I like money. I do. Always have, always will. I like making money almost as much as spending money. Oh how I love spending money. Like a rapper at a whore convention. In fact even the most excruciating of task I will do with a smile if I could have money. Hell I'd be a prostitute if I didn't have the weak body and soul of a 12 year old. But alas I love money. I dig it.
I've been an off and on gamer all my life. Certain parts of my life I endulge in it and other times I kick it to the curb in favor of, well, a life. So right now I'm slipping back into that Getting Into It Phase and I have to say there's something that's changed immensly since I left this beloved hobby of mine a few years back:
THIS SHIT IS EXPENSIVE!
No seriously! This shit is expensive! You know how much it cost to do this stuff? In the last 6 months since I've gotten back on the saddle I've spent more than I spent last year on entertainment total (this year so far I've spent $250 and maybe $150 in DLC). And you know how many games I have to show for it? Four. Four games, an XBL Indie game (which to be fair was $1), and a ton of Rock Band DLC which I play every weekend. I dunno about you guys but that bothers me. I have four games right now and I still play one of them. Well I plan on popping The Beatles back in when Abbey Road comes out but until then the only game to stay constantly spinning in my 360 is Mass Effect. And that's only until I feel my Shepard is up to snuff for ME2 next year. This hobby is fucking pricey.
But to be fair, well, it's kind of always been that way. Back in the days of cartridges we were dropping massive bones too ($80 if memory serves). It's kind of just been industry accepted that we're willing to pay big bucks for the experience of an interactive (and thanks to DLC ever expanding) medium. And now with peripheral gaming on the scene it's only become pricier. I have a $200 preorder for DJ Hero and I have to say as much as I am looking forward to the game $200 is what I, as a kid who didn't pay for his gaming, expected a console to cost.
It's not all bad. I mean some of the purchases are well worth it. For example I think the Rock Band bundle(s) are very much so worth it because they kind of are like consoles. Every week there's a new influx of content, the core of the game is solid, and with each true sequel my hundreds of dollars worth of DLC and on-disc songs carry over. Bravo Harmonix and bravo MTV Games.
And being an American means I still get some of the cheapest gaming around. Aussies and Europeans are still paying out the ass for games I can get brand spankin' new for $5-$10 less than asking price if I shop around. Hell of all my preorders I'm only paying full price for DJ Hero. The only guys I'd rather be in a financial gaming bind might be Canadians. And that's only sometimes.
And then I have to wonder how much of it is my own doing. After all I didn't need that $200 Renegade Edition DJ Hero. I could've settled for the standard package. And after all the only reason they release this shit at these prices is because punks like me buy it. And it's Activision! How doth the stains of mine sins disgust the saints!
Anyway this shit is expensive. And it's not like I'm even buying the games that will make me cool. No I have no plans of buying MW2, Dragon Age, hell I'm still iffy on buying Borderlands with the the Amazon credit I got. In the following weeks I'll be milking Brutal Legend, DJ Hero, and Lego Rock Band for all their worth.
I mean who are you people with your
mountains of gaming goodness? Are you geniuses? Sons and daughters of wealthy bachelors or bachelorettes? Can I have their numbers? Am I doing it wrong?
....don't answer that last one.
Also: Gamefly, how is it?
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This is how I role:
I think I meant roll but you know.
Bulkmailer, you're a miserable failure.
Oh and I like my women with a weak body and a soul of a 12 year old.
With that said, I think this is the first time in a long while where I had to carefully decide my gaming choices. I've so many on my "must buy" list, but until Christmas rolls around I have to settle with Demon's Souls, Uncharted 2, and maybe Borderlands or MW 2. I'm still on the fence about those two. I'm thinking that all of 2010 is going to be much, much worse on my wallet.
