Almost a year ago, I decided to issue myself a Steam Personal Challenge where I’d attempt to spend some time with games in my Steam backlog. With the Steam Summer Sale 2015 come and gone, I wanted to take a moment to look back on how my stats have changed over this time.
The Survey Says…
Before I started the Steam Personal Challenge, these were my stats taken from the Steam Calculator:
After the end of this Steam Summer Sale, here are my newest stats:
Apparently didn’t stop picking up new Steam titles. I’ve increased my library from 84 games to 125 (note that some of these were bundle buys, gifts and free games).
However, despite that, my percentage of games-not-played has decreased from 71% to 58%… which I consider a pretty good success! Yes, I am aware that I technically added 13 more games I haven’t played to my list overall, but I’m still pleased my percentage is coming down, especially since I’ve been focusing quite a bit on FFXIV since January.
Steam Summer Sale Summary
I really didn’t buy much at this Steam Summer Sale, even though I visited every day with all intentions to pick up games from my wishlist. Why? I’m not entirely certain. I think this article at Herding Cats echoes my feelings quite a bit.
Either I already owned a game on sale, or the sale price for games I’d like to pick up just weren’t enticing enough to buy. I didn’t spend over $10 on an individual game this sale, and I had a heavy debate between several survival-themed games that ended in me choosing the most discounted game of the three in the end.
I feel like such a cheap-skate, but I have a hunch that games like Cities Skylines and Pillars of Eternity will continue to drop in price if I just wait. I have so many games I’m playing already that I don’t actually feel the need to pick something up unless the sale price really wows me.
So what did I buy?
I only bought Don’t Starve Reign of Giants because the devs were kind enough to give me a Steam copy of Don’t Starve Together for free (when I originally bought it at GoG.com, which didn’t offer this free update). They also bundled in a Don’t Starve key as well, so I figured I could at least spend a few dollars on picking up the DLC, which I already owned on GoG.
I picked up The Guild Collection because my sister gushed about how great the games in this series are. It was super cheap for a huge bundle of games, so I snapped it up.
I had the itch to get an ocean-themed sandbox survival game, and Salt won out the debate. I have played this game a bit and really enjoy what I’ve seen so far. I have yet to write about it, but look for it in the future!
I haven’t played Civ V in a while, but all of the DLC was really cheap. Scenario Pack: Korea was one of the few DLC packs I didn’t own, and it seemed to have good reviews, so I dropped $2 on it.
Aaaaand… that was it, really. A lot of DLC, a bundle pack and only one stand alone survival game. I’m really cutting back this year!
So how did you fare this Steam Summer Sale?
I actually did pretty well this year. I only bought… maybe four games? 😀
Congrats on self-control for us both! 🙂
I also bought 4 games, of which I even started playing one (Anno 1404).
I’m doing pretty well on my backlog, too, it seems:
86 games owned, 35 not played (41%), keeping in mind that about 12 of these are bought with the eventual purchase of a newer laptop in mind.
I’ve wanted to try the Anno series, but never have. You’ll have to let me know how you like it.
I’ve played a couple of the Anno games (1602 and 2070). They’re fairly typical for the sub-genre–if you’ve played some of the ‘City Building Series’ games or something along those lines, they’re similar, though with their own unique take on some of the systems.
Another skirmish for us in the war on backlogs!
That’s the only way anything is going to get played! How sad is that? X<
I commend you for working on your backlog. I recently just hunkered down on one that I already own, after purchasing probably a good 10 games myself over the sale.
Good luck to you! It’s really worth it to try them out because you never can tell which game is going to be a next favorite!
Yay progress! Hopefully you have enjoyed most of the ones you’ve played so far.
There were a few that only lasted me about an hour – usually stuff that came with a bundle that I didn’t buy directly. But for the most part, I have a pretty good eye for games that I’d like! 🙂
I can’t believe it’s already been a year since we all looked at our Steam stats. I’ll have to run by the calculator and write up a post similar to this. I think I’ve probably doubled my game total, but I know very few get left unplayed (but unfinished, most definitely!).
Looking forward to that post, then! You’ve probably done better than I have! 😀
I wound up snagging Watch_Dogs at 60% off, along with a bunch of Rocksmith DLC and the import tool.
As for my overall stats.. yea. I’ll let ya’ll judge me:
Total Value: $2880 ($800 sales)
Games owned: 197
Hours on record: 3260
Average playtime: 33 hours
Games not played: 50%/98 games
The average playtime number is really distorted though; there’s a handful of games I’ve barely played and a bunch I’ve played a crapton of. For anyone interested, http://steamcommunity.com/id/AnimeJ/
Actually, that’s a malformed tag, not a good link.