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Average bought Steam-game remains unplayed by 22%

Lambda Piscium said:
shit, i remember the day you'd get a new game every 6 months (if lucky) and, by god, you'd play that shit to hell and back.
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This...
And it's interesting to note: if you would display the average Steam gamer's purchase behavior in a retail store, those gamers would be going out the store with carts full of games lol.
Just to say: when people say they "SAVE money by using Steam", they are lying to themselves. You buy games you will never play. It doesn't matter if they were cheap...

Exception: publisher bundles.
But I know tons of people who buy games not included in bundles, then never play them.

I personally never understood the impulse buying: even though I use Steam for all my gaming needs, I aim to play and complete all games I buy. It's just a normal thing to do...
 
rjc571 said:
Uh, no? Why should it be a reflex for people to go the wrong way?
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Because going the wrong way at the start of a level is one of the most common spots to hide secrets in video games, right up there with putting them behind waterfalls. I'd figure that everyone would at least make sure to take a quick peak whenever they can, since it's fast and normally will give results. I dunno, maybe I just think more people would do it because I always do it, but given how commonly secrets are hidden there I'm shocked that so few people bothered to check there.
 
Not finishing a game appears to be the order of the day. I know in my own case I got a ton of games, especially on Steam that I have never touched yet. Probably never shall. So why did I buy them? In case I did want to play them or they were cheap is the answer.

It's quite a far cry from the days when one game had to last forever, now it's a game every other day so a fatigue of sorts sets in on what you play and how much of it until the next big thing comes along.
 
75%. I'm not surprised though. I blame all the indie bundles I buy for only one game. Means I play 1, and the rest (4-6 games) just won't get played ever.
 
MetatronM said:
It's to demonstrate how engrained genre conventions are. That "achievement" requires you, at the very start of the game, to go left for just a few steps instead of going right. 2/3 of players don't even make that tiny move to the left, though, because experience has told them that platformers go from left to right. Just a nifty little social experiment.
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Summary of all overrated indie games right there.
 
I would like to see the stats when games bought during steam sale are taken out. I have bought games durings sales simply because they were great deals and havent got around to playing them yet due to backlog.
 
Archaix said:
Also, the Limbo note is pretty stupid. The achievement requires you to do something the game never asks of you, so there's no reason to assume people would get it. Yes it only requires walking left a few seconds but who gives a damn? It's working from an assumption that everybody who plays a game looks up all the achievements and could be bothered to get them even when there's no point in the game.
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Agreed, this particular one is a bit silly.
Some other games provide achievements of the same "do something the game never asks of you" -category: they also seem silly but they can show who's an explorer and who's not. I find these to be quite interesting!


These I achieved and surprised me:

ach1.PNG

At the start of Deus Ex: Human Revolution, in Megan's office, only 6.9 % bothered to check around her office.
So many people that just right away follow her to go outside her office, not even bothering to look around. There wasn't any loot aside from some lore, if I remember correct, but you wouldn't know if you don't look.


ach2.PNG

Only 4.2 % of LA Noire gamers bothered to drive from mission to mission. Instead of going for the quick spawning all over the map.
I don't understand: if you play an open world game, why don't use that advantage, and drive around? Why teleport? You have the feeling you play a lineair game with fixed levels, not an open world game that way... Immersion should be key.


ach3.PNG

You have a whole casino in Fallout: New Vegas, yet only 8.5 % of the players spent any considerable time in the casino. A shame...


ach5.PNG

Fallout: New Vegas is scattered with terminals waiting to be hacked.
But only 12.8 % of gamers hacked more than 25 of those...


ach4.PNG

All of my wut. I thought most CoD gamers bought the game for the multiplayer.
Only 40.1 % bothered to get to level 10 in CoD: Black Ops 2. Only 13.8 % prestiged once.


ach6.PNG

Only 41.1 % of Hitman Absolution are true PC gamers lol. Those ran the benchmark tool; others did not.



I play all my Steam games without looking at what the achievements are, because that would majorly spoil it. And I never aim to pursue them.
But when I do get an achievement though, I immediately check the percentage of Steam gamers that also unlocked it.
It gives quite a satisfactory feeling when you have a rare one like those examples above. :D
 
I have my steam games separated by how interested I am in them. 1, 2, 3, and completed. My completed section is really small. 3 being the least interested games, is a huge huge list. Most I haven't even installed/started up
 
CrackPebbles said:
Most of the games I have not played are from indie bundles.

I tend to put in atleast 20 minutes if I buy a new steam game.
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Same, but I am still at 63%. I've been trying to get much better about my backlog, but there are some games from bundles I'll never install let alone play.
 
