I grew up in a family of 7, five of which were kids, one of which was me. Since there were so many kids in my family, I had to fight and claw for attention, and resources. I remember the shame I felt in 7th grade, when I literally only had 5 shirts. I had to try to remix the same 5 shirts for the 5 days of the week for school. I kept quiet for a few months, but finally got sick of it and started plotting my vengeance upon my siblings for sucking up the attention, revenge upon my mom for not knowing that I needed more shirts, and a rage plot upon my dad for not giving more cash to buy more shirts. It was pretty clear my family was plotting against me, so I took it upon myself to balance the scales in my favor in the Bitter Ben household. It’s pretty shocking that I had to do so much, considering how successful (most successful bitter blogger of all time) I would become someday, especially compared to my underachieving siblings. It was pretty clear my parents didn’t care about me, so I made them care.

There was another time I had to get their attention, though this time I wasn’t as violent about it. One day my mom brought us to a strip mall in Melville, NY to buy my brother and I some Underoos (I got Superman, he got Spiderman). After my mom finished embarrassing us, we walked down to the electronics store. I heard heavenly angels and saw a bright light descend upon this rectangular machine made of hard black plastic and rich mahogany. The technical name for it was the Atari 2600, but to me it was my portal to a different dimension and an escape from these ridiculous people that I had to occupy a home with. I didn’t know how it was a portal to another world until I my parents finally got it for us, but it has always been my escape. Now it’s more of an escape from the bitter thing I call life.

It was a new, cutting edge technology where I was finally in control of the moving things on the TV. Once I got the Atari, there were only two time periods. Before video games (BVG) and after video games (AVG). To me, video games were the beginning of civilization, and anytime before them were the dark ages. If you don’t believe me, turn off all the lights in your house, and turn on your video games. Do you see how video games pierce the darkness that was in your living room before? video games on. Video games bring light to an otherwise dark world.

Some people say that to connect to this world you should go outside and touch grass. I say you should stay inside and play Legend of Zelda and cut grass…with your sword. There’s no better way to connect with the world, than to connect to another world. Like Hyrule, Azeroth, Sera or the Mushroom Kingdom. There’s plenty of grass in all those places. And in those worlds, you are in control. In this one…not so much.

The most ironic thing about video games is when other people see you playing games, they say that you aren’t being productive. I laugh in the face of those people. I’m the MOST productive when I’m playing video games. For instance, when I play Gears of War, I’m literally saving the planet of Sera from being taken over by the Locust Horde. When I play Legend of Zelda, I’m busy saving the world from Gannon, and saving Zelda. When I play Mario, I’m taking mushrooms and defeating Bowser.

Some people might scoff and say, “Pshht, in real life, you are working to make a living, so you can make real money, and buy or rent a place to live and connect with people.”

I refute that by saying, my job is moving numbers on a spreadsheet, making money that is electronically transferred to an account, which then just transferred to another bunch of places, like a mortgage, air conditioning, electricity, gas, and shoes for my kids.

None of that money ever sees the light of day. It’s all electronic. Air conditioning, electricity, heat and gas are all invisible. For all I know, those places aren’t really providing any of those things, and they are charging my electronic account. How are any of those things any more real than the stuff in video games? They may be a bunch of ones and zero’s, but to me they look pretty real. And people seem pretty real to me too, but aren’t they just a bunch of highly concentrated cells (basically 1’s and 0’s?) Video games are just as real as the real world in my mind.

I could get philosophical about video games all day, but what I really wanted to talk about are microtransactions. If you don’t know what microtransactions are, get ready to find out what a waste of money is.

The first ever microtransaction was on a game called Elder Scrolls. For $2.50 of real money, you could get Horse Armor. It was so absurd, that the video game community laughed and mocked it mercilessly. They said, “There is no way, not in a million years, that we would use actual, real world money to buy a digital piece of horse armor.”

It was only cosmetic, and it didn’t change the game at all, except that your horse looked slightly different. But that tiny little horse armor cracked open an avalanche of digital items, DLC (downloadable content), and loot boxes that now flood the entire video game industry. Now, you can’t open even the simplest game on your phone without being barraged with microtransactions. You’ve all seen them. From purchasing Eagles in Angry Birds, to Gold Bars in Candy Crush, there is always a “boost” that you can pay a little bit of real money to make the game better or easier.

Microtransactions have gotten so bad, that game creators don’t release fully complete games. They hide certain parts of the game and just save them for DLC that you have to pay more money for later. In Gears of War, there are two ways they can make money (besides the actual selling of the game) through microtransactions. There is additional DLC, which usually includes new maps, modes, and then skins. Skins can include different coloring on weapons, different avatars you can play as, or different kinds of finishers.

Every game has them and every game makes significantly more money from microtransactions than they make from the initial sale of the game. It’s absurd, but can you blame them for doing it when people will pay for it and they keep making money by doing it?

It is for this reason that I’ve adopted the same business model of microtransactioning my life. Get out your credit card, because I’m charging people for EVERYTHING. Don’t worry though. It’s just a little bit of money. You’ll barely feel it… at first. I’ll be charging just $.25 to read my blog.

I’ll even give you the first few blog for free. As a show of how much I care about you.

But then I’ll start using microtransaction creep, in which each cluster of blogs cost slightly more money. Day after day, month after month, year after year, you’ll pay just slightly more per post, but you won’t think about it, because it will just become habit to pay for my posts. Soon, you’ll be so addicted to my blog, that you’ll be glad to fork over thousands of dollars a post.

The best part is that you’ll do it willingly. What is the difference between gamers paying for digital items and my digital items? My blog posts are just 1’s and 0’s just like those video games. My blog posts are creative, and bring you the same types of emotions as video games. Anger, disgust, rage, bitterness, and a hit of dopamine just like games. Except my posts are much easier to play than video games. Mine are words that you’ve been using since you were a little kid. Video games on the other hand, have a much higher learning curve. You have to figure out all those buttons, you have to figure out how to walk, run, dive, and shoot in addition to reading a lot of instructions. All you have to do with my blogs is read.

I don’t even charge you for the initial game. That’s how generous I am. Go ahead and get your credit cards out, and enter those numbers in the comments below, and I’ll make sure that you get all the bitter blogging you need. I’ll even throw in some Bitter Friday Giftures for free (at first) at the end. Don’t worry, I’ll make sure that the line for heaping praise upon me is quick and efficient.

I grew up in a family of 7…

Apparently my mom and siblings…

So of course…

After my mom took me shopping…

We wandered down the mall…

Angels appeared…

Otherwise known…

Also known as…

Not everything is splendid about video games…

It all started with…

Which started an avalanche…

Which gave me the idea…

Including…

But don’t worry…

ARRGGGHHHHH

Bitter Microtransactions Ben