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Confessions of a GameFAQs troll, AMA

DonkeyPunchJr

World’s Biggest Weeb
Hey guys, I have a confession to make. I am a former GameFAQs troll.

It started on the Wii U board. I was there because I was genuinely interested in the upcoming system and I wanted to learn more about it and talk with others who were also excited about it. But I quickly learned that the fanboys were even worse than the trolls that they so despised.

EVERY perceived slight, every tidbit of unflattering information, every negative rumor NEEDED to be responded to. Even if it was totally obvious that someone was just concern trolling, it couldn’t be ignored. Not only did it deserve a snarky response, but Team Nintendo needed to have the last word. What this meant was that the board was dominated by dipshits bickering with each other, going back and forth for page after page, forgetting what they were even arguing about, just trying to “win” the argument.

Even worse, the responses were usually not a defense of Nintendo per se. More often, it would just be a deliberate attempt to antagonize the other side (and that other side was usually Sony). “But Sony this” “But Sony that” “Sony had to sell their headquarters” “599 US dollars” “Lol PlayStation Vita” etc. Even if nobody had mentioned Sony up until that point, “but Sony” was the most common response to a negative Nintendo rumor.

Positive rumors, on the other hand, had to be hyped up to 11 and interpreted in the most hyperbolic way possible. One comedic example was when the Darksiders devs said something like “we are happy with the hardware, we didn’t have to make any compromises in order to bring Darksiders to Wii U”. One of the prominent fanboys there took that to mean “they have the PC version of Darksiders running on the Wii U dev kit at 1080p 60 FPS with all settings maxed out, PS3 and Xbox 360 can’t come close”. (I remember that quote because I eventually made it my signature).

Eventually I gave up. I realized it was impossible to have a civil, productive discussion on that site. Instead, it became a game in itself trying to rile people up and get as many responses as possible.

initially my troll persona was kind of a “party pooper” downplaying expectations in a derisive manner and mocking those who hyped it up to unreasonable levels. I saw myself as doing them a favor, bringing balance to the board.

Eventually I decided to be the ultimate parody of a GameFAQs Nintendo fanboy. I made it my job to repeat every flimsy or ridiculous pro-Nintendo argument I read on that board. “Wii U dev kits were intentionally down-clocked to see what devs could do, the final version will be more powerful” “Wii U is based on the same technology as IBM Watson” “it’s lazy developers who refuse to adapt to GPGPU programming” “EA stabbed them in the back” “ignorant consumers” “the Japanese Yen is too strong” “Playstation 4 will cost close to $1000” etc etc etc.

it was…. Actually pretty hilarious. The smartest people on both sides figured out what was going on and thought it was funny. They’d play along sometimes. Everybody else would take me seriously and either get in an argument with me (where I’d make progressively more ridiculous claims) or agree with me and make themselves look stupid.


So, thanks for reading. That’s how trolls are made. Any questions?
 
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DonkeyPunchJr

World’s Biggest Weeb
When do you plan to lose your virginity?
This is no laughing matter. I’m saving myself for my real life Tifa. A woman with giant jiggling tits, the body of a porn star, yet the personality of a sweet innocent girl next door who has never known the touch of a man. She will see through my antisocial behavior and initiate a relationship with me, eventually resulting in coitus.

I have standards. I am willing to wait.
 

German Hops

GAF's Nicest Lunch Thief
This is no laughing matter. I’m saving myself for my real life Tifa. A woman with giant jiggling tits, the body of a porn star, yet the personality of a sweet innocent girl next door who has never known the touch of a man. She will see through my antisocial behavior and initiate a relationship with me, eventually resulting in coitus.

I have standards. I am willing to wait.
Fair enough.

