an even worse Macekre than the 4Kids dub of One Piece, and I had to try not to punch him in the face for being so totally delusional.
- The infamous "ball cabbage" scene from the third episode of Yoake Mae Yori Ruriiro Na ~Crescent Love~ was cleaned up for the eventual DVD release. Some viewers think it actually looks worse done realistically.
- Readers of the Fullmetal Alchemist manga can be horrifically cruel towards the anime. Even the slightest deviation from the manga plot is bitched about (They killed the Buttmonkey? NOOOOO!), and several Fridge Logic moments that only become apparent once you read the manga are declared as massive Plot Holes, any and all changes to the characters are deemed Character Derailment, and god help you if you mention the Gecko Ending or The Movie. To be fair the last one is often complained about by people who have never read the manga.
- And now that a remake based on the manga has begun airing, BOTH sides of fans are complaining about it; the original anime fans because it exists, and the original manga fans because it's changed a few unimportant details here and there. It's like some kind of fan complaint house of mirrors, where each complaint reflects images of all the others, forever.
- By far the largest complaint against dubs are the fact that they don't sound the same as the sub. Meaning that no matter how good the dubbing is it can never be as good as the sub simply because the viewer saw the sub first.
- It may be too early to tell, given that only a few episodes have aired, but fan response on several forums seems to indicate that the English dub of Code Geass has fallen into this hard. Lelouch/Zero's voice, in particular, is a point of contention, due in large part to his English VA "not sounding enough like" his Japanese one.
- It has. What makes this ironic is that while portions of the American fanbase seem to hate Johnny Yong Bosch for not attempting to mimic Jun Fukuyama's performance, many Japanese fans, upon hearing clips from the US dub, stated a preference for Bosch due to the fact that his performance is more natural (whereas Fukuyama's performance was considered more forced and "draining").
- Which in turn is an example of Mis Blamed, because it's the director that ultimately controls how an actor delivers his lines, not the actor himself. As Spike Spencer put it, "What I do is deliver the line how I think it should be done, then the director tells me that I'm wrong."
- On the flip side, there is a large segment of fandom that immediately jumps on people who prefer to watch subtitled anime as idiot purists that should just learn Japanese instead of "reading" the show. Regardless of the fact that, unless they're just pirating fansubs, these people are buying and supporting the *exact* same release the dub fans are watching, therefore nobody is forced to watching anything they don't like. Sub vs. Dub wars - they never end.
- For these reason it might be better to ask someone who didn't watch a show subbed first when asking about the quality of the dub.
- This contributor wonders what subbing fans think when even the Japanese decide they prefer the American dub to some of their works, like with El Hazard, or more recently, Final Fantasy X and Kingdom Hearts 2, since their international versions apparently retain it in favor of the original Japanese.
- One theory is that people who get incensed when the English dub "doesn't sound enough" like the Japanese version simply miss when the Japanese voice acting is bad. Some people have pointed out that the more you understand Japanese, the better English dubs sound.
- Your contributor just came across a YouTube vid for the official Magical Girl Lyrical Nanoha English dub, with comments complaining that they replaced the voices of the girls' magical staffs, their logic being that they already speak English.
- The dub doesn't correct the wonky grammar and awkward sentences of the staffs' lines in the Japanese version, so it's not as much bad as it is pointless.
- The dub changed the voices because the original staff wouldn't allow them to keep the original voices.
- This Troper watches anime mostly in subtitles because he's learning Japanese but has always preferred the English dubs he's seen.
- This Troper watches anime mostly dubbed with subtitles/closed captioning. Way to solve that problem.
- This Troper has never understood why Japanese purists complain about how English actors don't know how to emote correctly like the Japanese actors do when the vast majority of them don't even speak Japanese.
- Can the Prince Of Tennis fandom PLEASE stop bitching about how the Rikkaidai team was changed in the anime and how anime Sakuno sucks for being a Dojikko and not a Yamato Nadeshiko in training?
- This troper admits to bitching about the second season of Gunslinger Girl, especially since the original Mangakka was involved, which boosted his expectations of it. What part? The art and animation style, which made the male handlers, Giuseppe, in particular, look more Bishonen, switched the girls' appearances from Troubled But Cute to Sickeningly Sweet (particularly their eyes), and gave Franca fanservice scenes involving Male Gaze, amongst other visual horrors, all of which ruined the dreary, melancholic, tragic atmosphere of the series. Also, the only seiyuu from the first season to make a comeback is Rie Nakagawa (Farro, a relatively minor Recurring Character), while all the others were voiced by somebody new. The only thing that offsets all this is Badass Normal Pinocchio, but still... Let's hope that FU Nimation will use the same dubbing cast, at least.
- A purely ridiculous example is Knuckles being referred to as a "mole" in Sonic The Hedgehog: The Movie. Ignore the fact that it was only said once by The Ditz (who probably didn't even know better). Ignore the fact that the appearances, elements, etc. were more faithful than any Sonic adapation up to that point. Or that the anime in question was produced before Knuckles's game was even released in the first place. To make things worse, this is occasionally Mis Blamed on the dub.
- Actual comment
made at an anime forum: "It's one thing to say 'Sorry, but if we don't cut it we can't broadcast it. Take your pick.' And a competely different thing to have the chutzpah to actually sell changes as improvements. I'm asking everybody to imagine for a few seconds a Japanese licensee of a Hollywood movie on a press conference going like 'Well, we had to make some cuts but one the other hand this allowed us to fix some stupid mistakes this Cameron guy did, so in the end it all balances out.'" For the record, we're supposed to think that it would be bad.
- There are many Tengen Toppa Gurren Lagann fans that go absolutely berserk anytime the official translation has the name or pronunciation of any person, mecha, attack, or other terminology deviating from what has become popular among the fandom, even when 90% of the time they're at least as accurate. Strangely there are some people that realized this (thinking the fan-sub ones were simply better, not more accurate) but are still mad that the official translation didn't adopt them just because the fandom was accustomed to them.
- Also, Kyle Hebert is a damned hero for going though eight episodes of people declaring him guilty of the crime of not doing a 1:1 copy of Kamina's Japanese voice.
- Much of the complaints seem to be down to the fact that there are very few English-speaking VAs capable of being truly Hot Blooded.
- The first version of the dub (before the license switched hands from ADV to Bandai) had Brett Weaver (Nabeshin, Gai Daigoji) as Kamina. To this troper, this case of They Changed It Now It Sucks has less to do with Kyle Hebert's (admittedly good) performance and more to do with the fact that Brett Weaver is English Kamina.
- As a counterexample, I've seen some people wishing that the dub changed the pronunciation of the Simon's name from "SHE-moan" to the more typical "SIGH-mun" instead of the equally odd-sounding "SEE-moan".
- Gundam fandom underwent an epic shitstorm over the design of the Turn A Gundam, pictured above. Designed by famed American tech designer Syd Mead, the Turn A has very little in common with the "classic" gundam style used by the rest of the franchise. To this day, If you try to start a discussion about Turn A in a Gundam community, there will be at least half a dozen people who will say they refuse to watch Turn A solely because the design is "ugly".
- Really? We aren't going to mention Pokémon? The show that people complained about on a regular basis that 4Kids' localization was overdone, and then when it was turned over to PUSA, an utter outcry among the fans that the voice actors were replaced with cheap imitations?
- This Troper has unfortunately seen a number of people throw an absolute tizzy over Asuka's last name being changed from Sohryu to Shikinami for the Rebuild of Evangelion series, despite the fact that it continues the maritime Theme Naming.
- Probably done to tie her closer to Rei (sister ship) :). Before, her ship name tied her to Ritsuko and Misato, and was doubly awkward for being an aircraft carrier name (instead of a destroyer like Rei). Especially because the Kanji for aircraft carrier includes the one for "mother" (more or less it's "aircraft mother ship") And hey, suddenly she's no longer a "dragon lady" ("shiki" has some other appropriate conotations).
Film
- The X-Men movie, based on possibly the most sprawling, confusing and self-contradictory comic book franchise in all the land, had an infinite number of complaints leveled at it, from "Wolverine's like six inches too tall!" to "Magneto's too old!" to "Rogue's too young!" to "Since when is Jean Grey a doctor?!" to "How come Storm didn't freak out when she was in that elevator shaft, she's supposed to be claustrophobic!" to...well, let's stop while we're still young. Subsequent films in the series have just made things worse.
- Storm actually did freak out in the elevator shaft. That's her Big Scene, when she blasts her way free with lightning, and flies for the first time in the film, before delivering the worst line in the movie. But even so, Storm in the comic doesn't have claustrophobic freakouts on the regular either. She struggles with it depending on how severe the confinement is.
- One of the most ridiculous examples of this is fans complaining about Juggernaut being a mutant. Nevermind his relationship with Xavier being removed. Nevermind that his character was poorly used. How he got his powers is more important...even if those powers came from the magical, cursed artifact of a heathen God in the comics. They're wondering why the filmmakers didn't stuff a subplot like that into a movie canon that a) has never mentioned magic or any kind of superhuman powers other than mutation and b) is already staggering under the weight of Loads And Loads Of Characters?
- Not to mention that those people seem to have conveniently forgotten that the specific version of Juggernaut used in the movie is a mutant in the comics.
- Don't even get fans started on the Rogue/Iceman relationship with Gambit nowhere in sight.
- Let us not forget that there was a moment of Fan Dumb from (at the time)Marvel Editor-In-Chief Avi Arad with the X-movies. Apparently, he was worried that the Wolverine origin depicted in the films would be taken as the 'real' story, so he commissioned Wolverine: Origins, in which a pre-power Wolverine was an annoying emo teenager.
- What did he think when parts of said comic were adapted into the Wolverine movie, then?
- This phenomenon has caused many Harry Potter fans to have the exact opposite reaction to the film adaptations as many critics do. While film critics generally agree that the films got better from Prisoner of Azkaban (largely because of Dave McKean's art direction), when they stopped being obsessively faithful to every single scene and line of dialogue in the books, a lot of fans think that Christopher Columbus was doing a bang-up job and that ever since then it's been garbage, with Azkaban the worst offender ("They left out the Fidelius Charm! They left out the Marauders' backstory! Harry gets the Firebolt at the end! Nyaaaargh!!!"). Never mind that, with the length of the books spiraling out of control, something had to be cut. Even if the removed stuff gets non-readers lost.
- Or not, the last book has been split into two films. About damn time.
- The number of films doesn't change the fact that some plot points of (arguable) vitality were not set up in the previous films. How did Aberforth know when to send Harry help, hmm? Oh, that's right, he used the mirror which we've never heard of before now thanks to its conspicuous absence from the fifth movie!
- This troper gets very upset over the continued omission of Peeves.
- The film versions of The Lord Of The Rings have suffered from their fair share of this, notably with the removal of the last part of The Return of the King and the complete removal of Tom Bombadil (walking Deus Ex Machina, quintessential Wacky Wayside Tribe and unplayably strange person that he is) from the story.
- The Scouring of the Shire is something best not brought up in discussion with any fan. Also, a lot of fans will go off on a tirade if you bring up Arwen or Faramir. Or the Elves at Helm's Deep. Or...yeah.
- Batman Begins is commonly agreed to be the best Batman film adaptation so far, but some die-hard fans are very, very angry that Scarecrow ran Arkham Asylum instead of teaching psychiatry, while others just accepted the Rule Of Scary. Others disparage the new tank-like appearance of the Batmobile... despite the fact that it's Batman Begins and it's a prototype vehicle he hasn't had any time to modify into something more "battish". And that he loses it in the sequel and shows he's quite adept with high-performance sports cars, too....