Asgaro said:
ach2.PNG

Ony 4.2 % of LA Noire gamers, bothered to drive from mission to mission. Instead of going for the quick spawning all over the map.
I don't understand: if you play an open world game, why don't use that advantage, and drive around? Why teleport? You have the feeling you play a lineair game with fixed levels, not an open world game that way...
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Probably because the world was too big for it's own good. I ended up fast travelling after a while, because there was no reason not to fast travel, outside one mission which screwed you out of a clue if you didn't drive. The city just felt mostly empty. Not to mention, I bet the majority of people played for the cases, not the fact it was an open world.
 
Asgaro said:
Agreed, this particular one is a bit silly.
Some other games provide achievements of the same "to do something the game never asks of you" -category: they also seem silly but they can show who's an explorer and who's not. I find these to be quite interesting!


These I achieved and surprised me:
.
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True, my problem with that one is the game is pretty clear that you're supposed to go left to right. You start out on the far left side of the screen looking toward the right. It's been a long time since I played the start of Limbo, but doesn't the camera even start panning to the right as you begin? There are plenty of clues that the correct way to go is to the right, even if you've never played a platformer before the screen is telling you to go to the right.

The New Vegas achievement surprised me. I can't imagine getting through that game without accidentally hacking more than 25 PCs. I'm with LA Noire though. It was only barely an open world game in design and you were punished for bad driving (in a game with poor driving physics) while not punished at all for skipping the driving sections. I guess I just play games differently from you in general though. I'd never bother to look around in the early guided sections of Deus Ex either.
 
Probably 85-90%+ of my Steam games remain unbeaten, although I generally have played most of them at least once. Bought too many of the Humble bundles, etc type of sales.... I have finished a number of the top indie games that tend to last 6-10 hours or so.
 
I really think the guy who created Castle Doctrine had a point when he was in the news...Steam sales really have altered the way people play their games completely. Less focus, less attention paid, dedicating yourself to a game gets to be a rarer thing overall. If you don't mind this change for the sake of better prices, I say that's understandable. But you have to admit it's changing things a lot, and it could be seen as a bad thing.
 
mattiewheels said:
I really think the guy who created Castle Doctrine had a point when he was in the news...Steam sales really have altered the way people play their games completely. Less focus, less attention paid, dedicating yourself to a game gets to be a rarer thing overall. If you don't mind this change for the sake of better prices, I say that's understandable. But you have to admit it's changing things a lot, and it could be seen as a bad thing.
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People not finishing games is not a new phenomenon. Game design over the past generation was constantly changed to make it easier to finish and put less obstacles in the player's way so that they can see the end of the game, removing the idea of content that you have to seek out because most players never bother, and generally holding your hand until the end of the ride. This all started well before Steam sales were popular, and it started in console games. The only difference now is that we have hard evidence to show when people do or do not finish games instead of just taking somebody's word for it that they totally killed Dracula in Castevania and everybody beat Mike Tyson.

It's also not exclusive to gaming. I have a roommate with an entire room full of bookcases filled with DVDs, most of them bought cheaply and never watched. People I know who read the most also have the most unread books that they bought with intentions to some day get through, but in the mean time more and more new books jumped ahead in line. It's natural with any entertainment medium. Yes, sales make it easier to pick them up and never play anything but it's not anything unique to games.
 
Archaix said:
People not finishing games is not a new phenomenon. Game design over the past generation was constantly changed to make it easier to finish and put less obstacles in the player's way so that they can see the end of the game, removing the idea of content that you have to seek out because most players never bother, and generally holding your hand until the end of the ride. This all started well before Steam sales were popular, and it started in console games. The only difference now is that we have hard evidence to show when people do or do not finish games instead of just taking somebody's word for it that they totally killed Dracula in Castevania and everybody beat Mike Tyson.
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Not finishing the game is one thing, but don't even play it at all is entirely different matter. Sure, you can play the game and not liking it, therefore not even putting more time into it is entirely understandable.

but buy a game and then just put it there and don't even touch it, and there are over 50% of your collection is not getting any playtime at all?

Why even buy it in the first place? Because of the sale?

There was one saying 'If you are worrying about the price of the item, you should buy it, because most likely it is something that you REALLY want. If you are buying it just because it is on sale, you probably don't really want it."

I'm not sure if people are really saving money on those pc game sales.
 
kuroshiki said:
Not finishing the game is one thing, but don't even play it at all is entirely different matter. Sure, you can play the game and not liking it, therefore not even putting more time into it is entirely understandable.

but buy a game and then just put it there and don't even touch it, and there are over 50% of your collection is not getting any playtime at all?

Why even buy it in the first place? Because of the sale?

There was one saying 'If you are worrying about the price of the item, you should buy it, because most likely it is something that you REALLY want. If you are buying it just because it is on sale, you probably don't really want it."

I'm not sure if people are really saving money on those pc game sales.
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Bundles and insane discounts. I have a shitload of games from humble bundles that I never intend to play and did not purchase the bundle for. There have also been a few games that were sold for less than $2 (even free through some promotions) that I do plan to play eventually and grabbed because the price will never be lower. Even if I never get to many of those games I have saved an insane amount of money compared to buying them on consoles (in terms of the totality of my steam library even including the games I will never play).
 
