Be Patient with Yourself – You don’t need to play every game you buy right away

I know we see posts like this weekly about not forcing yourself to invest in your backlog, but I think this is an important aspect we might overlook sometimes.

My girlfriend bought me Super Mario Odyssey a few years ago. It was my first ever Switch game. For whatever reason I wasn't really feeling it; even going as far as telling my friends I enjoyed Super Mario 64 more. I ended up dropping it after the second kingdom.

After finishing Super Mario 64 again for the first time since my childhood with the 3D All Stars Collection (and finally getting all 120 stars!) I really, really felt excited to jump into Odyssey.

I'm at the second kingdom again, but unlike my first attempt a few years ago I'm really enjoying myself, and having a blast. I can't believe I had the audacity to say I preferred Super Mario 64 at the time. Something didn't click with me the first time - the magic wasn't there, but it certainly is now.

I think it's important to recognize that just because you buy a new game doesn't mean you have to enjoy it right that moment. It might sit on your backlog for a number of years before a conversation with a few friends or a stranger you meet really excites you to play it.

Half way through a game but you're getting a little bored? Drop it and come back a year later. That happened to me with RE2 Remake. I dropped it about halfway through Leon's campaign. All the excitement about RE8 got me excited to go back and finish it, and I don't regret it one bit.

I'm half way through DMC V, I have 2 chapters left of Outlast 2, and I'm 20 hours in to AC Odyssey. All of which I haven't gone back to in a number of months. And that's okay, because I know that when the mood strikes me they'll be there for me to play again.

I feel like a lot of negative reviews I see here are from people who aren't enjoying a game, but instead of dropping it and coming back when the mood strikes them they brute force their way through it so they can write up a review about how it wasn't all that great to begin with.

Now of course not every game is like this. There are definitely games you just won't enjoy no matter how often you go back to it. But if you drop a game like Hollow Knight or Dark Souls, and have some itch in the back of your mind to go back to it at some point then you should. (Because that means there are some aspects of that game you're enjoying right now) If that itch goes away, and never comes back then you know for sure that game isn't for you, and you can drop it without worry.

Just something I thought about today. Anyone have any thoughts?

Great post. A couple of my favorite games I ironically initially didn’t enjoy the first few hours of. I dropped them only to return a year later and absolutely love them.

Games are experiences and sometimes it may not be the right time for that particular experience.

I appreciate your post at this time because I recently bought several games (Okami HD, Onimusha Warlords, the Mega Man/X/ZeroZX Legacy collections, Monster Hunter 3U, 4U) but I haven't felt like playing anything lately. I just started uni so I've been pretty busy with that, but I beat 44 games last year and 3 so far this year, I just think I need a break for a while.

To build upon this, here's my experience-

I played Fallout 3 a crap ton. I played it so much and so often, I was just in love with the world, the ambience, and the gameplay loop. On top of that, there were DLCs that actually built upon the world and it was so awesome to take a new journey of discovering a new world. There were times I took a break from the game, but they weren't that long and I hadn't really taken them with the concept of a "break" on my mind. Just naturally. All-in-all I put in about 125 hours in the game. By the end, I remember chilling in my safe room I had made my central home for looting after exploring the world and I hadn't opened up the console and spawning anything in by then. I'm bringing this up because at this point in time I had done almost everything in the game and decided it's time to put it down and cherish the times I had in the game forever. So I spawned in the Mysterious Stranger's outfit and gun (an NPC who appeared randomly and insta-killed whoever the target is in VATS) played around for like 15 more minutes and then called it a day.

During the last dozen or so hours, one of my friends saw that I really liked Fallout 3 and bought me Fallout: New Vegas GOTY Edition on Steam. I knew it was more of the same thing gameplay loops-wise, but with a new aesthetic and writing. Subconsciously, I knew I might get burnt out on the game after finishing Fallout 3 but..... It was only subconsciously. I couldn't wait to start up a new save file in Fallout NV and dive right in.