- Likewise, many hardcore fans decry Burton's decision to have the Joker be the murderer of Bruce's parents in the 1989 film adaptation. More reasonably when the sequel rolled around, many fans were outraged at the Penguin's change from an eccentric professional criminal that was only slightly penguin-like in appearance (The origin of his nickname? He wears a penguin tuxedo) to a deformed subhuman that ate raw fish, had flippers, spewed black blood, and otherwise looked exactly like Dr. Caligari.
- And don't get anyone started on Batman being a cold-blooded killer in the 1989 and 1992 movies (he dispatches criminals and blows up buildings and such with reckless abandon).
- Actually, The Bat-Man did kill, with a gun, in his very earliest appearances. Hmmmm, maybe this trope applies to the standard non-killing Batman.
- This Troper knows of a fan who complained after seeing Batman Begins because Thomas & Martha Wayne were killed outside of an opera house instead of a movie theatre.
- That one actually has some basis to it - the original story has always had the Waynes seeing some variant on a Zorro movie, and a lot of the elements of the Batman mythos are drawn from Zorro. It's a nice callback, even if the idea of billionaire Thomas Wayne taking his wife and son into the city to watch a 60-year-old movie doesn't exactly fly in the modern age. Apparently, there are no Blockbusters in the Gotham suburbs.
- And then there were some real geniuses who complained when the murderer of Bruce's parents wasn't the Joker in Batman Begins.
- There were also the changes to the character of Ra's al Ghul and the total omission of his daughter Talia. Ra's convoluted (to say the least) backstory would have been very hard to fit into the movie, of course.
- Part of the problem is that the movie's version of his character is even more convoluted. Anyway, his original story worked just fine for a thirty-minute cartoon so why not a movie?
- On a similar note, certain fansites had some ongoing - and utterly hilarious - flame wars about whether The Dark Knight was going to suck... based on the fact that the Joker's appearance is from make-up rather than being "permawhite" due to falling into a vat of chemicals.
- It's amazing to see how much criticism the Watchmen movie received before its release. It seems people can't even wait to see it to start complaining...
- This is, of course, because the movie is based on an Alan Moore comic book, which have traditionally been subject to Adaptation Decay (or Distillation, depending on your viewpoint). Moore himself is quite vocal about how much he thinks the previous movies based on his works suck, which doesn't help matters. Furthermore, Watchmen especially has been long considered a work that any adaptation would struggle with effectively bringing to the screen whilst remaining faithful to the source material. However, this doesn't prevent the complaining from being very premature.
- Moore has said that even though he's seen one script (the David Hayter one) and can't imagine a better film adaptation, Watchmen is a graphic novel, not a film, and so something will be lost in the translation no matter how good it is, which is perhaps the ultimate example of the They Changed It Now It Sucks attitude.
- An interview with the director had him say something to the effect of 'I would think the fans would be more grateful to know that the storyline and moral ambiguity was kept intact then the fact that there is a giant squid at the end.' Of course, the replies for the remark had the fans arguing back and forth on if the squid or the story was important.
- One "minor" change actually changes the what the viewer comes away with from it. In the attempted rape scene, after Hooded Justice kicks the Comedian around for forcing himself on the first Silk Spectre, Hooded Justice turns to Silk Spectre in the comic and says "Clean yourself up." This adds a bit of shame to the scene, even though she did nothing wrong, and better explains why Laurie's father is the Comedian.
- Like the Genshiken example above, this movie also appears to have experienced something of a "They Didn't Change It Enough So It Sucks" reaction from several critics, who have argued that the fact that the movie largely sticks very closely to the original work (to the extent that many scenes are taken and film as if they were straight from the book come to live) means that the movie doesn't have enough space to develop as a work in its own right, as opposed to a faithful adaptation.
- The new Dragonball movie has already had fans starting to complain about the fact that Goku now goes to school, even though it's a minor plot point and the film is still very early into production. Then the animal characters were taken out, which is a bit more understandable, although still pretty minor. (It makes you wonder if they'd have been able to make them believable though.)
- To be fair, Goku being in school may well be huge Character Derailment. In the manga, after his "grandfather" died, he was something of a feral child. Then after meeting Bulma, he spent all his time either actively adventuring, or wandering around training. We're talking about completely changing a character's formative years here.
- People were in an uproar when the first brief images of Piccolo showed him to be a pale white. (Note that these early images did not give a very close look of his face.) Later images showed him to be a pale green, symbolic of how long it had been since he saw sunlight. When trailers appeared, it seemed like they did some color correction to make him more green, possibly to placate the fans.
- Lots of people have also been complaining about the hair. Goku doesn't have his distinctive hairstyle, Bulma's hair isn't blue, and Roshi actually has hair. Now, not having Goku's hairstyle is almost understandable, but the other two would be pretty damn easy to pull off. Although to be fair, bright blue hair could look just as goofy as Goku's original hair style.
- Now that the movie is out, it is safe to say that this trope has been averted. It doesn't suck because they changed it, it sucks because it is a bad movie. unless you like that sort of thing.
- This Troper simply stared at the screen for an entire pointing at the screen with an open mouth possibly for more than a minute just by seeing Roshi's house.
- Way before Star Trek XI came out, a segment of fans were already frothing at the mouth that the producers aren't exactly re-creating the crappy cardboard sets and cheesy 60's costumes of the original series (and I'm saying this as a Trekkie). Although it could also be down to the recasting of the original characters.
- Most of the criticism of the Beowulf movie was based on this. The DVD includes an interview with Neil Gaiman explaining why he made these alterations, and they're pretty decent reasons.
- The Resident Evil movie series. Never mind that it's not meant to take place in the same world as the games, or that it might actually be GOOD in its own right, as soon as they added
a character one of the most blatant examples of a Mary Sue ever and a backstory for Nemesis, people wanted to kill ANYONE involved in this movie for taking a new story and plastering the Resident Evil name on it.
- This troper has to admit she's one of these despite hardly even playing RE. The whole Alice and Carlos relationship thing just got me the most since they were screwing with canon characters AC or not. Also Jill is bad ass. In the movie not so much since apparently she can't do much without
the mary sue Alice helping her. Even though she's part of freakin' S.T.A.R.S. and obviously has to have some aptitude for fighting and shit.
- I thought the fans were more offended about the movie being awful.
- The American Godzilla movie. That is all this Troper is saying.
- Inversion: Most of the film critic complaints about the 2008 Speed Racer film was that it felt too much like a kid's action cartoon. Let me repeat that - they were complaining about a movie remaining faithful to the source material. This is no doubt due to the Wachowski brothers being bandied around as the directors, which meant a lot of people probably went in expecting The Matrix with (more) cars or a goofy racing show adapted into deep religious symbolism, even though they're on record that they always planned this to be a family film.
- Certain fandoms (usually of things from the 8o's) do this so often it should probably have its own trope, if it doesn't already.
- This Troper has always been annoyed at the way Spike Lee adapted The Autobiography of Malcolm X. Most of the substance is the same, but a lot of details were changed (including the addition of an important character who was just made up), quotes from the book were used verbatim but taken out of context, and so on. He feels his ire is somewhat justified because 1) this is messing with actual history, and 2) although history obviously needs to be dramatized for the big screen, the original book was dramatic enough.
- Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull. Since the period of the film shifted from the 30s to the 50s, the villains (Nazis > Communists) and film influence (old Republic Film Serials > science fiction) changed, and some fans weren't happy.
- Not to mention the serious Fan Wank about CGI gophers. Goddamn CGI gophers.
- In this editor's experience, it's not so much the genre shift or period shift so much as the quality of the writing and direction. And yes, the embarrassing CGI.
- The upcoming remake of The Warriors has fans in an uproar, even though almost no details about the film have been released. It's worth noting that the original movie was an adaptation of a novel, and not a particularly faithful one at that.
- Wanted may or may not be this trope. The original comic of the story presents all the characters as former super-villains who finally joined forces, kill all the superheroes, made humanity forget about them and rule the world from behind the scenes. The film adaption is about a league of assassins killing people who could possibly become the next Hitler.
- Let's be fair: there's no way in hell that the comic would ever have gotten made into a movie it it stayed true to the comic.
- The only thing it has to do with the comic is the names and title. Literally nothing else is the same.
- The Hitchhikers Guide To The Galaxy film adaptation was based on a new script written by Douglas Adams before his death, as opposed to direct adaptation of the original text. As a result of this, the film contained many differences in plot from the original radio/book/TV stories (each of which also had rewrites between adaptations; one joke in the fandom goes that there is no canon, only suggestions), which annoyed some long-time fans of the series.
- Even though the movie was written by Adams himself, which actually makes it Word of God, a God whose last message to creation was "Sorry for the inconvenience"...
- Lots and lots of people who were fans of the Ella Enchanted book bitched and moaned about the changes in the movie- there was no finishing school, she didn't try to kill the prince in the book, there was no evil uncle in the book, blah, blah, blah. As someone who greatly enjoyed both the book and the movie, this was very frustrating for me. As much as I loved the book, the climax was all about internal struggle and very non-cinematic, thus very hard to portray in film. All the changes they made in the movie upped the fun level, and Cary Elwes' evil uncle was absolutely fabulous. Yes, kiddies, you can change things and still have it turn out thoroughly enjoyable. Aren't you surprised?
- As written the novel would've required at least two movies (finishing school and the courtship) and a lot of narration. A lot of narration. Thank the fairy godmothers they didn't follow the novel exactly.
- The Shining is quite different from the books, and gets a lot of Stephen King fans saying how much it sucks. Outside of them, it's considered one of the best horror movies ever made.
- To a lesser extent, ditto for Carrie.
- The Star Wars Expanded Universe fandom suffers from this every time someone dies, even when a single character that wasn't even in the original movies was killed off. In recent years, the universe has dipped more into Anyone Can Die territory, leading to this happening frequently.
- The special editions, anyone? Anyone?! Not to mention all the prequel retcons... oh, Anakin wasn't a great guy that tragically fell - actually he was a Jerk Ass from the start. Also he's Jesus or something.
- The US DVD and Blu-Ray releases of Let The Right One In use a drastically different subtitle translation
than the theatrical release, which lacks many of the subtleties from the original version's lines, removes most of the dry humor from the script, leaves out entire sentences, and flat-out mistranslates several lines (in one case, a character's name is called out, but it's subtitled as "I'm trapped"). To add insult to injury, they're not dubtitles; the dub is, ironically enough, derived from the original theatrical subs.
Live Action TV
- This happened to Doctor Who as the new series was in production. Fans found lots of things to complain about, one of the most infamous being the enlarged TARDIS windows. The series itself eventually made fun of this point, with a character commenting that the TARDIS can't be a real police box, because "the windows are too big".
- It happened all the time with the old series, too — remember, this is a series that's had nine complete turnovers in the regular cast and over a dozen different showrunners with wildly varying approaches. Years before the new series debuted, there was a running joke on one of the online discussion groups that the series was Ruined Forever when they added the time-travelling alien to a perfectly good show about a policeman walking through the fog and hearing a strange noise.
- Knight Rider fans have a bad habit of becoming homicidally enraged at any changes from the original source material in the various Revival attempts of the series, even such changes as would be necessary to compensate for the fact that (a) it's no longer 1982 and (b) the Pontiac Trans Am has been out of production for several years. A new revival premiered in February, 2008, and, months before, fans have already taken note of several dozen reasons it is sure to suck. Of course, it did eventually turn out to suck anyway, but that doesn't make it right.
