I can't imagine having to pay a subscription fee to play games online. But I'm a PC gamer; you consoles with your PS5 and Xbox Series X really take advantage.

For me, the hardest time was when I was immersed in the world of Animal Crossing. I wanted to visit other people's islands, but to do so I had to pay a year's worth of Nintendo Online fees. This was one of the cheaper subscriptions for multiplayer, but it still bothered me that I needed it. I only used it once and have never been online on the Switch since.

"There are free games," I hear you say. That's right, there are "free" games. However, they are not free. Classic NES and SNES games are included in the price as value offsets.

Worse yet, for many games, it is not even Sony or Microsoft that provides the service to run online play, but the game developer or publisher. Moreover, you may be paying for season passes and in-game items. How many times would you want to pay for everything you own?

I know some of you don't care about these things, but I am here to professionally address your concerns for you. We should not have to pay for online play for arbitrary reasons. The situation is even worse when you consider that while I am merrily driving around in the PC version of "Forza Horizon 4" without paying a cent, you, playing the same game, are stuck with an Xbox Live Gold subscription.

Microsoft recently came under fire for trying to raise the price of Xbox Live Gold. In fact, it went so badly that Microsoft even had to drop charging to play free games like "Fortnite" online. And it was justifiably so.

Microsoft justified the price increase by saying, "In many markets, Xbox Live Gold prices have not changed for years, and in some markets they have not changed for over a decade." I laughed out loud at this. Microsoft charges for nothing but a few games (remember, Microsoft first-party games are not charged on PCs). Microsoft is cutting between expensive game consoles and the Internet. This reminds me of the joke about management consultants stealing your watch and charging you to tell the time.

Microsoft, Sony, and Nintendo act as gateways to the Internet, a sort of reincarnation of AOL and CompuServe, bloated corporations creating walled gardens with a few shiny things in them. The Internet, on the other hand, is awash with opportunities behind doors that cost $60 a year.

Well, citizens, maybe it's time to kick down the door and tell the console makers that you're not prepared to pay to play the games you paid to play on a console that may have been abused with charges not found on a PC and overpriced by a duffer, who also paid You pay to play via the Internet.