 
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DonkeyPunchJr

World’s Biggest Weeb
How does it feel being on the right side of history? Game FAQs is just Reeejectera-lite at this point. Especially 261.
Is it that bad now? Haven’t been back in a while. It used to be that the mods were very strict about overt insults and bad language but they were totally oblivious to trolling and toxic behavior.

no regrets though. That place turned into such a dumpster fire. Eventually I got tired of trying to put the fire out and decided I’d pour some gasoline on it and enjoy the show.
 

killatopak

Gold Member
I do frequent some boards on GameFAQS but I guess I’m lucky there isn’t much trolling going on.

Though there are some random sjw pandering, it isn’t a regular thing at least from the boards I go to. I guess there isn’t much because those I go to are pretty niche where there’s like less than 20 posts a day.
 
Eventually I decided to be the ultimate parody of a GameFAQs Nintendo fanboy. I made it my job to repeat every flimsy or ridiculous pro-Nintendo argument I read on that board. “Wii U dev kits were intentionally down-clocked to see what devs could do, the final version will be more powerful” “Wii U is based on the same technology as IBM Watson” “it’s lazy developers who refuse to adapt to GPGPU programming” “EA stabbed them in the back” “ignorant consumers” “the Japanese Yen is too strong” “Playstation 4 will cost close to $1000” etc etc etc.
You should go work for DF, they love the kind of predictions you make.
 
When do you plan to lose your virginity?
755728.jpg


That one was from half court bro. Damn lol.
 

DonkeyPunchJr

World’s Biggest Weeb
What was your endgame?
My hope was that the members, or at least the mods, would wise up. That they’d realize that trolls and fanboys feed on each other, and that sometimes fanboys are even worse than the trolls they’re trying to combat.

I see the fanboys as like, a guy who leaves a bunch of cash sitting on their dashboard. Their car keeps getting broken into and they cry “man fuck those thieves smashing my window and taking my money.” But they keep putting more money on their dashboard. They incentivize the exact behavior they complain about.

Trolls get handsomely rewarded with the attention they crave.

Did the message get across? Eh probably not. Haven’t been back in a while so I’m not sure if it’s any better now (I’m guessing not)
 

Nikana

Go Go Neo Rangers!
My hope was that the members, or at least the mods, would wise up. That they’d realize that trolls and fanboys feed on each other, and that sometimes fanboys are even worse than the trolls they’re trying to combat.

I see the fanboys as like, a guy who leaves a bunch of cash sitting on their dashboard. Their car keeps getting broken into and they cry “man fuck those thieves smashing my window and taking my money.” But they keep putting more money on their dashboard. They incentivize the exact behavior they complain about.

Trolls get handsomely rewarded with the attention they crave.

Did the message get across? Eh probably not. Haven’t been back in a while so I’m not sure if it’s any better now (I’m guessing not)
Do you think other fanboys know they are doing it for attention/are that far gone or are they jsut as aware of what they are doing as you were?
 

DonkeyPunchJr

World’s Biggest Weeb
Do you think other fanboys know they are doing it for attention/are that far gone or are they jsut as aware of what they are doing as you were?
Honestly I think all the fanboys I encountered were the real deal. Their personal sense of identity and self worth was tied to a video game company. They’d react to criticism of their favorite company the same way one might react to someone trying to convince them their wife is ugly or their kid is a juvenile delinquent.

They didn’t care whether trolls were seeking attention. It just burned them up inside to see their team suffer some indignity and they HAD to respond.

On a side note, I recently googled one of the fanboy’s names (same dude who said that Darksiders quote) and he is now some Sandy Hook-denying lunatic.
 
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Bernkastel

Ask me about my fanboy energy!
This is no laughing matter. I’m saving myself for my real life Tifa. A woman with giant jiggling tits, the body of a porn star, yet the personality of a sweet innocent girl next door who has never known the touch of a man. She will see through my antisocial behavior and initiate a relationship with me, eventually resulting in coitus.

I have standards. I am willing to wait.
She also needs to be a pro martial artist.
 