- The Dresden Files made a lot of (author approved) changes when it made it to TV. Interestingly, it was the little changes that got lambasted the most. Harry Dresden no longer wore a trenchcoat (they didn't want him looking like an Angel ripoff) and didn't drive the same car (while it might look good in text a 6+ foot man cannot drive a compact. It just doesn't work).
- Interestingly, the people who complained about the car change the most were invariably the people who had lampshaded that difficulty the most in bookverse fanfiction.
- Some of the complaints were downright silly, notably the brunette actress who played Murphy; she'd actually read the books before the audition, which made her more familiar with the series than the directors' first choice for Murphy.
- Unfortunately, this has also caused some bookfans to be prejudiced against the graphic novels, even though Jim Butcher wrote the script for one and was heavily consulted on the script for their adaptation of Storm Front
- Stargate Atlantis is currently experiencing a fandom that is divided between froth-at-the-mouth fans who enjoy the show and froth-at-the-mouth ex-fans that decry all of the advances made in Season Four. Stargate forums aren't happy places to be anymore...
- Considering all the other epic levels of Fan Dumb in the Stargate Verse, 'anymore' isn't quite accurate. There's a reason this troper sticks to the Stargate: Aftermath RPG on GateWorld.
- The fanbase currently has people who like or simply don't mind the new direction stargate universe is taking. Then the people who, at seemingly every new mention of universe, are ready with "This isn't the stargate i grew to love!" or "I want Atlantis back!" Of course there's also 'OH GOD! That's it! I'm not watching it."
- Speaking of Stargate, the Ori are hated for not being the Goa'uld, and the last two seasons are hated for not being the same as the first 8.
- Anything from Super Sentai ported to Power Rangers that isn't 100% true to source is grounds for gasping and fist-shaking. Admittedly, some of it is worthy of decrying, but...getting in a tussle because the heroes don't say "Henshin"? Or that they don't have the same morphers? Check out Kamen Rider Dragon Knight, and you'll have numerous people hating it because it's not Japanese.
- Same vein as Kamen Rider, Kamen Rider Hibiki was Ruined FOREVER in the eyes of execs due to the fact it had a FEMALE rider on TV (Femme was officially the first female rider, but Shuki was the first to appear on TV), something that is considered "taboo" with Kamen Rider (most females who had to transform had to rely on an anybody can use Transformation Trinket or is a Rubber Monster). Needless to say, the exec associated the failure of the later season of Hibiki with a female rider being one of them.
- The Discworld TV adaptions. Most fans loved them, but in a classic example of Unpleasable Fanbase, this troper has seen criticisms that Teatime should have been more obviously insane and less obviously insane in the same discussion. But Hogfather got off lightly compared to Colour of Magic, where, in addition to Rincewind being "too old", the creators committed the ultimate sin of getting rid of the aeroplane scene (a totally unnecessary sequence in which most of the comedy occurs inside Rincewind's head in any case). The fact that Terry Pratchett had approved these changes was claimed as evidence he doesn't understand his own books.
- This troper's biggest complaint of the Colour of Magic was that it was made, instead of numerous later Discworld stories superior to it. That, and that they made Jeremy Irons Lord Vetinari, despite of utterly lacking the character's mannerisms - he can only play a couple of character types, and Vetinari isn't either of them.
- Legend Of The Seeker is already getting this from some fans who object to, among many other things: changes to Richard's relationship with Zedd, moving Richard's father's death to after he meets Kahlan, and changing the main villain's hair color. This troper's already seen ranting forum posts that consist mostly of bullet points of things they changed in the adaptation.
- This troper remembers one particular forum post that was angry that, according to the first episode Zedd wasn't Richard's grandfather, which he is in the books. Said poster really should have waited a few episodes, because sure enough, it's revealed he still is. Zedd was lying about it, exactly like he did in the book.
- MST3K was accused of this with every cast change, especially when Joel left.
- One story told in their Amazing Colossal Episode Guide was about a viewer who sent in a yards-long, computer-printed banner reading "I HATE TOM SERVO'S NEW VOICE," after Josh Weinstein left and Kevin Murphy took over Tom's controls in the second season. The crew hung the banner up in their offices, amused more than anything at the idea that somebody went to the trouble and expense of producing this massive missive instead of just sending a letter. Who knew that in these days, ventriloquy could be such Serious Business?
- Because of copyright issues, Iron Chef had to change the music. This troper's brother now refuses to watch the show because 'it's not the same without the Backdraft music'.
Theater
- The ancient Roman playwright Terence adapted six Greek plays. All but the first contain "prologues" in which the playwright rants at the audience about criticisms of the previous adaptation. Apparently, the Romans accused him of "contaminating" the original plays by changing plot elements or tones, and at one point an audience even walked out after it became clear he had combined two similar but separate Greek plays into one adaptation.
- Stephen Sondheim just loves to tinker with his musicals even after their initial productions have finished previewing, resulting in different audiences seeing different versions of each show. None of these changes are supported by all the fans, but the most controversial is the addition of "Something Just Broke" to Assassins. Depending on who you listen to, it's either the master stroke that pulls the whole thing together, or a disastrous break in the dramatic arc that should never have been added and should be erased from existence.
- Even more controversial were the changes made to the 2002 revival of Into The Woods. Assassins, at least, has always divided both fans and audiences and has widely been regarded as a problem show; Into The Woods, on the other hand, is one of Sondheim's most successful, popular and beloved works as a composer-lyricist. The decision, then, to reintroduce a totally unnecessary (and not very interesting) sub-plot about the Three Little Pigs, as well as replace several existent and already excellent lyrics with new (and, according to some tastes, inferior) ones, seems baffling.
- Sticking with Sondheim, John Doyle's recent actor-musician revival of Sweeney Todd has enjoyed huge success and popularity with fans and critics alike, but its minimalist continues to rub some fans the wrong way. Some say that the score suffers in reduction from a full orchestra and ensemble choir to just eight actor-musicians; others found that Doyle's alienating production style prevented them from identifying with the characters.
- There's also the matter of the London version of "Follies," which made several baffling changes. Ben's solo "The Road You Didn't Take" was cut. "Live, Laugh, Love," was replaced with "Make the Most of Your Music" (a song which changes Ben's part from baritone to tenor). The lyrics to "In Buddy's Eyes" were altered.
Video Games
- Elite Beat Agents got a lot of this before it came out with fans complaining "It's not a Japanese setting!" and "Ashlee Simpson? Cher?!" Some even went as far as to call it a rip-off despite being made by the same company. When people actually got to play (and with the gameplay upgrades and still-goofy setting) this has abated significantly.
- This trope perfectly describes the Need For Speed series' fanbase reaction to NFS ProStreet doing away with the cop chases in NFS Most Wanted and NFS Carbon in favor of something more realistic and organized. EA responds by going back to the well with NFS Undercover. NFS Undercover also happens to be the worst-reviewed game in the series.
Take That, fanbase!
- I would have to say that ProStreet is more of a Your Mileage May Vary type game. While I really like Pro Street, since I think it was a good idea to have something more realistic, I won't say it's the best game of the series.
- This isn't very much of a Take That to the fanbase since the fans were asking for a return to the cop chases of Carbon and Underground, with the increased quality reasonably expected from a sequel. What they were presented with was a remake of Underground with less organized and realistic police chases with far worse cutscenes framerate and controls.
- While almost universally regarded as an improvement on at least the last couple of games before it, Tomb Raider: Legend saw a lot of contention among both the fanbase and others, for very linear level design, easy puzzles, too much action and spoon-feeding sidekicks. Along with some considering Lara's changed personality too much in the direction of Lighter And Softer... and accusations of her getting too much character development.
- Tomb Raider: Anniversary went a long way to satisfying those irritated by most of the above things, but causes some division over certain character design and storyline changes from the game it is based off. Plus there are certain room cuts that are near-impossible to defend as anything other than being due to time constraints; especially when they contrast with brilliantly remade sections.
- Neo Contra. Konami decided to try something new, changing the game to an Ikari Warriors style overhead run-n-gun. While not So Bad Its Horrible like the PS 1 Contra games, it was criticized for its short length and lack of difficulty compared to its Nintendo Hard predecessors. Konami saw the error of their ways, and changed back to the classic style for Contra 4 on the DS.
- When Square Enix games are ported, they frequently get new translations. If the old translations were completely incompetent (like Final Fantasy IV), no one really cares much. But heaven forbid the original was halfway competent, particularly if it was written by Ted Woolsey (who had to work within time constraints and the limitations imposed by the need to fit the game into a 24 megabit cartridge and Nintendo of America's censorship policies.) The script may be an outright improvement, but fans will whine left and right.
- Similarly, Final Fantasy Tactics got a new translation with the PSP port, with the original script having been notorious for Engrish and riddled with translation errors and widely criticised at the time of release for how utterly inept it was in light of the serious subject matter. Fast-forward to 2007 and the new script was immediately derided for not being as "campy", and the corrections to the numerous mistranslations and language errors completely ignored.
- Final Fantasy Tactics Advance was scorned by many Tactics fans for the art style and the story becoming "too kiddy" compared to the first Tactics that was dark and gritty. This opinion has not changed for A2.
- And the same thing has repeated itself for the new translation of Chrono Trigger. The script is a lot closer to the Japanese script now, which has led to some amusing diversions (namely that the "Good morning, Crono!" advertising campaign is quoting a line that was changed for the new script), but also a few like Frog no longer speaking with Ye Olde Butcherede Englishe, which is a mortal sin according to some people.
- Fans have been known to say that that the retranslation in the Game Boy Advance version Final Fantasy VI is "drier" and that Kefka has been made into a more serious character. This is an outright lie!! Exactly three of Kefka's one-liners were modified at all; one changed a word but kept the same joke, while another turned "HATE HATE HATE HATE (etc.)" into a long list of seemingly random insults, and "submariner" was changed to "sandworm", but since he says the line after seeing a submersible castle, It Makes Sense In Context and ergo isn't quite as funny. What's more, Kefka gets new one liners.
- This troper knows of people who hate the Final fantasy VII: Crisis Core Sephiroth for the sole reason that they added a belt buckle. No complaints about how he's drastically different due to Zack's perspective and the time in the universe it takes place in, no complaints about his voice, no complaints about his battle, the bloody belt buckle.
- The official forums for Starcraft 2 are constantly flooded with complaints about changes being made to the graphics, army unit rosters, and interface. Most of the released changes are improvements to make the game simpler and more efficient to play, but a very vocal segment of the player base thinks of compensating for the slow, clunky interface as part of the challenge of the game, and that the changes will remove physical skill from multiplayer. Another segment thinks that strategy games should be about strategic decisions, not about who can click faster. Keep in mind, this game will not be released until fall 2008 at the earliest, and is nowhere near finished, yet complaints appear daily.
- This troper recalls quite a few complaints over the prospect of an optional blood and gore filter.
- Diablo III Is already getting this with people complaining that it's now Too Colorful. They've even started a petition wanting to replace the entirety of Diablo III with Act 3 of Diablo II. Numerous Counterpetitions have already been launched, and Blizzard has pointed out why Darker And Edgier graphics would be implausible or unplayable.
- Nevermind that no one plays Act 3 in Diablo II in the first place.
- This one's easy, just have a Real Is Brown option like in Uncharted, except don't make it an Easter Egg and only silently mock people who use it.
- Here's a fun experiment - go into a games forum and loudly claim that the remake, Metal Gear Solid: The Twin Snakes, has superior voice acting because Mei Ling was never supposed to have a Chinese accent anyway. Actually, maybe you're better off not doing that.
