Games Finished in 2012

1. Fez (2012, Xbox 360) - April
2. Skyrim (2011, PC) - March (Not so much "finished" as "put on hiatus")

Short list so far. Still plenty of year left.

Steam Stats (Nerd Math)

So, I just did some quick calculations on my Steam account. And when I say quick, I meant for this to take five minutes and instead it took an hour.

First, according to the Wasted on Steam Calculator, my account has seen about 618.8 hours of playtime total. Of that 618, Skyrim alone makes up 12% at 74.2 hours. That's just where it stands now, I haven't even finished the game yet.

Now, here's the thing. about 23 hours of my account's total don't actually exist. I played Sniper Elite (#9) for about a half hour then went to bed. However, there was a weird bug where the executable got stuck running on my PC until I came back to it the next day, and Steam tracked all of that as time played. So, without that, we're looking at 595.4 total hours played. That only bumps Skyrim up to approximately 12.5%, but that number is sure to grow over time. Based on this new figure, I've played about 24.8 full days of PC gaming.

Looking at my top 10 (actually top 11, but excluding Sniper Elite for the previously discussed reason), here's some facts about the games that make up the lineup:

• 7 role-playing games or games with heavy role-playing elements
• Skyrim
• Fallout: New Vegas
• Dragon Age: Origins
• Mass Effect 2
• Fable 3
• Torchlight
• Alpha Protocol
• Two strategy games
• Plants vs Zombies
• Civilization V
• Four FPS games, or games with heavy shooting elements
• Fallout: New Vegas
• Mass Effect 2
• Alpha Protocol
• Portal 2
• Story-driven games
• Everything except PvZ and CivV
• Breakdown:
• Bethesda games (Skyrim & FNV): 133 hours (22%)
• Everything else in the top 10: 283.3 hours (48%)

Next, according to the Steam Calculator website, my account is worth $2107.44. That's an approximate figure of what I've spent, with variances based on actual purchase price (I purchase most of my stuff on sale) and price drops over time. Either way, it's a moderately useful metric, because now, with the amount of time  I've played, as discussed in the last paragraph, I can figure out my cost/time ratio.

So, $2107 over 595.4 hours gives each hour a calculated value of $3.54 per hour. That's a pretty great deal, when you consider some other entertainment options:

• Movies cost about $30 for two people to attend, because nobody goes alone, and then you have to get snacks, and then sit there and watch a two-hour movie. ($7.08 = 2 hours)
• Golfing costs about $20 a person at a nice course, or about $10 a person at the courses that people like me play, and that's about three to five hours out of a day. ($10.62-17.7 = 3-5 hours)
• An average bar tab for my wife and I (mostly me, plus a Diet Coke) is usually about $20, and that's if we ate before we met up with people for drinks. That's usually about two to three hours. ($7.08-10.62 = 2-3 hours)

I'm not done yet. My PC cost $717.47 to build. My Xbox cost $250 when I bought it. Obviously, looking at those, the value proposition is the Xbox. However, let's look at hours of game time. According to my Raptr profile, PC gaming makes up 61% of  the quantity of games I actually play. It says I've played just over 100 Xbox games, but this has only been tracking for a year and a half, so let's give it a hefty 15% boost, and say I've played 115 games on the Xbox. Let's figure some numbers here. 30% of that is made up of Xbox Live Arcade games, so we'll account for those at an average price point of $10, and the retail titles we'll account for at the average price of $60. That means I've played about $5175 worth of Xbox games. Granted, for a long time, I had Gamefly, so I was not buying every game I played.

TL;DR: Here's what I gained from all of this:

• PC Gaming
• Higher up front cost to build a machine
• Steam has frequent sales, often with rock-bottom pricing
• Lower software cost leads to a wider range of available games
• Console Gaming
• Lower up front cost
• Cost of purchase can be alleviated by rentals/borrowing
• Software costs are higher, never get access to Steam-like deals without resorting to theft

Games Finished in 2011

So, 2011 is over, and I played some games. More games than last year. The best move I made all year was hooking up my PC to the TV in the living room area of my basement, because I could play games in a nice comfy recliner instead of a marginally comfortable computer chair. Also, I got way into PC games this year. I've come to realize that it's a platform that is constantly moving forward, even when consoles start to stagnate. Consoles are great for some people, but if you want to be on the real cutting edge of gaming, PCs are where it's at (says the guy who mostly played PC ports of console games).

1. Alpha Protocol (2010, PC) - September
2. Assassin's Creed: Brotherhood (2010, X360) - July
3. Bastion (2011, XBLA) - August
4. Costume Quest (2010, XBLA) - September
5. Dead Space 2 (2011, PC) - November
6. Fable 3 (2010, PC) - October
7. Fallout: New Vegas (2010, PC) - December
8. Lara Croft and the Guardian of Light (2010, PC) - March
9. Mass Effect 2 (2010, PC) - February
10. Orcs Must Die! (2011, PC) - December
11. Plants vs Zombies (2011, Android) - July
12. Portal 2 (2011, PC) - April
13. Torchlight (2009, PC) - September

New addition to the ongoing party game repertoire:

1. You Don't Know Jack! (2011, X360)

I am done playing these games, despite the fact I did not actually "finish" them.

