Too many games?

I lasted an hour or two playing GTA4. On to the next game.

I mean, I'm completely amazed at how horrible actually playing that game is. Even if the prior games were all pretty bad. I hope the $250 million sequel managed to make driving, fighting and shooting controls that were on par with practically any 1 star 3/10 reviewed game that isn't called GTA.

The driving in GTA5 wasn't bad. The only real issue is that cars "float" a little too much. You hit the smallest bump on the road and your car takes flight. It makes flipping WAY too easy. They need to work on gravity in these games. Aside from that, it wasn't too bad.

Looked at my Steam games, and I've only actually finished 5 single player games in the last decade: FF12, Legend of Grimrock, Mass Effect 2, Dragon Age Origins, and The Walking Dead. The only games that hold hold my interest at all any more are Co-Op games with friends and some PVP games. I've put thousands of hours into Dayz, Starcraft 2, and Heroes 3, and tons into Borderlands/Payday/Left4Dead. Other than that, I just find myself not caring at all about the stories in games I play any more. it's all about the gameplay.

A big issue for me is that I play a new game over one weekend when I find the time, lets say 5-15 hours total. I'm usually half through, and when I think about picking it back up a few months later I dont remember the control scheme details, get annoyed by having to look up /relearn the controls and not know where I left off in the story and then I put it away again. Repeat 4 months later... I played the first half of Borderlands 2 with 3 characters because I restarted a different one each time that happened, but have yet to finish the game.

I typically find a random stream on twitch and just play whatever they are playing. Helps keep me somewhat focused.

So we are into the new year, and there hasn't been any new huge sales for a while. How's everyone doing on their quest to knock out some of their games library?

I was thinking on it recently, and thinking about people that play the same MMO for years. Whether it's that dude with max AA in EQ, or the dude that's raided since Vanilla in WoW, and I commend them for being able to stay so focused. I wish I had that same focus, but nothing keeps my attention that for long, even in an MMO setting where updates happen pretty regularly.

Crone_sl said:

So we are into the new year, and there hasn't been any new huge sales for a while. How's everyone doing on their quest to knock out some of their games library?

I was thinking on it recently, and thinking about people that play the same MMO for years. Whether it's that dude with max AA in EQ, or the dude that's raided since Vanilla in WoW, and I commend them for being able to stay so focused. I wish I had that same focus, but nothing keeps my attention that for long, even in an MMO setting where updates happen pretty regularly.

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Terrible. I'm kind of petering out at around halfway through Dragon Age Origins. Prior to that, I was about halfway through FF7. So I've still got to polish both of those off at some point. Installed Sleeping Dogs to see what that was all about, and it looks pretty awesome a couple hours in, but I'm trying to force myself to finish off DA and FF7 first. But in the last couple weeks I've spent most of what little gaming time I've had getting my ass kicked at Civ5. I'm not actually getting my ass kicked, I consistently win against the AI at normal difficulty, but I'm not owning the shit out of the AI like I'm used to, and I'm sure if I move up a notch on difficulty the ass kickings will commence. Just have Gods and Kings, not the latest expansion.

Crone_sl said:

So we are into the new year, and there hasn't been any new huge sales for a while. How's everyone doing on their quest to knock out some of their games library?

I was thinking on it recently, and thinking about people that play the same MMO for years. Whether it's that dude with max AA in EQ, or the dude that's raided since Vanilla in WoW, and I commend them for being able to stay so focused. I wish I had that same focus, but nothing keeps my attention that for long, even in an MMO setting where updates happen pretty regularly.

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Beat Ni No Kuni, Killzone, FF13-2, and a couple shorter games. I also acquired some so I didn't negate it at all.

I have a much easier time playing a MMO for long stretches than I do a single player game. And given my track record with MMOs over the last decade, that says a lot about how how bored I am with gaming. I could only guess how many games I have played one session and then left untouched for weeks until finally uninstalling once I was tired of seeing the icon on my desktop. And those are better games than the ones I hated and immediately uninstalled.

