"Gather 'round now, sit right down, and listen to the plight of an old time gamer.
"Y’see, back in my day, there was no such thing as mobile apps or gachas or ‘pay to win’ games or any other such nonsense. No, back in my day, you played a game, and you either won, or you lost. Didn’t have nothing t’all to do with what kind of fancy credit card you had in your wallet. Win or lose, it was what it was. And overall we were okay with that.
"[chuckling] hell, some of us would walk 12 miles uphill in the snow just to pop a couple of quarters into a game of Pacman, so that we could eat some dots. And we’d try to eat as many dots as we could just so we could post vulgar words as our initials on the game’s leaderboards. Until the owner of said establishment got mad at us for fillin’ our plastic cups with fountain soda pop that we hadn’t paid for, and chased us out with a broom.
"[sigh] those were the old days. Nowadays you kids got phones in yer pockets that can triangulate with satellites and cars that parallel park themselves. Y’all probably don’t even know what the hell a ‘pay phone’ is.
"But then again, maybe you do. Because you all are payin’ your phone. Constantly. Mostly for what I reckon is a bunch of dumb worthless 
. Maybe it ain’t on your own card, maybe your daddy bought himself an oil well and struck it rich, gave you a piece of plastic and told you to go wild. I don’t know. Ain’t really none o’ my business either way, I s’pose.
"Now I know what you’re thinkin’. ‘Get to the point grandpa, I don’t have all the time in the world.’ Well maybe you don’t, and maybe you do. Compared to me, many of y’all have a lot. Others maybe not so much. [cough cough] but anyway. Gettin’ back to my point.
"So I found this E&P game on my own fancy mobile thingamajob, and it sure looked like a hoot. Knights and wizards fighting dragons, like the stuff from them fairytale books. Y’all remember books, right? Oh who am I kidding. Look who I’m talking to. Of course you don’t.
"Anywho… it sure seemed like a lot of great fun, being able to battle monsters on a miniature computer that fits in my pocket. Whoo wee! Futuristic stuff right there. I guess my fun started to dry up once I done figured out how much of my cold hard cash they was expecting in exchange for all these fancy knights and wizards.
"After meetin’ a fellow on here who told me he had spent about $30,000 on this game, I told him, ‘you do realize that’s about the price of a house, right?’ Or least it was back in the old days. I understand inflations and all, but unless I’ve completely fallen off my rocker, I don’t reckon 'flation has expanded that much o’er just a few years, to where now instead of quarters, kids are pumping hundred dollar bills into video games…
"But then, I guess I don’t really know anymore. I used to think the value of a dollar meant somethin’.
"I certainly understand that the good folks over at Giant Small gaming & company are prolly puttin’ in lots of hours, toiling o’er their machines to draw them fancy hero cards and all… and I commend them for their efforts and creativity. But I just can’t for the like of me understand how or why these things should be so gosh durn expensive! Have they considered maybe convertin’ their hero card factory into some sort of an assembly line? There just ain’t no logical reason why in this day and age it should be costin’ them $100 to make a copy of a two dimensional drawing. It didn’t cost nearly half that much to make a carbon copy o’ somethin even back in my great grandpappy’s day.
"I know, it’s no bother really to you kids these days, what with yer hoverboards and ‘lectric scooters, floating around town and payin’ a hundred dollars for a cup of coffee and a thousand for a slice of avocado on a piece of bread. Guessin’ these days the median income must be around a million dollars a year. But for an old timer like me who ain’t never had or even seen anything close to a million dollars in his whole life, this game is just way too durn expensive.
"Well on that note, it’s almost 7 o’clock here, so time for me to be heading off for bed. I s’pose the rest of y’all are prolly just rollin out of your sacks and slicking on your hair gels for a night out on the town, doin’ the chicken dance, drinking $500 glasses of microbeers and blasting your technical music until 4 in the morning. Thanks for taking a few minutes out of your day to listen to the ramblings of an old fool.
“Live long and prosper. And don’t go spending all of your allowance all on one durn hero! I promise you, ain’t none of them worth it.”
[cough cough]
