So what's the deal with "genwunners"?

[Master of Memes]

Gen winners are:
Hypocrytical people who can't remember Muk
Biased
That's about it. It's okay to prefer gen 1, but attacking other peoples preferences is no joke. Some people simply joke about it, whole others jump 2 the conclusion that some people are genwunners. It's supposed to be a negative thing. I'll give u gen 1 fans out there this: The rainbow won't last forever. More clouds will come in your path. You can learn to love the new gens, ignore them, or hate them. It's your right

 

[LordGrizz]

Some of these posts make me kinda sad, especially the ones that detail "genwunners" as a fanatical group of nostalgia nazis. I personally always saw being a genwunner as a pointless badge of honor. I know everyone gonna hate me for saying that but eh. As a proud genwunner I'll say we had the best and most original pokemon like...exeggcute...and voltorb? Ok enough with the sarcastic banter really being a genwunner in my mind means one thing. I've played pokemon since the beginning and got to watch as this simple game of enslaving adorable monsters and making them kill for your glory grow into the gigantic beast is into today. I just dislike that being forth coming with my "genwunner" status means I have to agree with everything about later gens for fear of everyone tearing into me like thanksgiving turkey. Every gen had pokemon I'm not crazy about or systems that I disliked. I hate double battles and fairy types. There I said it, but that doesn't mean I don't like pokemon or am any less of a fan than I was years ago. To me the idea people get about genwunners is the type of people who outgrew pokemon after second gen, who apparently outgrew a whole bunch of stuff. They aren't fans of pokemon as much as pokemon is part of a list of things they enjoyed as kids. Genwunners are just the old guard. All it means is most of us are about 24-25 and still playing pokemon cause this games awesome.

 

[Master of Memes]

Some of these posts make me kinda sad, especially the ones that detail "genwunners" as a fanatical group of nostalgia nazis. I personally always saw being a genwunner as a pointless badge of honor. I know everyone gonna hate me for saying that but eh. As a proud genwunner I'll say we had the best and most original pokemon like...exeggcute...and voltorb? Ok enough with the sarcastic banter really being a genwunner in my mind means one thing. I've played pokemon since the beginning and got to watch as this simple game of enslaving adorable monsters and making them kill for your glory grow into the gigantic beast is into today. I just dislike that being forth coming with my "genwunner" status means I have to agree with everything about later gens for fear of everyone tearing into me like thanksgiving turkey. Every gen had pokemon I'm not crazy about or systems that I disliked. I hate double battles and fairy types. There I said it, but that doesn't mean I don't like pokemon or am any less of a fan than I was years ago. To me the idea people get about genwunners is the type of people who outgrew pokemon after second gen, who apparently outgrew a whole bunch of stuff. They aren't fans of pokemon as much as pokemon is part of a list of things they enjoyed as kids. Genwunners are just the old guard. All it means is most of us are about 24-25 and still playing pokemon cause this games awesome.

Well, I personally respect your tastes. But you can like the older pokemon. It's throwing stones at Trubbish that started this nonsense. *I remember in the gen 5 days, how I'd be rebuked for liking Unova* Your group isn't alone. Their are just more anti-gen wunners then gen wunners. As I said, simply liking gen 1 doesn't make u a gen wunner

 

[senzu]

I see Genwunners as people who played Pokémon like every other kid born in the late 80s - mid 90s and grew up when Pokémon was around every corner, but naturally grew out of it as with many other childhood phases, and holds a nostalgia about it that prevents them from enjoying the newer gens because they are afraid of 'replacing' those memories of their childhood. That or they just feel like they're too old to get back into video games/Pokemon.

I agree with that.

Verlisify made a video about this on YouTube, but I felt he missed the point entirely. You're not going to find too many genuine "genwunners" in active Pokemon communities like this forum, the subreddits and the PokeTuber channels. Generally speaking they're going to be full of people who still play the games properly and have played every generation and love/hate things about each one.

But it's very widespread on more mainstream media, particularly Facebook. Click on any Pokemon related post on Facebook and you'll immediately see someone say "there is ONLY 151 Pokemon!!!" and things like that. They are people who probably haven't picked up a Pokemon game since Gold/Silver when they were kids and have absolutely no idea about the newer ones. It's weird though, Pokemon seems to be one of the only game franchises where this sort of mainstream nostalgia occurs so frequently. You didn't really see too many people pining for the original GTA when GTA5 came out or something like that.

I also don't know how anyone could look at the gameplay of ORAS and dismiss it as inferior to Red/Blue either. But some people do.

 

[Electricbluewolf]

I think the term now is outdated-it seems that the release of Black/White saw many people think that many designs were ugly, unoriginal and didn't have the "spark" of previous games, so much hatred was born about.
Now with the release of the of Xy/ORAS it seems no one uses the term anymore as a range of fans enjoyed both games, and maybe people did not see the point of annoying/making fun of people who liked the new pokemon designs.

I personally enjoyed all the games, even when I started from Gen 1 it was nice to see new pokemon for every region, and different spriting designs. The only reason I disliked Gen 5 was the game play itself.