"My Two Cents as a $0.00 Player"

#PokemonGO: The recent post about whether Gym battles are rewarding inspired me to talk a bit about my experiences as a player who's dedicated himself to making zero in-game purchases: How I see the game, how time-cost analyses factor into my day-to-day play, and perhaps how other players like me think.Not buying anything is a very enjoyable self-imposed challenge. It makes the rest of your decisions all that more impactful in that great grind to Lvl. 40, such as carefully balancing pokemon/item storage. If Pokemon GO has a hard mode, then this is it.Not buying anything wards off the inherent risks of playing a game with micro-transactions. I'm not about to act like some doofus and lecture anyone about what they should do with their money -- that's your decision and I respect it. However, speaking for myself and myself alone, I could easily see myself going nuts over GO coins.*Holding down gyms becomes a lot more exciting when that's your only way of collecting Poke coins.Going for gyms in the first place feels...conflicting. On one hand, I am fully aware that the coin I just won sells in the Shop for less than a dime. However, because you're inherently more incentivized to interact with a gym as a free player, the matches quickly become more exciting, and could result in a whole new set of rules.Oftentimes it costs more to play the game at my slower pace than it would if I made in-game purchases, and that's okay. For example, I really love the outdoors, and now Pokemon GO has encouraged me to double my outdoor time. To say nothing of the cost-benefit of playing less and working more, there's travel costs, bug spray, water...Well, it can get pricey! Pricier over time than dumping $100 in coins upon registering, anyways. I welcome that cost however, because in my attempt to GO and not just stay indoors with incense, I've had the chance to explore some incredible places I wouldn't have been otherwise.Because GO is not that competitive right now, if at all competitive, I don't feel like the paying crowd really has that much of an edge over me. sure, you may be ahead, but in the end, that last leap from Level 39 to Level 40 is still 5,000,000 -- what difference does it make if some guy in Albuquerque gets there twice as fast? That may change quickly should Niantic ever improve its battle system, but now I'm fine being just a bit shy of Level 30. via /r/TheSilphRoad http://ift.tt/2bDRVL5