Bernkastel

Ask me about my fanboy energy!
My hope was that the members, or at least the mods, would wise up. That they’d realize that trolls and fanboys feed on each other, and that sometimes fanboys are even worse than the trolls they’re trying to combat.
They have mods? It seemed like twitter to me, where everyone can run wild and become a self mockery.
 

DonkeyPunchJr

World’s Biggest Weeb
She also needs to be a pro martial artist.
That would be nice but I’m trying to have reasonable expectations. I’m well aware of what I bring to table. Given that, I’d be willing to settle for a yoga instructor or maybe an above average instagram influencer.
 

Nikana

Go Go Neo Rangers!
Honestly I think all the fanboys I encountered were the real deal. Their personal sense of identity and self worth was tied to a video game company. They’d react to criticism of their favorite company the same way one might react to someone trying to convince them their wife is ugly or their kid is a juvenile delinquent.

They didn’t care whether trolls were seeking attention. It just burned them up inside to see their team suffer some indignity and they HAD to respond.

On a side note, I recently googled one of the fanboy’s names (same dude who said that Darksiders quote) and he is now some Sandy Hook-denying lunatic.
I like to think that fanboys know they are being fanboyish for the sake of being fanboys but based on your answer seems I am wrong.

Do you think this place is better?
 

Fare thee well

Neophyte
I've never understood fanatically tracking the economic and production details of these companies (sony, nintendo, microsoft, etc). I feel like some people just got out of a shareholders boardroom meeting. 'Star Citizen just reached 400million in funding' 'Sony reports its highest quarter of sales to date.' Fuckin yuck.

Hello? Games? Idk, I guess if it excites someone, fine. I just will never get it.

I'm glad you did your trolling. Satire is an essential service. 😄
 
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cireza

Banned
Hey guys, I have a confession to make. I am a former GameFAQs troll.

It started on the Wii U board. I was there because I was genuinely interested in the upcoming system and I wanted to learn more about it and talk with others who were also excited about it. But I quickly learned that the fanboys were even worse than the trolls that they so despised.

EVERY perceived slight, every tidbit of unflattering information, every negative rumor NEEDED to be responded to. Even if it was totally obvious that someone was just concern trolling, it couldn’t be ignored. Not only did it deserve a snarky response, but Team Nintendo needed to have the last word. What this meant was that the board was dominated by dipshits bickering with each other, going back and forth for page after page, forgetting what they were even arguing about, just trying to “win” the argument.

Even worse, the responses were usually not a defense of Nintendo per se. More often, it would just be a deliberate attempt to antagonize the other side (and that other side was usually Sony). “But Sony this” “But Sony that” “Sony had to sell their headquarters” “599 US dollars” “Lol PlayStation Vita” etc. Even if nobody had mentioned Sony up until that point, “but Sony” was the most common response to a negative Nintendo rumor.

Positive rumors, on the other hand, had to be hyped up to 11 and interpreted in the most hyperbolic way possible. One comedic example was when the Darksiders devs said something like “we are happy with the hardware, we didn’t have to make any compromises in order to bring Darksiders to Wii U”. One of the prominent fanboys there took that to mean “they have the PC version of Darksiders running on the Wii U dev kit at 1080p 60 FPS with all settings maxed out, PS3 and Xbox 360 can’t come close”. (I remember that quote because I eventually made it my signature).

Eventually I gave up. I realized it was impossible to have a civil, productive discussion on that site. Instead, it became a game in itself trying to rile people up and get as many responses as possible.

initially my troll persona was kind of a “party pooper” downplaying expectations in a derisive manner and mocking those who hyped it up to unreasonable levels. I saw myself as doing them a favor, bringing balance to the board.

