Why even is this?

I am, and I think you know this about me, a grown-up adult who still plays video games. I mention this because I recently--again, despite being a grown-up adult--paid sixty dollars of money for the absurdly titled Bravely Default II. 

Pictured: what I imagine adulthood is supposed to look like.

Or a drug bomb.

And it's good. That's not why we're here. I'm here because of pre-order bonuses. Which isn't something I've ever cared about, but it is still a hazard of buying physical copies of games. So when the be-masked box store employee handed me my copy of the game along with a little square package full of whatever, I took no notice. It could have been a bomb, or it could have been drugs, I didn't know. I was too distracted by the fact that he invited me to have a blessed day. I mean, who says that?

No it wasn't bees, but
it is equally baffling.

So now, days later I notice the thing sitting on the table, just existing and taking up space, so I decided to open it. Do you know what was inside? Go on, guess. I'll give you a hint: it's promotional material for a Japanese, turn-based role playing game with a sort of swords and sorcery vibe. So can you guess? Come on, no wrong answers. Ok, I actually can't hear you, but if you said four paper coasters and an equally paper placemat, congratulations, you're a goddamn psychic. Or you can see me right now. Wait...can you see me right now?

You had one job, coaster. One. Job.

I mean, four paper coasters and a paper placemat? Sure, they feature art from the game, but I have questions. For instance, why? Why one place mat and four coasters? And why paper? Thin paper at that. It's a material famously unable to stand up to moisture, thus undermining the very purpose of a coaster. What made someone at Square Enix, the game's publisher, think that anyone would need or want a branded place setting? I mean, is there some thematic connection between JRPG's and a placemat that I'm missing?

I ask you...

If this were Cooking Mama, I'd kind of get it. That's a food-themed game, it makes sense. If this were a little map on the placemat like they give to kids at chain restaurants to give their parents five minutes' peace, I'd get it. It's an adventure game, that tracks. But no, it's just this weird artwork of the main character serving dinner outdoors and I can't help but thing of those poor trees that were cut down to print these things that literally everyone who preordered this game has already thrown out or added to their hoarder nest. 

Look, not to get all "back in my day," but back in my day, I played a lot of JRPG's and they'd often come with rad extras. Yeah, we used to say rad. Posters, maps, sometimes bestiaries. It was great. Now we're lucky if there's a QR code to an online manual. So while I appreciate the sentiment, and realize that this is a weird thing to even have feelings about, I guess I just can not fathom why they wasted the paper on a placemat and coasters and not a kick-ass monster manual or something. 

Pictured: a typical NES RPG with an instruction manual, a map, a double-
sided chart with items and weapons on one side and a bestiary on the other.
Not pictured: a placemat and coasters because why would
you even think to include a placemat and coasters?