On my desktop right now - Assassin's Creed: Brotherhood, Aarklash legacy, WoW, Battlefield. The first two I installed two weeks ago and I've only loaded them once.

A game has to be pretty much flawless for me to enjoy it these days. Little flaws become insidious enjoyment killers. Tedious bits that I used to tolerate will drive me up the wall. The Assassin Creed series - I like the fighting, I like the platforming, I like the atmosphere - but holy fuck climbing up all those towers over and over and over for that same dumb spinny cutscene instantly bores me to death.

But then, I've been pretty miserable for the last several years so depression has a lot to do with all of this.

Hell, SC2. I loved Starcraft. I used to read all the strategy sites. I played a ton of it online. SC2 I didn't even play for a month. I liked it fine, I just couldn't get into it enough to read about strategies or learn how to get better. So I was vulnerable to all of the cheap gimmicks and couldn't possibly read opponents. But I can't just jump into a silver team match and pump out stalkers and have fun that way. I wanted to like the game, but I couldn't enjoy it casually. And I regret that, because how much enjoyment I got out of the original. (which in retrospect had a lot to do with the people I was playing it with)

Always goes back to the people you are playing with, which is why I think single player games rarely ever hold my attention. If I'm not playing with other people that I have some kind of connection too I rarely stick around. Whether that's a guild, or friends. There has to be some kind of connection, on top of being a fun game to play in the first place.

Sadly, it hasn't happened at all lately.

It's lupus.

And menopause.

My roommate and I (along with the GF) have recently started going and working through our library of unfinished games together. It helps a ton and satisfies my competitive urges to see them playing right next to me or being actually cooping with me.

My current backlog is still pretty significant though. We're currently working through Halo 1-4 + ODST. After this we're planning to do Fallout 1-3 + New Vegas and then right into Fallout 4. At some point I should try to get back into Dragonage 3 but every time I get ready to do it I just remember that stupid "war table" map with the 50 or so side quests on it and I "nope" right back into some other game.

A big thing I catch myself doing is I will come home, sit down and try to decide what game to play or movie to watch and then I'm on my phone and then it's time to go to sleep. I feel like sometimes I literally spend my whole day thinking of what I should do later and then by the time I decide the day is gone.

I got in the habit of asking for video games for every holiday (for the people who refused my requests of not buying me anything, and didn't want to do gift cards), so my backlog is like 30+ PS3 games that are unopened, a few PS4 games, and a shitload of PC games.

I've been trying to work through the backlog. Finally beat TLoU which was just ok, didn't really understand the hype. I beat Mass Effect 1 and was absolutely disappointed with how shitty it was, 2 seemed better but only held my interest for like an hour.

I'm now working through FFX HD Remaster (20 hours in) and hoping I can beat that soon. Might go for Lightning Returns next, but not sure. I have so many fucking games, I don't even know where to begin.

Also, I was disappointed with DA:I for PS4 as well, so you are not alone. I should've known since I didn't like the original, but I thought it would be better.

When I quit mmo's altogether I started liking gaming in general a hell of a lot more.

The worst game for me for starting and not finishing has got to be EU IV. According to Steam I have over 800 hours into that game, I'm sure a portion of that is me leaving the game on overnight, or going afk for a while, but I can safely assume I've played about 600 hours of that game and I have never finished a single campaign. I think it's mainly because it gets pretty tedious to manage your empire after a while, and once you get big enough no AI can challenge you as they just do dumb shit and there is basically no way to lose once your army is bigger than theirs. All the fun and challenge for me comes in the first 100 years or so when you start as a relatively weak country.

I have finished a few games recently, Mass Effect 3, Witcher 3, and I even got all the way through a long war xcom campaign, so I have staying power, but for some reason EU IV I just can't make myself finish a campaign all the way to 1821.