I am cheap when it comes to buying video games. I mean really cheap. I am a parsimonious, stingy, covetous old tightwad who has to have his fingers pried away from a twenty dollar bill even to buy an Xbox Platinum Hit that is now more than a year old. I will dig through the “used” bin at GameStop for hours, hoping that somehow, someway a gently used copy of a great new release has been mis-priced by some foolish acne-riddled, mid-pubescent stock person. The thought of finding Battlefield 2 for just $11.99 makes me weak in the knees.
You may ask, “How did you get that way Cranefolder? What horrible monetary tragedy in your past turned you into the money hoarding Scrooge you are today?” Well, I’ll tell you. There was no tragedy involved, I simply inherited it from my mother, who got it from my grandmother, who lived through the Depression. Now, I’m not as frugal as either of them, because the cheapness gene has been watered down through subsequent generations. My grandmother actually saves the foil wrappers from sticks of butter and uses them to grease the insides of cake pans. AND SHE USES THEM MORE THAN ONCE! There is a stack of at least 15 butter wrappers in her refrigerator right now. I could not possibly make this up.
So now, you are probably thinking, “Who cares if you are cheap? Why are you wasting my time with this? Maybe I should go back to surfing for porn.” Well, if you read the articles on this site regularly (which you should), and if you read the recent submission by Webmonkee about the different types of gamer (and you did, right?), then you would know that he has classified gamers into the following categories: Hard Core, Devoted, Pretend Hard Core, Casual, Clueless and Worthless. Webmonkee wrote an excellent article, and made great points about each of these types of gamer. (I would classify myself as a Casual gamer who gets Devoted to each game he plays. I don’t own or play too many games, but when I do play one I spend all of my time on it until I have conquered it completely. It’s the same way I eat dinner. I eat all of my meatloaf, then all the mashed potatoes, then all the green beans, then drink my sweet tea. I’m compartmentalized like that.) So in the same spirit as Webmonkee’s article, and at the risk of being called an unoriginal copy-catter, I would like to propose my own list of Gaming Budget categories. They are: Donald Trump, Daddy Warbucks, Even Steven, Scrooge and Wimpy. Which one describes you best?
Donald Trump: You fit this category if you buy every new game/console/video card that comes out that had any sort of decent marketing behind it. If you saw just one flashy commercial and then coughed up a wad of cash to make sure you got the latest and greatest on the first day so you could brag about it to your friends, this is you. The gamer with a Donald Trump budget doesn’t really care about the quality of the games or hardware, just the newness. They rarely actually finish any game because they are constantly buying new ones. They have more games and consoles than they will ever have time to play (some are still unwrapped) but they are constantly adding more games to the collection. These gamers are the ones who ALWAYS buy the special edition of the game, and not because they want the extras that come with it. These guys buy it because it is $10 more than the regular edition and that means it must be better, right? Donald Trumps will buy any other merchandise associated with their new game too. A special edition controller that is tarted up with graphics from the game, the game guide, action figures, T-shirts, it all goes in the buggy with the game. Heck, if the game is new, it must be good, and if it is good then all the stuff that goes along with it will be great!
Daddy Warbucks: Gamers on this budget don’t have a problem spending full price on a game, or even the special edition of a game, but it damn well better be worth it. They don’t just pop for every flash-in-the-pan that comes along. A Daddy Warbucks gamer views the time and money they drop into gaming as an investment, and one that should pay back dividends in entertainment value that are greater than the cash they outlay. These gamers follow the previews, screenshots, developer interviews and finally the actual reviews and scores of new games before making their purchase. If a game appears to be a borderline purchase, they may rent it first to see if it is worth buying. Folks on a Daddy Warbucks budget are careful and methodical in their approach to spending, but once they get the game it doesn’t just sit on the shelf like some kind of hunting trophy, they actually spend a good deal of time playing it and genuinely having fun.
Even Steven: This dude has his priorities straight. Gaming is supposed to be fun and if you spend too much time worrying about the money, then you aren’t having fun. On the flip side, an Even Steven knows that if you just spend money on gaming with reckless abandon, other parts of your life will start to be affected and that won’t be fun either. (You can’t play video games if your electric bill doesn’t get paid.) An Even Steven will pay full price for new games sometimes, but they are also willing to wait and pick up things from the used bin. If a store across town is running a special on a new release, they will drive over to get it, rather than pay full price at the closest store just so they can get it home and start playing right away. Even Stevens might get the new release on the first day it’s available, but it could be later on that week. They may trade games around with friends, but if they find something they really like, they will get their own copy. Purchasing decisions for an Even Steven are a bit more laid back than with the Daddy Warbucks type. If they have a friend who heard it from his cousin’s sister’s boyfriend that a game is good, then that’s worth $50, plain and simple. Even Stevens will outlive all of the other gamers because they keep their blood pressure low.