- Part of the Fallout fandom is particularly notorious for this, particularly with the release of Fallout 3.
- Granted, the game is being developed by a different developer changing the gameplay style dramatically. Unfortunately, a couple of loudmouths at one singular internet fansite have given the entire fanbase a bad name.
- Interestingly, the Fallout 3 hatedom is essentially split between this trope and Its The Same Now It Sucks: The former party considers it too great a deviation from Black Isle's original Fallout games, while the latter accuses the game of being essentially "Oblivion with guns".
- And then there's the infamous ending, which is getting retconned by an upcoming expansion.
- Silent Hill 4: The Room, although a good game in its own right, had gameplay way too different from the rest of the series, partly because it wasn't originally supposed to be a SH game, and lacked much of the horror atmosphere of its predecessors(eg no darkness requiring a flashlight).
- Silent Hill 5: Homecoming is viewed this way by fans of the first three games. It changed the combat system to be less clumsy, and didn't stick precisely to the original trilogy's "mythology". Though it's still a good game and is viewed by about half the fanbase as a worthy addition to the series, the other half (rather loudly) says that the American developers just don't get the series.
- This seems to be the fate of the newly-announced "re-imagining" of the first game on the Wii, which has changed the formula far more than either of the previous two games. Oddly, many fan complaints focus on the inclusion of a touch-screen phone rather than any of the more drastic alterations.
- A shitstorm of games becoming easier to appeal more to newer fans and to dispel complaints of games having tedious elements (such as requiring the player to grind due to a lack of Leaked Experience or removing Guide Dang It moments) improved or removed entirely, or having the balance worked out has emerged. Especially with the recent spike of Casual gaming.
- Fans of point and click adventure games had whined about the emergence of adventure games where the player could not make the game unwinnable through Guide Dang It moments or even get a game over by the character being killed. This meant that a player could brute-force their way through the game via Trial and Error.
- Some such fans complained that the games required less thinking since it was possible to use every single item on a plot barrier without getting a game over for getting it wrong or even saying a wrong conversational option. Despite that these were actually features of adventure games that were criticized by gaming magazines and non-fans alike.
- Other fans complained about games like Torin's Passage including an in-game hint system that was entirely optional.
- Some fans even complained about games like King's Quest V removing the requirement to type in commands on the keyboard, meaning that players would not have to type "Look" on every screen or know that a 2x2 pixel square on the ground was a tile that woudl be important for a puzzle, or even that something that looks to be part of the landscape is in fact an item you sould pick up.
- A similar reaction was seen with the release of Dungeons and Dragons 4th edition "Oversimplifying" the game, despite that 3rd edition started off the same way compared to Dungeons and dragons 2nd edition.
- The announcement of optional features in a Zelda game that would enable people to get a hint for puzzles or even watch the game play itself has caused an absolute bawfest amongst self-proclaimed hardcore gamers who cannot have fun experiencing the story or enjoying the gameplay unless it gives them a challenge. It has not actually been announced whether or not these features would even be required, meaning a solution would be "Don't like it? Don't press it!" or varying difficulties.
- The Wii in general has been complained about that there were not enough hardcore games, despite that puzzle games and "casual games" with a staff of maybe 30-100 people can be produced for a fraction of the time and money of a "Hardcore" game with a much larger staff and budget...or that the PC actually is covered in "Casual games" like Diner Dash and Bejeweled and has been since it emerged as a gaming platform.
- Most MMORPG gamers who enjoyed games like Ever Quest and Ragnarok Online have been up in arms against World of Warcraft and Guild Wars's attempts to appeal to people who did not like games that required the player to grind a lot, and how many new MMORPGs were trying to reduce the amount of grinding required and to offer descriptions for spells and abilities. But despite this, Game magazines, gaming websites, and other such forms of media actually praise an MMORPG for not putting such emphasis on grinding or punishing the player for dying by removing experience or even causing a delevel. (Which would be hours upon hours of work)
- To accomodate gamers who typically play with the Wiimote in their right hand, the Wii version of Legend Of Zelda: Twilight Princess not only featured a right-handed Link (who, in nearly all other games, had been obviously left-handed), but flipped the entire game horizontally, geography and dungeon puzzles included. Lefties and righties alike were up in arms over this change. The silliness was only compounded by the fact that the Wiimote sucked horribly at registering what could be considered a sword swing, so they might as well have let gamers flail around with their left hand.
- Thankfully, the GameCube version remains unflipped. This version seems to be more "canon," since a left-handed TP Link also appears in Super Smash Bros Brawl and Link's Crossbow Training (Wii games, mind you.)
- Star Wars Galaxies was once a thriving MMORPG with lots of devoted players. Right up until the Combat Upgrade which essentially revamped the entire core mechanic and almost everyone quit in disgust.
- Which, though, sounds like a very reasonable stance if it changed the entire core mechanic.
- Your Mileage May Vary on the Combat Upgrade, as it rebalanced a game where the majority of combat classes were totally useless. The NGE, on the other hand, really was dreadful.
- The Halo series. The bitter rage and hatred the most hardcore Halo fans showed at the relatively minute changes between Halo and Halo 2 is nothing short of embarrassing. For some fans, making the Elites speak English or adjusting the graphics on the plasma pistol overcharge are unpardonable sins.
- Ironically, this troper, amongst others, (although he loved Halo 2) was greatly disappointed by Halo 3 as it seemed too similar to its predecessor.
- Let's not even get started on the people who still demand the return of the first Halo's Pistol, ignoring the fact that it was MASSIVELY overpowered.
- Fear not: Almighty Bungie hath heard the pleas. The Halo pistol is coming back, though only in Halo:ODST.
- The Super Smash Bros series deserves a special mention with Wavedashing, which, no matter what anyone tells you, was a glitch. When removed from Brawl (by redesigning the air dodging mechanics) some players naturally complained.
- To be fair, Melee's exploits like wavedashing and L-cancelling (which had been in since the original game) gave the weaker, low tier characters a fighting chance to keep up with the game's more powerful characters, since everyone could do them. Also, Brawl has been noted to have several glitches as well, including Metaknight's infinite dimensional cape.
- Some were disappointed at the removal of certain features or characters, like Race to the Finish and Mewtwo, although most of these had some kind of replacement (Subspace Emissary, Lucario). Granted, not everyone's happy with the replacement. It gets worse. People are so angry
at the changes made in Brawl that some of them are trying to hack into the game and, essentially, turn it back into Melee. Anybody who questions their bizarre monomania is flamed and called a "noob".
- And the people who hacked the game succeded in hacking the game, naming it "Brawl+". Here is a gameplay video of "Brawl+"
- This resulted in yet another Broken Base with people claiming that it is wrong to hack a game. It is also believed that Brawl+ is making Brawl into Melee, though this troper allies himself with those who claim that Brawl+ attempts to make Brawl a better overall competitive game, prepare for an endless flame war of opinions
- Things got worse when Sakurai (the creator of the game) revealed in an interview with Nintendo Power that he knew of wavedashing before Melee was released. So, it's a glitch, but one that they knew about. So is it an intentional part of the metagame? Or did they just want to keep that holiday schedule? I guess the two camps will have to fight to the death to determine who's right *laughs*.
- The world's best Ikaruga player complained that the Xbox Live Arcade port of the game was "horrible" because it slightly altered a few of the bullet patterns and enemy placements that he had probably spent months meticulously memorising. Of course, he regained his high score and then complained.
- Inverted if unbeknowst to the fanbase with the official translation of the GBA rerelease of Tales Of Phantasia, which is hated by the fans of the DeJap translation of the SNES version for being more accurate, and not containing a bunch of adult humor that was never in the original. Also played straight with the reaction to not use the romanization in the Japanese version (like insisting on "Cless" instead of "Cress", even though the latter actually means something). There's also the whole "Ragnarok/Kangaroo" thing, but other then a couple error it's a largely faithful translation (almost boringly so).
- The first sequel to Legend Of Zelda, Zelda II: The Adventure of Link, received a lot of flak for going from an overhead perspective to a side-scroller with RPG Elements.
- Falcom did the same with Ys III: Wanderers from Ys, and mercifully changed it back afterwards. It did, much later, receive an overhead remake in the form of Ys: The Oath In Felghana for Japanese P Cs.
- Wind Waker received many of a fanboy's outrage for changing everything, from making Link into a kid in a cel shaded style, to using a boat instead of a horse, etc. Basically, it wasn't like Ocarina of time, so now it sucks, according to the fans. Twilight Princess brought back the horse and the realistic adult looking Link, but fans choose to find other things to complain about.
- Warhammer Online: Age of Reckoning has already begun to receive vast amounts of flak from various elements of the fandom for making alterations to the plot of Warhammer Fantasy, ostensibly to facilitate gameplay. In all fairness, Warhammer Fantasy/40K players are possibly the whiniest anywhere, complaining when any change is or isn't made (the Rhino Rush was a huge example of this. Players didn't like the fact that it was possible in 3rd Edition, and then when 4th Edition came around and removed it, the very God Damned same players complained at its removal.)
- It took big flak when they made the Chaos classes male only.
- Only two Chaos classes are male only, the same way Witch Elves are female only and Trollslayers are male only.
- Mario Kart Wii. Oh no, they changed snaking! Now it actually takes skill and effort to get a turbo boost in curves! I spent years perfecting my shameless boosting through straights and now it's gone! They even added an Auto mode for all the Noobs that need everything handed in a silver platter! RAAAARGHRRGJHGJHGRJHGHGHHHGH
- Resident Evil fans were outraged when Resident Evil 4 didn't have ink cartridges, obscure camera angles, Umbrella, or difficult controls. Resident Evil 5 kept the same game engine and kept some old wounds open, but changed back to the earlier games' inventory style, which has opened a whole new can of worms.
- Don't forget the rioting over stuff happening in DAYLIGHT. And the fact that you have a partner.
- They did NOT return to the old inventory style. The significant increase in ammo fluctuation and the lack of necessity for space to carry story-related items makes the "return" actually behave quite differently from the original style.
- To keep with the whole Magic to Steam Punk shift in the game's background, Thief 2: the Metal Age replaced the scary zombies of Thief: Dark Project with extremely creepy automatons. Gameplay-wise, they fit the exact same niche: both made a lot of creepy noise, both were very hard to kill, and both were very slow (to be fair, the automatons managed to be a real danger since some were fitted with cannons, while zombies only had creepiness to their name and could be outwalked). Then the game was released. Then the forums started spewing toxic ash and lava. Also, they completely removed the Burricks (cute little acid-spitting dinos), but that's a goddamn crime.
- If you are to believe the forums, there are only three groups of Total War players: those who played the first two games and don't like the new engine because they're anal-retentive wrinkled tossers who can't deal with change; those who discovered the series with Rome and are therefore braindead console jocks and SEGA fanboys who wouldn't know bad design if it shat in their eyes from a great height and should therefore go back to Counter Strike; and those who are adamant that only Shogun exists and anyone who disagrees with them most probably walk on their knuckles.
- Depends on the forums. This troper is a proud member of a far smaller minority that believes all the games are imperfect due to historical inaccuracy, and are thus moddding Rome: Total War to make it as accurate as possible. And yes, we use the original languages. But the majority of fans do indeed fall amongst the above described camps.
- NS13 in Kingdom Of Loathing was disliked by many players because, despite adding content, it basically nerfed every efficient (perhaps too efficient) strategy people were using as well as one or two that weren't actually that efficient. Most people have gotten over it, however. Some of the success of the recent "Hobopolis" content dump was in fact attributed to it not "pissing in anyone's bowl of Cheerios", to quote Jick.
