I have a friend who 100%/platinums a lot of games. We compared our trophy list a while ago. I think I’ve 100%ed nothing, and am a lot closer to, uh, like 12% on most games on average.
I used to feel pressure to complete games, or that if I started something I really ought to finish it, but yeah, I don’t feel anything like that. I got really uncomfortable with the word “backlog” at a certain point. I don’t have a backlog, because a backlog sounds like a list of obligations. I have games I’ve played a little but wasn’t engaged enough to stick with for whatever reason or forgot about (e.g. XIII on Gamecube), games I’ve finished to whatever extent felt right (usually an ending, e.g. Tales of Symphonia) or even played through a couple of times from start to finish (e.g. Persona 3), games I got bored/fed up with (Skyward Sword), and games I own and just haven’t played (hundreds).
And then there’s games I play, including Spelunky, Super Mario Bros. 3, Bayonetta, Zelda 2, Nanairo Ringo, Astro Boy Omega Factor, SMT Nocturne, ZeroRanger, etc. These last ones are games I like that may have definite endings that I may or may not have reached, but I enjoy playing them even if I just drop in on an old save file or start the game over from scratch for a minute or an hour. Most games don’t manage to feel as good to wander around in or have compelling enough level design to be worth revisiting, but those that are are so good.
I can’t believe there are some-dozen-hour RPGs that gate certain content behind 2nd, 3rd, or 4th playthroughs. What the fuck.
So I don’t think of the games I have access to (untold thousands, since a ton of what I play is free stuff I download from itch and freem) as a backlog or a list of obligations. I think of games as things I’ll pick up and spend time with if I want to for any reason. That often includes temporary fascinations, addictions, narrative intrigue, competitive drive (when I was doing well on the Pac-man DX leaderboard on PSN), and so on.
Such reasons are not always about fun, however amorphous that is. For example, there’s Persona 5, which I forced myself to finish recently, despite being mostly annoyed with it for almost two years (I wrote my longest post on this forum about it). I felt compelled to finish it for a couple reasons:
- Series buy-in: I am a big fan of Persona 3 and 4 and most SMT games and I felt like I wanted to participate in the conversation as fully as possible (and be able to thoroughly argue against takes about how much more “mature” it is than previous games)
- Related to the above, I’ve written and even presented papers about SMT games and want to keep writing about them, so I feel like both to deflect criticism of current and future criticism I might write about the game, I needed to be as fully informed as possible–this is not a standard I enforce on others (or myself) with regard to being able to hold opinions on games, but this is an instance where I wanted to be able to fully throwdown even with people who I’d disasgree with this on
- The fighting was occasionally fun and I cared about one or two social links
Those were compelling enough for me. That kind of was an obligation, but an entirely self-imposed one that had less to do with the $45 I spent with the game than anything else.
I do feel like achievements/trophies play into all this a little bit. Such things, for me, are there to enhance my enjoyment (doing a pacifist run in Downwell was a blast and something I probably wouldn’t have come up with on my own) of something already enjoyable. Some people seem to see them as more hurdles to jump through so they feel like they… finished something? Not my bag. I’m not going to slay 1,000 of the game’s most basic enemy just for the sticker. I’m going to die one day. I’ll play what I want to.