Eventually I decided to be the ultimate parody of a GameFAQs Nintendo fanboy. I made it my job to repeat every flimsy or ridiculous pro-Nintendo argument I read on that board. “Wii U dev kits were intentionally down-clocked to see what devs could do, the final version will be more powerful” “Wii U is based on the same technology as IBM Watson” “it’s lazy developers who refuse to adapt to GPGPU programming” “EA stabbed them in the back” “ignorant consumers” “the Japanese Yen is too strong” “Playstation 4 will cost close to $1000” etc etc etc.

it was…. Actually pretty hilarious. The smartest people on both sides figured out what was going on and thought it was funny. They’d play along sometimes. Everybody else would take me seriously and either get in an argument with me (where I’d make progressively more ridiculous claims) or agree with me and make themselves look stupid.


So, thanks for reading. That’s how trolls are made. Any questions?
Great read. Would read again.
 

DonkeyPunchJr

World’s Biggest Weeb
I like to think that fanboys know they are being fanboyish for the sake of being fanboys but based on your answer seems I am wrong.

Do you think this place is better?
This place is 100x better. Obviously there are still fanboys here but GAF has some actual standards of behavior. So that kind of tit-for-tat poop flinging usually doesn’t last long here. And the perpetrators get shamed/banned for their behavior.
 

Sub_Level

wants to fuck an Asian grill.
Gamefaqs was based and I have very fond memories of posting there. I only came to gaf in 2009 because I noticed more and more threads there on breaking news would link here. Not to mention I was an MGS3 & MGS4 board vet but that community fizzled out after MGS4 finally came out in 2008.

If I never made the jump from gamefaqs to neogaf my life would've been totally different. I'd probably actually have met girls and done better in college. But my interest in videogames would have faded. Glad I came here.
 

SkylineRKR

Member
Gamefaqs lol

It was one of the first sites I ever visited. Like many gamers in the late 90's probably, looking for solutions. Their guides were good.

But those boards man, fuck that. I signed up around y2k. Awful. Even back then. Lots of elitists not accepting new members, and lots of guys who would flat out tell you your opinion is wrong. There was absolutely no way you could start a civil discussion there. They also enforced backseat modding, I think you'd get Karma if you marked someone rightfully? Anyway, their censorship was hilarious. Gay would be moderated, even when used in context IIRC. Probably dozens of shitheads marking you if you said the word. Fuck and Shit were not possible.

I think there were some small boards, about niche stuff, those were okay people. The most toxic were the hardware boards, and I think the FF social boards had a bad rep. There was also LUE, which was weird.
 

DonkeyPunchJr

World’s Biggest Weeb
I've never understood fanatically tracking the economic and production details of these companies (sony, nintendo, microsoft, etc). I feel like some people just got out of a shareholders boardroom meeting. 'Star Citizen just reached 400million in funding' 'Sony reports its highest quarter of sales to date.' Fuckin yuck.

Hello? Games? Idk, I guess if it excites someone, fine. I just will never get it.

I'm glad you did your trolling. Satire is an essential service. 😄
I mean… I am interested in the business side as well. I like it when devs are financially rewarded for making a game I like, and I’m glad when they are incentivized to make more games like it.

but yeah it gets ridiculous sometimes. They love using financial info as a club to beat the other side with, then pretend like they don’t care about finances when it looks bad for their side.
 
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DonkeyPunchJr

World’s Biggest Weeb
Gamefaqs lol

It was one of the first sites I ever visited. Like many gamers in the late 90's probably, looking for solutions. Their guides were good.

But those boards man, fuck that. I signed up around y2k. Awful. Even back then. Lots of elitists not accepting new members, and lots of guys who would flat out tell you your opinion is wrong. There was absolutely no way you could start a civil discussion there. They also enforced backseat modding, I think you'd get Karma if you marked someone rightfully? Anyway, their censorship was hilarious. Gay would be moderated, even when used in context IIRC. Probably dozens of shitheads marking you if you said the word. Fuck and Shit were not possible.

I think there were some small boards, about niche stuff, those were okay people. The most toxic were the hardware boards, and I think the FF social boards had a bad rep. There was also LUE, which was weird.
I was really active on the Star Ocean 2 board back in the day. That place was a riot. But yeah some of the boards got really nasty and elitist.

