21 years ago, I bought Zone of the Enders for PS2(Cheesus Krist). Like the other 99% of the people who bought Zone of the Enders, I bought it for the Metal Gear Solid 2 Demo. Matter of the fact that Metal Gear Solid 2 Demo was so instrumental in my choice to get Zone of the Enders that I could not even think about this series without thinking about Metal Gear Solid. I did play and finish Zone of the Enders, but I played the Metal Gear Solid 2 Demo much, much, much more. I don't think I played the original Zone of the Enders more than one playthrough. Sequel comes out a few years later and I just say, "I'll get it later", and boy did I mean later.

Now it is 2022, and I finally bought Zone of the Enders 2 in its beautiful remastered edition; finished it yesterday and maaaan it awesome. The high speed action is great. It looks great, feels great and sounds great. The only negative I have is the strange targeting system and those 2 missions you get graded on, because of the targeting system. Fuck both of those. I want to shoutout Yoji Shinkawa's mechanical work; rather it be MGS, ZOE, or Death Stranding, his mecha work is just so unique and attractive. Every Orbital Frame looks amazing in design. 

Yea, thats all. I just wanted to say I finally beat a game that sat in my backlog for over 20 years. Feels good to truly give this series a chance without Metal Gear in the way.

Hopefully Konami greenlights Cygames's Zone of the Enders 3.

Anybody have any backlogged games this long?

Well, if you want to count NES games I never finished as a kid that I still own, then I've had unfinished games in my backlog for around 30 years now. Blaster Master, Rygar, Rad Gravity, and a few others as well I think. For games that I might possibly one day actually go back and finish, probably Koudelka on the PS1. I remember getting stuck in it early in the 2nd disc, and then just never came back to it for whatever reason. Would really like to go back to it one day, especially due to its connection to the Shadow Hearts games.

Congrats!

Always good when things come full circle. 

YOU SEE! The game is a masterpiece all these years later. Best part is the remastered version STILL LOOKS AMAZING! STILL PLAYS AMAZING!

FUCK KONAMI as well we 3 was announced and we got some concept models shown but Konami canceled the project in 2012.  Now you know why my sig is the way it is.

Daemon X Machina feels like the customization of Armored Core with the Gameplay most similar to ZOE since ZOE.  Astebreed is a shmup/hack n slash that to me feels like a spinoff and Bullk Slash feels like a proto ZOE and Omega Boost is another game along those lines.  Just nothing that feels quite the same. ZOE also has a couple of anime. Some hate it. It was ok.

Jehuty has the best design of any mech ever.

Cancellation of ZOE3 had nothing to do with Konami. You can blame High Voltage Software for that one. They were responsible for the bad ports on PS3 that tanked sales of the game. Kojima cancelled the game himself as punishment for failing the project. Its ok though, There was interview with a Konami Producer and Cygames director and they were both were very passionate about working on another. I think it will happen. 

I will say ZOE oozes a very cool style. Jehuty design in perfect.

Just going to leave this here

Anyway I will answer the OP's question. in 2004 I started Skies of Arcadia on Gamecube even tho I also had the DC copy. GCN had more content than the base DC game (I was unaware of the issues GCN version had at the time) I got about 50 hours in the game and my game froze and lost my save. I started over and this time 55 hours in and lost power while saving. Lost my save file again. I gave up. It wasn't until 2016 when I finally put my Dreamcast copy in. Played it to completion. Sadly no way to get the DLC now but I loved the game as it was. 12 years of waiting paid off.

Does it even count as backlog when you didn't own the game for 20 years?
Just asking as this would increase my backlog by a huge margin.

It is something that I was absolutely intending to play eventually vs just knowing about a game and not caring then deciding to play it. Think about it in the sense of a wishlist. 

My oldest back log game that I own (disregarding a whole bunch of C64 games) is Snake Rattle ’n Roll for the NES.

I’ve never been able to get past the second ice level (ironically I think it’s one of the last levels of the game I think). Great game tho, but it’s probably 15 years since I last played it.