What Percentage of Games Do You Finish Once You Begin to Play Them?

[Lei]

Remember the good old days of Steam sales? You could pick up a couple dozen games that total under $30. People like bargains and will snatch up cheap games....then they probably play through a handful of them and that's where you get a lot of folks not completing many of the games they purchase.

I have a lot of games I've never played or even opened yet....yes, I said, "opened". I probably have around 20 games still sealed that I haven't opened to play. I've got a bit of a digital backlog, too. I've got a running list somewhere of games I haven't beaten and notes next to ones that I've played and haven't beaten.

It's not hard to believe that people can have access to massive amounts of games and many of them were played, but never completed.

Faster internet: easy come easy go

 

[Chomiq]

I voted 50% because it largely depends on the game. Some of the open world games suck you in initially but get boring after a while (I'm looking at you AC: Odyssey) and I simply don't want to come back to them because core gameplay loop is flawed to me. I tend to finish majority of linear games but there can be (large) gaps (in case of Trials of Mana almost 12 months) before I actually finish them.

 

[dirtyferret]

100%, once I get bored with the game I'm finished with it!

 

[DAPUNISHER]

I voted 50% because it largely depends on the game. Some of the open world games suck you in initially but get boring after a while (I'm looking at you AC: Odyssey)

I put in over 200hrs on a playthrough. It's GTA: Ancient Greece in a certain sense. I'd go to Athens, get rowdy, and end up fighting the soldiers, citizens, and 5 Mercenaries. Mayhem and carnage ensued. Games like that are best when you make your own fun. The stories tend to be meh at best.

I finish almost every game I start, often more than once. The timeframe for doing so is where I can squirrel. I kept starting Witcher 3 and then abandoning it. Finally took the time to settle in right before its 7 anniversary of release, and played 10-12hrs straight every day until I finished it and the expansions. I think the only game I haven't finished in the last few years is Far Cry 5. I will, someday.

 

[bobalazs]

There is just too many games to choose from. Constant giveaways, take epic games, 1-2 games every week, Steam, humble, etc. they just keep piling up.
Doesn't hurt to try and play them.
There is a hidden urge to finish them though, at least for me.
And I am the below 50% guy...

 

[ThrashZone]

Hi,
So you're telling me there are scripted ends to games, that's news to me

Below 50% is not low enough

 

[skizzo]

I can tell when I get a game that's pretty good because more than 8% of the owners actually get the last story line achievement on Steam lol. So smaller games that get good reviews, like a classic form indie survival horror game which you likely didn't buy unless you're already obsessed with the genre. Then at best it's like maybe 30% finish the game....at best!

It boggles my mind because I finish practically everything I start, I don't buy a game unless I'm pretty convinced I'm going to like it. 99.99% of the time my judgement serves me well

 

[AlwaysHope]

Remember the good old days of Steam sales? You could pick up a couple dozen games that total under $30. People like bargains and will snatch up cheap games....then they probably play through a handful of them and that's where you get a lot of folks not completing many of the games they purchase.

I have a lot of games I've never played or even opened yet....yes, I said, "opened". I probably have around 20 games still sealed that I haven't opened to play. I've got a bit of a digital backlog, too. I've got a running list somewhere of games I haven't beaten and notes next to ones that I've played and haven't beaten.

It's not hard to believe that people can have access to massive amounts of games and many of them were played, but never completed.

Building up a backlog of games like that depends how picky the player is with the styles of games they are willing to play. I'm pretty picky with what I play so that pile of unplayed games never builds up with me. I've seen a lot of crap games in my time on Steam and certainly don't miss acquiring them either.... & I've been a member since the mid 2000s.

....

It boggles my mind because I finish practically everything I start, I don't buy a game unless I'm pretty convinced I'm going to like it. 99.99% of the time my judgement serves me well

I'm like you, got to be nearly 100% certain I'm going to like it & therefore a higher chance of actually completing the main mission or questline at least. Picking a game is not as easy as it first appears, especially with all the competition in all genres & playstyles these days.

On another note; I think there is some interesting psychological relationships between a players personality & their choices in games. No doubt there is some research ongoing in this area.

 

[PLAfiller]

Well depends, I guess "finish" can be mainly attributed to single player games, as multiplayer on-line games usually don't end. If I start a game I very rarely leave it before finishing. The few I have left on top of my mind are:

*Super-precision/platformer based games: Super Meat Boy, Skyforce reloaded etc..etc..
*Logic/puzzle based games where the puzzles were too difficult or time-consuming

I kind of left Prey 2 too. I was doing really good on medium difficulty, but at some point I realized how much more grind I have to do and I just said no more hours into this one.