Yeah, I haven't played 48% of my Steam library (343 games).

I've only spent 1836 hours across all my games, and no single game is over 100 hours.
 
Interesting according to the SteamDB calculador I played 107 out the 158 I own on Steam, and I don't even own gaming PC. I dont have any idea how many games I completed in my 2 and half year using Steam, but this year I managed to finish Guacamelee, Toki Tori 2 and Finding Teddy, my problem is just lack of self-control I start playing a game to finish then I decide to play a strategy/4x game to have a little change and when I notice I only played CKII in my free time during the week. D:
 
Nokterian said:
Yup same here. Diablo 3 is going to suck the time out of me.
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For me,

Dota2
Diablo 3
LoL
TF2
Titanfall
Battlefield 4

The first 3 of those 5 games are the fucking definition of "time sink", so it's really difficult to find time for anything else after playing those. Those 3 games are investments. And they're so good and fulfilling, you really don't thirst to play anything else.
 
Im way off on those stats.

I normally buy games off pure hype, other times is a double dip, and more often than not just buy games that are on sale because the screenshots looked cool.
All of which I must shamefully admit, never get to play, neither download after the purchase.

And after checking my current stats is worth noting that not a single game off my account is listed as "completed" or finished :(

*goes back to lurking
 
Asgaro said:
ach2.PNG

Only 4.2 % of LA Noire gamers bothered to drive from mission to mission. Instead of going for the quick spawning all over the map.
I don't understand: if you play an open world game, why don't use that advantage, and drive around? Why teleport? You have the feeling you play a lineair game with fixed levels, not an open world game that way... Immersion should be key.
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Cause it was a dull open world with bad side missions. I doubt most people buying LA Noire bought it because it was open world.
 
Im playing dota so much so I almost forget the others

almost 2000 hours of dota, the 2nd and 3rd is dont starve and ftl with 70 and 30 hours.

:(
 
kuroshiki said:
Not finishing the game is one thing, but don't even play it at all is entirely different matter. Sure, you can play the game and not liking it, therefore not even putting more time into it is entirely understandable.

but buy a game and then just put it there and don't even touch it, and there are over 50% of your collection is not getting any playtime at all?

Why even buy it in the first place? Because of the sale?

There was one saying 'If you are worrying about the price of the item, you should buy it, because most likely it is something that you REALLY want. If you are buying it just because it is on sale, you probably don't really want it."

I'm not sure if people are really saving money on those pc game sales.
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I want all those games in my backlog, just don't have the time to actually play them. I buy them knowing that fact, but it's not an issue because they're practically free anyway.
 
If it weren't for card idling I'd say that my unplayed percentage would be well within the 90% ballpark.
 
If I had an image-hosting account i'd put up the "y can't metroid crawl" image from miiverse in response to the limbo thing.... the "right is forward" convention of linear 2d games is so all-consuming that even when going left is the first mandatory action in a sidescroller, some people don't get it.
 
Asgaro said:
ach1.PNG

At the start of Deus Ex: Human Revolution, in Megan's office, only 6.9 % bothered to check around her office.
So many people that just right away follow her to go outside her office, not even bothering to look around. There wasn't any loot aside from some lore, if I remember correct, but you wouldn't know if you don't look.
Click to expand...

I think that people just want a more immersive experience now. Stopping the narrative to have your character rifle through an NPC's desk breaks that immersion. I mean, one could ask why the NPC is a lifeless automaton that doesn't care what you do to her office, but that's another issue.
 
These stats are really bad, lol.

I thought Steam and PC gaming in general attracted a more 'hardcore' crowd. I'm shocked at the completion rates.
 
Asgaro said:
I personally never understood the impulse buying: even though I use Steam for all my gaming needs, I aim to play and complete all games I buy. It's just a normal thing to do...
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obviously not considering only 30% of people complete the games they buy, according to this chart (for whatever reason)


Asgaro said:
ach2.PNG

Only 4.2 % of LA Noire gamers bothered to drive from mission to mission. Instead of going for the quick spawning all over the map.
I don't understand: if you play an open world game, why don't use that advantage, and drive around? Why teleport? You have the feeling you play a lineair game with fixed levels, not an open world game that way... Immersion should be key.
Click to expand...
There was nothing interesting about the open world parts and really nothing to do, either. The game was about the character parts and the crime scenes/investigations

LA Noire was open world and was a worse game for it
 
The reason the Walking Dead Stat is inflated is the achievement you get for finishing the game was glitched when Episode 5 originally came out.
Many played through, myself included, and the achievement never popped at the end.

I don't have the motivation to go back and get it, and that is assuming Telltale even fixed the issue. The historical precedence would suggest not.
 
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