Red Cog's Game Completion Log: compiled list

Showing posts with label compiled list. Show all posts

Friday, January 2, 2026

Game Completion List 2025

2025 was an unusual year for me. I feel like I finished a lot of games, but I could have finished a lot more. This past month for instance, where I had plenty of time to play games and likely could have knocked out a good handful more - I spent mostly playing time wasting games without a definitive end. As usual, there are always the games I fall off of due to something else grabbing my attention, but that's part of why I do this, to prevent that as much as possible.

I don't do this list just to pump up those "completed game" numbers and I do have to remind myself it's okay to enjoy a game I know I may never "finish" but I also get a little disappointed when I look at my "games to go back to finish list" and it's getting longer and longer from games this year.

Anyway, 49 games this year. I could have easily made it 50+ in the final hour, but the first game I finished in 2025 was a co-op beat 'em up I played with my wife, my sister and her boyfriend, and at 49 the final game I finished in 2025 was a co-up beat 'em up that I played with my wife, my sister and her boyfriend, and I thought that was kind of sweet, so I started played something I knew I wouldn't finish for a few weeks, instead.

Last year I complained how a lot of the "Year end round-ups" were provided in late November/Early December, which excluded most of December, even if you pulled it afterward. It seems some companies took that into consideration and didn't provide them this year yet - or maybe they just aren't going to at all. So instead of sharing just those stats from PlayStation(the only ones who seem to have their round-up available), I took a page from a friend who mentioned being inspired by me. Now, inspired by her, I came up with my own stats and graphs.

Taking this into account, I have quite a few new favorites for a single year. I even ran them through my big complicated favorite games spreadsheet, and some ranked pretty well, and if we're going strictly off of that, then I guess I have to say my game of the year is... Ghost of Yotei.

I loved Ghost of Yotei, but it almost feels unexciting as a game of the year. Did I love the game? Absolutely. It's a gorgeous game, and it's tons of fun, but in my list I put it exactly with/gave it a shared slot with Ghost of Tsushima. Even though they're not exactly alike, overall they're pretty similar and both have up and downs. In the end I feel pretty much exactly the same about them. It's not a bad thing, it's just not new information. I knew I would probably love the game going in it, and I did.

So then what's new in the list? Death Stranding, Cyberpunk 2077, Expedition 33, Crystal Project, and Tunic. The only one that I kinda gave a 5 to instinctually when coming up with my stats for this year that didn't really make it to the "favorite games" list, is Hellblade: Senua's Sacrifice. It's a 5, don't get me wrong. But is it a personal favorite? Nah, it's not the flavor of the game that I can really say defines me and my taste, that's all it is. Would I recommend it to everyone? Pretty much - with the caution that it can be hard to play with a caution to your mental faculties. It's rough.

Many of the other games shouldn't be all too surprising. Expedition 33 won so many awards, deservedly so in my opinion. It has some issues with the pacing, but other than that I found it a nearly perfect game.

Cyberpunk 2077 took a few years of fixing and I only ended up getting it because I was able to so cheaply all these years later, but I'm glad I eventually spent the time with it.

Death Stranding I liked when it first came out, but I was playing it very early Pandemic and maybe it just hit too close to home at the time and I needed something that wasn't explicitly about people being isolated.

Crystal Project fuses platforming and turned-based rpgs and somehow really works even though it almost turned me off with it's minecraft-esque voxel world.

Tunic is a game that you maybe have to delve way too deep into to enjoy, but I have found that I actually love that stuff, as I did with one of my favorites, Void Stranger.

While I didn't finish all the ones I played/planned to play. I noticed a bit of a trend with games released this year. A lot of "PlayStation(1,2,3) ass games." and what I mean by that, is a lot of games that feel like they belong on PS1 or PS2... maybe very early PS3 at the latest. Something about them, intentionally or not really captures the vibe of 99 to 2006 era of gaming - specific the feel of the PlayStation brand of that. This isn't a bad thing at all. Maybe I just notice because it's something I want, need, love?

Straightforward yet experimental games, not bogged down by extraneous modern design checklists that most people expect of a modern game when everyone was designing for the AAA standard. Games that are fine with being "less", or maybe just having a very specific idea in mind and going for it because we're not entirely sure what works because we don't have years of analytics and personal data and so we throw something out to see what sticks.

