How do I make gaming fun again?

[disolitude]

freebs2 said:

disolitude said:
Wow, I really appreciate the feedback. Lots of great ideas and suggestions here...

I've been a gamer since the late 80s and have thoroughly enjoyed every gen until the last one (X360, PS3). The last gen was when this began and I went from going crazy with anticipation and calling in sick at work to play Halo 3 on day 1, to being completely meh about Halo 4 for example. It didn't matter if games were SP or MP, I just didn't find them as enjoyable as before.

Fast forward to this gen and 2015 and I am literally unable and unwilling to finish any game I play. I have over 50 games for Xbox One and WiiU ranging from fun indies to "AAA" ones, to Peggle. Only games I played beginning to end this gen and had fun with it was Dead Rising 3 and ZombiU.

I also play maybe for an hour every 2 weeks, so I am not really saturating my spare time with gaming.

What I think I'll do is ride out this holiday season. If Halo 5 doesn't do it for me, and Transformers Devastation sucks and few others are just not enjoyable, I'll go off the grid for 3-6 months. That way I'll see if time off helps...and if not, I think that's gonna be all she wrote for me.

50 games in about 2 years is a lot. Maybe, one of the problems is that you have too many games. It may seem strange but since it's only natural you want to spend more spare time on other activities, if you have too many games (more than what is possible to play in the time you feel 'acceptable' to dedicate to games) you won't likely feel compelled to invest enough time in a single title.

Most good games require some time before you get really involved (I'm thinking of Demon Souls for example), if you have too much choice, you'll likely swich from one game to another before you can really get the grasp of it. The same thing happened to me some year ago when I decided to pirate games for a certain console; I went form buying only a few games per year to having all the possible games I could want, but in the end I started abandoning games halfway and I was becoming disengaged.

Imo, to make gaming fun again you should become much more selective when you buy games. You should be well aware of your tastes, and put them before anything else, avoid impulsive buys or to buy a game just because it's critically praised (After all, ZombiU and Dead Rising 3 got a lukewarm reception from the media).

Another suggestion, if you can, is to share your passion with some other player in real life. Writing on forums is fun but it's not quite like playing and talking about games with friends. Sharing is a great part of the enjoyment.

Really great advice. Yeah I do have a lot of games, but I get them with every intention to finish them. I just stop having fun with a title, so next time I play in week or two, I buy another one. I usually stick to the known genres that I enjoy. I've been gaming for almost 30 years so I won't like JRPGs all of a sudden out of the blue. :)

I think that focusing on a single title or couple games at a time may be benefiaical. The problem is that the games these days are massive. At the rate I am playing games I could play the Master Chief Collecton for a year and still not be done with it.

Funny thing is that the selection of games at my disposal is only going to get larger as  I own 140+ Xbox 360 digital games which I can't access since I sold my 360. Backwards compatibility for Xbone will be rough. lol