To cut it short and blunt, I put in 234 hours in Fallout NV. Only having half the fun as I did in Fallout 3. And with multiple save files I never fully completed. And all because I was chasing the same thrill Fallout 3 gave me. The main problem was that I had dove in when I thought I was ready (but wasn't) and was already burnt out. I spent the rest of that time trying to imitate the feelings of exploring like I did with Fallout 3, when I should have actually barred myself from the game for 6 months or 1 year or 2 years.

It really sucks because whenever I think of playing through Fallout New Vegas, I already experienced it but I feel like I experienced none of it. I guess it's a bit like speedrunning your way through high school or university, you go through it but you never really take it in within the moment.

Sorry for the rant, I don't know if it's valuable to anyone but it's my experience. To put it short, you don't immediately have to start a game you bought recently. And to put it in a weird metaphor, think of that game like cheese. It won't immediately be tasty, but after some time of letting the cheese doing it's thing it'll be fantastic.

Had this with fallout 3 and it's now one of my favourite franchises. The question I can't answer is how do you spark the magic to make you enjoy a game you are not feeling? What is it that helps turn a game Ur not feeling into one you love?

Totally agree. I bought Yakuza 0 last year and quickly got bored of it after a couple hours. I reinstalled it last week and I'm loving it now. Playing it at my own pace and enjoying the story. You should never feel like you have to rush through a game.

I feel like a lot of negative reviews I see here are from people who aren't enjoying a game, but instead of dropping it and coming back when the mood strikes them they brute force their way through it so they can write up a review about how it wasn't all that great to begin with.

I get that sense a lot too, especially when it's someone writing about how they decided to play a whole ton of games with their recent time off. And then they proceed to list 20 games that they blasted through. "Oh and I thought BOTW was just OK. It felt forgettable." Well, duh.

Of course, people can play games whichever way they want. It's their time to spend the way they see fit. But if you devour a steak in 5 seconds flat, your taste buds won't even have a chance to savour it.

I completely agree! I especially feel this with games that I was not only drawn to because they were freshly added to my backlog - but also those games that I was genuinely excited to play! For me, most recently, that was Octopath Traveler. It’s everything I love: a comfy JRPG with grindy elements and a nice mix of jobs to experiment with! I had heard amazing things and was really looking forward to finally getting into it. When I booted it up for the first time only hours after buying it, I found that I adored the music, but something wasn’t clicking for me, so I went back to Fire Emblem: Three Houses. And I’ve been enjoying my Blue Lions run so much!

In the back of my mind, though, there was the feeling that I want to go back to Octopath Traveler one day - but right now just isn’t the time for it. And I’m glad that I listened to that initial feeling, because like you mentioned, OP, it is totally okay to drop games that you’re just not ready for, for whatever reason. I know I’ll come back to it eventually, most likely, but... I was definitely forcing myself through and going through the motions. So after picking up three characters, I stopped. There is nothing wrong with leaving a game for a rainy day with a cup of tea, if that’s the mood you’ll need to properly enjoy the journey.

And I’m definitely going to try to carry your ideas with me, for the next time I pick up that game that I think I should be enjoying!

Thanks for the reminder that the only game you should be playing and enjoying is the one you genuinely want to play.

I started Dragon Age: Origins in 2010 and didn't like it. I don't remember why but I just wasn't feeling it. So I switched to Mass Effect 2 and other games, and eventually forgot all about DA:O.

Four months ago I noticed it in my Origin account and gave it another try. I was floored! Why wasn't I into this before!? DA:O is now one of my favorite games of all time.

This! I think, for the most part, gamers are too stuck in that consumer mentality to the point where they just consume games like bots, similar to publishers just making bland videogames to make banks/play videogames just to submit to that appearance of a gamer. They lack flavours and nuances in their approach to gaming (I dare say heart and passion) and nowadays with social media, low attention span, mob mentality and stuff, they are quick to criticize and put games on a box without taking a step back.

A lot of it comes from perception and experience imo. I'm getting older and have less time to play (and also care less about what people think about my taste), so I learned to let my gaming experience simmer for the past couple of years and I tell you what, I've been having a blast. Games that supposed to be bad (from journalists and gamers) turned out to be decent/good or even great experience.

I think people should learn to play really for themselves like back when we were kids and stop caring about if a game checks all the current trends and boxes.

