A Fatter Wallet through Delayed Gratification

One of the curses of being an early-adopter is not having enough money to adopt everything you want early. As Gadzooki points out you can often save alot of money by just waiting awhile.

Take Shadow of the Colossus for example. When the game was first released, roughly one year ago, it was a full priced PS2 title. Today, you can grab it on Amazon for $19.99. The same is true for Dragon Quest VIII which is now bargain priced. Just by waiting a few months the money that could have spent on two of these games wil now buy four bargain titles.

The concept suggested by Gadzooki travels over to consoles as well. First off there was the price drop on the Nintendo DS. Nintendo also is notorious for releasing newer versions of their console as soon as a month or two after initial release. Waiting a couple months could net you a black console over a white, a brighter screen, or even a small console (see the GBA vs. GBA SP). There are even rumors floating around that the new XBox360 will not only sport a better processor but a cheaper price and potential bundle setup.

Waiting a while also gives you some pretty solid recon on games, consoles, and gadgets. Early Nano buyers complained about easily scrached cases. XP when it first launched was buggy and broken, and even games like Lego Star Wars The Original Trilogy for the DS proved to be far less developed than versions for other consoles. Let us not forget the XBox360 ring of death that even yours truly has experienced.

For early adopters its a double edged sword. Yeah, it's great to be able to show off new gadgets or get in on the ground level of a console. Instant gratification though is not something that has ever proven to be the best.

Gadzooki's article claims to help you save $1000 per video game console through a few simple rules. If you think you can practice temperance or just want to save some cash, head over to the site and give it a read.