Nerf guns are, admittedly, a lot of fun to play around with. Despite everything we may say against it while talking about it in class, we know that we’re still going to point them at friends and bombard them with darts. There are a few things that come to mind, however, now that I look back at my Nerf gun that I didn’t really think of before.
When I first considered getting a Nerf gun, it was when my family visited me and took me to Target. My basic thought was “Hey, I need a Nerf gun for Humans vs Zombies. Let’s get one.” It was supposed to be simple. Of course, it didn’t turn out that way when the aisle was full of all the different types that the company had made. It took me a minute to look through all of them. Each had their own name that made me think of names of real gun models. And, of course, each box was emphasizing the good points of their product. They were all in competition with themselves.
I began to weigh the pros and cons of each. The big ones looked intimidating. The small ones seemed more practical. Each had something attached that made it “better” than the rest. Even the darts were different, from whistlers to suction cup ends. At that point, I started to feel overwhelmed and completely stupid. All I had wanted was something that would shoot Styrofoam darts at people who were pretending to be zombies. Instead, I had managed to stumble upon something that probably had a devoted fandom that knew the products as well as I knew Batman. (And I am quite the fan of Batman.) I basically gave up at that point, told myself I’ll ask my friends if they had any idea what was a good Nerf gun, and left.
The marketing strategy that Nerf had to convince people to buy their products had managed to backfire on me. The main point of the features of what made the gun “special” than the rest was to convince someone that they needed this toy to be superior to their other friends. It might even convince them to own multiple Nerf guns. If I hadn’t just given up in trying figuring out which one to get, I probably would have gotten one of the bigger ones. They had more, so the quick conclusion is that they’ll work better.
Well, it wasn’t the case. I won one of the big guns during a raffle. The rest of my friends had rented out the smaller, cheaper ones for Humans vs Zombies. We tested them both. If anything, the bigger gun was more of a hassle because it was bulkier. The longer barrel had improved accuracy, but it was such a small difference that it didn’t matter. In the end, I had chosen to strip away all of the extra parts and stick with the part that did what I needed: shoot Styrofoam bullets at my friends pretending to be zombies.
There’s a reason why the saying “less is more” is so valid. How many times have we agreed to get something that is over the basic just because it looks cooler and we could? Basic edition vs limited edition with features we’ll probably never touch. We’ll probably choose the flashier version. It just makes us feel good for that one instance to have something better than the rest. It’s one thing to get something because you know that you’ll use the bonus stuff. It’s another to get something with bonus stuff just because you can.
There’s always the nagging voice in the back of your head, telling you that you might possibly need the bonus stuff later on. You just don’t know when. Sometimes that voice is right: you’ll find a use to make all of the added stuff useful. But how often is that the case? Most of the time, you just feel good because you got more for your money. The question then becomes will you have actually used the “more” to make something enjoyable, or was it just instant gratification?
All I wanted was a basic Nerf gun. With the one I got, I manage to KISS (Keep It Simple, Sweetie/Stupid).
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