Things have sort of come full circle for me. When I was younger, I recall playing a copy of Super Mario Bros 3 on Game Boy Advance and never being able to complete it (in fairness I eventually got to the final world). This was the case for a lot of games for me; essentially they’d have infinite replayability.
As I got a bit older I was exposed to more games with linear single player campaigns. Halo 3 and Call of Duty 4 spring to mind. At the time, I couldn’t afford to buy that many games so I’d find myself doing a mission here and there, and focusing most of my attention on the multiplayer. It wasn’t that I didn’t want to play the campaigns, but rather than I felt like I needed to savour them. Sure, I could just blast through it in the space of a weekend - but then it would feel like I’ve blown all that money on something short-lived.
This mindset stuck with me as single player games became longer and longer. GTA IV, Red Dead and Skyrim for example took me months to get through, as I’d just play the occasional mission as a treat.
But nowadays I don’t have as much spare time as I once did. And it feels like the number of games in my backlog is growing each day.
I actually replayed GTA IV and its DLCs last year, and really enjoyed the experience. But only recently did I work out why it was more enjoyable than my first playthrough all those years ago – and I think it’s because I didn’t eke out the missions. The story felt a lot more coherent because it was fresh in my mind. The characters that appeared at the start of the game no longer elicit that ‘wait who were they?’ response when they turn up in the second act. And I was able to better understand the ways in which the three stories cleverly intertwined.
Recently I got the gamepass-style subscription on Playstation (‘PS Plus Extra’) which includes a bunch of older games I’ve been meaning to get through. And the fact that there’s an artificial time limit to playing them (i.e. I don’t want to pay for this tier of subscription any longer than I need to) has helped me to avoid wasting time.
Just to be clear, I’m not advocating for speedrunning single player games and missing all the side content. On the contrary, I’ve just platinumed Ratchet and Clank: RA, but did so in half the time than it would have taken me before. Previously I might have thought ‘I’ll just do the one mission’, and this was often an excuse to get distracted by crap on my phone for the subsequent 30 minutes. I feel like I now have a reason to focus for games for a little longer instead of wasting time. And as a result, I’ve enjoyed my time with them so much more recently.
So perhaps if you’re struggling with your backlog, try to set yourself a realistic time limit for each game. And don’t treat games like a treat – if you have the time, play them now!
That’s the great thing about being a patient gamer: games are usually cheaper, so I don’t feel obligated to get every ounce of value from it.
I use guides a lot if the game stops being fun. If it’s still not fun with the guide, I drop it. Most of the games I play cost $5-10, with a handful being $20-30 and a very small number being more than that (just bought
Cities: Skylines 2for <$40, which is the most I’ve spent in years on a game). So if a game ends up sucking or not being long enough, I don’t feel like I’ve been cheated, I mentally appreciate the time I spent with it and move on.What helped me was creating labels for my game library:
If I have a long break, I’ll install a handful from “maybe later” and see if I find a gem. If I’m strapped from time, I’ll pull from “play next,” which is where I’m much more likely to find something fun. If I’m feeling nostalgic, “replay” is right over there.
IMO, stop calling it a backlog. Organize stuff by how interested you are, and play stuff when you feel excited to play. I have hundreds of games collected over years of buying way too many bundles, and there’s absolutely no way I’m playing through them all. So I organize them by interest and play when I have a spare minute.
Your labelling system is a good idea! I do have plenty of games from bundles, but I only add the ones to my library that I’m actually interested in. So everything in my backlog is something I want to play at some point. Personally I don’t feel that there is any negative connotation to the word backlog, but maybe that’s because mine is full of stuff I intend to play.
I have a spreadsheet listing the games I’ve got to play, and whilst I do usually set an ‘up next’, this can change depending on how I’m feeling at the time. So it’s rare that I play a game I don’t like or doesn’t fit my mood :)
I’ve just seen far too many people express a sense of guilt about their unplayed games and an obligation to play them all. There’s also the “completionist” group who need to get every achievement in every game they have. Both are unhealthy IMO.
But yeah, I don’t see any negatives to the term “backlog,” provided you don’t intend to actually play all of them.
I personally do it because I get “analysis paralysis” where I just freeze up and don’t play anything if the list is too long. So I keep my “play next” list pretty short (like 10-20 games), which also forces me to be a bit more critical about my intentions to play a game.