Or maybe we're just getting to the point where those types of games are considered "classic" or "retro" and a lot more people have nostalgia for that era. I'm not complaining about it, but just something I noticed with games from companies big and small this year. Kunitsu-Gami, Slitterhead, Rogue Flight, Amedama, Mamon King, all specifically fit that exact vibe, and that's just from the top of my head and just from the list of games I completed. Honestly, I hope to see more PlayStation 2(1,3) ass games this year.

Wednesday, January 1, 2025

Game Completion List 2024

Compared to last year, this list is much shorter - I just barely squeezed in to my "average goal" of 30 games a year. The past few years I've exceeded it quite a bit, but this years game list was comprised of around 50% RPGs, depending on how you define the genre. Surprisingly those seem to take up more time than action platformers.

In order of completion:

There are just a lot of games I wanted to get to this year that I just did not. I even revisited some of the games from last years "Games I played a bit of but did not finish" and continued to not finish. I have had them in a "high priority" list all year, but there was always something... higher priority. Not that some game like, Sclash, was a high priority, but sometimes your spontaneously play a game, and you just happen to play it long enough to finish it.

Some of the games I played the most this year, like Halls of Torment, don't even get to be on this list because I haven't beat it. Can you beat it? I mean technically I "beat" all the levels, so is there ever a credit roll? I don't even know, but I guess I have to keep doing stuff until that happens, because it could just be hidden behind one of the many things I've yet to do.

That's kind of a problem with some of the more procedural games, too. They're more of a "thing to do" rather than a game you expressly play with the goal of finishing. Like I'm sure "Slay the Spire" has an actual ending. I finished a run and even though it rolled credits they cryptically hinted at it not being the "real ending", and there are other characters, so I didn't log that here, as I don't feel like I "truly" finished it yet. But what does it take to truly finish it? I know someone who has purchased Slay the Spire 7 times and seemingly played it hundreds of hours. Does it truly take that much? Or is it just a fun game to play without the goal of ever finishing?

Yeah, so I got caught up in a handful of those, I like the Vampire Survivor-like games, and sometimes it's hard to tell when they are really over. Maybe I did finish something and just neglected to log it.

This year, 2025, which truly feels like a year that means I'm now actually living in a sci-fi-esque futuristic dystopia, except it's a lot less aesthetic and cool than portrayed in media of the 80's and 90's or prior, my goal is really just to hit the backlog I already had existing for 2024. This means some of the games I started in 2023 mostly, except now I'm also adding games I didn't finish in 2024, and games that have yet to come out. It's truly a never ending backlog.

So finally, my Game of the Year picks. Unfortunately for everything else, a new Final Fantasy VII game came out this year, so Rebirth takes it by miles. That said I also added/revisited some favorites. Odin Sphere already had the spot on my favorites list from it's original release, but Astlibra Revision just captivated me like no other game. I even started the rogue-lite-esque spin off Astlibra Gaiden: The Cave of Phantom Mist, but it's a bit repetitive and I grew a little tired of the procedure. I'll get back to it soon though(I say).

Other than that, I really liked Unicorn Overlord, Fantasian and Metaphor, but I don't think they're quite absolute favorites of all time material, for me. Final Fantasy 13 and 15 are both great if not flawed in very different ways, which is also funny because of their relation. I think too many people really focus on the... assets of Stellar Blade, rather than it's content as a whole and are otherwise missing what a great game that is.

Here is a compiled image of all those game yearly wrap ups. Even though the one I care about the most, Nintendo, doesn't include December. They literally show you a "by month" list that ends in November! It infuriates me! Fantasian would have been my second longest game played on Switch with a playtime over 85 hours. Plus, I played a few other new games here and there in December that go unaccounted for.

Monday, October 7, 2024

Ex-Wishlist Games

There are too many games to play them all.

This is more of a post about games I won't beat just because I wanted an outlet for my thoughts and it was too big for discord. It also gives me a nice place to come back to, to maybe revise in the future.

Back in ye old days, I had a certain pride of being someone who pretty much tried every game worth trying. A feat that was much more possible in the 00's and prior.

Like with other media; tv shows, anime, music, movies, youtube videos. There are just so many more games now. Within my friend group, we often cite anime, simply because it's somewhat unique in the sense that while there is so much more of it being produced, ~4x as much, but there aren't 4x the studios, and some of them have barely grown. So the quality suffers as they pump so many more of them out in the same amount of time. Other forms of media don't suffer as much in that regard, but have their own problems, such as being subject to to shifts in how people consume media, giant corporations whims, or slaves to the algorithms.

