Too many games. Yes, it's the bane of many of today's gamers. In her latest column, Pokket takes a look at the games she plays and laments that, just maybe, there are too many good ones to attend to. See what you think and then leave a comment or two.

Over the past few years I've taken the liberty to play, or try out, many new games, even if I had little to no interest in playing them. I've joined betas, played in alphas, and pre-ordered games to gain access and playtime in them. I've liked, disliked, and temporarily enjoyed many of them, but that's not the point of this article. Not even close. The point of this article is that lately I've found myself having less and less time to actually play all the games I want to. It's not because I have more responsibilities (lol what's responsibility? jk). It's the fact that there are just more and more games I want to play everyday. WAY too many, even!

Read more of Hillary Nicole's Pokket Says: Too Many Games.

First?

I don't know that I have too many games to play, but I certainly have a limited amount of time to play them in.  When you have enough time for one game in an evening, it makes the choice of which game much tougher.

I've had the problem of too many games for years. Mainly because I don't stick to one genre or platform.

I keep telling myself "when I retire, I'll have time to play all of these".

I really seem to have the opposite problem currently. I just can't seem to find a game that I enjoy for any decent amount of time. The last game I really enjoyed was Skyrim but I don't know that I want to try to go back to it now since I haven't played it in months. I have thought about renewing my WoW sub but I really haven't been thrilled by the MoP changes (I don't care about them adding Pandas but I don't want to relearn how to play all my toons) so I think I am done with that.

I think I am going to just jump on the GW2 bandwagon and pick that up once it releases. I figure I should be able to at least get some enjoyment out of the WvW. Maybe buy TSW once they release their raid (if it looks decent) as well.

I totally agree, between the hundreds (thousands?) of F2P MMO titles, the hundreds of steam sale games I've picked up, my subscription to Gamefly, new indie or AAA games coming out monthly and an increasing lack of personal time to play said games, it's no longer the same landscape that gamers grew up with.

When I learned to love video games I think I owned about 4 games. NES games were expensive as a kid, and I would play the games I had, and I loved the games I had, because that was all I had. Then slowly getting more access to PC Games, playing UO/EQ when that was all I knew of online games I had no other online games. 

Now... now I feel pressured to finish Mass Effect, I have un-opened PS3 and Xbox 360 games, I have 10+ unplayed steam games from various sales (just beat Dungeon Siege again, now going through DS2 and DS3...). I have 3-4 MMOs currently installed on my PC with new games constantly coming out, amid others that I want to check out.

I think even if I had as much time as I did as a teenager, I could no longer spend 10+ hours a day playing a single game like I did back then. Entertainment overload when you consider all the access to movies, television shows and all other forms of entertainment we also have at our fingertips. How does one spend the time to appreciate a game and learn to love it when we are being pulled in 1000 different directions.

And don't tell me its because the current games are garbage. If the games I loved as a child/teen were released today they would never get installed because they were too boring or too repetitive. I loved Dragon Warrior and Final Fantasy because they were some of the few games I played as a kid, but go back and realize that those games are more grindy and repetitive than the MMOs that people complain about now. And can you really call games like Skyrim, Portal 2, Borderlands 2, Guild Wars, Diablo 3, League of Legends, EVE Online, Amnesia the Dark Descent, Minecraft, or Terraria garbage?

She certainly is not very discerning.  I guess if you have low standards, you can enjoy anything.  Have a had time believing she is still playing Dayz, the cheaters are rampant in that game atm, although there are some private servers where it is still fun.

Never could get into Swtor and come on Wow?  Even Pandas won't help that game any more.  

There are some good games coming in the future, but the current offerings are weak at best.

I've made a point to try to play at least four or five hours of every MMO that comes out. I know that sounds a bit incredulous, but it's something I've made a point of doing for years now. Primarily because every MMO seems to have at least one cool new feature or approach to some aspect of it, and I use that info both for work and for my own edification on what's out there.  At the rate that they are coming out now, it's become near impossible to do that, especially when figuring in all the variations from PBBGs to MMOFPS/RTS to the MMOTCGs and the mainstream stuff.

The market is ridiculously flooded, which is both bad and good. Bad, in that it seems the past few years there's been more emphasis on just getting to market than on getting a good product to market. Good, in that I know there are always a dozen more games to check outif the gmae i'm currently playing starts to lose my interest.

Originally posted by BillMurphy
For those who have to wait until tomorrow... Darksiders II is amazing. Just saying. :)

I completely forgot about Darksiders 2 also!! I loved the first one. Also Dark Souls on PC is coming out soon too!!! Even though I already own in on PS3 I probably will pick it up on PC just because I prefer playing games on my PC than PS3. 

Originally posted by BillMurphy
For those who have to wait until tomorrow... Darksiders II is amazing. Just saying. :)

Don't take this the wrong way, Bill, but screw you, screw you very much!

It's not so much that the MMO market is saturated.  There are just too many similar MMO products out there.

These games have to make money, right? If I have $20 to spend, whether that be on a sub or cash shop, where do I spend it?  For the most part, the only major difference between games is IP and/or setting which isn't enough when features and gameplay are too similar.

DDO works well as a F2P game because it is both conceptually and functionally different than most MMOs.  If you like the experience DDO offers, there are a very small number of games that provide a similar experience.  

This is the same reason why EVE continues to do well and grow (or at least remain very stable)

If you like an experience like WoW... there are a countless number of similar experiences with various payment models out there... that is a problem! 

Yeah and 99% of those games are totaly shit and not even worth wiping your backside with.

Its amazing how bad games actualy have become to lets says 15 years ago.

Most of those trash is played out within a few hours.

Guildwars 2 and Planetside 2 are the only games worth mentioning for me this year and last year.

totally agree I have way too many games I want to play and not enough time :(

Darkfall,TSW, PS2.. hell im even gonna play GW2 with my guild even tho i kinda hate the game haha but i picked it up cheap..

Then there is MWO, Panzar, RaiderZ at least 10 SP i have picked up this yaer that I still need to play LOL :)