Games are expensive sure, you and I have already chuckled about DJ hero, but the real problem for me is the sheer number of games that come out every year. I'm lucky my girlfriend is into gaming too becuase she picks up a lot of games that I wouldn't be able to afford. She got Beatles Rockband for us and shes getting L4D2 and MW2. Meanwhile, I got us ODST and scribblenauts and I've preordered DJ Hero, Forza 3 and Brutal Legend. That still leaves an assload of games that we're still interested in: Borderlands, Dragon Age, Bioshock 2, Assassins Creed 2, Guitar Hero 5, Tony Hawk Ride, New Super Mario Bros.... I could go on forever. The point is there are too many games and not nearly enough time to play them or money to buy them.
Goozex. It solved all of my problems. You can buy points and get games really cheap, or you can trade what you don't want and get new games for free. It's harder to amass a collection this way, but you can, at the very least, get new stuff to play without having to spend a ton of money. Any time a new game is about to come out, I put that shit on my Goozex want list so I can be first in line to get it from whoever wants to give up their copy first. :)
La Roux looks like a Dude.
Here in Brazil games cost R$250(US$125), the government is corrupt, if you import a game from another contry it will cost at least the double of its price, you can't buy MS points or Gold subscription directly from LIVE, you have to buy overpriced cards and we're a 3rd world contry so everybody is way much poor here(except the elite of course).
Fuck you.
I was going to make a post about how much I spend on video games, but then HiddenAHB posted and I instead realized I am a gigantic entitled douchebag.
Sorry bro.
It's not the games for me, it's the consoles. Dropping several hundred dollars on what is colloquially called a brick is not an easy decision.
Well, someday I'll be able to afford it. Study hard now, play hard later!
@HiddenAHB
Yeah that blows but I'm pretty sure I mentioned being American as the major positive. Sooo...yeah.
@Ashley Davis
Yeah I'm still trying to understand Goozex. I recently butchered a trade and didn't even know it. I felt bad.
@Aurain
Elly Jackson is hot as shit. Yeah I know I'm the minority but that just means I've got a better chance. ;)
this is why company's need to realize people will buy games any time. and to stop releasing all their games in october. where we have to choose a couple instead of getting them all over the span of a year.
95 cents canadian to the american dollar and every game ever still costs ten dollars more in the windy north than it does down there. that shit adds up, i tell you.
I've been a Goozex customer for almost a year and a loyal Gamefly customer for going on 4 years. What do you want to know? ask away! :P
And to stay on track: Yeah, they are getting more and more expensive in this gamer's opinion. The conomy sucks right now..yeah games may have been spendy 25+ years ago, but the ecomomy wasn't as bad then, was it?
Which is why I am finding myself buying the cheap downloadable games (like dsiware/wiiware and PSN...I don't have an Xbox 360; too many reports of the RROD for me to justify spending $200 on a console that will go belly up in the next 6 months..but that's another whine for another day) and using Gamefly and Goozex to buy games on the cheap and Goozex to trade games (and now movies!) for more games!
I rarely have games I want to get rid of, but I have dvd's as gifts I don't need..I don't watch much tv or movies. And more games in exchange for my movies gathering dust? (In some cases unopened?) Yes, please!
Oh god, I wish everyone in the Dtoid community looked like that
The market gets oversaturated with games at this time of year. I've actually had enough income lately that I can buy a game when I want, but back when I was poor, my philosophy was simply to figure out which game was the best for me, buy it, and play it to completion. It doesn't build a collection very fast, but it ensures that your collection is of the highest quality.
Right now, I find myself flitting from game to game, rarely ever finishing them, so I'm really not getting the enjoyment I would get from just concentrating on one game.
As for GameFly: I use it, but since I tend to buy a lot of new games, it's probably not worth it for me. If you rarely buy a new game, look into it. $18/mo for two games at a time means you'd have to keep those games for at least four months before you've spent more on Gamefly membership than it would've cost to get them used.
Of course, it's a crapshoot getting the new hotness from Gamefly in a timely manner, but they have a pretty good collection of previous generation games as well.
Gamefly's prices to buy their games for keeps are also about half to 2/3s as much as what Gamestop charges for used.
This hobby is wicked expensive. Now that I have a decent career and am making some good scrilla I have the cash to throw down on games, but never any time to play. The injustice of it all.