I hate hype culture
In the gaming community, early June is the period of time we all come together and wait for announcements from big and small software houses. This year was no exception and I think we got a lot of promising stuff this time around. A lot of stuff I don't really care about, but Xenoblade is back, Square Enix woke up and gave us updates on their major projects that have been MIA for quite some time and many other smaller scale JRPG to look forward to. I don't think I'm necessarily "hyped" though. I'm happy some games are coming out, some other got me curious, but there's nothing that makes me go like "I want it right now, I can't wait!!!". Yeah, not even KH4. I actually kind of hate when I'm hyped for something.
I don't want to have high expectations, it ruins every single experience for me. Every little flaw becomes a stain that I cannot stop looking at, even if the rest of the experience is excellent. I want an experience to be promising or to "vibe with it". That's probably why most of my favourite things have big flaws, but also other very special qualities (to me at least). If I forsee a flaw, it doesn't feel so big to me. Am I strange in felling this way?
That's why I don't like hype. It comes with expectations.
Take Kingdom Hearts. It's a silly series, I'm not gonna deny that. Owned by Disney, so it's gonna have Disney bullshit. It's Tetsuya Nomura's precious child, a project where he has a say, and of course it's gonna put all of his ideas there1. It's gonna have a lot of flaws. I know it, I expect it, I still have fun and it's still one of my favorite series.
I liked KH3. It's got a lot of bullshit, but I had fun playing it. I don't think I would have been able to enjoy it that much if during the wait I was so sure it would have been the best game ever, as many people did. "After so many years it HAS to be great!", it doesn't work like that...
I also notoriously haven't enjoyed "that much" many games considered masterpieces (I can think of Lost Odyssey and Expedition 33), mostly because of the hype around them. I won't deny their qualities, but since they're supposed to be so absolutely perfect, the things I don't like (or simply that didn't meet my expectations) feel far more prominent2.
So, yeah. Hype is not for me. I kind of don't get why people seek it. But, hey, if it works for you, I'm happy for you!