Scrooge: From the opening paragraphs of this article, you can tell that this is my budget. Scrooge gamers just refuse to spend full price on a game, or even half-price for that matter. If that means they are 2 years behind on the new releases, then so be it. These people were still rocking an original Playstation when the XBox was 2 years old because they could get the system for $75 and used games for less then $5. (Guilty) Scrooges are the absolute last adopters of any new console and a game has to meet very high standards even to squeeze $10 out of their bank account. So what if GameSpot gave it a 9.4 and it has sold 3 million copies, they aren’t getting half of a Ben Franklin out of this gamer. A Scrooge gamer sees numbers like that and thinks, “Well, there oughta be a lot of used copies of that available in a few months.” (I bought Halo 2 in September of 2005 and griped for days about laying out $30.) These gamers live in fear of every purchase, terrified that the price will drop $2 on the day after they finally buy the game. Scrooge gamers will also do whatever they can to squeeze every last bit of enjoyment out of a game, playing through it multiple times and finding all of the secrets it has to offer, not because it is fun to do that, but because every minute they spend in the game lowers the cost to playtime ratio. (I paid $20 for the GTA double pack and have more than 150 hours racked up between those two games. Who needs San Andreas, I’ll just find all 100 hidden packages in Vice City again. TAKE THAT ROCKSTAR!!!) These gamers could have more fun if they would loosen up their budget a little bit, but don’t hold your breath.
Wimpy: Wimpy was that dude on the Popeye cartoons who was always broke, but wanted a hamburger. Wimpy wanted to get someone else to pay for it. His tagline was, “I will gladly pay you Tuesday for a hamburger today.” Total friggin’ mooch. Everybody knows one of these gamers. They never spend their own money on games but always seem to be able to play the newest stuff anyway. They come over to your house and hog your system. They borrow games for weeks or months at a time. A Wimpy gamer may have even borrowed an entire computer or gaming system from you. Sadly, before I became a Scrooge gamer, I was a Wimpy gamer during my college days. My best friend in college (gamertag: Raste) was a Daddy Warbucks type and he sprung for a Nintendo 64 right after it came out. I was ALWAYS in that mo-fos room. Playing Mario, GoldenEye, Mario Kart, and I never gave him a dime. (One time I did buy an extra controller, but that was just so we could play at the same time and he wouldn’t kick me out. No altruism for me, thanks.) When he transferred to another school after our Sophomore year, I made sure to get a roommate who had a 64 so I could continue to mooch. A Wimpy gamer has no shame and will ask to borrow your one day old copy of Star Wars: Battlefront II and then disappear with it for a month. Really bad Wimpy gamers might even forget that they borrowed that game from you and trade it in at the local GameStop.
So, perhaps you have found a category here that describes your gaming budget, and hopefully it is one of the more honorable ones. If not, and you find yourself aligning most closely with a Scrooge or Wimpy budget, then do not despair. There is hope. As a member of this site you are part of a community that will support you and help you to change. And if you can’t change, then you have found a large group of people that you have the potential to take advantage of. I hear that XSSmoke is very generous with his toys…
So now, you are probably thinking, “Who cares if you are cheap? Why are you wasting my time with this? Maybe I should go back to surfing for porn.” Well, if you read the articles on this site regularly (which you should), and if you read the recent submission by Webmonkee about the different types of gamer (and you did, right?), then you would know that he has classified gamers into the following categories: Hard Core, Devoted, Pretend Hard Core, Casual, Clueless and Worthless. Webmonkee wrote an excellent article, and made great points about each of these types of gamer. (I would classify myself as a Casual gamer who gets Devoted to each game he plays. I don’t own or play too many games, but when I do play one I spend all of my time on it until I have conquered it completely. It’s the same way I eat dinner. I eat all of my meatloaf, then all the mashed potatoes, then all the green beans, then drink my sweet tea. I’m compartmentalized like that.) So in the same spirit as Webmonkee’s article, and at the risk of being called an unoriginal copy-catter, I would like to propose my own list of Gaming Budget categories. They are: Donald Trump, Daddy Warbucks, Even Steven, Scrooge and Wimpy. Which one describes you best?
Donald Trump: You fit this category if you buy every new game/console/video card that comes out that had any sort of decent marketing behind it. If you saw just one flashy commercial and then coughed up a wad of cash to make sure you got the latest and greatest on the first day so you could brag about it to your friends, this is you. The gamer with a Donald Trump budget doesn’t really care about the quality of the games or hardware, just the newness. They rarely actually finish any game because they are constantly buying new ones. They have more games and consoles than they will ever have time to play (some are still unwrapped) but they are constantly adding more games to the collection. These gamers are the ones who ALWAYS buy the special edition of the game, and not because they want the extras that come with it. These guys buy it because it is $10 more than the regular edition and that means it must be better, right? Donald Trumps will buy any other merchandise associated with their new game too. A special edition controller that is tarted up with graphics from the game, the game guide, action figures, T-shirts, it all goes in the buggy with the game. Heck, if the game is new, it must be good, and if it is good then all the stuff that goes along with it will be great!
