"Pretentious" just means that they adopt a character with an element of bad faith - that they're playing to a role in order to attract approval. It's typically used in reference to intellectualism, and is often appropriate in that context (such as the entire of my body of posting on the Escapist), but it is fairly openly used by anyone who thinks that being analytical is not a valued trait, of anyone who is explicitly analytical.EmperorSubcutaneous said:
The thought is basically "This character trait is so far removed from what could be socially engaged with that it could only exist in an artificial setting". That intellectualism is so considered tells you something rather curious about what broader society sees as the function of human interaction - it's entirely plausible that when it comes to discussing "the art of videogames", there might be a legitimate point there somewhere.