Yeah, I think I've been suffering with OCD.

I felt the sickly urge to finish each of the games that I had started, each of the games that I had bought, it took me a real work on myself to undo myself, to free myself from this thought because it really hurt and I even got disgusted with video games.

For a while I had stopped playing because it was a mess in my head. today, I have completely let go, I am no longer a perfectionist at all, I simply play according to my desires.

There are a lot of games that I stopped along the way because I was bored, I realized that there was no consequence, that I had built this mental pressure for nothing.

I bought Horizon Zero Dawn day one. Played it a bit and couldn't get into it so I stopped playing it for a while.

Six months later I got back to it, got swooped by the story and had a blast.

Was it the game or my mood at the time. I don't know. Many people seem to find the beginning very slow so it might be it.

On the other hand I had just played four Uncharted game + Shadows of Mordor in a row and could have been just burned out. According to my trophies/achievement list I didn't game during those six months at all.

All that to say it ended up being my favorite game of this generation. This might not have been the case if I had powered through it for the sake of finishing it while I was not in the mood.

Witcher 3 and bloodborne. Started off hating them now both in my top 10 all time.

You're right.

People just have no self-control when it comes to gaming, and make it entirely unfun for themselves. I think there are a lot of addiction signs, but that's far from the point you're making and I won't dig into it here.

People just need to play what they want to and stop playing what they aren't enjoying. A backlog is a library of potential, not some stressful obligation.

I'm glad you found what works well for you. I hope others can follow your example and just have fun instead of stressing out.

Thank you for this. I’m currently trying to juggle between Nier automata, death stranding and yakuza 0 which is a total pain that I know I shouldn’t be rushing because of all the wonderful aspects each game has brought to me. Sometimes I just like the feeling of delving into a new game you know?

I agree, but people should think about not buying games they aren´t going to play. I have a lot of games in my library I bought on sale and still want to play. Play the games you have and when you truly have nothing to play think about buying a new game.

I just finished rdr2 on Thursday and then jumped back into re7 and finished it Friday. Was a pretty good feeling to finish off two games, two days in a row.

Jumping back into my re3make playthrough (50%) today, and plan to play control after that. Also need to check out new season in BO cold war, heard new zombie mode on a huge map... I also need to get back to beating original ori, so I can play the new ori which was on a lot of top 10 lists this year.

I love my backlog, and gamepass for pc is insane. Oh... How I wish gaming was like this when I was younger. I remember going to blockbuster to rent super NES/ sega genesis games and having to hurry up and beat them because they'd keep charging you by the day for keeping it. Haha. Kids these days don't know how good they have it!

If you don't enjoy a game... don't force yourself to beat it. Just uninstall it and move on to the next game. Throw it in a folder called "Done". Throw games you enjoy into your "favorites". With being off work all last year I cleared my whole back log. Use howlongtobeat.com to check game times. Play shortest games or games you think you probably won't like. Many games you bought won't be worth playing. You might even uninstall and skip 10 games for every good game worth playing. Yeah you might have wasted some money... but I wouldn't waste my time on boring games. My backlog consists of 2 whole games. I enjoy my games more too.

I agree, though it is hard to pick up where you left off in a game after not playing for a while. I usually have to start the game over, and sometimes I lose interest by the time I get back to where I was. Soma and Prey are games I dropped and picked up again, and eventually completed. Now they stand out as two of my favourites. Sometimes you get a very specific craving for a game, so it’s nice to have that backlog for whatever mood you’re in.

I’m 40 hours into AC: Odyssey and got bored with its litany of missions to uncover the cultists. I wasn’t having fun.

So I’m taking a break and playing Spider-Man now and will revisit after this.

I kind of see games like movies or tv shows. Sometimes you want comedy, sometimes you want action and other times you just want something familiar like the office for the 800th time.

Sometimes I want to play a shooter, sometimes I want to be a viking or sometimes I just want to play something I already know.

Whenever I finish a great game, I tend to face a bit of "casting about" to find my next game. I'll bounce between various games in my library for a while before landing on something that clicks again. I used to feel frustrated by being unable to get into anything for a while, but now I embrace this time! It's a great way to quickly sample a bunch of backlogged games, and get a feel for which ones I can just sunset, and which might scratch a certain itch when I finally feel it.

