How or Do You Refrain From Buying Games?

[Frag Mortuus]

Hello Fellow Racketeers,

After reading Exhuminator's post about how folks make time for games with everything else in their lives, it dawned on me that even though I go through long stretches where I don't play games much. Then when I do get back into them I usually become enthralled with one game in particular and don't play anything else. At least this is how my play style has developed to over the past couple of years.

However, it occurred to me that I continue to buy games that I usually let sit there and rot while I am playing the new hotness at the moment. For example, I have Dragon Age: Inquisition, GTAV, Metro Redux, and Wolfenstein on the PS4, Duck Tales on Wii U, and multiple new PC games acquired during sales. All of these games were either given as Christmas gifts or bought since Christmas. No to mention the massive backlog (if counting PC games I'm well over 250 games in my Pile of Shame) I have built over the years. But these new games have sat there as I pour hour after hour into Destiny. So why did I buy them knowing I won't be getting to them anytime, or possibly ever? The only thing I can think of is that I got them all on sale.

This raises the question of how can I resist this urge to cash in on this awesome price and use that money more productively then acquire said new game when I will actually sit down and play it (and probably get it for an even better price)? I know some folks may say just don't buy it. But, we all know that satisfaction you get when that game you've been eyeing for a while lets it's guard down for a moment and lets you have it for 1/3 of it's normal price. So you swoop in and claim your victory. It's a great feeling. The down side is that I will buy the game, let it sit unplayed for years, finally start playing it and realize I could have waited until that current time and paid $5.

Any ideas, good advice, or interesting stories to share?

[Hallow]

You can try this http://thegaminghistorian.com/game-new-year-resolution/

[Flake]

In theory, I really just stick to certain franchises or developers that have always given me rewarding experiences in the past.

In practice, this doesn't work very well because I tend to get very impulsive about collecting the 'definitive' games of that series...and then the spin offs....and then that developers other offerings. It's really something I need to stop because I simply don't have the time for a lot of the games that I buy and that's less a 'oh, I have other priorities' which is true but more that there are 24 hours in a day and I have a finite lifespan.

Fortunately, this is what keeps Flake Industries so well stocked so at least you guys have that which is nice.

[Exhuminator]

I have games I've bought from the 1990's that I still have not played. There was a time when I spent way, way too much money on gaming. I never went into debt over it, but the fever certainly got in the way of savings.

That was before I set a gaming budget and stuck to it religiously.

Seriously, a gaming budget is the only thing that works. By that, I mean you allot yourself a certain amount of money for buying video games per week. And that's all you get to spend. We all have different incomes so of course each budget is going to be different.

My personal budget right now is $45 a week. That works well for me. If however there's a game I want to buy that is somehow more expensive than that, then I save some of one week's allotment and roll it over to the next. That means if there's a rare $65 game I want, then the week before I would have only spent $25 on gaming. That keeps things in balance and allows for variation when needed.

Gaming budgets folks, it's the only way.

Also it's not a "pile of shame", it's a "library".

[BoneSnapDeez]

I don't have a job.

[Flake]

I don't have a job.

Clever.

[TSTR]

I don't have a job.

this is surprisingly effective, can confirm

[Damm64]

Yeah setting a gaming budget is the best way, i set myself on $ limit depending on the game and about 80$ per month. For used games i don't want to expend more than 10$ and for a used game but it is of this generation i can justify 20$. The only time i espend more than that it's with imports or somewhat hard to find games.

Or you could try the Bone method, incredibly efective.

[Snatch1414]

The (in my opinion) sometimes ludicrous prices pretty much do the work for me. I went balls deep awhile back and have amassed a decent little retro collection as well as a good number of Xbox 360 games. I don't have time for them all.

I play games pretty much every day, but only once or twice a week do I have a chance to have a "game session", therefore anything that adds to my backlog at this point is basically dead money for the foreseeable future. I'm not going to pay $20-50 for an old game that is just going to sit there. In the summer I will look every weekend in some capacity and in the winter I'll buy a game here or there just to get my fix, but going over $10 is rare when it's cold out, and like I said almost everything I buy from this point on will be a paperweight or make something else a paperweight, so there's no need to spend more than I'm comfortable with.

[Tanooki]

I made a google drive spread sheet with a couple of tabs -- modern and classic.

On each it's broken down by system and game that's not been touched/finished and I put an big number at top.

It's a nice and easy scare tactic to remind me I have too much crap backed up and if I can't get my ass motivated to play it, ditch it.

I can't help if I'm gifted something though or I find a sale too good to ignore like last weekend I got a sweet deal on New SMB2 and SuperSF4 both on 3DS so I got those and for my b'day I got that PS4 FFtype0 big box set. All this while I have been whittling away at Shin Megami Tensei4 and Ocarina of Time 3D at the same time. It's a bad situation in my book because I've got other unfinished goodies.

This is my current modern gaming list (3ds/ps4) (10 Games)
[Nintendo 3DS]
- Kirby's Triple Deluxe
- (The) Legend of Zelda: A Link Between Worlds
- (The) Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time 3D
- Luigi's Mansion 2: Dark Moon
- New Super Mario Bros. 2
- Shin Megami Tensei IV

[PlayStation 4]
- Final Fantasy Type-0
- Lego Movie the Game
- LittleBigPlanet 3
- Tomb Raider

The older games, there's 20 more on that. (5 NES, 9 SNES, 6 GBA) 7 of them are RPG/ARPGS that are not short. Stuff like this is why I keep selling off games I have because I can't finish them and find it hard to see how I ever will, but some of them I'll just keep but they will rot on that list as a reminder.