Question 2019 Steam challenge

DigDog

Lifer
Jun 3, 2011
13,443
2,084
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I, Emperor DigDoggus 1st, issue this challenge:

That by Christmas 2019, you have successfully *completed* (simple non-100% easy/medium diff or simply access most of the content) every game you own on Steam BEFORE purchasing any new games.
You may purchase games before 2019 Jan 1st if you so wish.



I keep reading here how people have like 1234 games on Steam "but i haven't had the time to play". SO WHY DO YOU ******* KEEP BUYING THEM!

So i hereby issue you this challenge.
Save your wallet. From January 1st, 2019, stop buying games. Do not buy new games until you have gone through your entire game library.

Rules:
(obviously single-player, one-playthrough games only)
1. You dont need to complete a game on super-epic difficulty. You dont even need to play any further than your skill allows.
2. You dont need to complete a game you hate. Just playing some and calling it quits is enough.
3. You pledge to not buy any more games (for yourself) until the task is done.

Register here your pledge.
Write, if you want, the number of unplayed games you have in your library. All platforms are valid - GOG, Steam, Epic, etc.

There might be prizes, including but not limited to sexxy pictures of my fat ass in embarassing poses. Or not.

But the real prize is you taking back control of your wallet from a world that only wants you to buy even if you do not consume.

Go.
 
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BSim500

Golden Member
Jun 5, 2013
1,480
216
106
I, Emperor DigDoggus 1st, issue this challenge: That by Christmas 2019, you have successfully *completed* (simple non-100% easy/medium diff or simply access most of the content) every game you own on Steam BEFORE purchasing any new games. You may purchase games before 2019 Jan 1st if you so wish.

I keep reading here how people have like 1234 games on Steam "but i haven't had the time to play". SO WHY DO YOU ******* KEEP BUYING THEM! So i hereby issue you this challenge. Save your wallet. From January 1st, 2019, stop buying games. Do not buy new games until you have gone through your entire game library.
Challenge accepted! In all seriousness I've been doing that this past year - late 2017 I made a spreadsheet of games I haven't played, and slowly but surely spent much of 2018 clearing through them oldest to newest, starting with I Have No Mouth And I Must Scream. Admittedly there were a few 2018 Indies I picked up, but after completing them I went back to that list and carried on. I'm honestly surprised at some stuff I missed that turned out to be pretty damn good. Eg, I played Planescape Torment & Icewind Dale for the first time in 2018 with no prior "nostalgia goggles", and yup, all that "old school" praise is absolutely well deserved. If a few titles crop up then then I might break the rule and buy them (same goes with freebies, eg, Sigil (essentially "Doom 1 Episode 5" due next year that will be played the very femto-second it gets released)), but that'll be nothing like compulsively buying literally hundreds of games without playing any. Never did understand why people do that.
 
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DigDog

Lifer
Jun 3, 2011
13,443
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Well .. the word "compulsively" kinda already explains why they do that.

Now .. im not an anarchist. I do now want "to see Steam fail".
I want an ecosystem where consumer and producer exist in harmony (see image below)
god-damn-hippies.jpg

Where Steam & co go wrong is that .. throughmarketing hype and various psychological-manipulation tools, they attach happiness to BUYING the game rather than PLAYING the game. We can all be better off if this stops and remember why we buy games in the first place.
 
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clamum

Lifer
Feb 13, 2003
26,255
403
126
This is a pretty cool challenge, but I am not manly enough to take it up. I actually probably have less unfinished games than a lot of people here do, but I'm still unwilling to complete them before getting a new one. There's a couple I bought probably drunk and I have less than zero interest in even playing them once so yeah... not gonna happen for me. But I like your idea man, lol.
 

GodisanAtheist

Diamond Member
Nov 16, 2006
6,716
7,006
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While beating every game in my library is out of the question (married with children means 2-5 hours of gaming time a week) I have made it a mission to categorize my purchased games that I actually have an interest in playing (in contrast with some indie game that looked interesting for $5 back in 2009) and then playing through and beating them.

I subsequently write up a small review in the "What are you playing now" thread. I then categorize the game as completed, likely to never touch it again for as long as I live.

I've had a lot of fun and found a lot of games I already own that are a ton of fun and plenty of games that I stalled out on that have more to offer than I originally gave them credit for.

One major caveat is that I do not hesitate to go to a walkthrough or wiki if I hit a wall with a game. I'm past the point of pride and just want to play frustration free.
 

