Poll of the Day > I have become lost in a sea of games, I can't keep up anymore.

(+) Yeah! (+)

So, I just got Vigil, the longest night. It looks good (alot like salt and sanctuary that I love), but there are just too many games, I can't keep up with them anymore. I have so many I need to play that I already own, and then on top of that good games like this get released and I totally miss them.

I guess having too many games is a good thing, but, it's actually making it so I don't play any of them very long for some reason and rarely finish them now.

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Try being poor.

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shadowsword87 posted...

Try being poor.

I did as a kid, it sucked, no reason to try again.

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*points to sig links*
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shadowsword87 posted...

Try being poor.

These days even poor people can have a sea of games.

Didn't finish AC:Odessey.
Didn't finish RDR2.
I will finish Ghost of Tsushima.

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I'm in the same boat, wolfy. I genuinely enjoy a large variety of games. All kinds of genres, from small and quirky indie titles to big-budget AAA blockbusters. And I buy most games that I have even a passing interest in.

Having three kids and a wife and full-time job leaves me with only a couple hours a night to play, and that's if my kids go to bed on time and my wife doesn't want to do something together.

While I haven't really slowed down in purchasing games, I have gotten rid of my gaming PC and focused most of my interest on the PS4 this gen, and that's helped. Not advocating for PS4, just suggesting maybe you pick a platform you think has the most appeal to you and focus on that.

I skipped Xbox this gen and probably will again next gen. I bought a Switch to play BotW and Odyssey and Animal Crossing but otherwise don't touch it much. Mostly just play PS4, and limiting my options has helped reduce my backlog immensely.

I also don't force myself to play a game I'm not fully enjoying. Case in point, bought Death Stranding the day it released. Played it for a couple hours but it was boring the hell out of me. Shelved it and played other stuff. Recently picked up Death Stranding and I'm having a blast with it now, but if I wasn't enjoying it this time around I'd probably shelve it for good.

That's been another part of my growth as an avid gamer with no time to be an avid gamer: letting games go. Used to bother me to not finish games, and it still does to a degree, but I realize my time is valuable and if a game simply isn't "doing it" for me I'm not going to waste what little time I have chasing an ending I really don't care to see.

I'd like to get to a point where I'm more discriminating in my purchases, so I'm not spending as much on games I don't play, but for now this system of limiting my options and letting go of games I'm not enjoying is working for me.

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I don't really have this problem. There is maybe 1 good game released a year that I'm willing to invest any time into. Apart from that, I mostly play NES and SNES games.

Far-Queue posted...

I'd like to get to a point where I'm more discriminating in my purchases, so I'm not spending as much on games I don't play, but for now this system of limiting my options and letting go of games I'm not enjoying is working for me.

I don't actually mind supporting good game creators even if I don't ever play the game myself. But I am getting tired of early access that never ends or eventually theygive up on them etc.

I actually have unlimited time now to play but yeah once I was married at 27 (23 freaking years ago now) I had way less time to playgames, but for a very log time I stil really enjoyed them.

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I think #2 was on to something.

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Just gotta accept that life's too short to play all the games you want to play. Once there, the next step is to learn to stop caring about finishing the games you're not enjoying. Rediscover that the goal of gaming isn't how many games you can beat or how many achievements you can collect, it's how enjoyment and entertainment games can give you. Play for that goal, and you shouldn't be so bothered by the games you're not playing/finishing.

At least, that's my take on it.

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I've pretty much always had this problem. Being into so many different types of games is both a blessing and a curse...mostly the latter.

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wolfy42 posted...

I guess having too many games is a good thing, but, it's actually making it so I don't play any of them very long for some reason and rarely finish them now.

Yeah man, it's funny but when I was a kid I'd stick with a game and try to finish it almost every time. Now though I think there are just way too many options- if something doesn't grab me right away now I'll just hop onto something else. It kind of sucks, actually. There are maybe only a handful of games that I'll even go back to on a regular basis now but they're few and far between.

EDIT:

You know what now that I think of it I think I'm always looking for the next 'big thing'. For example there are some games that I'd rank very highly all-time that have captured my attention for very long amounts of time: Diablo 2, the Borderlands games, Disgea, Dragon Warrior/Quest 3, hell even friggin' Bejeweled!

I think whenever I see something that might be that next big thing I buy it, and usually it doesn't end up cutting the mustard. Animal Crossing New Leaf came pretty close. Hades- for all its awesomeness- I've already put it down for a while now. BotW I bought with my Switch Lite and haven't played more than 10 friggin' minutes of it! Ugh.

EDIT #2:

Yeah and also I have a very active 3 year old at the house so he doesn't let me play PS4 like ever haha. That'd sure help things!