- It's almost a given that any time a new update is made to Urban Dead, any of three groups (the pro-survivor faction, the pro-zombie faction, and the PKer faction) will complain about game balance. Of course, given the high regard most players hold the game's creator in, they'll instead tear into one another for having made "bad suggestions."
- Burnout Paradise. Circuit racing was replaced with an "open world" city layout, races were point-to-point affairs that required an in-depth knowledge of the city layout just to give you an idea of which road to take, and the fan-favorite Crash Mode was replaced with the compromise "Showtime" Mode that didn't feature the exact same kind of fun puzzle mechanics as the previous games. Oh, and you can't restart a race you just lost; instead you have to drive all the way back to the starting point, which is miles away. Sure, the car selection may be the best the series has ever had, Stunt Runs are enjoyable, the open world lends itself to lots of wicked jumps and fun secrets, and there's the promise of (rumored to be free) updates, including new sections of the city, a day-night cycle, motorcycles and even airplanes — but enough longtime fans of the series were angered by this shift in gameplay focus to swear off the series entirely.
- This could be a rare example of a justified trope, because as good as Burnout Paradise is, the 'Burnout' part is only a label and the game has very little to do with old Burnout games.
- Team Fortress 2 was getting a lot of flak for the inclusion of alternative weapons, especially to the Pyro class - which some players deemed "overpowered" after a new feature was added to the flamethrower, and the alternate weapon to the flamethrower was revealed to be a better flamethrower without the new features but with more health and a higher crit chance. And the Pyro was given range-capable harassment abilities. Somebody pointed out what the Internet Backdraft would be like if Valve had only just recently introduced the game-essential Ubercharges (limited invincibility) ability, and that combined with a good deal of players actually having fun with the new changes managed to get the Fandom to quiet down and get back to blowing one another to smithereens.
- Team Fortress 2 was already subject to flak as soon as its final graphic style and game design decisions came public - namely the new cartoony graphical look (to draw attention away from the game's less realistic aspects) and removal of grenades (to emphasize individual class abilities and make it easier for new players to get into the game). These changes soon gave birth to Fortress Forever, a Half Life 2 mod which seeks to undo these changes...and basically just remake Team Fortress Classic on the Source engine.
- Fortress Forever was in development before TF2 was announced. Granted, it was still just a TFC remake (made by dedicated fans who wanted to play the same game on a new engine), and it's still nothing compared to the real Team Fortress 2. Speaking of the "dedicated fans" of TFC:
- They hate TF2 on general principle. Much like the Smash Bros brigade, high-level TFC play relied on exploiting physics and mechanics. In the early days, TFC was fairly close to the game's intended design. However, as time went on, more and more exploits were found. For example, the "Medic" class was more likely to be found flying around the map running the flag than actually healing people. Valve's Team Fortress 2 is essentially an attempt to recreate Team Fortress Classic as it was originally designed, not as the game became after exploiters ran rampant. Having played TFC in the days before bunny hopping and the like took over, TF2 is more like TFC than Fortress Forever or any other attempt by the old guard to recreate Team Fortress.
- There's a mod being worked on for TF2 that re-adds grenades into the game. Also, this troper's had to kick at least one person from his server for incessantly complaining at how the game was dumbed down from TFC instead of you know, playing. Is it just me or does this seem to have odd parallels with the Smash fandom, except for the fact that this type of thing is much less widespread among Team Fortress fans?
- This Troper does still play TFC as his computer sucks. Someone did complain non-stop about no grenades in TF2... which is the main weapon in TFC and renders most weapons useless.
- Gears Of War 2 has had some changes from the original which made the Shotgun a less desirable weapon, notably the general gameplay addition 'stopping power', which slows you down from being continuously shot from the direction you're running at, making flat-out charging at your opponent a disasterous idea. This was on account of how people were often quite content to practically only use it for an entire match, completely ignoring their other standard weapons. Some people weren't happy. Even when it turned out the shotgun was made to be better and more consistent within the close ranges it was supposed to specialize in.
- The Gears 2 shotgun was initially bugged (and eventually fixed), and blindfired shots would usually go straight into the ground. Although thought to be a purposeful and welcome change by some, most of the community went into an outrage because they actually had to aim the weapon to fire it accurately (OH NOES!!). The most baffling argument this troper has ever heard against the shotgun was that the Gears 1 shotgun took more skill because you didn't have to aim it to fire with perfect accuracy. Let that one sink in and see if it doesn't make your head explode.
- Initial D (Arcade Stage) 4 is a matter of debate among fans. Some welcome it as a fresh reboot of the series, but many others find it a pain in the exhaust pipe to get used to the weird physics. Worse yet, the game punishes high-speed cornering by "locking" the player's steering and making his or her car crash into the wall and suffer an acceleration penalty, and to fix this one must perform a "Penalty Cancel," which consists of releasing the gas, tapping the brake, and pressing the gas. Many players think of Penalty Cancel as a stupid technique—who the heck brakes on a straightaway?
- As if that isn't enough, the "Version 1.5" patch of the game almost makes a new game out of an existing one by removing said exploit and steering lock, and replacing it with oversteer. This troper played one round of ID4v1.5, and will never play it again.
- Purists of Puzzle League / Panel de Pon / Tetris Attack should stay very far away from Planet Puzzle League, which, in addition to providing the tried-and-true directional-pad-and-buttons gameplay, also offers the much easier stylus control.
- Though, when there's an online mode and no mode that restricts gameplay to the D-pad and buttons...
- The citybuilder series that started with Caesar has about 10 titles, all similar in theme. Ever since the release of Pharaoh in 1999, each and every new release has elicited cries of They Changed It Now It Sucks and Ruined FOREVER from the community.
- While admittedly some complaints are legit, the sheer amount of Fan Dumb in Sonic The Hedgehog is downright embarassing. Some people hate everyone but Sonic, ignoring the fact that there were plenty of characters before the game went 3D and are certainly a heck of a lot more characters in something like Mario at that point. Some people even hate everything but the first game, whining about all the characters. Mario started out with more characters in its first few games! From this logic, idiocy like Sonic Underground would be a faithful adaptation.
- The worst of this for the Sonic series would have to come from Sonic CD, which had a partially different soundtrack (some tracks were shared) for American and Japanese/European releases. Despite the fact that the game is arguably the best Sonic game ever made, or that the American soundtrack is almost if not just as good as the Japanese soundtrack, the game gets a lot of flak for simply having different music than the Japanese version.
- This troper has also seen this trope...inverted? Subverted? One of the two...in relation to games like Sonic Rush. There are at least a few groups and one official magazine that declared the game was too hard to enjoy because "it's too evocative of a Genesis game"...the sentiment that the fans had easily been asking for the most. However, this is the minority, and the Sonic Rush games are generally agreed to be some of the best Sonic games in the past decade.
- And we can't forget about the mindless amounts of Fan Dumb that resulted from the "Werehog" portions of Sonic Unleashed. The instant the idea was first casually mentioned, it was met with hordes of Internet-dwellers declaring the Sonic series Ruined FOREVER (as if it hadn't already hit the Polygon Ceiling and wasn't trying desperately to recover). To this day, this troper has seen some groups of people declaring Unleashed the greatest Sonic game since sliced bread, some enjoying the daytime-more-traditional portions of the game while quietly dismissing the nighttime-werehog-portions, and others (including official gaming news sites) declaring that the werehog completely and utterly destroys the game single-handedly. Unbelievable.
- Anything Sonic the Hedgehog related and released after Sonic 1 fits this trope perfectly. In a weird twist on this trope, allot of times Sonic fans rewrite history to make stuff to complain about. Appearently, there weren't any Nintendo fans in the 90's (Never heard of the first console wars?), Sega only released one Sonic game a year in the 90's, the only new characters were Knuckles and Tails (Forgetting Amy, Fang, Bean, Mighty, Ray...), Robotnik never lost, Knuckles was never tricked and thought things out before sucker punching Sonic in the start of the game, and Tails never knew enough to repair and fly the Tornado because he's just a little kid. They then continue on to complain about how Sonic Adventure "changed" it, despite it being started long before Sonic Adventure. To say nothing of the tendency to accuse Sonic Heroes of being responsible for the current large cast, despite it having introduced exactly one new character (and he's a Jonas Quinn).
- Heroes Of Might And Magic IV made several changes to the format of the series. You could now have armies without heroes, you could have multiple heroes in one army, heroes were actually vulnerable to damage within a battle and could directly enter combat, towns now had multiple choices between different soldiers to hire, soldiers appeared in their dwellings daily instead of once-a-week and the highly useful caravan structure was introduced, allowing you to hire minions from across the map without running a hero there and back. However, because it wasn't like the very popular HOMAM 3, fanboys whined and as a consequence all the changes were reverted for the next sequel. HOMAM 5 could just as well have been titled HOMAM 3 with new graphics!
- Metroid sparked fanboy backlash when Metroid Prime was shown to be a pseudo-first person shooter.
- Hell, any 2D game going into 3D sparked backlash among the fans, even to this day.
- One HUGE exception: Grand Theft Auto. Is there anyone who likes 2D GTA better than 3D GTA ?
- Now that the second World Of Warcraft expansion is underway, the forums are filled with complaints about changes made in the beta, even though they are for the better, all things considered. People complain about nerfed talents (which have been adjusted to the new itemisation process), "bloated" talent trees (when Blizzard tries to give people a wider range of choices even in the same tree), only being able to use one potion per fight (even though that cuts down on one of the major expenses of raids) and the fact that there will be 10-man versions of all raids (supposedly devaluating the achievement of beating them). Or the fact that Blizzard dares to make classes that have a hard time finding groups more attractive.
- There are actually people on the WoW forums who spout these complaints any time a patch changes character skills or talents the slightest bit. Of course, to these people, it's always cause for complaint when their character is made weaker and it's always a cause of celebration when their character is made stronger.
- Also a problem among the WoW player base is any change to the lore. Some retcons are understandably frustrating, like Draenei being completely changed from mud people to advanced dimension-traveling aliens that don't even look the same. However, a lot of things people complain about are simply plot developments that don't go exactly how they expected it to, like Blood Elf paladins or playable Death Knights.
- Banjo-Kazooie: Nuts & Bolts. Vehicles. And the artstyle. That would explain why the game hasn't sold very well - only 140,000 units were sold in America, compared to the 1.2 million units for Fable II. Nuts & Bolts was a good game in its own right, but not a good Banjo game.
- The Elder Scrolls went through a lot of this in the jumps between mainline titles. This troper has a friend who refused to play Morrowind when he learned that the wall-climbing ability from Daggerfall was gone. And let's not get started on the kvetching over Oblivion. "What do you mean they folded Long and Short Blade into a single skill!?" "What do you mean they took out crossbows, throwing weapons, and a ton of other weapon types that were useless anyway!?" "What do you mean I always hit my enemies if they're in range to be hit!? I want my dice rolls that show misses as my sword passing straight through the enemy!" "What do you mean there's no Levitate!?" And so on, and so on...
- In a similar vein, each successive game by Bio Ware is generally condemned by a fair portion of the fanbase for not being Baldur's Gate III.
- In Naruto: Clash of Ninja Revolution 2, they had to remove some older characters (such as Zabuza, Haku, the Third Hokage, Kimimaro and Iruka) to make room for some new ones (Towa, Komachi, Yugao, Baki and Bando, all of which have never been in a Japanese game). Fans raged. Good thing Game FA Qs has several
ways to take care of this .