TheELF

Diamond Member
Dec 22, 2012
3,967
720
126
I keep reading here how people have like 1234 games on Steam "but i haven't had the time to play". SO WHY DO YOU ******* KEEP BUYING THEM!
Bah,next you'll be asking why people keep breathing even though they don't process 100% of the oxygen....


THE DEALS MAN THE DEALS......how can you afford not to buy games?Humble gives you 12moths of bundles for $99 right now,that's $8.25 a month for at least one semi recent AAA title and a bunch of other games how do you say no to that?
And the crazy bundles fanatical or gmg or humble release from time to time don't help either,it's just so much value my hunter/gatherer brain just can't refuse... :(
 
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DigDog

Lifer
Jun 3, 2011
13,443
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I know you are joking there but that's exactly what happens, people see a deal and they can't resist, and wind up with enormous libraries of untouched titles.
 

ImpulsE69

Lifer
Jan 8, 2010
14,946
1,077
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Well..if anyone has darkest dungeon in their library they probably already lost :D

I have been slowly going through my backlog, but when most of the games I buy are 60-100 hours....it's tough.
 

JPB

Diamond Member
Jul 4, 2005
4,064
89
91
I only have 213 games...all AAA titles. And ive been a member of Steam, for 14 years. Registered the day Half Life 2 was released. November 16, 2004
 
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Stg-Flame

Diamond Member
Mar 10, 2007
3,494
470
126
Eh, this honestly sounds like some kind of New Year's resolution nonsense that everyone will adhere to for the first month and a half, then forget all about around the end of February. I have 322 games in my library and while I've completed the vast majority of them, I still have plenty of incredibly long games in there that I'll likely never get around to finishing. Given how little time off I have these days, I just don't see myself playing certain games due to their length or the fact that they revolve around just messing around and I don't have the kind of free time anymore to play those types of games.
 

DigDog

Lifer
Jun 3, 2011
13,443
2,084
126
This absolutely is that kind of New Years resolution nonsense; and generally they tend to be good resolutions? Like "lose weight", "go to gym", "world peace", or "do not buy entertainment products if you already own unused entertainment products to entertain yourself".

The challenge isnt about completing games, it's about not buy more games than you can consume.

Tbh i was hoping more people would pick up on it ... maybe a bit of snowball effect too.

Me, im at the opposite end of the spectrum. I own ONE unplayed game on Steam ("Duck Game", a 1980s style platform shooter) because i dont buy games unless im gonna play them.

You got all of 2019 to go through your library - you can do it.
 

JujuFish

Lifer
Feb 3, 2005
10,999
733
136
I"m not going that extreme, but other than a Humble monthly subscription, I've stopped buying games unless I plan to play them right away. I have plenty of great games in my backlog to get to.
 

pmv

Lifer
May 30, 2008
12,972
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Is it not almost entirely down to the way Steam uses sales? They provoke consumer-anxiety, i.e. " if I don't buy it now I'll later decide I do want it after all and by then the price will have gone back up again. And I'll have to wait for another sale." Does anyone ever buy anything on Steam at less than, say, 75% off?

Also I think there's an element of denying one's mortality about it. I've pretty much stopped buying or playing games, but the same applies to lots of things - books and podcasts and music, say. I stopped buying books, except I keep finding huge piles of interesting ones people have just dumped in the street outside their houses, with a 'please take' sign!

There is just not enough time left in my life to read all the books I own (yet alone the ones I hear of and feel I ought to read) and play all the games I own and listen to all the podcasts I've downloaded (probably could listen to all the music, but not many times each song!). I think it's partly that I don't want to admit that my time here is finite. Hey, maybe consumerism is all about fear of mortality?
 
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BSim500

Golden Member
Jun 5, 2013
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That's an interesting insight, i think you are right.
Indeed. Some publishers have also long figured out consumers can be psychologically played by "75% off", either into buying games they have no real intention / spare time of playing through "fear of missing out" as pmv described, but also for older games "skewing" base pricing up into the realms of imaginary savings vs the second-hand physical era. Eg, years ago I bought Morrowind & Oblivion GOTY's on disc on Ebay for £6 (£3 each). Spent 3 minutes sourcing the "No-CD's" and they're instantly made as DRM-Free as GOG's. Fast forward to 2018 and the account-locked "digital only" no-resale era, and due to former surplus of discs drying up, we have new base pricing set by Bethesda on Steam & GOG of £13 for Morrowind & £15 for Oblivion, that's £28 in total, or quadruple what I bought the same games on discs "almost new" for on Ebay. So it takes a 75% off in a "special sale" just to reduce the price down to the levels of what the former second hand disc resale market provided healthy competition for old games, 365 days a year outside of any sale, and it becomes obvious for such games that the base price is artificially inflated precisely to make the 50-75% discount off the "new normal" price whilst giving consumers the impression they're getting a good deal. In other words, for some sales of older games, you aren't actually saving any money, simply being artificially "time-gated" into being "permitted" at buying at a normal price (for 12-16 year old games) for only a few weeks a year without getting totally ripped off by having the deep-sale mechanics "played" against you.
 