And yeah the modding there was so stupid. If I said something like post 4 (obviously joking and people find it funny, but it has some naughty words) then I’d get modded almost immediately.

Whereas if I posted some low effort bait like idk “Nintendo needs to be more mature to appeal to adult gamers” then they would ignore it as it turned into a 500 post flame war.
 

SkylineRKR

Member
I was really active on the Star Ocean 2 board back in the day. That place was a riot. But yeah some of the boards got really nasty and elitist.

And yeah the modding there was so stupid. If I said something like post 4 (obviously joking and people find it funny, but it has some naughty words) then I’d get modded almost immediately.

Whereas if I posted some low effort bait like idk “Nintendo needs to be more mature to appeal to adult gamers” then they would ignore it as it turned into a 500 post flame war.

The Saturn board was really good by the way, and the DC board was decent. Those consoles were out of the game or close to it, and had only true supporters left. Usually helping eachother out with good deals and all. But the most populated boards were generally a cesspit. But its kind of amazing the FFVII PSX board is still alive. I posted there in like, 1999.

The modding on GF is the worst i've ever seen probably. It was remarkable. Dunno how it is nowadays.
 
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DonkeyPunchJr

World’s Biggest Weeb
The Saturn board was really good by the way, and the DC board was decent. Those consoles were out of the game or close to it, and had only true supporters left. Usually helping eachother out with good deals and all. But the most populated boards were generally a cesspit. But its kind of amazing the FFVII PSX board is still alive. I posted there in like, 1999.

The modding on GF is the worst i've ever seen probably. It was remarkable. Dunno how it is nowadays.
Remember VeghEster? That is the one guy who I’m honestly not sure if he was a troll or just “on the spectrum”.

Dude would go to various JRPG boards and “help” people by recommending all these convoluted game-breaking strategies that took lots of effort. E.g. on the Star Ocean 2 board his answer to EVERYTHING was the bloody armor trick (basically you’d equip your whole party with armor that makes you invincible but continually drains your HP, then counteract it by continually healing. Effective but takes a lot of setup to get it working)

He was on there for like 20 years until he got banned.
 

Sub_Level

wants to fuck an Asian grill.
The modding system there was funny. You could appeal all the way up to an admin (once per x amount of time, but still true regardless).

I was like 12 years old and the admin had to personally address my appeal lmao
 

Kev Kev

Member
The modding on GF is the worst i've ever seen probably. It was remarkable. Dunno how it is nowadays.
yep. total garbage

you have trolls clearly making topic after topic (they call them topics over there) and comment after comment, every single one of them obviously a troll post or disingenuous post, all for getting people riled up and essentially ruining any sort of honest, mature discourse. it was like a plague across the entire site. every board you visited was inundated with these assholes.

but the problem is that mods would not discriminate for anything or anyone. as long as you werent "breaking a rule" you were untouchable. and the rules they actually enforced were basically dont cuss or name call. other than that, you could spew whatever kind of bullshit you wanted, make all the troll posts you want, entire troll topics, anything, anything! lol they wouldnt give two shits about how loaded the boards were with trolls and how it just drove away any sort of welcoming community, as long as there was no cursing or name calling 🤦‍♂️

i'd have moved over the GAF 8 years earlier but i didnt have a student or professional email until 2012. so glad i finally did tho.
 
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Kev Kev

Member
lol holy shit i just checked in on the PotD board out of curiosity and that place is still kickin. lmao who tf still uses that trash forum? its got to be like 60-70% trolls.

by chance D DonkeyPunchJr did you use the halo 3 boards back in the day? i spent a lot of time there and argued with a lot of fuck boys lol. hope you werent one of them :messenger_tears_of_joy:
 
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DonkeyPunchJr

World’s Biggest Weeb
yep. total garbage

you have trolls clearly making topic after topic (they call them topics over there) and comment after comment, every single one of them obviously a troll post or disingenuous post, all for getting people riled up and essentially ruining any sort of honest, mature discourse. it was like a plague across the entire site. every board you visited was inundated with these assholes.