This is at its worst for me with presents. Sometimes I throw a game on my Amazon or Steam wishlist and forget about it, then Christmas or my birthday roll round and someone buys it for me. I get overwhelmed with a feeling of obligation to play it asap because, well, it was a gift.

Of course, in reality, that person just wanted me to be happy which is why they bought me anything at all. They wouldn't care if I didn't play it right away. It's just a stupid sense of guilt really.

I had a similar experience with Mario odyssey, and it didn't click for me until the mushroom kingdom. Then something clicked, and I went back and played through each level again getting a bunch more moons so I could do the darker side of the moon. It's now my favorite 3d mario game.

I'm ahead of the curve if I play it within a decade.

I have like 50 games on the virtual or physical shelf that I need to play. Add another 20 that I want to replay or continue playing and will likely get to before some of those 50.

I want to play them. It's a matter of time. Literally. And my living situation right now isn't the best. Cramped, need to sit on my bed in a terribly uncomfortable position to play PS4 games.

But I will get to them eventually.

Way too many posts about people feeling burned out or bored with gaming because they force themselves to play through their backlog. Not having fun with a game? Yeah, that's not gonna change if you just try to power through. All you'll end up with is resentment.

I agree OP and what helps with this is not falling into the trap of thinking you need to restart a game from the beginning if you stopped playing halfway through. I used to do this and I would just get burnt out and enjoy it less. Now, I'll just pick up the game from where I left off. It can be hard at first and you often forget a lot of things but I just watch videos and read story summaries or guides to refresh my memory. I got through Mass Effect Andromeda almost a year and haven't played since but I plan to just pick it up and finish one day. This may be easier for linear story games than sandbox games where it's harder to retrace your steps though.

I've really wanted to enjoy KC:D for the longest time. Perhaps it'll grow on me eventually.

Currently feeling the same about outer worlds! I'm not sure why I felt like I couldn't get into it but now the thought of playing it actually excites me, which happens with very few games for me these days.

If it helps. I still prefer Mario 64 due to Mario's weight, inertia, and running speed.

I keep saying it but it's exactly what happened to me with Deus Ex: Mankind Divided. Being a Deus Ex fan I had even pre-ordered it and got it day one, so I was eager to try it out. When I did, I can't remember why but I felt like I couldn't get into it at all and dropped it after 8 hours. It was only in December 2020 that I finally got in the mood for playing it again, and I had a blast this time! Every once in a while I buy a game but having little time for myself and little energy doesn't help me start them right away, so now I just play them whenever I feel like it. I'm not in a hurry.

That happened to me with evil within and Persona 4. Didn't like both games at the start and I quit. Months later I decide to try them again. Loved both games by the time the credits rolled.

I thought I was the only one.

I’m in the habit of never playing a game I buy, who is with me!!

I'm also the same way. But then I see posts of people writing about the 50 games they finished last year when I barely started 20 games and finished 5. It makes me wonder if gaming really is for someone with a lot of time. Sometimes when I struggle to like any of my current games, I also feel like I have stopped enjoying games but then I watch some video or read posts like these and I get the itch to play again. And the cycle repeats.....

This happened to me with Dark Souls II. I’d played Demon’s Souls and Dark Souls and was wary of the second one because of the negative things I’d heard about it. I tried playing it too close to the other games and gave up after the first or second area. I tried it 3 or 4 times and it was a slog.

Then I popped it in randomly a year later and it just clicked. I couldn’t stop playing it. And while I like the first two better, I enjoyed my time with it because I played it at the right time.

What I have learned from patient gaming is play what you want to play. I always wanted to finish the games in my backlog as soon as possible. That meant that they weren't as fun and I wasn't really enjoying them. I tried not to go back and play games I already finished because I would deem it a waste of time.

But you know what? Games are meant to be fun and I should just be enjoying them even if that means playing The Sims 4 for 5th save file or starting up New Vegas again for another 70+ hours. It's all about enjoying the time you spend not what you can finish in the shortest amount of time.

