I love plasma. Vibrant colors, good picture from every view, etc. Both LCD/LED and plasma have come a long way though, so either tech is quite good. You don't have to pay out the nose or accept some finicky tech to get the quality image you want.
Image retention also isn't much of an issue anymore. Sure it affected the early plasma screen TVs, but not much anymore. It's not like you're using a plasma screen TV for a kiosk or something that'll have the exact same logo on it for 24hrs a day. Even game HUDs won't be on screen long enough to really make a difference these days.
Many screens have tech to vary the screen image unnoticeably to prevent burn-in even for static images, and you can also easily condition your plasma to reduce that image retention for the first 100 hours, and be good to go after that. I know on those Panasonic brand screens you don't even need to watch it in full HD, because for SD video the bars on the side are kept neutral gray to extend their life. Of course you'd want to use it for HD a lot anyway.
Plus, it's a $400 42" TV. Great deal, though you can pretty decent LCD/plasma screens at that size for even less. I was pretty impressed with some no-name brand 32" my friend got for like $150. Good viewing angles, sharp, etc. What a price! I figure those things have 5-6 years on them anyway before you want to replace it with something better. Though I'm usually not a fan of "planned obsolescence," some things you don't want to pay to last forever. The lifespan of my old CRTs far outlasted their burn-in and I played games constantly on those; it shouldn't be all that different for plasma at least past the first 100hrs.
