Why most people don't finish video games

Wasn't sure where to post this (and if someone else did sorry about that). Just found the article ... well somewhat depressing although I agree the "aging gamer" aspect has some points. I know I have less time to play games but that doesn't mean I want shorter, simpler games. It just means I get to enjoy them longer.

http://www.cnn.com/2011/TECH/gaming.gadgets/08/17/finishing.videogames.snow/index.html?hpt=hp_bn7

In fact, the attrition (or bounce rate) of video games is pretty pathetic. "What I've been told as a blanket expectation is that 90% of players who start your game will never see the end of it unless they watch a clip on YouTube," says Keith Fuller, a longtime production contractor for Activision.

That's a lot of unfinished games.

And it doesn't get much better when isolated to just avid gamers.

"Just 10 years ago, I recall some standard that only 20% of gamers ever finish a game," says John Lee, VP of marketing at Raptr and former executive at Capcom, THQ and Sega.

And it's not just dull games that go unfinished. Critically acclaimed ones do, too. Take last year's "Red Dead Redemption." You might think Rockstar's gritty Western would be played more than others, given the praise it enjoyed, but you'd be wrong.

Click to expand...

'''

he aging gamer

At the beginning of the 21st century, the average gamer was pushing 30 -- mid-to-late 20s, to be exact. They weren't playing as often as they did in their adolescence, but in between entry-level jobs, earnest slacking and higher education, there was still ample time to game.

Fast forward to today, and the average gamer is 37, according to the Entertainment Software Association. The average age of the most frequent game buyer is 41 -- nearing Just for Men-type levels. They're raising kids. In the middle of a career. Worried about retirement.

Not only that, but time is precious for gamers of all ages.

"People have short attention spans and limited time now," says Jeremy Airey, head of U.S. production at Konami.

Click to expand...

So what do you think? Do you never finish most games you play? I tihnk I am about 50-50 although sometimes I know when I buy a game it is more out of curiosity then a real desire.

If I focused on just those games I was super excited about and had high expectations on my complete rate is closer to 80%.

I've finished every CRPG I've ever started. Crummy games on my phone/iPod, well that's a different story...

So what do you think? Do you never finish most games you play? I tihnk I am about 50-50 although sometimes I know when I buy a game it is more out of curiosity then a real desire.

If I focused on just those games I was super excited about and had high expectations on my complete rate is closer to 80%.

Click to expand...

I finish more than 50% but less than 80% of all games I play, as long as they are good. If its games that I've been waiting for a long time the success rate is near 100%, as long as the game is good.
I mainly drop games due to either them getting repetitive or insane difficulty spikes. I'm not a completionist though, so I consider ending credits to be a finished game, not finding every little token, catching every monster or whatever the game has as a life extender to be very interesting.

I've barely finished any of my games. Many times I'll get through majority of the game and then I will just stop. Mass Effect 2 and Dragon Age come to mind. The last game I might of finished was the first Witcher game, mainly because the story and environment sucked me in.

wolfgrimdark said:

So what do you think? Do you never finish most games you play? I tihnk I am about 50-50 although sometimes I know when I buy a game it is more out of curiosity then a real desire.

If I focused on just those games I was super excited about and had high expectations on my complete rate is closer to 80%.

Click to expand...

As a distribution:

40% - I play to completion because I'm Interested enough in the story to want to see the ending/cutscene, or the gameplay manages to keep me hooked to the end.

30% - Rage quit (interface problems, can't remap keys, bad design decisions, slow running, sluggish jumping or strafing, bugs, crashes, etc.)

30% -

After struggling (although with satisfaction) through most of the game I discover an exploit or build/item/config that makes the game trivial, get bored then quit.

OR

Get frustrated with a specific issue and feel justified in using a trainer/character editor as a workaround. I then play with smug satisfaction feeling that I made the game better than the designers did, but then (I rarely last long) can't resist the temptation to whore said cheat and MAX my chars to the point where the game becomes silly, get bored then quit.

OR

See the end coming, don't want the game to end, get sad, quit so the game can live on forever in my memory as never having ended.

In my younger days I would finish almost everything I started.

Now I would put it at about 50% but I do buy really cheap games (<$10) from time to time just to see how they are. Tho I admit I generally like these games more than the super hyped mega games.

The last few games that I bought and never finished were:
NWN2: I may go back to it eventually but the movement controls finally got to me.
Bioshock: I never gave it an honest attempt to get into it.
Fallout NV: Hate the music, hate Vegas, not enough face melting mutants.

I borrow games from friends but those I expect to never finish as they are the normal shooter games that everyone else likes. I borrow em just to check em out.

Winter is my main gaming time so I think I'll pick these three back up then if Skyrim doesn't dominate my time.

For me part of it is that I have a lot more games now. Never mind finishing a game, I have a hard time starting one.

When I was young, that £30 a game cost me was a significant investment, and piracy was hard (not that we didn't, but it was the lending the disks to a friend and photocopying the manual level rather than anything cunning), so I needed to get my moneys worth.

Now that £30 is pocket money, and I rarely even pay that for a game (I have however stopped pirating as there's no need to), so I get my money's worth after a few hours of gameplay. I've also found that my attention span for single player games is about 30 hours.

Also, you know, MMOs. I mostly stopped playing a lot of single player games the day I got my first Ultima Online subscription.

Gregz said:

See the end coming, don't want the game to end, get sad, quit so the game can live on forever in my memory as never having ended.

Click to expand...

I did that with Prince of Persia. You've defeated Ahriman, but the girl is dead...

I chopped down one tree, thought, 'WTF!? She wouldn't have wanted this' and decided that the 'Prince' drifted off back into the desert. Wish that that had been a built in option.

