James Rolfe: An Analysis

It has been said that the work of a critic is easy; all you need to do is share your opinion on a work. Thanks to the Internet, it is ridiculously easy to become a critic; all you need is a Facebook page and boom, a platform to share your criticism. To gain an audience alone ought to be considered a feat all dream of, but there is ONE critic in gaming who's achieved the Holy Grail of criticism: James Rolfe.

In the year 2004, James Rolfe created two videos to be shared with his friends in which he plays a character who gets unreasonably angry playing classic games: Castlevania 2 and Jeckyl and Hide. The videos were never meant to be put online, but to make a long story short, Rolfe eventually wound up uploading them to the Internet on his own website, Cinemassacre.com. Why not YouTube? Because YouTube didn't exist back then; and even if it did, it'd take many years before it would become the Internet mainstay it is today. Indeed, James Rolfe wouldn't begin uploading his videos  on YouTube until the year 2006.

In September os 2006, Rolfe's videos became viral. People began sharing his videos on MySpace, then on Facebook once that site became more popular. What was it about his videos that made him so popular?

Before we continue, we need to look at the state of game reviewing pre-Rolfe. Video game reviewers were, in their majority, professional writers whose works and critiques were featured in specialized magazines. Magazines like Game Informer, GamePro, Nintendo Power, etc. Held a tight grip in gaming journalism and critique. Because of this, a game critic's language would be tightly controlled and edited, ergo making them sound more professional. Game critics didn't use the phrase "lol" when talking about a video game, nor would they dare use any language stronger than PG.

And that's where Rolfe came in. The moment Rolfe said "oh shit, it's fucking night!" in his criticism of Castlevania 2, he cemented himself as essentially DIFFERENT from professional game reviewers. How? It wasn't JUST the cursing itself, but what the cursing entailed, that endeared him to common viewers.

James Rofle (in his Angry VG Nerd persona) wasn't some sterilized no-face reviewer for a big name company, he was an Average Joe, like his viewers. He was a guy who would get frustrated, swig a beer, and then verbalize that frustration in ways that are both unique and memorable ("pissload of fuck!")

Consider the lyrics of his theme song, bolding mine:

He's gonna take you back to the past

To play the shitty games that suck ass

He'd rather have a buffalo

Take a diarrhea dump in his ear

He'd rather eat the rotten asshole

Of a roadkill skunk and down it with beer!

He's the angriest gamer you've ever heard

He's the Angry Nintendo Nerd

He's the Angry Atari, Sega Nerd

He's the Angry Video Game Nerd!

Those lyrics do much more than eloquently prepare the viewer for the cuss-fest the videos are known for; rather, they are also a manifestation of Rolfe's critical voice. We define the term 'critical voice' to mean "the way a critic communicates their opinions onto the public, creating a rapport between the two." To take an example of a critical voice, we need to look at the most famous and celebrated critic of all time: Roger Ebert.

Evert had a passion for film that made itself known through every criticism he ever wrote down. He held no punches; if he hated a movie, he hated it and that was that. If he loved it, he'd gush over it and tell you everything good about it. Every word he uttered, every stroke of his pen was a testament to his passion for movies and the cinematic experience. May he rest in peace.

Back to Rolfe. Rolfe's critical voice is passionate and sincere; his every utterance is either an on-point criticism of the game, or it's an on-point manifestation of his frustration. When he calls a game a "shit load of fuck" with that anger of his, you KNOW he's reviewed a terrible game. When he destroyed a Sega 32X in his review of the system, that action was unequivocal  in expressing his disproval of the add-on. In fact, his entire nine and a half minute video review of the 32X is one long deconstruction of everything wrong with the add-on, from the mediocrity of its library, to the unfathomably inconvenient plugs the add-on comes with.

And you compare that to a more sterilized review of the 32X, which would likely say "the system is disappointing." A more "lowbrow" but still sterilized review show in the style of, say, X-Play would likely say "this system sucks! A one out of five!" 

Again, the key word to take away from this is PASSION. When you look at the Nerd's anger, you see that it is constantly directed not at the audience, but at the games themselves. But it's a passionate anger, not a destructive anger (OK, it CAN sometimes get destructive), which again, helps build a rapport with the audience.

It was this anger that helped gain him his popularity. Unfortunately, it was also the part his many copycats focused on, instead of the REAL reason why Rolfe's Nerd got famous.

There are three post-Nerd reviewers whose inspiration was unquestionably the Nerd himself: Noah Antwiler, Doug Walker, and Chris Bores. Of these three, Bores is/was the most infamous; his style was very much just a more aggressive version of the Angry Video Game Nerd, to the point his show was called Irate Gamer.

Doug Walker also mimicked the Nerd somewhat, creating a character who reviewed films and television from yesteryear: the Nostalgia Critic. Like the Nerd, the Critic gave a critical view on a beloved or forgotten piece of media from the 80's and 90's, and like the Nerd, the Critic used anger to get his point across. But while the Nerd's anger was that ever-so-relateable frustrated anger, the Critic's anger felt more whiny. That made it much harder to take the criticism seriously, though it did make him entertaining to watch.

The point I'm trying to make is that the Nerd wasn't just a pioneer in the genre of online critique, he set the standard for which the genre would be measured for the better part of a decade. Various other online critics allowed themselves to be influenced by the Nerd, to the point that they became near carbon copies of him. But what they all failed to mimic was the Nerd's core characteristic that set him apart: his SINCERITY.

Jame's videos might be for entertainment, but they are also legit critiques of whatever he's covering. He both informs AND entertains, blending the two near flawlessly. Although many of the critics who followed in  his footsteps did eventually gain healthy followings, none of them have managed to achieve the greatness James Rolfe gained.

The name "Angry Video Game Nerd" is near synonimous with "online game criticism shows." Along with the Nostalgia Critic, James Rolfe is THE face of the online critic community, and continues to be so 14 years after his start.