Serious question, I don't mean to offend (at least not yet ;) ) - do you only ever play DnD? Because this community is called RPGmemes and I rarely (if ever) see anything but DnD.
It's a shorthand for folks outside or new to the hobby, it skips a hurdle to talk to people about other RPGs with those people, and it weakens the brand identity. Considering how much D&D has coasted on brand identity as the game suffered, I'm all for that.
I'm less likely to do it places like here, because it causes more confusion, but still. It's fun to say, "Pathfinder is a great way to play D&D." :P
I prefer TTRPG because it doesn't give free advertising to Hasbro. Even if most people know what you mean, someone googling D&D ends up at Hasbro's product.
Personally, the game I run the most is Shadowrun. Managed to transition my DnD group to Pathfinder 2e and it's great. Pathfinder is DnD but so much better.
Classic Pathfinder basically is 3.5e, so I would hope that they would want to switch just to get away from Hasbro. Pathfinder 2e is basically a good version of what D&D5e wants to be, but they didn't test out the rules well enough to do. It's fairly simple and easy, without tons of contradictions. D&D3.5 and Pathfinder are great too though, but most modern TTRPG players want the simplicity of the modern systems.
so I would hope that they would want to switch just to get away from Hasbro.
I'll say this as a relatively newer player, I don't care about the company that made the game when I'm trying to find something to play. As a player in 2 campaigns and a baby-DM for another, I think the only money I've paid that hasbro would get anything from is a Nolzurs mini I bought before I started making my own.
I'm not saying that people shouldn't look outside of DND for other RPGs, there's a ton of other great platforms out there, just trying to offer some perspective. I don't think the average DnD player really gives a crap about Hasbro (again, not saying they shouldn't care, just that they don't), let alone have a desire to change platforms based on the manufacturer.
Players playing 3.5e are not average players. They've invested a lot of time into the game already. They should care what the company does, especially considering what they did after 3.5 that they should remember.
You probably will care who makes the system soon though because Hasbro is going to require subscriptions for everything. It's going to sucks. You can always pirate the PDFs, but just play a better system. D&D 5e is so janky and you have to remember so many exceptions. Pathfinder 2e just works how you'd expect.
I see, I missed that tidbit of the conversation. My bad.
I don't see myself caring if Hasbro tries to require a "subscription". Like I said, none of the gaming I've done with DND has been through any legitimate channels they offer, I've got the PHB and DM guide on my phone and all the games I've played are either homebrew or stolen PDFs that work exactly the same way a "subscription" would.
I have been interested in checking out Pathfinder, but honestly don't care enough to push my friend group towards it. If anyone approaches me with a PF game I'll join, but not going out of my way to find one.
We finished a five year D&D 5e campaign, now we're bouncing between Fiasco, Brindlewood Bay (murder she wrote with Cthulhu), Mothership (Alien or Starship Troopers vibes), and soon a Star Wars EoTE. Most every game is fun!
Swapping my own group to PF2e and we've all played other systems (lancer, sw saga, vtm, cyberpunk, kids on bikes, etc). I do think if a meme says something different than DnD (using it as a generic term for TTRPG) you'll get more people commenting on the system rather than relating to the meme (like if this said Traveler there'd be more comments about never played Traveler or if it said PF2e comments would be more about the system war).