If I quit a game I usually do so in the first levels, like Cryostasis, You are Empty, Übersoldier or Shellshock 2: Blood Trails. These are usually so bad, annoying or boring that I see no reason to continue.

Some games I forced to quit thanks to being hit with schoolwork such as Final Fantasy VI, Metro 2033, Fallout NV and Final Fantasy XII. If a game is good enough though I tend to return later and keep the game on my list to-play.

It have happened I begun a game, thought it sucked badly, deinstalled it then wen't back to finish it later like Cold Fear, Arcanum, Pools of Radiance: Ruins of Myth Drannor and Gothic 3: Forsaken Gods.

As I get older, the percentage I finish keeps getting lower. It's 80% a lack of time and about 20% getting tired/bored of a game. On my current list:

U6: Project - I have about 60 hours of play in it and I've enjoyed it, but I got a bit stuck getting the map piece from Covetous/Wrong and I sort of lost interest. I think the game is just too long for what it is. Still have loved it and will probably finish.

Ps:T - Still haven't gotten out of the Crematorium. I want to like this game, but so far it hasn't grabbed me. Someday I'm sure I'll play it, but I don't have the time to really push myself farther into it right now

Arcanum - Played 5 or 6 hours. Really like it and finally getting used to the 'follower' system it has. Just haven't had time to go farther

MotB - Got a bit bored with the story, but was going to push through it, but just haven't had time. Probably 2/3 through.

MoW - Same as above

SoZ - Loaded it once, was very intrigued but haven't had time to go back to it

Ultima VIII - Want to play it since it is the only Ultima I haven't played through but I never seem to have the time

Fallout - Picked it up off GOG, played about an hour. Didn't grab me, but I would have pushed farther into it, but just don't have time.

Yes, ageing gamer here as well. Don't have the time for games that require a high initial investment and dense playing times any more. If I've forgotten the mechanics and don't have a manual to refer to after a month then it gets added to the list of backburner games.

I recognised that that was happening however, and changed my purchasing style to only a few high time investment games, and now *shock horror* have a place for casual games.

I find myself not finishing games recently. I think many recent games not that good in the second half.

Also my ability purchase games have gone up unfortunately the time to play them have gone down, so I am not as forgiving as i used to be.

With a few exceptions, if I get past the "tinkering" first few hours with a game, I finish it. My disease is the shelf-full of games that are either unopened or never made it past the tinkering phase. As we've discussed elsewhere, DDO occupies much of my gaming time these days, plus I have a much more difficult time playing and/or enjoying games that can't be chopped into numerous short sessions.

These days I doubt I "finish" most games that I start, but it depends on how you define finishing. I play games to have fun. Not for the story, not for the graphics, not for the excellent use of textures to convey man's inhumanity to man. As far as I'm concerned, I'm finished with a game when I've stopped playing it for whatever reason, be it boredom, lack of time, or moving on to something else.

There are games that I love that I've never finished, or finished once just to see what happened. Most the time, when a game offers some open gameplay, which is almost exclusively what I buy now, I play through the plot just enough to unlock the entire map (any GTAish game) or until I understand the gameplay enough to sandbox (city builders, Civ-ish games, etc.).

Seeing the end credits is in no way linked to my enjoyment of a game, and it always makes me a bit angry when people suggest there needs to be a definite, linear end. It's fun, not work!

Menigal said:

These days I doubt I "finish" most games that I start, but it depends on how you define finishing. I play games to have fun. Not for the story, not for the graphics, not for the excellent use of textures to convey man's inhumanity to man.

Click to expand...

But what is "fun"? Surely it is derived from the right combination story, graphics, art, mechanic etc?

lostforever said:

But what is "fun"? Surely it is derived from the right combination story, graphics, art, mechanic etc?

Click to expand...

If it was that easy to answer than there'd be no un-fun games, would there?

I can play a game with no story at all and have fun, and far too often these days story makes things less fun as some wannabe novelist continually crams his masterpiece down my throat instead of letting me play. I can play a game with minimal or ancient graphics and still have fun. Good art can give a game a certain feeling that might grab my attention, but won't make me keep playing it. Mechanics? Well, when you get right down to it that is the game, but I've enjoyed games that have some pretty crappy mechanics.

In the end, all you can say is fun = fun.

I'd say I complete at least 90% of the games I start playing.

I think that the problem is not with the gamer but with the gaming industry making games like sausages - and some are of high quality. Developers spend years to develop a game that we only spend few hours with and not fully appreciate becasue we have just purchased another game or being hyped and reading all articles about the next upcoming super duper game that we convince ourselves that is different from anything that we had before!

If there were a couple of decent games a year then I think that the majority will finish them, enjoy/make mods for these games and investigate every hidden and corner in these games.

I just don't have the time anymore. I mean, I do have time to play but it's not unlimited and with with a wife, kids, work and other hobbies it's a balancing act.

It's actually a vicious cycle with me: start new game, buy another, start THAT one, buy another, repeat. It doesn't help that most games nowadays just don't draw me in as much so that after 15 hours I just don't care anymore. And I don't mean just RPGs but all games in general.

The last game I finished was ME and that's actually funny because I didn't like that game much. It was decent but too many irritating flaws and about 3/4s of the way I quit - but the wife gave me ME2 for Xmas and I felt I had to finish the first and I did. ME2 was actually pretty awesome but I put it aside to play something else and haven't gotten back to it.

The other huge issue is the length of games. Some RPGs are just too damn long. That's fine if the quest/gameplay is exciting throughout but a huge chunk of that time is senseless walking/backtracking and combat/gameplay. I'd rather have an excellent story/gameplay/setting and have it end at the 25 - 30 hour mark than 60 hours of boring filler nonsense.

Must add that I'm totally fine with spending a decent amount of time with a game whether I finish it or not as long as I get some enjoyment out of it.