Video games just weren't as mainstream 20+ years ago, and now that they are at the forefront of entertainment media, the tools to make them have expanded to the point they can be produced at every level. There are dozens of video games being released every single day. Maybe not a dozen on Switch, maybe not a dozen on PS5. But across all platforms, if you are including ultra independent works, shovelware, and mobile games, we are just saturated with video game releases. Games released on Steam alone hit above a dozen on slow day, daily.

As someone who used to be very online in my younger years, almost always having some sort of opinion about every game, I've continued trying to keep up with as many games as I possibly can. Putting more focus these past few years into actually finishing the games I play, I finally have to come to terms with the fact I can't play everything. It's at the point where, even if I came upon infinite money, could quit my job, quit all other hobbies, devote every moment of my life to playing video games, I can't even play everything I have interest in playing.

My Steam wishlist has nearly 1000 games on it, and I already own over well over 1000 games on Steam, if not closer to 2k. Steam is far from the only platform I own games on, on PC.

My Switch wishlist seemingly randomly prevented me from adding games to it at 391 games. It didn't let me add that 392nd game. Seems like a arbitrary point, but that's fine. I thoughtfully considered how much I needed to add that 392nd game, and turns out I didn't. I just wanted to add it so I didn't forget it. It's a game I have the vaguest interest in because it has cute sprite art, and I MIGHT play it if it goes on sale for at least 50% off and has great reviews. That said, I knew there were going to be other games I want to add to my wishlist soon, and so begun a mass exodus.

I went through and spent time watching trailers for games, reading reviews, and considering what the odds I would play a game even if I purchased it, for hundreds of games. In the end, I reduced my Switch wishlist to 269. It would have been lower... if I didn't add 4 games in the process. Maybe I didn't entirely learn my lesson, but I made a step forward. A lot of these games seem like they might be great games. I just had to consider, will I ever prioritize them over everything else in my never ending infinite backlog?

No, I don't think I will.

There are a few reasons my wishlist is still quite so high, obviously I like games a lot and there are still many titles I'm interested in, but I also have a refusal to remove shoot 'em ups that I don't already own on another platform from it. I wouldn't be surprised if over 100 of those titles are shmups alone. I love my shmups, and the Switch has a hell of a library in that regard, brand new ones, rereleases, and tons of previously arcade-exlusives, but because I already have so many options for shmups, I almost exclusively buy them on sale, when I know I'm going to play them soon.

Another category that takes up a couple dozen of those wishlist items is music game dlc. Music games are an extremely monetized genre, usually coming with a few dozen tracks and then releasing songs via track or pack incrementally for years to come making it very easy to spend hundreds of dollars on a single game if you're not careful. So a lot of these tracks or track packs sit in my wishlist waiting for a day when they're both on sale and I'm in the mood to play said music game.

That said, I still have that fear of missing out on certain titles, fear of forgetting they exist, fear that maybe I made the wrong choice in removing them from my wishlist. So I logged every game I removed from my wishlist I was worried about potentially forgetting. I didn't include games I already down that would have been a repurchase or an updated rerelease, or direct sequels to games that would be easily remembered, or games that are just too mainstream to forget.

Maybe I also logged them so I could present it, and if anyone feels like I made a bad move, can say, "hey, I saw X on your list, actually you should really play this." Maybe I'm saying all this just to justify this backup wishlist. Eh... baby steps. (but seriously let me know if you think I'm dropping a banger)

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Sunday, December 31, 2023

Game Completion List 2023

I guess the content of this list will be much smaller than the past couple years since I did individual blog posts for each one - if you are interested in what I thought for each game, you can just go to it's post directly.

In order of completion:

Wowie kabowie, 57 games in one year. I didn't even have a set goal for this year, but I do think having this blog pushed me to strive to finish more than ever before. Not that many people actually read it, and despite me sharing it out to people, it really is only for my own purposes, to collect my thoughts and practice discipline when it comes to seeing the games I play through.

Does this mean I finished every game I played this year and I only played the above games? Not at all. I without doubt played hundreds of games this year. Some more than others. Some only for moments, a round of something here or there, some for quite a bit, some I just didn't finish(yet), like Valkyrie Profile, The Legend of Dragoon, Cyberpunk 2077 and Nioh 2. Some I don't even put here because I'm not even sure they qualify as "completed". Usually a credit roll is enough to qualify a game but there are exceptions.

Fighting games for instance. If it has a singular story mode where you alternate characters while a narrative plays between battles, sure, I'd put it here, but does running through a single characters 8 match arcade mode count as completing the game? I don't think so. But sometimes they only have a basic arcade mode, so when do you count it completed, beating arcade with every character? I'll likely not ever do that... again. I think I did it with the original Soul Calibur and that might have been it.

