its a battle between nerds,long will it rage.......

also its always been like this,people used to fight over spectrums and commodores,but with the net no one is safe,it never sleeps.....

I blame more people having faster internet and forums being much easier to use. A lot of people online deal in absolutes no matter the topic is. Also, I know a few people that only post online to bitch about something, but not to praise.

Tedesteriscool is right, The hell with MS for trying to make a dollar, Sony is the ONLY gaming company that should be making bread!

None of these consoles live up to the GameCube, so it isn't a big deal to me.

becasue for the 1st time in a long time the console war is actually close

No that is very simplistic comment and it's not how our pride works that is like saying when you lose a war, oh it's a just a country 200 more where that came from or telling Lucas fan's oh Start Wars is just a movie...

We live in society of pride and easy appreciation and when we are impressed with a product we want equal minded people to give the product its due respect name me one multi million related item that people use the phrase "it's just..." on?

There probably aren't any significant ones. Every console has it's reason Xbox becauase it's a major improvement game line and quality wise over the previouis one. WII because it's an innovator and PS3... well because it does everything.

We are humans if this was anything else divided into multiple parties involving millions we'd be involved just the same (*cough*elections) there is no reason for you to restate a repititive argument. We love what love very well...

A rose by any other name would still smell just as sweet

And so a battle by any other classification would still be as vibrant as this one.

I don't know about it being any more personal then last generation.

Last generation I decided to get a GameCube and go exclusively with Nintendo over buying a PS2 or X-Box. I was flamed out of every forum online except for VGChartz and Nintendo's own N-Sider. People were very passionate about PlayStation being the way truth and life nobody games but through Playstation. For Playstation as my witness you are a fanboy JoelCool. It was radiculous and many N-Siders began creating their own forums to chat in instead of getting flamed out of existance on other boards.

I remember time after time having Sony fanboys show up every E3 on the N-Sider board and flaming the living crap out of it. I remember seeing topics like "Nintendo sucks" "Nintendo fails" and then the threads post would be some crap about how the PlayStation was kicking GameCube butt and that Nintendo was a kiddy console.

You know how many times people called me kiddy and the GameCube a childs thing. I got insulted day in day out. 1.UP for example was one of the worst sites for a Nintendo gamer. Infact writers of 1.Up and their magazine personally insulted me for being a Nintendo fan. After I got in a few fights I actually got banned.

Today I go on forums and say I'm a Nintendo fan and people are less flamboyant. I don't get insulted by everyone in the thread. I think the passion has actually shrunk theirs fewer fanboys today then last generation!

Corporations have been hammering for years in people's heads the concept that when choosing a brand you're also defining yourself by being part of a collective, a lifestyle, a tribe.

That inclination has always been present as a trait of pent-up aggression, especially in males - see the blind sport fandom and its extremes. It's all about exclusive grouping.

Exploiting this inclination promotes brand fidelity, but leads to people being over-defensive because they are actually defending their identity, not a simple product choice anymore.

@WereKitten

I agree with your comment. Anthropologic studies of male behaviour tend to show that pent-up agression and disturbances over what they feel themselves connected to, as part of semi-territorial comparison, has led to this kind of debates. I don't want to go to sports fandom, since my favourite sport, Football, is plagued with the worst kind of offenders with extremes I never thought a human being can go too.

But I think in the end It all has to come down to a person own morality and common sense to discern if their identity has to be the one that corporations "brand" them to, or it people can make their own identities, respecting what other people choose to be. That's whats lacking in the modern world, each time more and more, respect for other people's opinions and choices.

^That would require better self-knowledge, as knowing what makes us tick also brings understanding of others, both in their commonalities and differences. Sadly, mass-communication and mass-production have all the interest in opacity, in exploiting mechanisms but keeping them under the surface of consciousness.

Real introspection, real empathy, real instruction form the basis of a healthy individuality and are actually a detriment to many economic powers that be. Too bad.