"Overrated"

Hexartes

See also: "nostalgia bait" et al

Terms I don't like

Odradek

same

Imipolex G

"overrated" may sometimes apply.

"nostalgia bait" is just a stupid term.

Hexartes

It's not even that either term is inherently wrong, just that they're needlessly insulting and reductive.

For example, I could call BioShock "overrated" or I could go in detail about how the climate of the time it was released in, namely, the large amount of game reviewers (but relatively few game commentators) and their flawed metrics for what constituted good storytelling, contributed to elevating an excellent bit of environmental storytelling with some neat emergent combat and caused its major flaws to be overlooked, but if I did all that I'd have to, you know, use my words and not insult people.

Sredni Vashtar

Same.

Obā-san

words are overrated

Obā-san

but seriously: in the vast majority of casual contexts, full, detailed explanations of your positions are unwarranted unless they are specifcially asked for

Tachyon

that's true i guess but dismissive comments can be irritating

mostly i'm with Kex on this one

Aliroz

Tachyon said:

that's true i guess but dismissive comments can be irritating

mostly i'm with Kex on this one

This except completely with Kex.  I don't mind full, detailed explanations or infodumps, because I genuinely have no clue how a lot of people think, and I want to infodump, so why should I be upset when other people do the same?

I can't stand dismissive comments.

Hexartes

Today is Tomorrow said:

but seriously: in the vast majority of casual contexts, full, detailed explanations of your positions are unwarranted unless they are specifcially asked for

Well yeah, obviously, but overrated is just such an obnoxious term I would never use it without serious qualification and by that point I probably wouldn't need to use it

Obā-san

so you're saying that it's


overrated?

glennmagusharvey

naney wins this thread

Obā-san

ok i take it back

MetaFour

Let's say that X is a music album or a book or a video game. I'm interested in X.

If you're someone I care about, I'm interested in your opinion about X. 

If you're someone I don't care much about, I'm less interested in your opinion about X—and what little interest I have is because of the connection to X.

I'm even less interested in the cumulative opinion of many people I don't care about, regarding X.

And you—whoever you are—once we start getting into your opinion about the cumulative opinions of other people, regarding X, then we're so far removed from X that my eyes glaze over and I desperately start seeking a way out of the discussion.

"Overrated" as a criticism falls into that last category.

Obā-san

iunno man this whole kit cat and caboodle really feels like a big knot of overthinking things

like, if you're talking to someone IRL about a thing, and they like, "y'know i thought it was ok, but it's kinda overrated"

are you seriously going to go like "hey, calling things overrated is bad because it's an insufficiently detailed criticism that has some baggage"

or are ya just gonna roll with it, because you got what they mean?

Imipolex G

I'm gonna punch their fucking lights out

Crystal

Punches Imicow's milk out

Imipolex G

that is not how you milk a ladycow u_u

Hexartes

Well it's kind of a multitude of things, depending on context I think

First and foremost it doesn't exactly stick in my craw when it's just a matter of casual conversation

But it's something that kinda only works as a (quite reductive) shorthand and it's immensely irritating seeing it in anything other than the context of casual conversation

Hexartes

Also there are some people who seem to believe that fucking everything is overrated and that shit gets old quick

Salix Babylonika

I think saying things is overrated is overrated

:chased off screen to the tune of Yakety Sax:

Klinotaxis

got beaten to that one champ

Sredni Vashtar

Today is Tomorrow said:

iunno man this whole kit cat and caboodle really feels like a big knot of overthinking things

like, if you're talking to someone IRL about a thing, and they like, "y'know i thought it was ok, but it's kinda overrated"

are you seriously going to go like "hey, calling things overrated is bad because it's an insufficiently detailed criticism that has some baggage"

or are ya just gonna roll with it, because you got what they mean?

Context is key, though. Someone going, "It's fine but I think it's kind of overrated," is different from somebody whining about something and, when asked to explain, just going, "It's so overrated!"

Obā-san

ok but how often does that actually happen

Crystal

I tend to see both pretty frequently, though thankfully the former more.

Hexartes

Today is Tomorrow said:

ok but how often does that actually happen

Often enough for me to be bothered? Do you need statistics or something?

Sredni Vashtar

Annoying circular uses of the word with insufficient explanation? Enough that it's worth mentioning. Although I don't think I illustrated the phenomenon properly. Regardless, even "appropriate" uses annoy me. It's just not a word with much independent value, aside from implicitly asserting that one's own tastes are ostensibly in the minority yet also superior.

I'm just saying I get where Kex is coming from and I'd rather people explained their feelings without complaining about something's supposed unwarranted popularity.

Crystal

MetaFour said:

Let's say that X is a music album or a book or a video game. I'm interested in X.

If you're someone I care about, I'm interested in your opinion about X. 

If you're someone I don't care much about, I'm less interested in your opinion about X—and what little interest I have is because of the connection to X.

I'm even less interested in the cumulative opinion of many people I don't care about, regarding X.

And you—whoever you are—once we start getting into your opinion about the cumulative opinions of other people, regarding X, then we're so far removed from X that my eyes glaze over and I desperately start seeking a way out of the discussion.

"Overrated" as a criticism falls into that last category.

Sredni Vashtar said:

implicitly asserting that one's own tastes are ostensibly in the minority yet also superior.

Today is Tomorrow said:

or are ya just gonna roll with it, because you got what they mean?

I am feeling lazy and tired, so these sum up my thoughts. I suppose.

Tachyon

i'll be honest, sometimes i just kinda unthinkingly use this word with the intended meaning, 'i don't like it as much as a lot of people seem to'

like if i say that i'm not trying to make some objective claim about the value of the work or offer my evaluation of other people's tastes or w/e

even so i think it's fairly lazy and only happens because i tend to have trouble vocalizing my thoughts, like if i rehearse some precise thing in my head beforehand it comes out garbled and i trip over my tongue, and if i don't rehearse it in my head beforehand i'll use words like 'overrated' that don't quite convey what i mean

glennmagusharvey

"cs188 is fucking overrated" ~ Barack Omaba, according to cs188