2016 Gaming Resolutions

Ahhh it's that time of year again when it's almost not that time of year again. Which is a really weird way of saying the year's almost done. Which means it's time for our annual resolution thread! Now that 2015 is practically over (good riddance), what are people's resolutions for gaming going into 2016?

My main resolution is to continue chipping away at my backlog and not buy any more games unless they are new releases. No more GOG sale impulse buys of games I'll never actually play. Secondly, I want to get back into speedrunning. It's something I really enjoy, but I never find the time for it, so I'm going to make time for it. On top of that, I have the ridiculously ambitious goal to play EVERY main series Pokemon game. Not just one from every generation. Every release from every generation. Red, Blue, Green, Yellow, Gold, Silver, Crystal + Vietnamese Crystal (for funsies), Ruby, Sapphire, Emerald, FireRed, LeafGreen, Diamond, Pearl, Platinum, HeartGold, SoulSilver, Black, Black 2, White, White 2, X, Y, Z (when it releases), Omega Ruby, and Alpha Sapphire. I'll be doing some challenge and non-standard-ruleset runs to keep it interesting. Is this realistic? Hell no. Will it be fun to try? Of course.

So what are your goals for 2016? More gaming, less gaming, replays, backlogs?

BONUS ROUND: Reflection Time

https://howlongtobeat.com/forum.php?&thread=655

^This link directs to last year's resolution forum. Compare what you said you were going to do with what you actually accomplished!

Me, one year ago: "I don't want to set any super lofty goals for 2015, because I always flop on them, but I really want to spend this year expanding my speedrun experience and maybe develop one or two short, simple games. Hopefully bridge the divide I'm experiencing between my writing and my gaming hobbies. And of course, cut deeper into my backlog: buy less, play more. My big non-gaming resolution is to pick up a part time job so I can start saving up money to live on my own."

For as bad a year as this was, I actually did pretty well on my goals. I kinda dropped the ball on my speedrunning, but I did develop a few text adventure games this year and I wrote a novella that utilized some of my gaming knowledge to tell a story. As for "buy less, play more," I didn't do too well on that count, but with 56 completions to 34 purchases, I technically did alright (even if my completion total is half of what it was last year). I did get a job though. Even if I'm not actually living on my own...

How'd everyone else do this year?

I thought I did post in last years... doesn't look like it though.

For me, it will be that I need to be stricter on retiring games that I find a struggle to keep my interest. Having moved into a house now I have less time to play games.

Though according to my stats I played 50+hrs more in 2015 than in 2014, I think getting a N3DS in April may have helped there as it meant I could play games on the go too, or in short bursts.

Unless there are big titles dropping (Uncharted 4, Mass Effect 4), I have to STOP buying games even if there are awesome deals (just today I bought Suikoden 2 during a PSN sale for $2.50). My backlog is NUTS and would easily take more than a year with the amount of time I have to play. Especially with some of the longer JRPGs I just keep buying and putting on the back burner.

I would like to replay Uncharted 1-3 before the new one comes out in April (got the collection for Xmas).

Pipe dream: playing every Kingdom Hearts game to completion by end of year.

I'd also like to continue my trend of doing everything in my power to complete a game before retiring. This month I retired 3 games - and I'm confident in saying I gave them as much as I had to give - but since joining this site my retirement of games has been an all-time minimum.

Finally, I'd like to complete 35 (previously unbeaten) games this year.

"I promise myself that I'll finish the games that I've installed 6 months ago and still haven't touched yet (System Shock 2, Thief 1/2) and start learning for baccalaureate or else my life will go downhills surely."

This actually made me laugh since I still haven't tried SS2 and Thief 1/2 yet. I did passed the final high-school exams though.
I'll probably try and pass the ''200 games completed'' mark in 2016, although I don't think I'll make it past 185.

I'll probably just aim to beat more games than I did this year, but it will be difficult to do. I beat more games in 2014 than I have in any other year by far.

121 games beaten last year and only 113 this year.

I almost made it, but not quite. I could have pushed it over the edge if I had played a bunch of short Atari games or something, but eh... It didn't help that November was almost exclusively Fallout 4 and then in December I started GTAV and Metal Gear Solid V, both of which I am nowhere near finished.

Those totals are slightly skewed, though, because I count individual episodes from adventure games as "games" for the sake of date completions, so a few adventure games increase the total quite a bit.

My gaming resolution is to beat some of my RPG's that i've collected over the years. On steam alone I have about 80 RPG's already. I have only about 6 months to finish my gaming resolution though, so I can't make it a huge one (Such as beat all of the RPG's I have on steam). I'd say if I can beat 10 of them, I'm okay with it. Going to go for 20 though.

Damnit. Almost did it. 8 RPG's finished this year. 13 games in total.

2016:

I've said it multiple times before and i'm going to say it now too. My backlog is WAY too huge. I'd love to play through all of them, but it's just not possible. It will never happen. I buy more than i play.

So... This years resolution will be to go through (Just check them out, not play them) all of my games. And remove a lot of them from my backlog. Hopefully at least 50-75%. For most of them i'm just going to check the steam store page and ask myself "Am I seriously EVER going to play this?" and then most likely remove it from my backlog.

