Wherin I fail

It's a sad day for me. I dislike Sony and ever so many things about the way they operate. Unfortunately, they seem to have pulled off a win in the HD disc wars, and Bluray is the heir apparent to the DVD empire. Of course, it's almost equally likely that streaming media will turn out to really take over from DVD, and Bluray will become the new laserdisc, but that's a different discussion.

Loving HD movies as I do, it was inevitable that I was going to get a player eventually. What's strange about the Bluray player market is that there's only one player that runs well, is relatively glitch-free, and will support the constantly changing Bluray standard. I just so happens that this Bluray player comes with a PS3 attached to it.

So I've been resigned to the fact that it was very likely that I'd be procuring myself a PS3 at some point in the next year. This week, two things combined to bring me to the place I'm at now.

Thing the first: Sony has a deal where if you sign up for their credit card, you get $100 off your first $300 purchase with it. PS3s are more than $300.

Thing the second: Walmart had a promotion last week where if you bought a 40GB PS3, you got a $100 Walmart gift card. Best Buy, it turns out, offered to match that deal if you asked them.

The result is essentially a $200 PS3.

So, freshly minted Sony card in hand, I armed myself with the SKU for the pricematch (I love the internet) and a printout of the Walmart ad, and made my way to Best Buy. Once there, I got someone at Customer Service, and pulled out my Walmart ad, and asked about the pricematch. Having done this kind of thing before, I was fully prepared with a story about a friend in Albany who works at Best Buy having clued me in to the pricematch, the email to stores from corporate, and the exact SKU to use to ring the deal.

To my shock, the guy knew exactly what I was talking about, and said it was no problem, and did I want to get anything else while I was there?

So for a relatively low cash outlay, I now have a PS3 firmly attached to my home theater setup. One more run out to get a new set of cables (the ones I have apparently cause a strange video artifact on my TV when they're hooked into the PS3, one of the wierdest things I've seen in a while), and I'll be all set. Pirates of the Caribbean and Ratatouille will be very sweet in HD.

Unfortunately, this means my no buying games plan has failed. I picked up the two games I'm really interested in for the PS3, though I got them for half price, so that's good. I'm also using the remainder of the gift card to pick up Metal Gear Solid 4 later this week. Which brings us to:

Games bought:
Uncharted: Drake's Fortune - $30
Ratchet and Clank Future - $30
PS3 - $200
Medieval 2: Kingdoms - $8

New total:
$366.99

Fortunately, there aren't more than a few games coming out for the PS3 that I'm interested in, so I don't foresee this resulting in any extra game purchases beyond what I listed. However, it may result in some bluray purchases. Good thing I already kicked my compulsive DVD buying habit.