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Try having a 7 month old with a full time job. Only gaming I do is on the toilet. Thnk god for my 3ds

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chandlermbing posted...

Try having a 7 month old with a full time job. Only gaming I do is on the toilet. Thnk god for my 3ds

I still play my 3DS - it's what I play most other than PC...

Mostly 'cuz of Picross

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I wish I had the free time to play all my games...

And read all my books and comics...

And watch everything on my streaming queues...

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Play a MMO and pretend the other games don't exist (I kid).

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chandlermbing posted...

Try having a 7 month old with a full time job. Only gaming I do is on the toilet. Thnk god for my 3ds

That sounds like a shitty way to play games!!!

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play 1 long games with short games on the side and be determined to finish them without starting something else, doing other things help

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Black_Crusher posted...

You know what now that I think of it I think I'm always looking for the next 'big thing'. For example there are some games that I'd rank very highly all-time that have captured my attention for very long amounts of time: Diablo 2, the Borderlands games, Disgea, Dragon Warrior/Quest 3, hell even friggin' Bejeweled!

Yeah I had staples throughout my life that I would go back and replay, but not for decades now sadly.

Started with games like Wizardry proving grounds of the mad overlord, moved on to all the great/amazing Might and magic games and then the two insanely awsome games Phantasy star online and Diablo 2 came out. Final Fantasy 6 (3) was in there as well. Pretty much had something as a "yearly" game till about 2000 but yeah, been 20 years now where i have been constantly accumulating more games than I play, and the number I finish each year has decreased constantly, to the point where I prob have not even finish one game in a year a few times now.

Even the ones I really really like, I often don't end up finishing at this point for some unknown reason.

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wolfy42 posted...

Yeah I had staples throughout my life that I would go back and replay, but not for decades now sadly.

Started with games like Wizardry proving grounds of the mad overlord, moved on to all the great/amazing Might and magic games and then the two insanely awsome games Phantasy star online and Diablo 2 came out. Final Fantasy 6 (3) was in there as well. Pretty much had something as a "yearly" game till about 2000 but yeah, been 20 years now where i have been constantly accumulating more games than I play, and the number I finish each year has decreased constantly, to the point where I prob have not even finish one game in a year a few times now.

Even the ones I really really like, I often don't end up finishing at this point for some unknown reason.

Wow that's awesome, looks like we actually played a lot of the same games as kids!

I had played the first Might & Magic on the Apple ][e (the one with Sorpigal with all the white walls and etc) and it was probably my first real deep computer game. I didn't get a chance to play Wizardry Proving Grounds until I got a NES but I played the crap out of it for years. Unfortunately the good ol' NES "blinking blue screen of doom" erased my entire roster. That was a bad day hah.

I really only played the first Phantasy Star for the Master System to any decent degree and that was a HUGE step up in basically everything that I had played before then. The graphics mostly, and the way they handled the 3D dungeons specifically, really set it apart. FF6 is one of the two FF games I even like, and had played the mighty Diablo 2 pretty seriously for the course of about 10 years. The good ol' days!

It's weird but I don't really drink and I don't do drugs. I wonder if buying video games that you'll never play qualifies as some sort of addiction? Serious question, now. We may not be all that bad however take a gander at Steam and you'll routinely see tons of people who'll buy stuff and never even install the thing. That's next level!

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Black_Crusher posted...

I wonder if buying video games that you'll never play qualifies as some sort of addiction?

Yes. Not just video games either.

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Yeah I played Wizardy on the Apple IIc I think it was, but that game was so freaking awesome for it's time.

Yeah I have freaking tons of games on steam and have not even installed more than a few hundred of them. I can't resist a good deal, then there are free ones sometimes, or humble bundles etc. They just keep adding up over time.

Phantasy star II was actually my favorite non-online one. PSO (phantasy star online) was very similar to Diablo II in alot of ways, only sci-fi based, and I would say even more skill based in the combat. It was close to an MMO much like D2 as well (you could play with others).

FF6 (3) is still my favorite final fantasy, I played that every year for quite awhile (along with the Might and Magic games). Summers (back in the day) used to be dry for video game releases, so every summer I'd break out my old favorites and replay em. I actually have world of Xeen on my computer right now still lol.

Once I got married I cut back on my gaming alot (waaay back in 97 which is so long ago now), but I still kept my hat in and till 2000 or so, still finished most games that came out that I bought, but eventually I started this weird thing where I would only finish a few of em (Dark souls games, Digging games (steamworld dig 1 & 2 etc) and not even finish most of the large titles anymore (or even start em, I still have not played more than an hour of FFXV for instance, have not even loaded PErsona 5, never got halfway through Dragon Quest 11, only made it about halfway through Kingdom Hearts 3 etc).