That's my whole gaming resolution for 2016. Clean my backlog.

EDIT:

Was bored so decided to start this already. Used steamcompletionist for this because they have a very good way to just blacklist games from your steam library. Went through all the games, and blacklisted all the casual and (point and click) adventure games. Also removed most of the strategy games since those are usually WAY too long and not something i want to actually play for weeks just to finish the campaign (some day maybe. I just have more important games to play). Mostly just left games that i'm unsure of (Need to download and test first), or I definitely want to play through.

So far i've dropped the backlog to 136 games (Down from like 600). But like I said, there's still games i need to test first, so this number might drop a lot more.

Usually the same as usual... beat more games than I buy. I've never been able to do that, but... this year I think it's possible. I won't be reviewing games too often anymore, so getting review copies won't bloat up my new game count anymore. Gotta be careful of those bundles, though.

I guess a backup goal is to beat my overall best beat/complete stats, which I actually beat this year at 48 beats and 15 completes (these are Backloggery stats). I'm not sure how possible the complete stat is though.

Gaming wise I am setting a loft goal for me, which is 60 games over 2016. Given my recent rate of completing games this will be a challenge to finish at least 5 a month, I know I have some short ones but I have lots of long ones too. This coupled with my sad sad MMO addiction...lol

I am still really pushing my goals in MTG, last year I was able to attend 3 major tournaments and I am the verge of finishing high enough to make money, all 3 I was one win away from making the cut to the next day to be in the money placings. I am hoping to attend 3 open series events, and 2-3 other major events, I have to travel for most of these as there really aren't any in my immediate area, (some are day trips of 3-4 hours, others are weekend trips that are 8ish hours away) The first weekend trip will be Baltimore, the others have not been posted yet but I am looking forward to improving in that area.

I will be happy if I am able to accomplish those 2 things, finish 60 games, and finish winning money at a magic event this year.

Last year I said "My goal this year is to get my backlog down to...30 days. That's right. Cut that mess in HALF."

Easy to say when I was working part-time this time last year. I started a full time job in July and haven't played much since then. I swear I was down in the 40-something day range at that time.

According to me a year ago, my backlog was at 57 days. It is now at 65. Not only did I not come anywhere near my goal, but I actually acquired more game time than I played.

I'll be more realistic in 2016. Goal: Decrease backlog from 65 to 50 days.

Unless there are big titles dropping (Uncharted 4, Mass Effect 4), I have to STOP buying games even if there are awesome deals (just today I bought Suikoden 2 during a PSN sale for $2.50). My backlog is NUTS and would easily take more than a year with the amount of time I have to play. Especially with some of the longer JRPGs I just keep buying and putting on the back burner.

I would like to replay Uncharted 1-3 before the new one comes out in April (got the collection for Xmas).

Pipe dream: playing every Kingdom Hearts game to completion by end of year.

I'd also like to continue my trend of doing everything in my power to complete a game before retiring. This month I retired 3 games - and I'm confident in saying I gave them as much as I had to give - but since joining this site my retirement of games has been an all-time minimum.

Finally, I'd like to complete 35 (previously unbeaten) games this year.

Your backlog would take a year? That's so cute. At this point mine's probably closer to a decade than a year. No, I don't have a problem. I can stop buying bundles whenever I want.

Actually, I did much better with that this year, especially in the second half. My very unambitious goal a year ago was to at least not do worse than the previous year(s) and keep my completion ratio the same, maybe even improve it a little. With several hundred games in my backlog at this point, it's gotten very easy to not buy things no matter how good the sale is or how ridiculous the bundle is. Because honestly, do I really need it when I can come up with a dozen amazing things I'm in the mood for that I already own and haven't even touched yet at any given time? I didn't quite get to 40% complete/60% remaining like my optimistic stretch goal, but I'm only slightly off.

I think I don't really want much in the way of a specific goal this year either, beyond just being more spontaneous. I sometimes spend way too much time going through this huge list of games I have trying to figure out what I should play and debating why or why not one thing would be a better choice than another, which I don't feel like I used to do as much. So what if I just played a bunch of long games and this one is long too and I won't get around to playing anything else for a while? If it seems like fun, just do it. Or play a whole bunch of super short games that I don't even remember what they are or why I have them like I did in the summer, which was great and incredibly refreshing. Or just hit the random button. Basically no getting stuck in ruts.

Oh, and stop leaving games unfinished for months at a time. Either keep playing them or retire them. I really don't know why I've been doing that. I need to set a time limit of like two weeks or something, and if I haven't played it in that long, jump in again. If I still like it and I wasn't playing it for some other reason, it can stay, but if it's not doing it for me and it feels like I've been avoiding it, it can't keep malingering.

I wasn't here last year to make one so this whole resolution thing is actully a real suprise and a pretty cool idea. Although I have no clue what to do as a resolution, I don't have a crazy backlog becuase I haven't had a working computer in a good 3 years or so, so no steam and so on. I do have a lot of Nintendo games, most of them just arnt on my backlog but it actully would be a bit much, my plan is to just play games MORE, yes I play everyday but I play at a very slow pase since I just chill back and enjoy everything and I don't mind doing long tensions and unesccasry things like killing every enemy in an area when I don't have to and such, lol.

