If you had a massive gaming backlog, how have you attacked it?

S

samduhman

[H]ard|Gawd
Joined
Feb 1, 2006
Messages
1,028
Guys,

Short story

Just curious how those of you who have a huge backlog work through them? At this point the only idea I have is, for single player games set the difficulty on easy and race through them. It would be really nice to play some of those 5+ year old titles I have sitting gathering dust but new titles just keep a coming... I'm not complaining just looking for some kind of gameplan ...:cool:


Long story

I literally have dozens upon dozens (maybe 100s) of games I want to play but not sure of the best way to attack it. In the meantime new games I want to play just keep coming out. I currently want to buy Dishonored, Xcom, GW2, Dark Souls, just to name a few.

I'm about 7 or 8 years behind in my backlog because of games like WoW and Battlefield series eating up years of gaming time.I have bought but haven't played games like GTA IV, Witcher 1 and 2, Skyrim, Max Payne 2, Fallout 3 and Vegas, Dead Space, Bioshock 2, Dawn of War 2. I think you get the point, the list is endless going back to the early 2000s.

In the meantime I find myself spending an hour on this title, 3 on that....I think I'm bopping around between 4 or 5 right now.
 
Screw that, take your time. Pick a game that sounds fun, relax and enjoy it. It's not like your library is going to disappear if you don't get to it fast enough. Just my point of view.
 
I have around 60 Steam games, I will never even install more than half of them. Accept your losses and play the games that are fun, if you hit them all that's great. If not oh well.

edit: 172 games, I was way off. List doesn't look that big.
 
look at it this way.. at least youll never be bored.. I have about a dozen games I havent even looked at. Ill get to them sooner or later. Besides some need patches. So can wait for that also.
 
I do that sometimes, depending on the game. If it's a game I think is going to be really exellent, I will take my time like any other game. If it's one of those "this was $5 in a Steam sale so why the hell not?" games... I'll sometimes set it on easy and blow through it. That can still be enjoyable with the right game.
 
Frraksurred said:
Screw that, take your time. Pick a game that sounds fun, relax and enjoy it. It's not like your library is going to disappear if you don't get to it fast enough. Just my point of view.
Click to expand...

Yep. Games are meant to be enjoyed, not rushed through.

Another strategy that I've found is working for me this year is to pick a single game and play it through to the end. In the years past, I'd start a game, play for a few days, get distracted by another game and start that, play it for a while, rinse and repeat until I had many different games partially played but not finished. Eventually some games would get so old that even if I went back to them, I wouldn't remember much about the story or the gameplay/controls and I'd just uninstall. Sticking with a single game at a time means you at least manage to get through some of your backlog instead of none at all. I'm also keeping a Google doc of all the games I've completed this year. It's a nice way to keep track of how you are progressing through your backlog.
 
The only way to do it is pick a game and dig deep into it. With the average game only being able to hold your attention for less than 40 hours you should be able to breeze through a good chunk of your backlog. Really good games like WoW, Battlefield, etc will eat your time and they completely took all of my gaming time away just like you.

There is no cure for games that when you type /played on a single character and it's over 280 days; not hours. You just have to fit the others in when you get bored of playing and want to go fishing in a MMO. Oh I have the desire to fish for the next 3 hours in WoW; let me hit up some Sleeping Dogs instead.

Variety is the spice of life.
 
The only way to eat and elephant is one bit at a time.

But first I wouldn't buy a game that I wouldn't play and beat in the first place.
 
I have a review site that I'm just now starting work on. I feel like if I'm gonna take it seriously I need to follow other reviewers example and get one review in a week minimum. This applies to my backlog in that I'm now obligated on two fronts to hammer out these games. Having the site is like having a nagging mistress on top of my nagging wife who nags me to finish the games I buy :p
 
I often find I'm in the "mood" for certain genres, usually the ones I haven't played in a while. That makes it pretty easy to attack my backlog. :)
 
I've been attacking my backlog based on when/if the next entry in the series is coming out...for example last month I played Assassin's Creed 2, Assassin's Creed: Brotherhood and Assassin's Creed: Revelations in anticipation of AC3 being released next month...plus it helps keeps the events and story of the previous games fresh in my mind before playing the new one
 
I have 306 games on steam, 92 of which are installed. I have a huge backlog and just keep buying games, I'm addicted. When I start a game though, I finish it most of the time.
 
i found quitting MMOs really frees up a lot of time to actually have fun gaming, instead of logging in and doing your virtual job every day.
 
^ that can definitely help kill off a backlog of games..lol

TF2 did that too me, well that and battlefield 2142 before that. A couple weeks ago I finally beat the Half Life 2 games (HL2/ep1/ep2) lol.

Honestly just pick a game you'd really like and go through it. I juggle back and forth between a couple different type games... right now doing doom 3 and f1 2010 and if i need a break from either torchlight (going through the shadow vault with my old character.. still a fun game these days)
 
samduhman said:
Guys,

Short story

Just curious how those of you who have a huge backlog work through them? At this point the only idea I have is, for single player games set the difficulty on easy and race through them. It would be really nice to play some of those 5+ year old titles I have sitting gathering dust but new titles just keep a coming... I'm not complaining just looking for some kind of gameplan ...:cool:


Long story

I literally have dozens upon dozens (maybe 100s) of games I want to play but not sure of the best way to attack it. In the meantime new games I want to play just keep coming out. I currently want to buy Dishonored, Xcom, GW2, Dark Souls, just to name a few.

