Is Crap Still Crap if it is Free?

Some of you know that I have jumped on the HD-DVD fire sales. I currently own 3 HD-DVD players – 2 Xbox 360 add-on drives and 1 Toshiba A30. Since the demise of HD-DVD, my collection has ballooned to 5 times its original size and it’s sitting at close to 35 titles and growing. The problem I run into is that they are pricing these HD-DVDs at close to $8 used and $13 new. At these prices, it’s so close to rental costs that it makes more sense to own them. I run into a problem with titles such as Shrek the Third. That movie received universally low scores and did not fair very well general audiences. I have seen it and I thought there were moments but certainly not a worthy title to own in ones collection. But at a price of $8 used (and in mint condition – I wonder why!) it’s almost a shame to leave it behind.

So I bought this piece of crap for the sake of it being a cheap.

The other thing that has been bothering me is with most of my consoles modded (PS3 is the only one still virgin), I have access to a whole catalog of crap that I would not have considered if my console was still virgin. The Wii is a prime example of this, where there are 8 crap-tacular games for every one good title. I have recently come across the game Elebits. That game was an average 7.5 score and was mediocre at best. But I was always interested in it so I decided to pick it off of my site. Once booted and I began to play, I realized that this would have been fun if I was 12 years old or if I had never played a video game before. The Xbox 360 also has its share of crap-tacular titles. I was playing Kane and Lynch the other day and was that ever a stinker.

I guess the point is when you have the ability to get free crap, most people that are predisposed to deals, will jump on it. I can personally list a few friends and family that have boxes full of crap because it was a good deal. In keeping with my “green” theme, I think I will save some “green” money and be more selective on my “purchases” from now on. Because even if I have access to these titles of my modded consoles, it is still costing me time, effort, and the price of media to play a piece of crap.