All this good, high quality games, but I rarely get halfway through them now, meanwhile accumulating hundreds of other games many I never even load or try. I stopped buying em on steam about 2 years ago though unless I was willing to play them right away because too many games were just going into the list and never getting played at all.

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Buy a game, complete it and then buy another. I've never had a backlog issue as such due to this. Not only that but the longer you wait for a game the cheaper it gets and/or a "complete" version comes out. Seems pointless buying new games day one these days save for the odd few such as Cyberpunk 2077 is a day one buy for me.,

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Maybe you could like, pick a game and then only play that game for a week or something. If you don't wanna play it, then you just don't play games. Might break the cycle. I sometimes get the same way and sometimes forcing yourself to stick with a game can kinda break me out but sometimes the game just isn't fun enough.

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DeltaBladeX posted...

*points to sig links*

we both know you'll never be able to clear your backlog even if a genie gave you immortality.

i don't think PotD could collectively clear your backlog if we split it up amongst ourselves in shifts around the clock for the next century.

and you're going to keep adding to it.



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yeah nowadays I can only spare the effort for 1-2 games at a time

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wolfy42 posted...

never got halfway through Dragon Quest 11

I bought this day one and have yet to finish it. I play it really sporadically now but IIRC I just got to the part after where Veronica dies in Act 2. It's a fun game but it's not like DQ8 where it captivated me enough to want to play through the whole thing right away.

wolfy42 posted...

PSO (phantasy star online) was very similar to Diablo II in alot of ways, only sci-fi based, and I would say even more skill based in the combat. It was close to an MMO much like D2 as well (you could play with others).

I think this is a huge reason why I enjoy the Borderlands games so much. "Diablo with guns!" is a pretty apt way to describe it. The graphical style is what got me to try it in the first place though, I love the look vs. super ultra realism.

WhiskeyDisk posted...

and you're going to keep adding to it.

But that's his thing!

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blu posted...

These days even poor people can have a sea of games.

It's true. There are so many giveaways, deep discounts, and games that are just outright free to play (good ones, not the aggressively monetized cash grabs that dominate most of the F2P market) that it's really not that expensive to amass a sizable backlog, especially when you also throw in games that are more normally priced but offer thousands of hours of gameplay (e.g. Minecraft). You've still got the relatively high cost of entry of a console or gaming-capable PC, which can be a difficult hurdle to overcome for poor people, but it's far from insurmountable (especially looking at older second-hand consoles) and is still an incredibly efficient use of entertainment dollars.

Black_Crusher posted...

It's weird but I don't really drink and I don't do drugs. I wonder if buying video games that you'll never play qualifies as some sort of addiction? Serious question, now. We may not be all that bad however take a gander at Steam and you'll routinely see tons of people who'll buy stuff and never even install the thing. That's next level!

I'd say it's a variant of hoarding disorder, at some level. It's not as destructive, since digital libraries are hypothetically infinite (and even physical libraries can get very large before taking up enough space to affect living conditions), but it's the same basic compulsion of "I should take advantage of this good deal and I'll probably play it eventually" driving people to purchase stuff that will ultimately be useless.

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adjl posted...

I'd say it's a variant of hoarding disorder, at some level. It's not as destructive, since digital libraries are hypothetically infinite (and even physical libraries can get very large before taking up enough space to affect living conditions), but it's the same basic compulsion of "I should take advantage of this good deal and I'll probably play it eventually" driving people to purchase stuff that will ultimately be useless.

I also like to support good games, even if I dont' want to pay full price for many of them. If I see a good game, or a game that looks fun to me, even if I don't get a chance to play it, I want to support it. There is a kinda "collect them all" part to it as well, or just a "shiny!!" kinda thing going on behind the scenes as well.

But yeah, I have like 50 games on Epic and have never bought a game from them for instance. A computer to run most games at this point (heck even a labtop) can be had for a few hundred dollars (if you buy it used).

Used PS4's can also be gotten fairly cheap at this point (just not Switches!!), and a used Xbox would let you play the huge library of Xbox's game pass ($10 a month after the free trial thingy...which I think is still 3 months). I've seen used Xbox S's or whatever they are called for insanely cheap prices as well.

A PC is the best though since it gives so many free MMO's you can play, games like path of exile, flash games etc, all the free epic games, the insanely cheap steam games (some are free as well) etc. Get a used laptop or desktop with a 2 gig GPU for $200 or less and you can play thousands of games for free at that point (in fact enough are released that you could never keep up with just the free ones).

If I sat down and tried just to play all the free games from epic right now, I wouldn't finish within a year and by then a ton more would have been added.

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