So I just need to spend more of my time playing games since I complete little to no games per month and this year was extra slow for me. But it's my best year on this site lol, since It's my only year on this site.

My goal for 2015 was to complete in average 2 games per month. That failed quite miserably once I started on the big RPGs. Shadow of Mordor took a lot longer than expected - and then came Baldur's Gate 1+2 (enhanced editions). All in all, I managed to finish 10 games this year, which is nowhere near my goal.

Which leads me to my real problem. I have a lot of truly massive games on my backlog still..

So, I'll keep it very, very simple for 2016: Complete more games than 2015. Big goal: 20 games completed.

I was supposed to try streaming or something but that didn't happen.I did record a few more sessions but I didn't publish most of it. Will have to think of something for 2016, something more manageable.

From last year's thread:

The challenge this year is balancing my ongoing aim of clearing my DS and PSP backlogs with the mobile games I still want to play, and my newly-acquired steam account. So my resolution is two-fold:
-To completely clear my backlog of DS games (EDIT: There are 31 DS games in this backlog, incl. a couple of replays) (and to try and clear some more of my PSP backlog too)
-To buy no more than one new game per month, so that I have a decent stab at cutting my overall backlog down

My non-gaming resolutions are two-fold as well. The first is to keep on top of my university work, and be better organised than I was last year. The second is to get back on track with my health goals (I'm hardly obese, but am undoubtedly larger and less muscular than I'd like to be). I made really good progress at the start of last year, but a broken bone over the summer (which is still not right yet) proved to be a major setback, and I'm probably in worse shape now than I was last year. I am adamant that next year, I will be in significantly better shape than I am right now.

I failed pretty miserably at both of my gaming goals. I completed 12 DS games this year - 1 a month doesn't seem bad, but I bought more DS games as well, leaving my DS backlog at 24 games (30 with replays). And I'm pretty sure my new game buying goal was broken within the first month! My non-gaming goals, on the other hand, are going pretty well, so I'll carry those through into the new year.

My goals for the year ahead are simple:
-Beat at least two (non-replay) DS games each month, so that my DS backlog is completely clear by the end of 2016;
-Revisit every game in my replay tab on the site (15);
-Complete more games than I did in 2015 (49) - I will aim for one completion a week, but that isn't going to be a strict goal;
-Finish 2015 with a smaller time-to-complete stat for my backlog/replay than I do now (63 Days 12 Hours)

I was doing the 52 game challenge but only completed 36 (not counting Atari 2600 games and replays). My game playing really crashed and burned in the second half of the year with only 7 completions.

This year's resolution is to get my 'Remaining' percentage below 80%.

My goal for 2015 was simply to beat more games than I did in 2014. And I managed that quite easily with 59 games beaten (27 more than in 2014). For 2016 I'm simply gonna try and beat more games than I buy and get my backlog percentage as far down as I can (currently at 58%). That should be easy enough to accomplish, but we'll see.

My goal for 2016 is simply to beat more games than I buy them. Also I try to beat more games than this year (this year I beat 55 unique games).

I like to set the bar low when it comes to these sorts of things so, my resolution this year is to just play as many great as I can.

My gaming resolution is to play more PS1-3 games. I haven't beaten a single one this year. I'd like to buy a PS4, but at this rate I just can't justify it.
So I'll try to beat at least 10 games on my PS3 in 2016.

Also, I'd like to play more older games. And longer games.

I think this year I'll focus less on beating so many games and more on beating longer games. That way I can finally tackle some of the games on my backlog that would otherwise sit there forever.

Main thing would probably be to rage less when playing, other than that just play games and have fun, the usual.

2015 gaming resolutions:

"My goal is to man the fuck up and play the first Silent Hill :D
I've been terrified of it since playing the demo that came with Metal Gear Solid."

YES - and it was terrifying. The scariest game I've ever played. I had to regularly pause it and go get some water to calm my nerves.

"Explore more PS1 games - (and actually finishing Tenchu - got stuck on the last mission like 10 years ago...)"

YES and YES - finished Tenchu. Spammed the last boss with grenades. Was really fun replaying it! Completed No One Can Stop Mr. Domino, Syphon Filter, Ape Escape and a bunch of others. Mostly short ones.

"Explore more SNES games - get through all the Super Mario games on the All-Stars-collection, try some of the classics I haven't played (Castlevania IV, Super Metroid, Link to the Past etc)."

NO - am currently at Super Mario Bros. 2. Did not play any of the other games listed.

"Enjoy all the new exciting releases on my new PS4 - I have Wolfenstein, Alien: Isolation and The Evil Within to keep me busy until then :D"

NO - had to sell my console because of not having a job anymore, finished The New Order and Alien: Isolation before that though. Both really nice games!

"Play through the Halo collection in co-op on my friends Xbox One"

YES

What I said last year: "Anyway, my resolution is a simple "play more games." My backlog has now entered the quadruple digits. o_o; Also to exercise, but thus far that's going nowhere."

Failed on both counts, trying again.