Sunday afternoon was the first time I had stepped into a GameStop in years. The store was surprisingly packed, with people trading in old iPod nanos and an iPhone 4S, while others were purchasing 3DS games. Pokémon X and Y were the hot items, with kids and parents (who could probably think of more productive things to do) waiting their turn in line. On a whim I asked about trade-in values, went home, erased the data off my Xbox 360, and returned to GameStop to trade it in for around forty bucks, with an extra thirty percent earned on top since I turned around and bought a game off of GameStop’s “trade offers” list. I hadn’t touched my 360 since my early college days, and I determined I wasn’t going to get a better deal on eBay or Craigslist, nor was it worth the hassle. Might as well get rid of it now before it’s worth next to nothing once the next generation of consoles arrive.
I walked out with one of three 2DS systems that were left and a couple of games. Considering that I was trading in other items, I really didn’t have to spend a whole lot of money to gain access to a large library of fun titles. As an adult, I purchased a system that the press has written off as “cheap” and “just for kids.”