As years go by, my preferences changed to games that have low learning curve and don't change too much. For example if you haven't played Warframe for half a year, you are dead in the water-> balance changes, new weapons, new patches, new builds...you need to read SO much blah-blah.

 

[Flogger23m]

Most of them.

 

[ir_cow]

If it surpass 2-3 hours, I'll complete the whole thing. The intro to games is the killer for me. I just don't have time to go through a tutorial level anymore. I know how to play a game... If I get bored within the first level after the tutorial I will just never play it again.

 

[Vayra86]

will not help. Something I spent 2/3 of my life on is dieing. It's not good.
Last straw was blizzard who killed Overwatch 1 for me. It's over

Looked into more obscure titles yet? There are so many hidden gems out there and best of all, most run on a toaster too. Also: emulate consoles!

As for finishing games, I kinda define my own 'this is finished' over time. Lots of stuff I play is open ended. The other stuff with a fixed storyline I have a habit of completing just over half of it. Some games just burn out prior to the end, or I burn out on them.

 

[gffermari]

90-100%
It's extremely rare to start a game that I already know that I don't like it in some way.
So, I tend to start only what I find interesting and 9 times out of 10, it's worth finishing them.

 

[Count von Schwalbe]

I gotta say, if I can make it an hour I will probably finish it. I am seeking novelty/dopamine rush and the wonder of something new when I game - so I never replay a story-based game.

I also have a nice big backlog, from Epic giveaways. So 3-4 games I haven't been able to finish and a whole bunch I have never played.

I hate playing more than a couple of games at once. I guess I really have an alternate existence when I am sitting down at the screen - today it might be Bayek of Siwa, next week Lara Croft, later BJ Blaskowitz. Never more than one at a time though. I am not playing as these people, my imagination is captured and I become them.

That being said, leaving a story unfinished feels like Chekhov's Gun - it looms over me as I face the monitor and grasp the mouse, pulling me in to another round of the game.

Most of the games I couldn't finish were ones that either failed to capture my imagination and were not that fun in thier own right (BioShock Remastered) or I realized that I was just forcing myself to play them (XCOM 2 - although a bug nerfed the aliens and it became fun again, so I finished it). Some multiplayer games can be fun without needing your imagination, such as Wolfenstein: Enemy Territory.

 

[mrthanhnguyen]

Just saw a menu of God of war since launch date and never pass it.

 

[defaultluser]

i like to finish any game that passes the Steam whiff test -for games without demos, watch a half-hour of game-play on YouTube, then two hours before refund

but I cant anticipate poor difficulty curves or shit mid-game content boring me stiff,so its pretty rare for me to finish a game with either of these issues! given the crap out there, its rare for me to pay more than 30 for a game (and no launch-day bug-fests) ;as a result of crap, my complete rate is well-under 50

i usually switch-up games several times a week, s there are several in-progress for me

 

[Bones]

I finally started (Again) a game I've never finished or gotten very far into.

It's one of the rare(er) SNES games I've got, namely PTO II and now that I'm finally getting into it for real, it's turning out to be good as I knew all along it would be.

I just never had time to devote myself to it (My fault) but now that I do, I'm going for it.

First round (Playing as the Japanese) had me capturing Palmyra and Midway islands plus shelling Pearl Harbor too with a good chance to work it down to the point it could be taken as well within 3 months of in-game time.
All this was done (In game time) by the 29th of Dec 41, with hostilities breaking out on the 10th of Dec 41 with this round of it.

This is one thing I like about the game - It allows for the "What If" side of things.
Still starts things off as they were in terms of who has what on either side but from that point onward, things can turn out VERY differently than historical fact, including Dec 7th not being Dec 7th, the war can breakout on different dates depending on (Seriously) how the cabinet votes to start it.

I did run into a snag so restarted the whole thing and that's fine, I'm still learning how everything in the game works.
As I had said earlier it's a simple, yet deep game to get into.

 

[80-watt Hamster]

The

If it surpass 2-3 hours, I'll complete the whole thing. The intro to games is the killer for me. I just don't have time to go through a tutorial level anymore. I know how to play a game... If I get bored within the first level after the tutorial I will just never play it again.

Problem is reversed for me. Lots of games are interesting for the first few hours, but then turn into a slog as the mechanics get stale, the difficulty curve hockey-sticks or the story stalls.

 

[thesmokingman]

I am terribad about finishing games all the way thru lol.