- This is even better because Kimimaro and the Third Hokage were only in the later Clash of Ninja games which were never even released in America.
- Though the hate on Enter the Dragonfly is more or less justified, Spyro fans are seemingly determinded to hate anything after Spyro 3. The Legend of Spyro games were the biggest change, being a total reboot in continuity, and actually taking themselves seriously. However, they are arguably good games (though perhaps not as good as the original trilogy).
- Pokemon. When Diamond and Pearl were little more than a speck on the horizon, there was a rumour going around that the starter Pokemon would be a Fighting type, a Psychic type and a Dark type instead of the traditional Grass, Fire, Water triangle. Predictably, forums were full of people complaining about how this would totally ruin the games (one popular argument was that it would be unfair for people who favour Fire types, since they are traditionally unavailable until later in the games. Apparently no-one stopped to think that this would be easily solved by simply making some Fire types available earlier on, which in fact they did). When the games were finally released with the traditional Grass/Fire/Water trio, people then complained that the game was too similar to the previous ones.
- And let's not get started on those who believe that the first three games, Red/Blue/Yellow, are the only ones that count. Especially when they go against Gold/Silver, even though they fixed issues that the original had. What's this? My Mewtwo/Butterfree can't destroy everything with one Psychic/Psybeam? What an outrage! They changed evolution lines? Pokemon like Golbat and Seadra are made useful? Scandelous! They thought that a new region should actually contain new species of Pokemon?!? HOW DARE THEY RUIN SOMETHING SO PURE! Etc, etc. Odd thing is, some go on as to attack each generation for the point that it is not their generation's Pokemon, whereas the first two generations were only two years apart, technically still being in "their" generation...
- Subverted with the remakes of Silver and Gold, Soulsilver and Heartgold. Most people seem to like the new changes to the game..Minus Soul. Relief over having a game that can be left alone for ages and then picked up and played again without having to open the cartridge and replace a battery can forgive a lot, it seems.
- There are fans who only want the original Japanese names for everything because apparently replacing Japanese puns with English puns is some sort of crime for a children's game. One complainer's reasoning, due to other Japanese imports keeping their names, Pokemon should too. And not only that, keeping the names respect the original creators.
- This is in a lot of games. Having hung around the Fire Emblem fandom for a while, this troper can honestly say that there are people who actually get pissed off by seeing someone refer to the lead character of Radiant Dawn Micaiah instead of Mikaya, even though both are pronounced the same, and more than a few simply outright refuse to call a character by the English translation of their name. This includes stuff like a character named Eddie becoming Edward in the English and European versions of the game, by the way.
- This troper remembers quite a few feathers were ruffled at the announcement of Fire Emblem: Seima no Kouseki's future American release. People all over the fandom panicked that the game's subject matter, plot and relationships (particularly Ephraim and Eirika's) would be completely watered down and sanitized to make it kid-safe, cries of "Die, NOA, die!" and hissy fits over every little name change were a daily occurrence...even the reduction of one measly stat by one point for an early boss had people foaming at the mouth. This also opened the doorway for a lot of bashing on how "badly" Rekka no Ken was localized ("Eliwood was too confident!" "Lyn was too feminist!" "Raven and Lucius's ending was changed from them being gay at home to them being gay on the road!" "They used too much fancy medieval language!" "Sain and Isadora's C support made him sound like he wanted to sleep with her so it's all NOA's fault people think he's a crazy sex hound!" and so forth).
- This happened yet again with Fire Emblem: Shadow Dragon, where many names were changed including one Trope Namer. The fans should've kept in mind that while they have been using the same set of names for the characters from the first and third game for years that they were still fan names and would've been changed during localization.
- Let us not forget how fans freakin' exploded in rage after seeing the way Fire Emblem: Radiant Dawn changed the mechanics of Fire Emblem: Path of Radiance. Some were upset at the simplified support system. Others disliked the addition of countering for healers and laguz. Several complained over the addition of weapon level SS and that knives and strikes have levels like other weapons. The three tier class system, having certain characters and events only accessible on the second playthrough, and the division of the game into 4 parts annoyed a lot of fans of Radiance and older games in the series. And a lot of these complaints came up before the game was finished!
- Since the American version of Mega Man 4, the name of Mega Man's original helper robot identity was Rock. Fair enough. Then came Mega Man Powered Up. Sure, the art style was drastically different, and yes, some of the fans are complaining about that, but let's take a look at what the game's calling Rock now. It's... Mega?? Apparently the translators thought that the game needed to be a bit slightly more in line with the Japanese versions in an unusual way — if Rock becomes Rockman in the Japanese version, why not rename him Mega just so that we can say that he just added the word "Man" to his name when he became a fighting robot in all versions of the games? Naturally, the fans complained that this ruins the Theme Naming of himself and his sister Roll. Possibly due to the Fan Backlash, Capcom quietly went back to the use of the name "Rock" as Mega Man's original form overseas, as can be seen on the American Mega Man 9 site (check the "news" section there)
.
- Before that, people were complaining about the Charge Shot and saying that it ruined the Mega Man series by making it a lot easier. Despite that, this trooper hasn't seen a charged shot hater who complained about E-Tanks which fully heal you and can be carried in abundance. Made more ridiculous by the fact that E-Tanks were introduced at least two games earlier than when the charge shot was created.
- Want something even more ridiculously hated? The Ruby-Spears cartoon. Bad enough that a great deal of the complaints are about trivial things, like the designs (ever seen the American box art?); "fans" have a tendency to treat it like it's part of the game canon despite clearly being its own continuity. (These same fans happily give Upon A Star a free pass for using the art style of the games) I suspect part of the reason is that they don't realize just how much of the games' plot was in the manual (and how much wasn't) back in the late 80s and 90s...
- Even before the game itself was released so its gameplay could justify the hate (which it did), the second Hudson Soft announced their flagship Bomberman series was going to take on a darker look in Act Zero, every hardcore Bomberman fan who probably would have been one of the very few to buy the abomination was turned off by it.
- City Of Heroes, as with most MMORPGs. Granted, Enhancement Diversification and the Global Defense Reduction were enormous nerfs, but at least they were the result of a genuine and continuing effort to rebalance the (formerly horribly broken) game. This did not stop enormous amounts of players from declaring that the game was Ruined FOREVER and that they'd cancel their subscriptions. Of course, you also get a bunch of people declaring "I'm canceling my subscription!" over individual power changes. One could make a case for City Of Heroes players having no sense of scale.
- Grand Theft Auto IV. Maybe Hype Backlash did its part, but the complaints about this game and how it changed from the Grand Theft Auto III-generation games were countless: the graphics were too colorless, vehicle physics were too unforgiving, airplanes were gone, the storyline was too grim and/or too disjointed with too many plot holes, the constant phone calls from your friends were too annoying, the city was too boring, and so forth. Most of the people who hold this trope against GTA IV have since gone on to champion Saints Row 2, which they believe holds truer to the original free-form mayhem and silliness of previous GTA titles.
- There has been a flood of topics on Game FA Qs showing patents for a game that shows an easy mode and a normal mode for a Zelda game (though it hasn't even been confirmed if the game will be Zelda). The easy mode has in-game videos that shows the player what to do if they are stuck. People are naturally complaining that this new change will destroy the Zelda franchise as they know it.
- The Dawn Of War series removed the ability to create barracks and other typical buildings for your base, like practically every other RTS, in Dawn Of War 2. The developers themselves have stated they felt basebuilding in the first game was generally just a means to the end of upgrading, bringing out and expanding your army's forces (start at paragraph 5)
, and so, just simplified the whole thing by removing that feature. Being on the They Changed It Now It Sucks page... some were vocally opposed to it.
- Suikoden fandom does this for nearly every game that isn't Suikoden II (V got off easy because it was so much like II). So when it was announced that the latest installment, Suikoden Tierkreis would essentially be a continuity reboot taking place in an alternate universe to attract new fans, it did not go over well. Several fans have refused to support the game without even playing it, even though Konami has expressed interest in revisiting the old games eventually and their ability to do so is likely dependent on the success of Tierkreis in the first place.
- The Touhou series' tenth installment, Mountain of Faith, generated discontent among fans because of the significant gameplay changes, such as powerup-based bomb system (and with it, the removal of distinctive bombs for the characters — meaning Marisa was without her trademark Master Spark) and snap-back to beginning of stage on continuing. Most damningly, however, was the removal of the graze system, where players would be rewarded points for getting as close to the bullets as possible without being hit. The graze system and personalized bombs (sort of; they corresponded with the players' partners) were later reinstated with Subterranean Animism.
- Fans were also upset with MoF's character reboot, leaving Reimu and Marisa as the sole playable characters and tossing fan-favorites such as Sakuya and Youmu aside. However, this was justified in terms of the storyline; ZUN stated
that it would be weird for someone like Sakuya to show up and head to the shrine to fight the gods. Though it would've been a damn cool thing to watch.
- The newest game, Undefined Fantastic Object, brought back the seperate bomb bar from the earlier Windows games and gave the girls their own personal Spell Cards back, as well as introduced a new character into the playable pool (SA did as well, but only to the extent that the girls' partners were unseen within gameplay.) However, the UFO mechanic for the game has been widely criticized, requiring the player to fly into three UFOs to summon a larger one to shoot down — a task proving annoying and potentially game-ending in the face of hundreds of bullets, especially since the mechanic is the only way that more lives and bombs can be obtained. Also, the red power items needed to increase the girls' power gauges only earn 0.01 point this time around, instead of 0.05 as in the earlier games.
- People seem to like the original Bubble Bobble and Rainbow Islands releases for what they are and outright put down the new-generation remakes that don't keep the original gameplay.
- Final Fantasy Tactics A 2 got some flack from people who played the previous game. MP starts a 0 instead of being full, most of the old classes were toned down to prevent them from being overpowered, and most advanced classes and extra races aren't available until you progressed in the storyline and some side quests. These factors were put in place to try and balance the game, but some people insisted that they shouldn't have to wait in getting the good stuff.
- Avernum suffered a lot of backlash from the sudden switch to the Geneforge engine in Avernum IV. While this came with a graphics upgrade and a potentially stronger gaming experience, many who liked the Avernum series for the very fact that it was graphically simple felt offended by the decision to switch.
- Animal Crossing: City Folk. "Visitors are in the city? No more in the town? Laaaaaaaame!" "Grass wear? GRASS WEAR? What the crap?"
- Just the Wii's name alone sparked this trope amongst many Nintendo fans. Before Wii even came to light, the code name (meaning the name of an in progress project and not the official console name) Revolution was assumed to be the name of Nintendo's next console. Once Wii became the official name, people whined that the name sounded too kiddy or stupid and many of a Troll had their fun by making tons of dirty jokes based on the name. While the majority of the fans have gotten over the name, some people to this day absolutely refuse to say "Wii", but prefer "Revolution" instead.
- That and the controller got this for being "waggle" mashing, while "conveniently forgetting" that they hated button mashing just as much.
- So many people declared Rune Scape to be Ruined FOREVER after the updates removing player killing. There were riots, thousands stopped playing altogether... but they did bring it back in the form of PK worlds, so it's not like they intentionally decided to alienate the player killing population.
- Turbine added an outright magic-using class to The Lord Of The Rings Online with its first expansion. Back when all we knew was "an outright magic-using class," people were frothing at the mouth because there are very few confirmed magic users in Tolkein's writings. This in a game that already allowed you to call lightning, summon Ents, and bind ghosts to your will. The players eventually ended up in two groups: "If it's fun, why not?" and They Changed It Now It Sucks.
