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Garple

Temptation

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How do you deal with the temptation to buy every game that's ever released. I find myself wanting to buy stupid things like Tomb Raider: Legend and Condemned on Games on Demand. I buy games constantly, I think we all do, that's one of the things that make me wary about getting a gaming PC. Steam would probably obliterate my bank account. Video Games as a hobby have so much compulsion involved. Compulsion to spend all your time playing games and especially compulsion to drop large sums of money all the damn time. How do you guys deal with it? I'm not just asking this for the sake of shooting the shit. I'm looking for advice that will help me keep my spending under control and I'm asking becuase I think we all deal with this and it's something we should talk about as a community.

Frankly, one of the ways I deal is: used games. I'm sorry Chris, but even a small savings makes a big difference to me. Also, I try to pad out my repertoire of gaming options with freeware indie stuff. When I first started college, it was the first time I didn't have a current gen system, so I sought out all kinds of stuff I could play for free on a "student-grade" (if you'll allow me to coin a term) laptop.

Aside: that led me to stumble onto a brilliant adventure game called Eye of the Kraaken which I recommend to anyone who likes TellTale (it captures a similar tone to what I've played of their games, and it's free). Has anyone played that or played the noirish adventure game they were working on and I assume have now released? Sorry this post is so tangential.

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I do most of my gaming on Steam now, just because with the sales they run it's so much cheaper. The last time I bought a console game it was because I saw Brutal Legend for $20. I have so much to play and so little time to do it in that new releases aren't too big a deal for me until they go on sale. I really wanted Dragon Age, but was able to wait for it to be $30, same with Borderlands, etc, etc. I don't buy used, I have kind of a thing about that (though I don't hold anything against those that do), but I do often buy very late. I've been thinking about No More Heroes 2 a bunch lately, for example, as it's a Wii game that's several months past launch and will probably now be reasonably cheap.

Best advice is: think about how much time you'll actually have to play things. If you don't have time to play a game, don't buy it until you do. I find that trying to budget my time is much more effective than trying to budget my money. The problem with Steam is that the purchases are all digital so you click a button and forget you're spending money. If I think about whether or not I'll have the time to play it before I click that button, it works far better as a method of holding back.

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I only buy games developers/designers/directors I really like already so that I don't buy games at random or by reviews the way I used to do in middle school.

Only problem is depending on who you are following, you might add largely to the games you have to play. I have a lot of games, more than most people, just because of an aversion to emulators and need to track down old console and PC games, but there are also a lot of rules I make for myself to keep it at bay.

I also generally avoid games that I hear take over 25 hours to finish. I can give leeway to some games that require OCD type completion that I feel compelled to do so, but games where just finishing the main storyline takes over 60 hours is a no go for me. The shorter the play time, the better in my opinion. I also avoid designers that typically make games that take this long to finish.

I'm not saying my rules are really that logical to anyone but me, but I think it all has to do with setting yourself some major boundaries that only encompass games you know you'll enjoy and make those your must-haves, then branch out and allow yourself some leeway to try games that you think you'd be interested in.

The thing that just sucks about only buying games that you really want when you have the time to play them is just what a short shelf life everything has now. I guess that's not a problem if you only play digital downloads.

Also, since you seem to be interested in trying out indie games, you could just skip to blind buys more with those than the more expensive titles by bigger companies. They will usually cost less if anything at all, take less time to finish, and lead you to a better variety of games, so it would be low risk and low cost.

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How do you guys deal with it?

Mostly I don't worry about it because my compulsion doesn't really extend beyond the amount of free time I have available/want to devote to gaming, but as a general rule, I limit myself to having one bought-at-full-price AAA title on the go at a time (I either finish it, lend it to someone or sell it back before I go on to another), I fill in the rest of my gaming with:

Borrowed games from friends.

Demos to figure out that I really do/don't want something.

free/cheap indie or XBLA/PSN stuff, flash games.

price dropped (used/steam sale/old) stuff.

I sell back stuff more often than I buy used. Yeah I know I'm getting ripped off, but $5 for something I paid $60 a month ago is still better than nothing if none of my friends want to play it and I know I'm never going to touch it again.

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I tend to channel mine on Steam and Xbox into smaller (cheaper) games. Sadly, I usually derive more entertainment and less frustration out of my $10-15 games than I do out of my $60 games. For example, 1943 might well be my game of the year for 2009 as I played it the most and probably had the most fun with it. This allows me to buy 5 or 6 games for the price of 1 'full' game.

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I'm in a similar situation you were as a college student. I don't have a current gen console (or a tv), so 90% of my gaming is on the PC. (10% is on the DS, which is current gen console I guess. So I lied.)

I almost never buy a game at full price, but even then I think I buy a bit too much. Steam sales are a huge blessing, but also a curse... I tell myself I won't buy another game until I've finished playing some of the ones I already have, and then Steam has a weekend sale and I cave. I honestly think I would be spending a lot less money on games if they weren't so cheap.

I've been meaning to buy a console for a while now, but I'm afraid of how my spending habits will just get worse once I do. That, and I'll need to buy a TV too.

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I uh, dont!

I get myself into minor financial trouble about once a year because of my video game buying/impulse habits...

Be a better person than I am and choose your games wisely. There's always a few hanging around waiting for me to get interested in them again, and I totally could have bought those later on or waited for a sale instead of jumping all over them in launch excitement.

Agreed that Steam sales are awesome and terrible events- I don't even want to look at the list of gems I have yet to install, let alone play from last holiday season...

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Well, for me it boils down to buying 85% of my games on Steam during their regular massive markdowns (speaking of which, Trine is marked down to 4.99 so maybe I'll actually get around to playing it). The other 15% comes from Good Old Games. With that in mind, I really only need to assert a measure of self control during the holiday sales. The downside is never (or rarely) playing games as soon as they come out. Some of the surprise is lost as podcasts and forums discuss in length a game I'm looking forward to playing (Just Cause 2 is the latest example for me), but for the most part, it hasn't been an issue.

You mention being wary of switching from consoles to PC, so I'll mention some verified data from my own life (feel free to disregard it). My wife and I have recently been discussing our budget; we're considering having another child and decided to really scrutinizing our spending, including (you guessed it) looking at every dime I've spent on video games over the last few years. For a two year stretch, I did most of my gaming on the Wii and 360. I had just bought both systems and my PC was a bit long in the tooth. I've since upgraded my PC, and have enjoyed a sizable stretch of almost exclusive PC gaming. I was pleasantly surprised to see that my spending dropped by almost 60% when I switched to PC gaming. Simultaneously, the amount of time I spent playing games went up significantly.

Console games, even when on sale, are surprisingly expensive when compared to the sales direct download services offers. You also have the additional costs; Xbox Live and the ridiculously over priced accessories for example. On the Wii side, first party Nintendo games rarely go down in price much, and as we all know, the accessories are plentiful...

With the PC though, there is an absolute insane amount of fun and affordable games available. That's not even counting all the free games out there. Will I ever play all the games I buy? No, of course not. But it still fits within my modest budget. I think the PC really allows you to maximize your entertainment dollar, and it's more flexible when it comes to really scaling down your spending.

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