but the problem is that mods would not discriminate for anything or anyone. as long as you werent "breaking a rule" you were untouchable. and the rules they actually enforced were basically dont cuss or name call. other than that, you could spew whatever kind of bullshit you wanted, make all the troll posts you want, entire troll topics, anything, anything! lol they wouldnt give two shits about how loaded the boards were with trolls and how it just drove away any sort of welcoming community, as long as there was no cursing or name calling 🤦‍♂️

i'd have moved over the GAF 8 years earlier but i didnt have a student or professional email until 2012. so glad i finally did tho.
Lol yes, exactly. They were so concerned about policing your language there but they didn’t care about your intention. Unless your trolling was super, super obvious, they wouldn’t do a damn thing about it.
 

DonkeyPunchJr

World’s Biggest Weeb
lol holy shit i just checked in on the PotD board out of curiosity and that place is still kickin. lmao who tf still uses that trash forum? its got to be like 60-70% trolls.

by chance D DonkeyPunchJr did you use the halo 3 boards back in the day? i spent a lot of time there and argued with a lot of fuck boys lol. hope you werent one of them :messenger_tears_of_joy:
Hey you asshole is that you?? J/k I wasn’t on the Halo 3 board at all. Mostly I was on various JRPG boards. Especially Star Ocean 1/2 and Final Fantasy V
 

Unk Adams

Banned
How does it feel being on the right side of history? Game FAQs is just Reeejectera-lite at this point. Especially 261.
It seems like nearly every single gaming forum has gone to shit at this point. Many forums that were great in the past are now wannabe Reseteras where they're total circlejerks. Most gaming forums will now ban you for wrongthink and then wonder why they have little to no activity anymore. Even giving the "wrong" opinion about a game can get you labeled a "troll" and then immediately banned. It's bizarre how you're not allowed to have discussions on most forums anymore and the few remaining members on those boards are hysterical tyrants.
 

GametimeUK

Member
I used to love trolling the Blue Rats on N4G. There were some great trolls on there. Breakfast and Socomnick are two names I remember fondly.

One of my fave trolls was as easy as calling God of War "GodOW" and calling Gears of War "GOW" as Gears was the game that deserved the acronym. People would lose their minds. I've grown up since then... kinda.

What was the best troll you used to use, OP?
 

PJX

Member
Man I haven't been to that place since the PS2/Xbox/GC era. There was an Xbox fanboy called Nick23 and a Sony fanboy called Wolf something. I also mainly went there when I was heavily into PSO on DC and Xbox.
 
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DonkeyPunchJr

World’s Biggest Weeb
I used to love trolling the Blue Rats on N4G. There were some great trolls on there. Breakfast and Socomnick are two names I remember fondly.

One of my fave trolls was as easy as calling God of War "GodOW" and calling Gears of War "GOW" as Gears was the game that deserved the acronym. People would lose their minds. I've grown up since then... kinda.

What was the best troll you used to use, OP?
On the Star Ocean 5 board I took on a rabid weeaboo persona. I responded to all criticism of the game by saying that they didn’t understand Japanese culture and the localization didn’t capture the essence of the original. I kept telling people I was going to move to Japan someday to become a game director and I was planning to start learning Japanese soon. I told them I was fed up with American women and I wanted to meet a Japanese girl by bumping into her at a hot spring.

A few people figured out it was an act but most of them would constantly tell
me how stupid I was and tried to prove they knew more about Japanese culture than me. It was pretty hilarious.
 

SteadyEvo

Member
This is no laughing matter. I’m saving myself for my real life Tifa. A woman with giant jiggling tits, the body of a porn star, yet the personality of a sweet innocent girl next door who has never known the touch of a man. She will see through my antisocial behavior and initiate a relationship with me, eventually resulting in coitus.

I have standards. I am willing to wait.

Bro, that sounds amazing and I hope you get it one day.
 
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