I agree but it's also frustrating to come back to a game a few months later only to realize you have no idea where you are, how to use the controls, what you're doing, or what has led up to this point.

The challenge for me is that a lot of games are difficult to come back to if you were mid-way through. In my case, I REALLY want to finish up God of War. However, every time I go back to it, I'm frustrated because I don't remember the controls or much of the story.

I think it would be hard to implement, but a cool feature game developers can add is one where it recognizes that you haven't played in a long time. It would give you a bit of a story synapsis and an option to play through a tutorial to re-familiarize yourself with the game mechanics and controls.

I've now started to keep a little game journal, where I can at least write down important story beats and what I was planning on doing next, if I decide to put a game down for a little bit.

Hmm... now can you help me choose which game I should start with in my library of - holy shit- 485 games? I really should play some more of these at some point.

I run into this issue a lot since I buy games on sale, pretty consistently, even though I'm often in the middle of another game. I have a hard time switching between games because I don't want to lose whatever proficiency I've gained in the one I'm playing.

Better than buying it at full price and not playing it until it's like 65% off

There are a lot of games that I just didn’t like the first time I tried playing them. Dark souls remastered I made 4 different characters before the game really hooked me and I actually played past the second boss and now I’m absolutely addicted. Same thing happened with Kotor and Fallout 1. I had the play through the beginning several time over the years before It finally clicked.

This 100x. Sometimes it just takes me to read about a few games to really get me wanting to play it.

Mando S2 ? Now I wanna play Jedi Fallen Order finally. Ghost of Tsushima wins a bunch of awards ? Looks like its time to start that one up. You'll be in the mood when you want to be in the mood.

This just happened with me with The Last of us 2. For whatever reason, I just couldn't get into it, I just didn't care and didn't find it engaging. I put it down for a few months and kept playing Apex Legends. Finally picked it back up a couple of weeks ago and I'm loving it!

I initially felt like I had wasted a bunch of money on a game I'm never playing, but patience allowed the right time to play the game to present itself. Big fan of "put it down if you aren't feeling it"

Yeah, interest in games varies. Sometimes you just aren't in the right state of mind for them.

Several times I have seen a cool comment or YouTube video referencing a game and I felt like buying it, then found I already had years before.

I absolutely hate the first 1/4 of Prince of Persia as a kid. Couldn’t get past the intro for almost a year. Then I finally did it and it quickly became one of my all time favorite games!

I'm finally getting around to playing Final Fantasy X. I recently bought Xenoblade Chronicles 2 on the Switch, to scratch a JRPG itch, but Xenoblade's combat just did not do it for me at all, so I dusted off FFX from my backlog. I'm playing it via Steam Link to my TV, with a Switch Pro Controller, so it's almost like playing Final Fantasy on Nintendo like the good old days.

Conversely, don’t buy games that you aren’t going to play right now. I found that I actually spend less money by only buying games I’m going to play right now even though I miss out on sales.

Man I hope I have motivation to play or finish some of the game I have on both Steam & Epic Games

I just add games i want in my wishlist. And by the time I'm done with the current one it's already on some discount. If say there is a discount period whilst I'm playing another game, i know i can buy it from a marketplace for the same price after the period. So my tactic has never failed me this far

As my girlfriend said once - "Games don't expire." (of course in regards to online only games and servers this is technically only half-true but the message still stands)

I also dropped a few games I enjoyed playing half way through because for whatever reason I just stopped having fun with it. Recently, I went back to finish one of them and had a lot of fun. Thinking back, some time away from that type of game (bombastic and difficult ones) was really what I needed.

I think the worst is when you have very high expectations for a game. A while ago, I finally got to a visual novel I've been meaning to play for a long time. However, I just couldn't get into it and felt like I want to like it a lot more than I actually did. I ended up dropping it after realizing I just wasn't in the mood for a slice of life romcom at the time despite it being a genre I normally enjoy. This kind of experience is quite disappointing. Hopefully, I will get back in the mood for it later on.

