The late Bill Kunkel is often referred to as "The Grandfather Of Video Game Journalism", and with good reason.
One of the earliest professional writers to spot the incredible appeal of interactive entertainment, Kunkel served as executive editor of Electronic Games Magazine in the early 1980s. He would also write for EGM, Tips & Tricks and VG&CE during his career, and The Society of Professional Journalists even honoured his incredible impact on the industry by naming their video game journalism awards 'The Kunkel Awards'.
However, just like any human being, Kunkel was prone to the odd mistake—and his 'Fall Out' column for the superb but sadly short-lived Fusion Magazine in September of 1995 is one such example of this (thanks to the brilliant John Szczepaniak for bringing this to our attention).
In a shockingly aggressive piece, Kunkel attacks 2D fighting games as an "over-hyped, two-dimensional genre" and says that anyone who spends their days becoming skilful at them is wasting their time:
My point is that you pathetic individuals who spent years of your life mastering these goofy commands on fighting games need to Get A Life.
It's time to kick this genre in the head. Admit it; you spent years learning a skill that serves absolutely no use whatsoever in the real world. In the old days, players who mastered Space Invaders and Pac-Man at least learned pattern recognition. What have you idiots learned? A bunch of non-standard fatalities and babalities and clayalities, and you're all no better off than you were when you started. Move on.
Move out of your momma's home. Learn to try other types of games. At least move into three dimensions with Virtua Fighter or Toshinden. Try sims, sports games, RPGs; just try something other than an interconnected series of spastic twitches, signifying nothing (Street Fighter Alpha is not an option).
Grow the hell up. In the future, try doing things like reading the works of Chinese philosophers or viewing the cinematic ontput of John Woo. Simply understand that you were seduced by an over-hyped, two-dimensional genre and move beyond this point.
Kunkel notes with a degree of irony that he was summoned as an expert witness in the case of Capcom U.S.A., Inc. v. Data East Corp., where Kunkel testified that Data East's Fighter's History was different enough from Capcom's Street Fighter II to avoid claims of copyright violation. "I love an ironic epilogue," concludes Kunkel.
It's easy to poke fun at this viewpoint today, given that 2D fighters are now enjoyed at tournament level by a vast audience. Kunkel lacked the benefit of hindsight back in 1995, a time when there was genuine apathy for the seemingly endless flood of 2D fighting games that had been triggered by Street Fighter II's stunning commercial success. Indeed, as the decade progressed, 3D fighters would become the more popular genre, so Kunkel was right in that respect, at least (shame he had to pick Battle Arena Toshinden as a recommended title, though).
It's also important to remember that when the PS1 arrived on the scene, its 3D power was so impressive that many publishers (and gamers) rejected anything that wasn't rendered in three dimensions. Kunkel's stance, while certainly not universal, was very much in line with what a great many other people thought at the time.
Kunkel sadly passed away in 2011 at the age of 61. As well as his love of games, he was also a professional wrestling journalist and was able to combine these two loves in 1987's MicroLeague Wrestling for home computers, the first video game to carry a WWF (now WWE) licence.