I'm about 7 or 8 years behind in my backlog because of games like WoW and Battlefield series eating up years of gaming time.I have bought but haven't played games like GTA IV, Witcher 1 and 2, Skyrim, Max Payne 2, Fallout 3 and Vegas, Dead Space, Bioshock 2, Dawn of War 2. I think you get the point, the list is endless going back to the early 2000s.

In the meantime I find myself spending an hour on this title, 3 on that....I think I'm bopping around between 4 or 5 right now.
Click to expand...

The only thing I could suggest is to take it one game at a time. Don't rush it but focus on just one game. It's brought my backlog down from a couple hundred to about 70.
 
99.99% of my games are in Steam (Crysis 2 is in Origin). In Steam you set categories for your games so for the games I needed to complete I put in my Favorites category and then for the games that were completed I then change their category to "Completed". I also have some games that I may have acquired in bundles that I determined I was just not at all interested in playing so I stuck them in another category.

That should help you see just how bad your backlog is. Then you need to force yourself to play them because I like to get stuck playing monotonous online shooters (TF2) but once I get started on a game I typically stick with it until I'm done unless it's just so bad that I don't care to continue on.
 
djoye said:
99.99% of my games are in Steam (Crysis 2 is in Origin). In Steam you set categories for your games so for the games I needed to complete I put in my Favorites category and then for the games that were completed I then change their category to "Completed". I also have some games that I may have acquired in bundles that I determined I was just not at all interested in playing so I stuck them in another category.

That should help you see just how bad your backlog is. Then you need to force yourself to play them because I like to get stuck playing monotonous online shooters (TF2) but once I get started on a game I typically stick with it until I'm done unless it's just so bad that I don't care to continue on.
Click to expand...

Same I've got "To Be completed" and "To be completed+" The latter being a priority. I have a separate category for bullshit shooters like BFBC2, CSS, TF2 and BF3 (whichs launches from steam fine)
 
DeathPrincess said:
Play each of them for an hour and see if I care enough to complete it.
Click to expand...

What he said

I picked up +170 games during the summer sale and if the game doesnt grab me in the first few min, its on to the next.
 
1) Look through games you don't think you'll ever play.

2) Next time you buy games during a Steam sale, put them in your inventory rather than your library.

3) If you think you will never play some games, give them out to others here on [H] so we can help you play through your backlog.
 
I play the oldest first and then any sequels to that series if they continue on that story. If not I play the next oldest game in my list. I skip all multiplayer games, and just focus on single player. You can do 2-3 games a week if you pick the right ones.
 
Here's what I say, find a game in your library that you're least interested in, and start there. If you don't have fun playing, move onto the next least interesting game. With luck you'll find one that you really like more than you thought. It also lowers expectations a bit and the more crappy games you play the better the good ones feel when you get around to them. If you start with a game you know you'll dig into you might never get around to the others.
 
What I like about having a large backlog is that I can actually select something that I felt like playing at that moment. Some days I feel like playing RPG, and some days I feel like playing a lazy linear FPS, etc.

I just don't like the idea of forcing myself playing a game just because its the oldest in my backlog, or just because I've started it.

I'm just not a hardcore player that could dedicate myself to focusing on one game at a time. I have Diablo 3 and Guild Wars 2 apart from my Steam backlog, and I don't really go playing those games for weeks continuously. I still need to switch between different games.
 
almalino said:
Faceplam. do you have life? :)
Click to expand...

Not sure what this is supposed to mean? :confused:

ValeX said:
Delete delete delete and delete some more. Pick 3-6 franchises or series' that you enjoy the most and only play those. Delete or sell the rest and never look at them again. It's muchhhh more enjoyable to play a game and not constantly have to think about "ugh, is this game over yet? I have 50 more to get through"

Less is more.
Click to expand...

This. I pretty much have come down to only playing games which I know I'll want to finish, and finish them for the sake of enjoying the game, not to "move to the next one".
 
samduhman said:
Guys,

Short story

Just curious how those of you who have a huge backlog work through them? At this point the only idea I have is, for single player games set the difficulty on easy and race through them. It would be really nice to play some of those 5+ year old titles I have sitting gathering dust but new titles just keep a coming... I'm not complaining just looking for some kind of gameplan ...:cool:


Long story

I literally have dozens upon dozens (maybe 100s) of games I want to play but not sure of the best way to attack it. In the meantime new games I want to play just keep coming out. I currently want to buy Dishonored, Xcom, GW2, Dark Souls, just to name a few.

I'm about 7 or 8 years behind in my backlog because of games like WoW and Battlefield series eating up years of gaming time.I have bought but haven't played games like GTA IV, Witcher 1 and 2, Skyrim, Max Payne 2, Fallout 3 and Vegas, Dead Space, Bioshock 2, Dawn of War 2. I think you get the point, the list is endless going back to the early 2000s.

In the meantime I find myself spending an hour on this title, 3 on that....I think I'm bopping around between 4 or 5 right now.
Click to expand...

I'm in the same boat myself. I've also got a fulltime job, a marriage and a two year old son, so I can't game as much as I used to :p.

I find I have to play wow in small amounts, dedicate a week to grinding away quests and dungeons, then take a break and play something else for a week. Wow is a huge timesink and probably the reason why I'm so behind in my backlog.

My steam count is around 190 or so. I have probably over 40 xbox 360 games, about 10 or more ps3 games and even lots of games from previous generations I hope to tackle eventually..

If I won the lottery and had endless time to play my games, I would never be bored :D
 
It is really hard to find time to play some good SP games, I have been meaning to get to some old FF games but been playing new games.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top