As someone who knows nothing about audio: wouldn't it make more sense to get a top quality microphone and apply post-processing, rather than deliberately getting inferior hardware?
And cost nothing or very little. (But do support the authors.)
Hardware has ease of setup and excellent knobs going for it, but if you're going for cheap, you should spend money on a condenser microphone, some mounting hardware (e.g. gooseneck, spider mount, maybe pop filter) and audio interface first.
$200 put there makes for professional quality audio. t.bone SC 400 and an interface that does phantom power, like one of the cheaper Focusrite or Presonus ones. (If you feel extra cheap, you can go lower price on interfaces but it's not worth it.)
$50 is about the price of the microphone.
It so happens that there's the $70 USB version of it too, but the interface in it is just acceptable, as opposed to being superb. (This microphone sounds as good as $400 RODE products, using it with bad interface is a disservice when $80 gets you a great one.)
Condenser mics are a lot more sensitive and omnidirectional. They are great in a studio to pick up every detail, but if you use them in a normal room you'll end up with lots of echo/reverb which is really hard to get rid in post.
On the other hand, one that that does matter a lot is that dynamic mics can handle a lot more sound pressure. So, yeah, you often see them recording things like drums and the likes. This on the other hand is actually intrinsic with the mic itself.