The "Buy and Never Beat" Syndrome

January 1, 2008, 4:30 AM

Over the past couple of years I had this problem where I could never stick to one game, play it, beat it, and then buy another. What I'd always do is buy a game, play it for a while, hear about or see another game and get interested in it and buy that game too.

So when that happens, I buy that game and put the one I was playing before down, and I start playing the new game. Then this whole cycle repeats over and over.

I'm getting out of this though thankfully - yeah I do still buy games a lot, and I'm still trying to stick to games now too - even if that means play one to three games or whatever (RPGs or not). The way I got out of it was I was at a friend's place and we were flipping through channels and I saw this thing called the "World Series of Gaming" and I told him to go to it and it ended up being a $100 000 Halo 3 tournament. These kids' eyes were bloodshot - it was absolutely crazy. And this problem that I had just lifted.

So yeah, I just came up with the name because it's pretty much self-explanitory...has anyone else had this problem - or is having this problem at all?

January 1, 2008, 4:37 AM

I have the exact same problem, except with books.

With games though I will usually just play one at a time, but I still won't get them finished because I'm too lazy, or I forget about the game for a while and play something else. And then come back to it weeks later and forget what the hell is going and start a new game.

Although on Tomb Raider on the rare occasion where I will get past the training level I end up moving onto the training level on a different Tomb Raider game, I have no idea why..

January 1, 2008, 4:42 AM

Iv got afew games iv never completed. Im stuck on the very last level of timesplitters on hard

Iv only got halfway thru TS future perfect

Burnout 3 is half completed

I havent even STARTED Kingdom hearts 2 yet & im only a couple of hours in KH

i started FFII - VI but never completed them

Im sure theres more for like the megadrive - some of those games where so hard

January 1, 2008, 4:49 AM

Coming to think of it, I hardly ever complete games...

Although I don't play as many now as I did when I was in single digits, but even then I was unaware of the concept of 'completing' a game and I just thought that you played and played at it and got further and further each time, like never-ending games or something..
But that was probably because I never got particularly far on them >.< Was lucky to get past Level 1 in a lot of cases.

January 1, 2008, 1:57 PM

Oh yeah, I've had problems with that. Still do, in fact. For instance, there's FFVI. I bought it last year, got really into it, but haven't bothered to continue playing it for...almost a year now, due to FFVII, Kingdom Hearts I & II, FFIV, and FFIII (which I'm currently playing). I still have to finish KH II too. >.>

Yeah, talking about this is kinda stressing me. There's so many games I have to play, but with oh so little time!

January 1, 2008, 3:10 PM

I'm very much a sufferer of this particular problem.

I have too many games that I care to mention that I have yet to get 'round to finishing, including some of the earlier FF's. There are of course games which just lose their appeal towards the end such as Star Ocean Till The End Of Time and Wild Arms 3, where the games just seemed to lose the buzz they had at the start of the game.

More worrying are games like Onimusha 4 and Godhand where I really enjoy the game yet can't seem to bring myself back round to playing them.

January 1, 2008, 3:15 PM

I'm glad I'm not the only one who has this problem. I tend to do this a lot. I become obsessed with games for short periods of time and then I either buy another game and start playing it or I just pick something else from my collection. So far all attempts to stick to one game until I beat it have failed miserably.

January 1, 2008, 3:20 PM

yeah some games just get boring at the end. kind of like a movie that tries to wrap everything up too quickly or not fast enough.
It happened to me and metroid prime

books too, Narnia for me

January 1, 2008, 3:24 PM

I have FF1-6, never beat them... MGS 1-2, never beat... Return to Castle Wolfenstein, never beat (but it has a glitch on it), Half-Life for PC AND PS2, never beat either.

Yeah... I'd say I have that problem with some games... But mostly just if I forgot what to do.

January 1, 2008, 6:38 PM

I'm happy to say that I also suffer this type of "addiction". Out of the huge list of games I have, I've only completed about 20%....maybe even less. Not sure but I'd say I have well over 100 games (that's just for 360, PS2, DS & PSP). Counting other consoles & PC, I'd probably have close to 400.....maybe more, if I bothered to count them all.