Since the NBI was still running its annual event, there was talk about the backlogs gamers can end up with. I actually threw the topic out as a discussion piece during the event, but despite a lot of participants, I never did write my own post on the subject. Since then, a more recent topic has cropped up surrounding the Steam Calculator, and a personal challenge to actually play games we buy on Steam. Much of the discussion revolved around the fact that people tend to buy a bunch of games during Steams holiday sales and then never play them.

This also ties in nicely with a project I’ve been meaning to work on, and I think I mentioned it once before. If not, I’ll mention it now. I wanted to catalog all of the games I have across all platforms, including physical copies, and do something much like what the Steam Calculator does. I wanted to know the kind of money I had spent, the amount of games I own, and which ones I had yet to complete. Having this nifty Steam Calculator solves part of the equation, but I’ll have to manually do the research for the info regarding other platforms. This is something I have resolved to do, so you can expect further commentary on the subject once I piece together the rest of the information.

For now, I’ll focus on the Steam side of things. Let me just say that compared to some of the other people who have posted similarly, I have done pretty well when it comes to my Steam account. Let’s break it down, shall we?

This account is worth $607.64. If all games were bought on sale, it would be $276.54.

That’s a high figure, even a the sale price. I think when all was said and done, It might be in the ballpark of $200 spent. However, most people have already figured that DLC doesn’t seem to count, and some prices are applied when you paid the sale price, etc. Of the games it says I “own,” 17 are free to play and 2 are “not in store.” So obviously I don’t own those games, nor did I pay for them. Most I didn’t play for very long either.

* *Games owned:* 55

* *Games not played:* 5 **(9%)**

* *Hours spent:* 304.5h

So obviously I don’t own 55 games, and my actual profile page says it’s 39. I’m no math whiz, but 55 – 39 = 16, so who knows what is going on there. Of those games though, there’s only 5 I haven’t played. Two of those are RPG Maker made games that came in the Humble Bundle I got probably a month ago. I don’t know that I’ll ever play those, they were kind of a package deal. One was a free to play game I just downloaded last night and haven’t gotten around to trying (it might also be instantly removed). The only game that’s on there that I truly haven’t played and probably should have is Overlord II. The problem there is that I started on the first game, never finished it, and didn’t want to start up the sequel having not finished the original. I’m weird like that. It’s why I haven’t played Bioshock 2 or Infinite, because I never finished the first game (and I don’t own a copy, despite having the other two). So perhaps that is something that I need to remedy.

Finally, there are games on there with hours played, but that I haven’t completed. I already started my own steam challenge of sorts when I held a community poll a while back, and my readers voted for a playthrough of Shadowrun Returns. I finished that playthrough and moved onto the expansion since, but was planning to either have another vote or move onto another game in the backlog anyway. So overall, I do have some games that need played (or finished), but I’m not as bad off as some members of the community.

With that said, I do want to catalog my PS3 library (particularly the digital portion) and make a list up of the games I need to play/finish there as well. That would give me a larger picture and the ability to plan this out to be more efficient. Despite my bitching about wanting some new MMO to come along and sweep me off my feet, it’s probably a good thing I’m not devoting all of my game time to one at the moment. I’d be missing out on a lot of other experiences (for better or worse).

Did you need to challenge yourself?

#steamchallenge #steamcalculator #gaming