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pmv

Lifer
May 30, 2008
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Indeed. Some publishers have also long figured out consumers can be psychologically played by "75% off", either into buying games they have no real intention / spare time of playing through "fear of missing out" as pmv described, but also for older games "skewing" base pricing up into the realms of imaginary savings vs the second-hand physical era. Eg, years ago I bought Morrowind & Oblivion GOTY's on disc on Ebay for £6 (£3 each). Spent 3 minutes sourcing the "No-CD's" and they're instantly made as DRM-Free as GOG's. Fast forward to 2018 and the account-locked "digital only" no-resale era, and due to former surplus of discs drying up, we have new base pricing set by Bethesda on Steam & GOG of £13 for Morrowind & £15 for Oblivion, that's £28 in total, or quadruple what I bought the same games on discs "almost new" for on Ebay. So it takes a 75% off in a "special sale" just to reduce the price of the discs back down to the levels of what the former second hand resale market provided healthy competition for old games, 365 days a year outside of any sale, and it becomes obvious for such games that the base price is artificially inflated precisely to make the 50-75% discount off the "new normal" price whilst giving consumers the impression they're getting a good deal. In other words, for some sales of older games, you aren't actually saving any money, simply being artificially "time-gated" into buying only a few weeks a year without getting totally ripped off by having the deep-sale mechanics "played" against you.

You are right. The end of physical products and the traditional ownership that went with them (and hence the 'used' market) has really changed the economics. The time-limited sales, I guess, are a form of artificial scarcity. I don't think it's, so far, led to an increase in 'real' prices, though, but I find it hard to see where things are going.

Same with music and streaming/subscription services. For me, I just am not sure I like the idea of being kind-of dependent on the various corporations one has to subscribe to, as opposed to actually having physical objects in your possession...but then, maybe it's bad to hang on to to much physical crap anyway? Not really sure what I think of it.
 
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DigDog

Lifer
Jun 3, 2011
13,443
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Shouldn't that be motivation enough to not buy redundant products?
Im not calling for the end of gaming, but the behaviour of companies *can* be influenced by the market .. if just enough people take up the challenge ...
 
Feb 4, 2009
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I've started, I played Kenshi last night for a bit.

Fanatical Meat started off in a desert without any food or money. Found a small town on a small hill. Met another broke guy named Marlu(spelling?) he joined up in my quest for greatness. We searched the desert for some supplies until we were attacked by some bandits who immediately killed Marlu. I retreated.
Wandered the desert more, found a well and some basic supplies then was killed by some mutated spider thing.
Overall a game I'd like but runs pretty crappy on my hardware which is odd since I've over the minimum specs. Frustrating that I didn't see the bandits or Spider until it was too late. Going to uninstall until I get a new machine. I think I'll like this game provided it runs better.
* I have 8GB of ram, game minimum is 6GB recommended is 16GB. This is likely my problem.


https://store.steampowered.com/app/233860/Kenshi/

Whomever is participating try to give updates about your game in this thread, be fun to hear the stories. I'll try to do brief summaries of the backlog games I play. I'm kind of bitchy about games so many will get played for a bit then shelved. I am not a completionist.
 
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DigDog

Lifer
Jun 3, 2011
13,443
2,084
126
That's completely fine. What we are looking for is to not have a huge library of "never played" games.

So, in your case, "i tried it but cannot really play due to minimum specs" is enough for the challenge. Any condition where basically your fun with the game dries out, you can shelve it and move on.
 

Justinbaileyman

Golden Member
Aug 17, 2013
1,980
249
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I too have only around 200-ish games, so no where near that 1000+ game mark you were complaining about. Maybe some day I will have that many titles in my list.
For me personally I cant just stop buying games. I am a member of the Humble-Bundle monthly game club and get like around 12+ random games each month sent to me.

Most the time those games are AAA titles and go for upwards of like $59 $69 and even $79 dollars per game if I were to purchase them for xbox one or even PC at a local store like Walmart or Bestbuy.

Can't beat paying $10 or $12 a month for a $60+ game bundled with 12 others.
But then there are those random crap titles they also send every now and then which fill up your Steam list pretty fast.
I have played through a lot of my titles but there is no way I could finish off say 160 titles by Christmas.