> To even get started in React, you need a babel, npm, gulp or webpack, node and a data-store of your choice This is patently not true. You don't need any of t

> To even get started in React, you need a babel, npm, gulp or webpack, node and a data-store of your choice This is patently not true. You don't need any of that to make a React app -- you can just download the min.js files and get coding. React is perfectly capable of handling it's own state management and webpack/babel/npm are just to make your life easy. The problem is people follow full-stack, real-world tutorials like the one you linked without first just learning React.