Can you give it away for free?

If it's worth doing, it's worth doing right. Or, correctly, as it were. I moved into a house that was built in 1998 and there are far more things wrong with it than I thought. The plumbing is bad, the lighting is bad, and a previous owner had done some construction that was of poor quality. They don't care because they moved. I care because I moved in. See, they only needed to do some work and sell the house. They don't care if it's a bad product; they only care that they got paid. In the end, I'm the one who is disappointed.

Such seems to be the case with the PlayStation Classic, which comes with twenty games and two controllers. Originally retailing for $99.99, this item was hotly anticipated by those who wanted to relive their youth, and also by those who missed out on this particular system or console generation. However, shortly after release, many users complained about several aspects of the product.

One major complaint was how the system ran PAL versions of games at the 50hz rate instead of the NTSC versions of games at 60hz. Another complaint was that the controllers weren't DualShock controllers. Lastly, some complained about how lackluster the game collection was, and how 20 games doesn't seem like much for $99. Compared to other recent "classic" offerings from the original brands, the PlayStation Classic just didn't seem to cut it.

And so the price dropped...and dropped...and now you can buy a brand new unit for around $40. Well, until today. Today you can get one for free*! Complete with an asterisk! Which means it's only sort of free. Apparently BestBuy decided to run a promotion where you can buy a PlayStation 4 Pro for $399 and get a PlayStation Classic for free! This system is so unpopular that it's being included in a package with the newest iteration of hardware. You'll notice that Nintendo didn't need to do this with the SNES Classic or the NES Classic, as those both sold like hotcakes, so much so that some stores could not keep them on the shelves.

Now, certainly the PlayStation Classic isn't really a "bad" system to own, but it is lackluster. It doesn't even really interest me, and I never owned a PlayStation in the first place! I would love to play some games that I missed! But not like this. Not games I'm not interested in or games that I own on Sega Saturn. Rayman? Saturn. Resident Evil? Saturn. Metal Gear Solid? Well, I guess I missed that one. And I'd like to play it. But at this point I think I'm better off playing it on a PlayStation 3 instead.

So, if you're interested, go buy a PlayStation 4 Pro and get a PlayStation Classic with it. I want a PlayStation 4 Pro, but I think I'm going to wait for a better offer than this.

Thank you for reading this short article. Check out some of my previous work at the links below.

Local Co-op Games - I want more!

Games as a Service - Are You Into It?

What happens when a game is gone?