Also some multiplayer only games, or trial/challenge based or music games don't even have any way of performing a credit roll except accessing it from a menu. When do I possibly account for those on this blog?

Considering how many older games I invested my time into this year, it was definitely a year of nostalgia, where I indulged in many of my more formative interests. Whether those were remakes, replays of games I have already finished, or yet to be completed games I fell off of or played only sporadically. Some of my non-game interests support this too. Back in January I got back into Kamen Rider by finally watching a newer with Zero-One. Loved it. Been watching random Kamen Rider stuff non-stop since. I watched Shin Kamen Rider 3 times. Movie of the year for me hands down and that's saying something because Godzilla: Minus One was excellent, and that's also just another nostalgic interest we have here.

To wrap it up, what is my Game of the Year? Once again, I have a hard time picking. I will say that I'm going to review my favorite games of all time list and see if Final Fantasy XVI, Void Stranger, and Witch Spring R deserve a spot. Okami and Super Mario RPG are already on there. Star Ocean 2 might be, but I think 3 is still my favorite, even though this version of 2 was amazing.

It's kind of odd, but I think the games I would most recommend others play, are just the classics Okami, and Super Mario RPG. The remake of Super Mario RPG is nice, but play it either way if you never have.

I can't really decide between the three new ones so... Final Fantasy XVI was the best AAA action rpg I played. Witch Spring R was the best turned based indie rpg I played. Void Stranger was the best weirdo puzzle game with amazing pixel art I played.

Spoiler for 2024: I mentioned some games I was currently playing/didn't finish(yet) to give myself some accountability. Maybe if I feel guilty since it's written out for the world to see, I will finish them. That said, Sea of Stars is likely my first completed game for 2024. Let's see how this goes!

Bonus: Some of those "Year in Gaming" stats provided by the platforms, even though I am super mad at Nintendo for cutting out December entirely.

Sunday, January 1, 2023

Game Completion List 2022

Alright, here it is. The reason I decided to move over to the blog. 2022's game list. I did a better job at making notes after finishing a game. Usual rules apply. Credit roll is enough to go on the list, but just because I rolled credits doesn't necessarily mean I stopped playing. I usually go for "Full Completion". I wanna see multiple endings if it doesn't require a new full replay. I wanna do all the side quests that have story content. I wouldn't say I aim to 100% and I never pay attention to achievements if a game has them. I usually just aim to see all the content a game has to offer.

If I didn't beat a level in under 30 seconds to get the gold star, and I didn't collect every single sword, I'm probably fine with that. I also usually play on normal mode, unless it requires a harder mode to see the true ending or whatever. Which I have a problem with. But more on that later.

If I had a screenshot that I took easily accessible, I added it. If I failed to take a screenshot or couldn't find it in a quick pass, I didn't include it.

Listed in order of completion:

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Saturday, December 31, 2022

Game Completion List 2021

Another archive post. In the original thread, I posted some of my Nintendo Wrap Up images, so I'll add those to the end. This one is copied from January 1st 2022 and is as follows:

In a continuing effort to hold myself more accountable for completing my games, I made my goal 50 games this year.

I can't remember if I had made it a goal, or I just tried to beat as many games as I could last year, but that number was around 30. Twenty more games this year. Nearly a game a week on average, and when I look at last year’s games... well.. there were a good handful that were less than 2 hours or not much longer.

But I did it. Admittedly, it got tight in the end, and this past week I wrapped it up with 4 games I knew I could beat within a couple days.

This year, I also wrote down some thoughts as I completed each game, instead of thinking of something to say about it as I wrote this. That said, in many cases my thoughts got more and more detailed as the year progressed.

Instead of increasing the number this year, I’m taking a side step. Most of the games I finished this year are pretty recent with a few exceptions. This year, I wanna really focus on that backlog. My goal will be to beat at least 20 games released prior to 2015.

Now, here are the games in I finished, in order of completion:

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Game Completion List 2020

First post is a copy of a Facebook post from January 6th 2021, it is as follows:

In an effort to hold myself more accountable for actually finishing games I acquire, I tried to jot down each time I beat a game this past year. Sometimes I forgot, but I think I eventually covered everything I actually "beat" this past year. That said, I've still picked up tons of games that I only got so far in. Ordered by completion date(I think). I generally won't beat a game I don't enjoy so if I were to rate them they're all at least average or above average. Figured it would be fun to share.

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