- Star Fox has a really good example of this. With the release of Adventures, many fans whined about everything about that game, and upon the release of Assault, whined about the lack of missions and solo replay value and totally ignoring the multi-player content of the game. To them, only Star Fox 64 is the greatest game, despite that the newer games have improved the rather lacking character development that was common in the series.
- Everquest. It's been around for over a decade, and its original developer, Verant Interactive, was swallowed by Sony. So obviously, it's had a lot of changes, and this page demonstrates you can't change anything without people complaining. But to stick with the most blatantly complained about change: Planes of Power. This expansion brought the Plane of Knowledge, which had portals to every starting city, making the travelling aspect of the game obsolete. Fallout from this involved zones that were previously popular becoming abandoned as they were now inconvenient, and most of the importance of one's hometown taken away.
- Another Ever Quest one. Because it's been around for so long, so much of the player base is maxed out in level, and so it's hard for newbies to compete. So, they went and made the shared bank, which makes twinking, formerly a frowned upon concept (in the old days, people frequently refused to group with "twinks" on principal), easy and risk-free. Problem? All the guys at the end game would send down their uber gear to their lower level characters. Oh, and with each expansion pack, the uber gear gets more uber. By this point, a non-twink lower level character is absolutely hapless.
- Batman: Arkham Asylum. Harley Quinn: WRONG WRONG WRONG!
◊ Then there is Bane: Seriously. ◊
- Wait, what? Is Bane even any different? Like at all? Okay, so the Venom tank on his back is slightly larger. Fans are actually complaining about this...?
- Bane's mask in the comics covered his mouth. That's the only real difference I can spot.
- Nintendo themselves are accused of changing for the worse. Many common phrases include "sold out" or "Nintendo only cares about making money". Fans hate Nintendo's new direction in their games by making them more open to non gamers and adding motion controls. Some fans even think that if Nintendo was losing again in terms of sales, they would get better games like they did with N64 and Gamecube. Some people even want Nintendo to bring back the "seal of quality" and to be strict with 3rd parties again, all while completely ignoring the fact that the Nintendo seal never meant a game was good (Superman 64 got the seal of quality, what does that tell you?) and Nintendo's super high standards for 3rd parties is what drove some of them away.
- The renaming of The Legend of Stafy to The Legendary Starfy is already attracting complaints from longtime Sta(r)fy fans. Never mind the fact that "Stafy" was a mis-Romanization anyway, that both names are pronounced the same, and that "Starfy" is a more fitting name for a character who is, you know, a starfish...
- Who could forget Final Fantasy XII giving the battle system an overhaul? No longer were battles random and the game no longer had to load a separate screen for battles. Battles are now all on the field you walk on and you can move your character as you fight. Gambits also help micromanage your commands so players didn't have to input Attack every single time or manually heal when needed. Purists denounced the new fighting system for being too different, battles being in "real time", the game playing itself via gambits, and how there were no victory posing after every fight. Never mind the fact the battles are still mostly the same as before, just much smoother and no interrupts to do a dance for beating a bunny. Not to mention gambits make your characters only do what you told them to do and even then, they can't do everything perfectly.
- Left 4 Dead 2. Valve announced a sequel to the popular Left 4 Dead game, but it has been met with scrutiny. Many fans have expressed their disappointment with the new character designs being radically different from the original cast, the setting being like New Orleans, and adding day time to the levels.
- However, it seems to me that most are complaining that Valve, and I quote "Is making us pay more money when they promised downloadable content, they gave us an unfinished game, it took them months to give us the two versus maps and the (crappy) last stand. This has been Ruined FOREVER"
- The Wall Banger in this Left 4 Dead 2 situation is that when the game is released, it will be given The Same Now It Sucks comments. It's only a matter of time before Valve starts to lose their free pass...
- Metroid: Other M. Fans are finding anything to complain about. "Team Ninja?! What happened to Retro?", "It's going to be Ninja Gaiden in Metroid clothing!", "The art style is TOO SATURATED!", "Samus SPEAKS?! Metroid is Ruined FOREVER!!!"
- Command And Conquer, anyone? It seems that EA is unable to add a single new game mechanic without the fanbase going into a rage about it. I have personally seen a fan post that he would pay $50 a game exactly like the original Command And Conquer, but with new graphics.
- Recently, a remake of the first Persona game has been announced for the PSP. This one will give the features of portability and when released in North America, will not have the terrible translation and localization. Except that one thing stands in the way of Persona fans. The developers committed the sin of changing the music. Ruined FOREVER.
Webcomics
- This seems to be the mentality of quite a few people about when the webcomic Megatokyo underwent Cerebus Syndrome. The comic basically switched its fanbase from "people who know about shoujo manga" to "people who like shoujo manga and/or character-based plots", so while the quality is still good and the update problem has arguably improved, it did cut a few people out of it's main circle. And since these people are those who don't like things...well...
- The character of Fanboy in the Magic The Gathering webcomic UG Madness plays out this trope a lot, mimicing the Unpleasable Fanbase of the game, as seen here
. The actual author of the comic, though, is more reasonable, as show in strips such as this .
- This mindset is satirized in this page
of Shortpacked.
- There was quite a bit of backlash when Andrew Hussie of MS Paint Adventures began his new series Homestuck, with many people complaining that it was too slow-paced and not as funny as the recently-completed Problem Sleuth. Then the Wham Episode hit, and most of the vocal critics were shut up for a while.
Web Original
- Often invoked by fans of evolving items on the avatar and forum site Gaia Online - despite the fact that the entire point of the EIs is that they undergo dramatic changes every few weeks.
Western Animation
- Any of the Robo Cop cartoons will do. Hell the second one gets more flak because Murphy simply has more gadgets, and he gets called "go go gadget cop".
- Transformers has gotten this pretty much since Beast Wars. Despite the fact that the fandom itself has its own self-deprecating phrase for the trope: "TRUKK NOT MUNKY
", regarding the complaints over Optimus Primal being a gorilla, which isn't actually a monkey at all. The more general term is "GEEWUN ".
- We'll never know how the fans' heads exploded when they first saw the character designs for Transformers Animated, or when they found out it would have human villains, with the Decepticons being a recurring threat and not the only one, or the fact that Optimus Prime would be voiced by David Kaye (who before has primarily voiced Megatron), or that Optimus was a firetruck (until they realized he was technically a semi-truck outfitted as a firetruck. Then some were upset that he didn't have smoke stacks...), and let's not forget about Optimus not being the leader of all the Autobots. There are even people going berserk that the new Soundwave doesn't sound exactly like the old one (Frank Welker is expensive nowadays, one presumes). Transformers Animated, however, has managed to convert many of those same naysayers (such as This Troper) through much story, design, and casting Shout Outs that show that the writers had indeed Shown Their Work. Even so, some Fan Dumb just won't quit.
- In the live-action movie, many were pissed that Optimus was a Peterbilt instead of a regular trailer (which was done to prevent large amounts of mass-changing between vehicle and robot modes). Not only that, but Bumblebee was a Camaro and not the original VW beetle, Megatron was a jet, not a Really Big Gun...
- Though most of the "change" causing absolute fury in Transformers Fan Dumb is the prominence of humans in the story... y'know, humans, the dominant life form on the planet the story is taking place on? These fans consider it a change that the humans weren't shown briefly in the background occasionally as a catalyst for the story, while the camera stayed firmly on robots the entire time; in spite of the fact that many, many episodes of the original cartoon were pretty human-centric (Spike, Chip Chase, Carly, others). So, y'know, basically they were pissed that the movie wasn't Beast Wars. "Trukk not munky" indeed.
- The recent episode of The Simpsons episode "That 90's Show" is hated by many fans entirely because it was a an alternate backstory for Homer and Marge. This despite the fact that the show has never had anything even resembling continuity and has always operated on a sliding time-scale. What's even more ridiculous is that a lot of professional reviewers were actually getting away with massive amounts of Fan Dumb, like Robert Canning
who literally spent four-fifth of the review bitching about this instead of the actual content of the episode, gave it a 3/10, and called it "an abomination". Simpsons' "continuity" is Serious Business.
- Another thing is that this is a massive exaggeration of the effect, claiming that it RetConned away every past event established to have happened. If you accept that the show has a sliding timeline (which it very obviously does), the only thing this changes is that Marge went to college for a short time and Homer formed a band between them graduating and Marge getting pregnant. So it's more along the lines of :"They made their Expansion Pack Past and use of Comic Book Time come with somewhat more obvious Ret Cons and they've thus thrown out all other previously established past events, now it suck".
- The seasons when Mike Scully was show-runner (9-12) are often denounced as a Dork Age for simply being weirder then the most. This also leads some fans to make the ridiculous claim other episodes were "realistic" instead of just not as strange.
- As if people aren't already displeased with the current state of the show, in season 20 the intro was permanently changed for the first time ever. It was remade to go along with the show's widescreen HD makeover. The completely newly animated sequence features various minor characters and gags that weren't there before.
- Which is itself wrong: this isn't the first time the opening change, it's the second: it changed the first time in season 2 and did pretty much the same thing the third opening did (added characters that were since introduced).
- Toonami got a lot of this; fans themselves are a broken base as to whether it sucked when (in Toonami's last change in style) TOM received a childish look and a face instead of a helmet (being a robot, it was assumed to be his whole head), the AI character SARA disappeared with no explanation and was replaced with robots similar in design to the new TOM, and the setting was changed to a jungle planet outpost instead of the spaceship Absolution. Of course, there was a similar reaction way back when after TOM replaced Moltar...
- Lampshaded by "Yahtzee" Croshaw when the introduction of an original theme tune and new intro sequence for Zero Punctuation created predictable backlash; the weekly update to his website
was titled "You Changed It Now It Sucks".
- In fact, every week, the video thread is evenly divided between "best one evar!!!!!!11" and this complaint.
- Winx Club: Here's a YouTube discussion
which has quite a few complaints about 4Kids cutting what amounts to a Filler scene. Your contributor has a friend who refers to said scene as useless and is thankful it was cut. Can't say I disagree...
- Thomas The Tank Engine fans on hearing the show would be switching from models to CGI. Caused acts of Fan Dumb on You Tube. Then again Gullane and Hit have made plenty of changes to the series before this so the fans have been saying "it sucks" for a while now.
- This Troper keeps encountering someone that absolutely furious that in Batman The Brave And The Bold Batman's parents died when he was mad at them over a Christmas present.
- You would think he would focus more on the fact that the humor has devolved to Adam West-era puns, Batman practically having super strength, Batarangs being made of cellophane peeled from his chest logo (???), or that he's voiced by Hoss Delgado making him even harder to take seriously.
- Those are more about what era of comic the series is based on.
- Fairly Odd Parents-Fans believe that about season 4-7 and the main character's Flanderization and Jerkassness. I believe they are half-right and half-wrong.
- Mattel has announced that they will release 'Tween Dora' to appeal to older girls. Many are expecting Bratz Dora.
- Doug-Fans of the Nickelodeon verison were and probably still known to trash the Disney verison, because of all the changes that were made to it and because it was Disney making it now!
- Though The Spectacular Spider-Man is very well received by comic book fans and others, there are people who do not like the show for things such as the style, Shocker not being Herman Schultz, but Montana of the Enforcers, Venom's design, there may be other reasons I'm forgetting to list, but I'm obviously not forgetting about some of the more Militant fans of the previous series.
- This Troper's friend appearantly hates the show. When asked why, he came up with reasons such as: "they stole all their plotlines from the film series" and "Peter has a mole on his face, which he's never had before". This is odd, since he's essentially both complaining about the show being too similar AND too different from other sources.