Daddy Warbucks: Gamers on this budget don’t have a problem spending full price on a game, or even the special edition of a game, but it damn well better be worth it. They don’t just pop for every flash-in-the-pan that comes along. A Daddy Warbucks gamer views the time and money they drop into gaming as an investment, and one that should pay back dividends in entertainment value that are greater than the cash they outlay. These gamers follow the previews, screenshots, developer interviews and finally the actual reviews and scores of new games before making their purchase. If a game appears to be a borderline purchase, they may rent it first to see if it is worth buying. Folks on a Daddy Warbucks budget are careful and methodical in their approach to spending, but once they get the game it doesn’t just sit on the shelf like some kind of hunting trophy, they actually spend a good deal of time playing it and genuinely having fun.
Even Steven: This dude has his priorities straight. Gaming is supposed to be fun and if you spend too much time worrying about the money, then you aren’t having fun. On the flip side, an Even Steven knows that if you just spend money on gaming with reckless abandon, other parts of your life will start to be affected and that won’t be fun either. (You can’t play video games if your electric bill doesn’t get paid.) An Even Steven will pay full price for new games sometimes, but they are also willing to wait and pick up things from the used bin. If a store across town is running a special on a new release, they will drive over to get it, rather than pay full price at the closest store just so they can get it home and start playing right away. Even Stevens might get the new release on the first day it’s available, but it could be later on that week. They may trade games around with friends, but if they find something they really like, they will get their own copy. Purchasing decisions for an Even Steven are a bit more laid back than with the Daddy Warbucks type. If they have a friend who heard it from his cousin’s sister’s boyfriend that a game is good, then that’s worth $50, plain and simple. Even Stevens will outlive all of the other gamers because they keep their blood pressure low.
Scrooge: From the opening paragraphs of this article, you can tell that this is my budget. Scrooge gamers just refuse to spend full price on a game, or even half-price for that matter. If that means they are 2 years behind on the new releases, then so be it. These people were still rocking an original Playstation when the XBox was 2 years old because they could get the system for $75 and used games for less then $5. (Guilty) Scrooges are the absolute last adopters of any new console and a game has to meet very high standards even to squeeze $10 out of their bank account. So what if GameSpot gave it a 9.4 and it has sold 3 million copies, they aren’t getting half of a Ben Franklin out of this gamer. A Scrooge gamer sees numbers like that and thinks, “Well, there oughta be a lot of used copies of that available in a few months.” (I bought Halo 2 in September of 2005 and griped for days about laying out $30.) These gamers live in fear of every purchase, terrified that the price will drop $2 on the day after they finally buy the game. Scrooge gamers will also do whatever they can to squeeze every last bit of enjoyment out of a game, playing through it multiple times and finding all of the secrets it has to offer, not because it is fun to do that, but because every minute they spend in the game lowers the cost to playtime ratio. (I paid $20 for the GTA double pack and have more than 150 hours racked up between those two games. Who needs San Andreas, I’ll just find all 100 hidden packages in Vice City again. TAKE THAT ROCKSTAR!!!) These gamers could have more fun if they would loosen up their budget a little bit, but don’t hold your breath.
Wimpy: Wimpy was that dude on the Popeye cartoons who was always broke, but wanted a hamburger. Wimpy wanted to get someone else to pay for it. His tagline was, “I will gladly pay you Tuesday for a hamburger today.” Total friggin’ mooch. Everybody knows one of these gamers. They never spend their own money on games but always seem to be able to play the newest stuff anyway. They come over to your house and hog your system. They borrow games for weeks or months at a time. A Wimpy gamer may have even borrowed an entire computer or gaming system from you. Sadly, before I became a Scrooge gamer, I was a Wimpy gamer during my college days. My best friend in college (gamertag: Raste) was a Daddy Warbucks type and he sprung for a Nintendo 64 right after it came out. I was ALWAYS in that mo-fos room. Playing Mario, GoldenEye, Mario Kart, and I never gave him a dime. (One time I did buy an extra controller, but that was just so we could play at the same time and he wouldn’t kick me out. No altruism for me, thanks.) When he transferred to another school after our Sophomore year, I made sure to get a roommate who had a 64 so I could continue to mooch. A Wimpy gamer has no shame and will ask to borrow your one day old copy of Star Wars: Battlefront II and then disappear with it for a month. Really bad Wimpy gamers might even forget that they borrowed that game from you and trade it in at the local GameStop.
So, perhaps you have found a category here that describes your gaming budget, and hopefully it is one of the more honorable ones. If not, and you find yourself aligning most closely with a Scrooge or Wimpy budget, then do not despair. There is hope. As a member of this site you are part of a community that will support you and help you to change. And if you can’t change, then you have found a large group of people that you have the potential to take advantage of. I hear that XSSmoke is very generous with his toys…