This happened to me with Persona 5. Played P4 Golden on Steam, and it ended up being a top 4 game of mine of all time. Got P5 on PS3 the next week and... the burn out was way too strong. I ended up dropping it in a week, just finishing the first palace.

​

Since I got a PS5, I ended up getting P5 Royal, and I've been having a great time! There are still some issue I have with it that make it less enjoyable than 4 for me, but I'm having a lot of fun, now on the 6th palace.

But please, don't take this as an excuse to buy game don't don't feel like to play right know. It's not healthy having a queue of 50 games you've bought and didn't even touch.

Funny that you mentioned Hollow Knight and Dark Souls at the end because those two were the first examples that came to my mind when reading your post.

I'm not exactly a "git gud" type of player and my reflexes are ass. I knew I would enjoy the lore and world of those games but I bought them at times when I just wasn't in the right mindset for a first playthrough (and once the first playthrough is done and you're much more knowledgeable than before the mindset doesn't matter as much).

Hollow Knight I played on my Switch, outside in the shade, during a hot summer where I literally could not play on another console inside cause it would heat the room too much. So Hollow Knight it was, even if I wanted to play something else at first.

Dark Souls I finished the first time during an exam phase, where I could only get half an hour of playtime in at most. I didn't make much progress like this but also did not get frustrated by being stuck several hours at once, so that helped. And once I finished that first game I also came to enjoy the other Fromsoft games (though I'm still really really stuck on Sekiro and don't see myself going back to that anytime soon).

Another one I had problems with at first was Pillars of Eternity 2. I had finished the first game in one go and I loved it but got burned out on the genre so I could not start the next one for several months. Finished and enjoyed it eventually too. Even your favourite type of game might just be wrong in the moment.

I'm 20 hours in to AC Odyssey

Same, got stuck at the point where I was something like level 23 and the next main story quest was level 32. Left it for weeks multiple times to come back and realize it doesn't get better. No way I'm wasting another 20 hours on dumb copy pasted side quests.

I've done this with GoW (2018), Spiderman, and Subnautica. I also still have an unopened copy of AC Valhalla that I got on a sale months ago. I will probably not get to playing it for at least another year.

Feeling this! I got Ori and the blind forest for Christmas last year and even though I enjoyed it I stopped twice less than halfway through. On my third time now and nearly finished, idk what it was about the first 2 times that didn’t make me want to continue but thoroughly enjoying it now.

Incredibly I'm in the exact same situation now. I had a switch shortly after launch and had odyssey. Played until new donk city and felt it didn't have the same special-ness as the old 3d Mario games. After replaying galaxy, and sunshine via 3d all stars on my 2nd go around having a switch, my craving to play Mario games is very high and all I can do is think about pulling the trigger on buying odyssey again!

agreed, I'm studying for my dissertation right now so long games are kind of fallen out of my priority list, but I'm a sucker for a good deal so I bought a bunch of games that are 100+ hours so I'm really looking forward to immersing myself in them after I've finished academic stuff.
This is a good to tell myself when I look at my backlog (of anything... i've got loads of books to read too) it's a future investment rather than one for right now, which is okay.

I tried Skyward Sword a few days ago and I don't enjoy it a lot. The fence at the beginning of Faron Woods just left me a bad taste of limitation in contrast to BotW' openness.

But, definitely gonna try it some other time. Because right now I'm in the mood for more open-world games.

I wish I could go back to great single player games and mix them up, I am a sort of person who gets immersed and can't really play on an on/off basis, plus I get infamiliar with the controls and mechanics.

I originally bought Crysis 2 and 3 for the 360. When I played it the first time I stuggled with the stealth and misunderstood a mission halfway through. So I put it away. Not to long ago I picked it up again on the Xbox One and really enjoyed myself. Overall they're very cinematic, like playing Micheal Bay's Transformers.

These were great games and at some point I should pick up the remake of the first game.

Just going by the title, that's how I feel about Persona 5R. I played through the first castle but I got a little worn out from having to follow a guide so I wouldn't miss any minute details or decisions up to that point, so I'm slow rolling it from now on.

