Happy New Year 2022!
We’re back at it for another year – I hope it treats everyone well. Very soon, will be this blog’s anniversary again, too! For now, though, I want to do what I do every year and set down some goals to achieve.
Last year, I did well! Let’s see if I can top it this year!
Spend Less on Games
This seems to be a running goal because I’ve set this for the past few years. I want to buy less games, unless I know for sure I’m going to play them right there and then. This includes two parts:
- Buy less new games
- Spend less in cashshops
I’ve done well about buying less new games – or, at least, the games I buy are things I really want and do spend time with. This has been improved also by PC Game Pass, which allows me to dabble in games that I might have otherwise bought. It keeps games out of my backlog and still allows me to enjoy playing new titles. While it is a minimal monthly sub, I feel like it’s saved me money in the long run.
I’ve not been so good at keeping my cash out of cashshops, however.
I have way too many alts in FFXIV and my desire to skip past Stormblood is just too strong not to plunk down skips for them. I think, however, I’ve gotten all the characters where I want them right now – with the exemption of one or two who might get a name change or a fantasia (I’m waiting on female Hroths). But even if I only do that, it’ll be far better than what I spent in a cashshop last year!
I wasn’t exempt in BDO, either, but I’ve severely cut back playing that game since last year. I mostly just log in for dailies and to try to awaken my next dream horse (many failures).
Steam Backlog – Get to 65% Played
This is not a huge jump in backlog progress, but I’m making this number low on purpose. If I can go beyond 65%, I’ll be really, really happy!
This actually has a couple of sub goals within it:
- Finished all games in CLEAR list
- Start playing gifted games
I’ve talked about my CLEAR list several times now – this is a list of games that I got as part of bundles or something like that. Games I’m not interested in playing at first glance, so I basically want to install the game, poke around in it for a short while, and if my hunch is correct, I’ll just uninstall and mark it off.
I want to get that category out of my Steam backlog for good this year. I’ve held off on some of these games because they’re just so dang BIG in terms of install size. But this is the year I’m going to finish my CLEAR list.
From there, my focus will be on actually playing games I own. I want to start with my Gifted list. If someone buys a game for me, or if I buy a game using a giftcard someone sends, I add it to my Gifted list so that I know this was from someone else. The idea was that I would pay more attention to these games since they were gifts, but while I have played some of my gifts, others I’ve failed to pick up.
I want to address that this year, and I’m going to start with my copy of Final Fantasy III that was gifted to me a couple years back. I’ve played into the game a bit, and really do want to play it more to see the lore that links to the FFXIV crystal tower. Since I’ve already got it started and installed, I might as well keep playing.
Focus Time on Games
More than just throwing things out of my backlog from a CLEAR list, I want to try to put more focus time on the games I’m playing. I’ve had a bad habit of picking games up and putting them down because of distractions.
While I still do this to an extent, last year, I got a lot of quality focus time playing certain games that I enjoyed – Valheim, Wildermyth, No Man’s Sky, etc. While there’s still plenty for me to explore in these games, the time I put into learning them and figuring them out makes me feel satisfied with them.
I want to do that with more games this year – be it games on my Switch or games on Steam. I’m going to start that with my copy of Final Fantasy IV. I’m halfway through the game, and it’s one that I’ve finished many times in the past on consoles. So this shouldn’t be hard at all to focus through and finish.
From there… don’t know? I’ve got Switch games to focus and then the Gift list to focus.
Get My Switch Backlog Under Control
Based on what I entered in Deku Deals, I have 97 games in my Switch library. Keep in mind, I got a slew of free games over the holiday due to giveaways, so I didn’t buy all of them! And when I do buy games, it’s usually on deep discount!
Anyhow. Based on the stats I’ve entered into Deku Deals, I’ve only played 24 of those games. Played doesn’t mean I’ve done a deep focus on the games, but just that I put some time into them or checked them out.
Because I suck at math, I entered these numbers into a calculator and now know that I’ve played only 24.7% of my Switch library.
Yuck. Here we go again.
Here’s the actual breakdown of the categories:
Completed – I’ve played a game to the end or I’ve played it as much as I’d like, and have moved on.
Currently Playing – What I’ve actively put time into lately, or want to come back to pretty soon.
Want to Play – Games I’ve dabbled in a little bit, or have at least tried. These are games I started but got distracted from and will likely have to start over again.
So yeah. I need to make these numbers better this year.
More Gaming Blogging
I had an uptick in number of posts I wrote last year here, and actually had some nice stats overall for the year. It’s also the year that Wordads have performed best for me – though that dropped off a bit at the end of the year.
I want to continue the upward trend. Hopefully with all these games I’m playing, I’ll have lots to write about in 2022!
What gaming goals do you have in mind for this year?