Dear Sony,
By now you've probably noticed that things aren't working out so well between us. I've been very supportive of you, financially and emotionally, but you're just not returning the favor. The PS3, for example. How horrible of you to demand that much money, when I am a poor college kid who must also pay gas, tuition, food, etc. You know I can't pay $600, or even $400, and there's no way I can pay 80-100 dollars for one game. And where is the PS3, anyway? For all of how much its supposed to kick ass I'm seeing damn little demonstration of ass-kicking. I could forgive you if you just wanted the best technology to run your games, but that's not all. There's also the 2 PS1s and 4 PS2s that I've gotten over the past several years because you can't seem to make stuff that doesn't break. That's 6 consoles in 7 years. Or, over $1500 worth of broken PlayStations. Not to mention a solid month of my time wasted over this summer while the Vaio you made was in the shop. I can understand maybe one physically defective hard drive, but two? In two months? Even then I could have forgiven you, because everybody makes mistakes. But then, last night, I discovered the pictures of the "Pink PS2" you're so secretly proud of on my computer.
I knew after I found these that I had to leave. You say it will bring in more women gamers. You say its new, flirtatious, and fun. I say that you have no concept of me or what I want to play, and I am done with putting up with your arrogance and your stereotype of women. I am taking the games. They deserve a better console than you. It's taken me six long years to realize it, but you are abusive and neglectful, and I am leaving you for someone better.
Things didn't used to be like this. You remember the PS1, right? I was 11 and you were 52. All of those hours we spent downstairs playing Monopoly, Chrono Chross, and so many others...there was nothing we couldn't do together. In the beginning everything was perfect; you had great games, I had Christmas and birthdays. You had working technical support, and I had a working knowledge of technology. Yeah, you remember. I played my first adventure game with you. My first RPG. My first racing game, my first strategy game...the list goes on. But then things started to change. The PS1 stopped working. In a panic I rushed to my parents, who in turn rushed to the store, who were in their turn told that this was a common defect, but we'd have to send it off to you to get it fixed or buy a new one. I had so much faith in you that I bought a new one right there on the spot, because I knew that this was just a fluke and there was no way you would ever fail me again, right?
Well, I was wrong.
We coasted for a couple years after that. I honed my skills playing progressively more difficult games while you were fighting the rest of the world for dominance in the gaming sphere. You won, of course. You never did tell me what happened that night when you came home all torn up and dirty. I had to read for myself in the newspaper the next day that the Dreamcast and Sega were dead. Then the PS2 came out. I got one for Christmas and spent about 8 months happily whiling away the hours before the laser eye within it went blind. I was devastated. How could you do this to me again? I picked myself up off the ground and bought a new one, which within a year also died. I was angry and bitter, but I still wanted to believe that you cared for me, so I bought a third one with my own money. That one died in March. I'm now on my fourth PS2, with no plans to buy any new ones.
I'm fairly tough on my consoles, I admit. Not that I throw them through walls or anything, but I use them extensively. So I can give you maybe a bit of slack as far as the PS2s. But I can't do that with computers. I need those to work all the time. When I bought my Vaio from you last summer I fully expected it to be dependable. I was so...wrong.
Everything worked fine for the first year. I had no problems, except for the ones I created myself. Then in May everything started slowing down and locking up. It was overheating because the fan was broken, so I sent it off to get it fixed and waited. Well, to make a long story shorter it took a month before anyone discovered that the root of my problems was a defective hard drive. So the Vaio was sent out again. It came back, and it still didn't work. The replacement hard drive that had been installed was also defective. I had no choice but to send it off yet again to be fixed. 27 days, Sony. That's how long it took for me to get a working computer. 27 days.
And then...something happened.
I realized who you are.
You are not my friend.
You are not a hip authority figure with money and power, who also just happens to put out video games.
You are a con. You have deceived me with the lure of a stable alternate reality, whiled thousands of dollars from my trusting hands, and crammed me into a demographic box marked "girl".
Yeah, I know you say you can change. Everybody says that when they're faced with a crisis like this. You try to convince people that its not that bad. Well guess what? It is that bad. Its time to stop blindly chasing wild and fantastic pipe dreams and accept the reality that you have overextended yourself to the nth degree. It was in your best interest financially to put out the cheapest possible product, so you did it. Less money towards product, more money towards advertising...it was a worthy formula. But in the process of cornering the market, you forgot one very important thing: the gamers. Gamers, who like me, are poor. Gamers who can see past the PR bullcrap. Gamers who might just get offended if you thrust Barbie McConsole upon us and declare it "hip". You know what whole story about the emperor's new clothes? Well Sony, you're buck naked in the middle of Times Square, and I'm gonna shout it to the world.
Goodbye.