Which is a shame, because I adore the game and characters so far, but my anxiety peaks at the idea of potentially missing an important event or social interaction, but what can you do

This makes me feel much better about not yet playing the game my friend bought me for my birthday 6 months ago. I'll get to it... it just wasn't in my plans yet so it's taking a while.

And if you playing a long game, feel free to stop and continue after some time. Put about 40 hours in Witcher 3 and was kinda burned out, put it down for couple of month, now I'm enjoying it again

Age, family and responsibilities will catch up and you sure can't play any games you buy right away!

Yeah, it took me about 2 years to play through Witcher 3. I got about halfway through, lost all urge to play it but then like a year and a half later i came back with refreshed energy and had a blast.

Same thing happened to me with Dark Souls 1. I found it insanely confusing, couldn't grasp the humanity and bonfire system and didn't know where to go. Saw some lore videos and realized i loved the world building. So then i went to study up on the gameplay systems and went back to the game and had a great time bashing my head against the bosses until i reached the end line.

We don't have infinite time to enjoy everything in the world, but i think it's important to spend the time that we have with joy and happiness instead of frustration and anger just because we feel urged to complete games before jumping onto the next.

Good post! I struggle with this all the time, I have to be in the right mood for a certain game in order to enjoy it to its fullest

I bought bioshock/ Subnautica and downloaded ratchet and clank. Played all 3 and couldnt get into playing them consistently. Now I have anxiety cause i dont see myself completing any of them.

Did this with RE4. I don't think I made it too far, maybe the first few hours but I believe its time to jump back in

Yup, sometimes I start a game, drop it for a year and then take it back up when I feel like playing it, and it's sooo much fun then!!

Look at what you feel like playing and dont force yourself to complete or play something, that way gaming becomes so much more fun again 🙂

Currently I'm playing Rogue Legacy 2, Curse of the Dead Gods and Gunfire Reborn. I love them all and I'm finding it difficult to fit them all in--this is intensified by the fact that all 3 are roguelikes and these games really set the hook in me. So I separated them this way... Gunfire is now a game I only play online with a buddy on Saturdays and Rogue and Curse are games I stream during the week and I switch off every other day between the two. With this approach, the three barbarians duking it out in my brain on the daily have buried their swords and all of them have become good friends.

besides games like destiny 2 and division 2 doing seasonal content im sure its fine to not play right away and very often that makes you mentally tired every week

I think a lot of times you start a game and it isn't quite what you expected. So when you come back later, you know what to expect and are able to enjoy it more. This has happened to me quite a bit.

The only thing I would add or suggest for dropping games about halfway through would be to write down what you were doing when you left off. It seems to me a lot of people start a game and don't finish it, only to come back later and not know where they left off. This should help jog the memory and jump back in.

Other than that, I completely agree with you. I've left of halfway through so many games to come back later and finish them.

I have a bit of a different but similar experience. SOMA sat in my library for over two years, I knew it was good but I don't really like horror games and I read it had instakill monsters. Finally the developers made an assist mode which allowed you to turn off damage from the monsters. So I finally played it, the monster parts still sucked but overall it was one of the best stories in video games ever.

Good post. My only concern with leaving a game to come back to it after having played another game is, that I will have to re-learn the keys for playing the game I am going back to (on a PC).

I've been playing AC Odyssey as well for around 120 hours. I am still having fun, but I want to play Outer Wilds, which I have heard good things about. My plan is to play it after having finished AC Odyssey, and then after finishing Outer Wilds, go back and play the Atlantis DLC for the former. Hopefully I will be able to remember the key configuration, or I will just have to re-learn them again.

Odyssey took a long time to keep my attention. It was only after i had started to master the movement mechanics that I would stop playing and 10 minutes later would feel like jumping back in. With 3D All-Stars I've solidifed Super Mario Galaxy as having the greatest soundtrack in any video game ever (imo), but its gameplay isnt nearly as creative or innovative as Odyssey.

>have some itch in the back of your mind to go back to it at some point then you should

This hit home for me cause I keep getting these 'itches' to play things but then leaving it too long before actually starting them, and it seems to be happening pretty regularly. Most recently I had the urge to replay Rayman 3 (a game from my childhood I hadn't played in over a decade) and to my joy it was only £6 on the Xbox store.