- Fans of Avatar The Last Airbender are already criticizing M. Night Shyamalan's soon-to-release film adaptation based upon set photos, casting news, and a single teaser trailer. Most arguments seem to focus on the choice of casting for the film, and some fans have even organized a RaceBending
community on Live Journal. Whether this is fandom dumb or not is largely up to question. Nonetheless, the fanbase seems rather split in its opinions about the film .
Tabletop Games
- Among the Magic: The Gathering changes this has been applied to: The Sixth Edition rules changes, the Eighth Edition card face changes, removing Armageddon from the base set, making counterspells more expensive, moving from "Xth Edition" to "Magic 20XX", the Great Creature Type Update, the creation of Type 2, the name change from Type 2 to Standard... and so on.
- Now the M10 rules changes have been announced, this is (at the time of writing) in full swing. How many of the complaints are justified, history will judge. This Troper has his own opinions/flamebait - without going into detail: most of the time, the game will play exactly the same, aside from slightly altered vocabulary; on the other hand, the times when it plays differently are going to be among the more dramatic moments under either set of rules.
- Among more legitimate complaints, this comes up a lot when Dungeons And Dragons editions are discussed. The base is not so much broken as it is shattered into a billion tiny splinters.
- 4th Edition Forgotten Realms. Nuff said.
- When people on the Privateer Press forums found out that one of the newest units for Warmachine was going to be plastic instead of metal, reactions were...mixed. Many people welcomed the change but a particularly vocal minority condemned it for straying from the "Full Metal Fantasy" aesthetic that the company had cultivated up to that point, among other things. Apparently they wouldn't weigh the same as metal models. No, this troper doesn't get it either.
- It's either something to do with a feel of solidity, or the vocal minority use their Warmachine figures as sling ammunition and don't want to have to correct their aim.
- While World of Darkness/Storyteller System was never considered a very good simulationist system ([1]), the nWoD/Wo D 2.0 seems to be simplistic beyond description: resisted rolls as we knew them are gone, there is only one difficulty (8), botches only occur under rare circumstances and aren't factored with decent skill level, weapons don't differentiate between accuracy and damage etc.
- Simplicity can be a good thing - look at the poster child for excessive complexity, FATAL.
Real Life
- Fans of the Ford Mustang
pony car adopted this attitude when the 5.0-liter Windsor V8 was replaced with the 4.6 liter Modular motor in 1996. Eventually, they came around, and the aftermarket heavily supports the Mod motors. Now, Ford is gearing up to introduce a 5.0 liter Modular motor in the 2010 calendar year, about a year or so after the new refresh hits dealers...
- While This Troper is talking about cars, the new Nissan 370Z
has a feature called Synchro Rev Match, which automatically blips the throttle during downshifting for effortless power delivery and to keep RPM's in check. Driving snobs cried foul almost from the word go , as they felt it would be the end of heel-toe downshifting , nevermind that A.)Synchro Rev Match can be switched off, and B.) it's part of a sports package, so not ordering it will keep it out of the car (although it means that you won't equip your car with a limited-slip differential, 19-inch wheels and tires and bigger brakes).
- Let's not get started about the reaction to the 370Z's styling, especially the headlights and taillights...
- And all this happened despite the 370Z being a better car than what came before it.
It's lighter by about 95 pounds compared to the outgoing 350Z, has 30 more horsepower, and, well, the numbers speak for themselves...
- Let's be honest, most people do care more about how a car looks than it's stats.
- One more car related one. The Mopar Community universally said They Changed It Now It Sucks with a little Ruined FOREVER when it was revealed that the Dodge Charger
would be resurrected... as a four-door sedan. Massive amounts of Fan Dumb ensued, never mind that the nameplate was defiled previously, that the Charger sedan is RWD and has a Hemi (not quite) like its celebrated predecessor, and that making the Charger a sedan instead of a muscle car gave Dodge the avenue to bring back another muscle car classic... needless to say, once the Challenger was brought back, all was forgiven.
- If someone sat somewhere just once where you normally do, even though there's nothing which makes it 'yours' in anyway, you probably felt a bit annoyed.
- This troper had a thing about this in High School. In classrooms where there were no assigned seats and people could sit anywhere, which was all of them, said troper would freak out and essentially yell at anyone who sat in "his" seat until they got out. Blame OCD. Actually, OCD would probably explain a lot of these kinds of people.
- This troper and his friends would deliberately migrate around the classroom whenever we didn't have assigned seats; the sole reason being that no one else ever did that, and we wanted to mess with their heads.
- This troper's friend keeps sitting next to this one girl he kinda likes. Not helped by the fact that said friend is in his seat half an hour before class even begins.
- The sheer number of references to most dubs of anime as "Macekres" on this very wiki. Sure, I can think of some anime that fit that bill to a T (the 4Kids version of One Piece), but ye gods.
- On that note, most everyone here constantly complains about even the most minor bit of Adaptation Decay. Because a movie that takes one small detail out of the book it's based on can't be loved or seen as a classic or good in its own right by anyone. Ever.
- This Troper has Nonverbal Learning Disorder. Along with giving symptoms of a TV Genius, it also makes it very difficult to adjust to change after settling in to a clear routine. Which is why I must add:
- A 20 example list of angry rants has been removed for the benefit of the readers, and to discourage angry Flame Wars.
- This troper, after seeing this happen way too many times to count, has concluded that there's just no pleasing most people.
- When radio stations change formats, there will always be people complaining about the changes. I give you: Rob Sherwood's Story
. The radio station in question is one of that market's most fondly-remembered stations, I might add...
- Opal Fruits turning into Starburst, and combining Lemon and Lime together to allow space for the blackcurrant.
- What the hell is a blackcurrant? Anyway, the real problem isn't with the changes to the Original Flavor pack (although personally, I would've liked a lime one here in the States); it's with the Tropical Fruits. They got rid of Kiwi Banana and Tropical Punch and replaced them with "Royal Berry Punch" and something claiming to be Pińa Colada, leaving Mango Melon as the only remaining edible flavor in what used to be my favorite mix! I'm sticking with the originals, thanks.
- This troper is calling it that in February of 2009, when the federal government of the United States is forcing all free over-the-air broadcast stations to change their signals from analog to digital, we're going to get a lot of people complain about adjusting to the change.
- We did. For various reasons, the date has been bumped back to June.
- The UK's going through Digital Switchover gradually, with some areas of the country changing before others. There are complaints, all right.
- In an inversion of this trope, this editor has been complaining about the Australian government taking too damn long to shut off the analogue TV system ever since digital broadcasts started back in 2001.
- Microsoft's beta release of their new OS, Windows 7, has already generated complaints about how some things were cut out from Vista or changed for the worst.
- Not to mention Vista itself, which broke all sorts of usage patterns that Windows users had gotten accustomed to over the years and forced you to relearn about half the operating system from scratch.
- As well as obsfucating simple tasks by hiding them behind several layers of menus when they used to be accessed immediately directly from the Desktop or Start Menu.
- Not to mention getting rid of some features completely. Like the ability to search for files on your computer
- It's there. Open any folder, and there is a search box in the upper-right corner.
- Distilling the Vista problem was the "Ribbon"
interface for Microsoft Word 2007, due to get added to new versions of many of Microsoft's other programs. The internet raged with the voice of a thousand IT people who will have to retrain employees once they inevitably upgrade. It is, from a complete newcomer's perspective, better to be more graphical and icon-laden, but people have gotten so used to the menu system for over a decade it's quite jarring.
- It is often stereotyped that senior citizens complain about everything that is current just because it's different from the stuff they were used to when growing up (TVs, phones, etc.).
- This troper has been to the real Moulin Rouge in Paris - or stood outside it, anyway. It's now an overpriced tourist trap with a red neon windmill on the front.
- Television Without Pity. Bad Sign #1: Three original editors depart a year after Bravo buys the site. Then the site was redesigned to include a lot more widgets, style flourishes and assorted clutter. More editors left. And the site started covering a lot more reality programming, especially Bravo's Top Chef, Top Design, etc. and scaling back some of the previously in-depth recaps with more glib, bare-bones "weecaps." About the only things left from the site as it once was are the Supernatural fangirl bridgade and the recapper Jacob. This troper still reads Jacob's articles, but his increasingly unique fannish-academic style isn't for everyone.
- This Troper encountered someone who kept complaining that Final Fantasy IV DS was the worst adaptation of the game he'd seen. After pressing, it was eventually revealed that he complained of this because it had been changed enough that he could no longer beat it by rote memorization, and he had thus lost fighting the second boss.
- Major League Baseball created the World Baseball Classic to try to promote the growth of the game in other countries, modeling it in large part after the World Cup and handling matters of advancing similarly in the inaugural event in 2006 (round-robin pool play, top 2 teams from each pool advance—then they had a second round of pool play, which differs from the World Cup, but whatever). Many people railed against the whole idea of the WBC itself, but only because they were worried that players could get hurt competing at such a high level when they would normally be in Spring Training. Because they wanted to avoid having it in the same year as the aforementioned World Cup, it was announced right away that after the inaugural 2006 WBC, it would be held every four years starting in 2009. Here we are in 2009, and pool play now looks like this: The four teams in a pool are matched up in two games. The winners of the first two games play each other next, and the losers play each other. The loser of the loser game (0-2) is out, while the winner of the loser game plays the loser of the winner game (both 1-1), with the loser being eliminated. Now, here's the really stupid part: The winner of the 1-1 game, now at 2-1, has to play the winner of the first winner game, at 2-0, with the winner of that game winning the pool. Remember, the runner-up from the pool also advances. What the hell? Instead of playing each of the other three teams once, one team has to play four games, and theoretically could end up not playing one of the other three teams (say A beats B and C beats D, then A beats C in the winner game, D beats B in the loser game, and then C beats D again in the 1-1 game, C has played four games and never got to face B.) Pool play is not supposed to work that way! Bring back the round robins!
- Facebook suffers from this big time every time there's a major change to their layout.
- Before the new layout was forced upon everyone they had it set up so that you could use either the old or new. If they had left it like that it would have saved everyone a lot of grief.
- Many of the complaints is that they turned Facebook into a My Space clone, when it used to be seen as the "anti-My Space".
- Speaking of MySpace, that got some backlash when everyone, not just people under 16, could set their profiles to private (without setting their age to less than 16). People complained that the staff ruined the fun and purpose of MySpace, believing that the privacy of individuals who like not being easily stalked by internet predators was a small price to pay. One user even went as far as to suggest that MySpace should become an 18-and-up site with absolutely no privacy.
- Two words: New Coke
.
- Ebay. Every change made, good or bad, if followed by endless ranting in the blogosphere and hastily-organized boycotts.
- "Sci-Fi/SciFi/Sci Fi/Sci-fi/Scifi Channel" changed it's named to SyFy. No one cares that it's pronounced the same and exists mostly so they can have a name that can be trademarked. All they care about is having a focus for their hate of the channel's geniune Network Decay.
- Google's exploits with You Tube.
- Speaking of Youtube, they recently announced a new channel design that will be forced upon all users on July 15th. So far, no one likes it, saying it's buggy and slow and horribly designed. Many people are ditching Youtube over this.
- Australian Football has regular rule changes, all of which lead to massive fan outcry. Some work out for the better by most people's opinion (such as the rushed behind rule introduced in 2009) whilst others such as the "hands in the back" rule introduced in 2007 (explained in the other wiki
) is almost universally hated.
Misc
- If a design of a major website gets changed, it can likely cause upset and confusion.
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