1. Super Meat Boy (2010, XBLA)
   I spent three hours on level 6-5 and could not complete it, and actually split my thumb open while playing, so I figured that was as good a time as any to call it quits.
2. VVVVVV (2010, PC)
   I was in the room right outside the last teleporter and the game deleted my save after an update got pushed out. I didn't want to play through all of it again.

In the new year, I resolve to finish Alan Wake and Darksiders, as well as start some of the new games I got at Christmas and from the Steam holiday sale, such as Skyrim, Trine 2, Arkham Asylum, and much more. I'll probably go back to Fable and Fallout because I did pick up DLC for both of those games and never touched any of it. I'm going to keep my eye out for sales on Assassin's Creed: Revelations, Saint's Row: The Third and Zelda: Skyward Sword, since I wanted to get a hold of those and never did.

I can say with confidence that 2011 was a great year in gaming, and 2012 is bringing Diablo 3, Bioshock Infinite, Mass Effect 3 and Borderlands 2, and maybe even word of new consoles, so there's a lot to look forward to.

Nerdpaper

When the Portal 2 ARG was in full swing, I got pretty hyped for the game and changed my desktop to this. Also, my desk is a fucking mess.

Games Finished in 2010

Last year was an exceptionally prolific year for me finishing games. This year I moved to a new house, got married, and finished my masters program, all within four months. Granted, that doesn’t sound like much, but it also does not leave me with as much time as I used to have to play games. As such, this year’s list of games I have finished is much shorter. My initial post was around this time last year, so let’s see how far I’ve come.

1. Assassin’s Creed II (2009, X360) – January
2. Borderlands (2009, X360) – March
3. Batman: Arkham Asylum (2009, X360) – August
4. Carcassonne (2007, X360) – September
5. Dante’s Inferno (2009, X360) – August
6. Dead Rising 2: Case 0 (2010, X360) – September
7. Dragon Age: Origins (2009, PC) – October
8. Limbo (2010, X360) - October
9. Nelson Tethers: Puzzle Agent (2010, PC) – July
10. Singularity (2010, X360) - December

Completed DLC
As with last year, only major add-ons count, not just Rock Band songs.

1. Borderlands: The Zombie Island of Dr. Ned – April
2. Borderlands: The Secret Armory of General Knoxx – June
3. Dragon Age: Origins: Warden’s Keep – September
4. Left 4 Dead 2: The Passing – August

Ongoing Games
These are games that don’t really have a defined ending point, and as a result of that, I have invested a lot of time into them this year, and will probably continue to do so this year, and beyond.

1. Beat Hazard (2010, PC)
2. Civilization V (2010, PC)
3. Minecraft Alpha (2010, PC)
4. Rock Band 3 (2010, X360)

Update (9/12): Made a lot of progress once I got through all of my big summer projects. Now that the wife has started teaching again, I will have a lot of time in my evenings open, so I will be playing a lot more at that time. Got a lot of stuff going at once on the PC, so we’ll see how that all fleshes out as time progresses.
Update (11/1): If you intend to play anything else in your life ever, do not invest any time in Civilization V, Rock Band 3, or Minecraft. All of which I decided to play, and now, play only those games.

Games Finished in 2009

For my own records, mostly. Later I’ll put it up against the list of games I bought in 2009 and cry. Sorted alphabetically.

1. The Beatles: Rock Band (2009, X360)
2. Dead Rising (2006, X360)
3. Dead Space (2008, X360)
4. Henry Hatsworth and the Puzzling Adventure (2009. DS)
5. The House of the Dead: Overkill (2009, Wii)
6. King Kong (2006, X360)
7. Left 4 Dead 2 (2009, X360)
8. Mass Effect (2007, X360)
9. Monsters Vs. Aliens (X360)
10. Peggle (2009, X360)
11. Penny Arcade: Episode 2 (2008, X360)
12. Plants vs. Zombies (2009, PC)
13. Prince of Persia (2008, X360)
14. Prince of Persia: The Sands of Time (2003, PC)
15. Professor Layton and the Diabolical Box (2009, NDS)
16. Prototype (2009, X360)
17. Red Faction: Guerilla (2009, X360)
18. Resident Evil 5 (2009, X360)
19. Rock Band Country Track Pack (2009, X360)
20. Shadow Complex (2009, X360)
21. World of Goo (2008, PC)
22. X-Men Origins: Wolverine (2009, X360)

Completed DLC
Significant game add-on content only.

1. Fallout 3: Operation Anchorage (X360)
2. Fallout 3: The Pitt (X360)
3. Fallout 3: Broken Steel (X360)
4. Fallout 3: Point Lookout (X360)
5. Fallout 3: Mothership Zeta (X360)
6. Fable 2: Knothole Island (X360)
7. The Beatles: Rock Band: Abbey Road (X360)
8. The Beatles: Rock Band: Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band (X360)
9. The Beatles: Rock Band: Rubber Soul (X360)