I was pretty annoyed that it costs to use, but the results were worth it. You can get a 7-day free trial to have access to the magic avatars and then you just pay $3 for 100 images. It's not a bad deal, but I do think it should be free. They could easily rely on in-app advertisements as popular as the app is.
Glad you are getting active on Hive again. Now is a great time to get involved again because many people are stepping away due to the drop in prices.