However I had also recently started Metal Gear Solid V and I felt obliged to play that a little more, so I begrudgingly did that instead. By the time I finally caved and got Rayman 3 a few days ago I still enjoyed it, but the real burning desire to play it had gone and now I have to search my soul once again to work out what I really want to play.

I find it difficult to drop a game and pick it up again after not playing it for a while. I find that once I leave that game world it is hard to recapture that same rythm and feeling. Sometimes (more often than not for me) it just doesn't work. But that's just me. I'm glad you got back to Mario Odyssey - a wonderful game that I thoroughly enjoyed.

How much would you say this applies to multiplayer games? Because I have a sort of weird “gamer FOMO” about playing online games before they die.

I’ve been blasting through my backlog on my new computer. Was waiting but game time has arrived. Full speed ahead . Beat like 20 games since November. Glorious

Lookin at my "never played" list in Steam library like yeah

thats true, i bought payday the heist in like 2012 i guess, came back at 2017 and finished it more than 100% and it was amazing

By my estimation I am about 8 years behind my playlist lol... Keep gettin pulled into the "classics"; Diablo 2, Diablo 3, Factorio, Dark Souls 3, Wow Classic... I'll get to the Witcher 3 someday!

I absolutely agree. Tried Hollow Knight in 2018 and didn't enjoy it at all, came back to it two years later and it was one of my best gaming experiences ever.

But there is a downside. Obviously you don't have to play something you're not liking, but if you instantly drop a game as soon as you get a little bored by it, you will miss on many awesome games.

It happened to me so many times to play a game too superficially and then, as soon as I dug more into it, I thanked my past self to have stuck to it.

IMO just because of how game prices drop over time (Nintendo is the obvious exception) it's better to just buy it once you feel like actually playing it. No need to spend $60 on it and then end up playing it when you could've just bought it for $15 or something.

Also the feeling of a newly bought game gives an extra boost of motivation (for me at least)

Just a side note, if you really like Mario 64, be sure to buy the game this month before Nintendo stops selling the All-Stars collection.

Last year Charlie Brooker (of Black Mirror fame) appeared on the BBC radio series 'This game changed my life'.

In that interview he mentioned the Sniper series and how much he'd enjoyed it at the time. He had written an article about how his pleasure of the violence in the game might reflect on himself as a person. Particularly in respect to watching slow motion bullets go though a targets body and switching to to an x-ray vision as it does so.

As a response to that article, the developers had put him in their later game Sniper Elite, and awarded an in-game bonus if you "shot his balls off".

After listening to that interview, I realised I'd had a number of Sniper games in my backlog for a few years and never previously had any desire to play them until that specific moment.

Some of my favorite games are the ones I spent an hour or two with and left for months before returning, such as Bloodborne, Deus Ex: Human Revolution, Mass Effect 2 and Devil May Cry V. Sometimes you're just not ready for a game yet, and that's okay.

Why do you people do this? Act like you're talking about life affirming anxiety combating philosophy that's as holistic and all encompassing as nihilism or something?

They're computer games. Play them when you want to.

Get it?

Just to confront the title itself – why do you buy a game if you are not keen to play it right now anyway?

Don’t say that it’s on sale and you need to get it now or you’ll loose money. If people only really bought games to actually play them right away, on sale or not, I think they’d have spent much less in the end.

I get it it’s different when you receive it as a gift. But then, if people hadn’t huge backlogs already, maybe they would enjoy their games better, dunno.

(I have to admin I am guilty of having huge backlog, too. But I at least try to think twice before buying anything new nowadays. Do I REALLY want it right now?)

this sub has the weirdest posts lmao

I cycle through about 3 at a time so I don't tend to get caught on one and give up.

Conversely, you don't even need to buy every single game as soon as it comes out. Sales are so prevalent today that it's not uncommon to run into them in the first year. Heck, you can get one free game a week on EGS and that's 52 games a year.

I do a 2:1 ratio of games finished versus games bought, but that's just my personal preference, and it keeps me from spending more money than I want to.

Speaking of Mario Odyssey, I just saw on my feed that it's on sale (at least in the US):