Sometimes I check the hours my Steam friends have played a game to see whether I want to try it. This is one reason I haven’t played Baldur’s Gate 3, for example, and possibly never will even though I’d probably like it.
Other times I unwittingly get pulled into a very long game. (I first played SnowRunner with three friends in a multiplayer session. None of them have ever opened the game again after that and I didn’t particularly enjoy the experience myself but now I think my hours in that game have surpassed even Elden Ring and Let It Die.)
I’ve carefully avoided endless online games since Ultima Online, even if they look like fun. I like to try a lot of small/indie games and I never want one big game to crowd those out.