Gaming thoughts, bite-size chewables - new orange flavor!

[Dan Homerick]

The [BGCOLOR=rgb(30, 31, 35)]purchase history[/BGCOLOR] is a neat trip down memory lane

Thanks for that link. Looks like I started using Steam in 2009 by buying Valve's Orange Box.

Looking at the numbers more closely, I see that my games spending has been actually been $325/year ($27/month). It's $250/year if I remove the Index.

I wonder how much of that money I've never even played. It's gotta be pretty significant.

 

[technophile]

Thanks for that link. Looks like I started using Steam in 2009 by buying Valve's Orange Box.

I don't think it goes back all the way. It says my first purchase was in 2009 as well (World of Goo, for the record) but I've had a Steam account since 2004 (I remember installing it on my laptop outside the classroom where my wife was holding auditions, as she'd just given me Half-Life 2 for my birthday) and I doubt that I didn't buy anything at all on Steam for the first 5 years I was on it.

 

[Jonathon]

I don't think it goes back all the way. It says my first purchase was in 2009 as well (World of Goo, for the record) but I've had a Steam account since 2004 (I remember installing it on my laptop outside the classroom where my wife was holding auditions, as she'd just given me Half-Life 2 for my birthday) and I doubt that I didn't buy anything at all on Steam for the first 5 years I was on it.

It has my first purchase as the Orange Box in December 2009, but my account creation date (which you can see on your profile) is August 2009. Not sure why I would've created an account a few months before my first purchase, but I'm pretty sure the Orange Box was my first.

About $2100 in total spend over the life of my account. About $800 of that is Steam Deck + dock, so about $90/year of actual game purchases. Which seems about right for my PC gaming habits (mostly stuff on sale apart from one big new release every year or so).

 

[malor]

I don't think it goes back all the way. It says my first purchase was in 2009 as well (World of Goo, for the record) but I've had a Steam account since 2004 (I remember installing it on my laptop outside the classroom where my wife was holding auditions, as she'd just given me Half-Life 2 for my birthday) and I doubt that I didn't buy anything at all on Steam for the first 5 years I was on it.

Mine goes back to late 2007, but I'm dead certain I bought things before that. I actually remember the first listed transaction (because I messed up and bought the wrong Civilization expansion, and got a refund so I could switch to the other one), and I know, absolutely for sure, that this was a midpoint for me on Steam, that I'd bought many other things before.

Not least, of course, the original Civilization version that I was trying to expand.

Total (tracked) spend on Steam is about $7500, about $2500 of which is post-2015, so $300/ish a year over the last few years.

 

[Diabolical]

I wonder if it’s because we were all still buying physical copies of things up until the start date of the tracked listing? I know I preferred having a CD/DVD for initial installs until I went to Baghdad for half a decade.

Even then, it shows my first purchases being in 2008 (Rainslick Precipice of Darkness 1 and 2). Thinking back, that might be true. Like everyone else I’ve had a steam account for faaaar longer, but it was furnished mostly with either:
a) physical games via keys (I distinctly remember inputting CD keys…). Orange Box, etc.
b) purchased through other online retailers and input into steam via keys. Mass Effect

So this list is simply a list of purchases done entirely within the Steam store, I believe. So no humble bundle, no other etailers, no physical copies, etc. And yeah, those numbers make more sense then.

Edit: And given the absolute dominance of the market? It would also make sense that in the early/mid 10’s most people see a dramatic increase in thrir Steam expenditure.
Fascinating data, but far from tells the full story.

 

[thrillgore]

Someone in the local slack linked to this, its tangentially related but it sounds like the ESRB wants to use some kind of AI and biometrics to do the job parents can't. And Epic Games has its hands in the entirely suspicious affair.

I don't like anything about this.

It's still open for public comment.

 

[MichaelC]

Surprised this hasn't yet appeared here. See just how much you've spent on Steam:
https://help.steampowered.com/en/accountdata/AccountSpend

TotalSpend 2589.19 USD

My oldest purchase recorded was Dec 2007. So 143.84 per year. I don't play that many games as it takes a long time for me to get through a game usually, but ok, some years I may purchase more than other years. I probably buy at least one thing each year.

Feels like Steam been around longer. Wow.

And then there's GOG.

I don't see a total summary, but my purchase history shows my first purchase was 2010. Many of those purchase are at $0.00USD. Lot of GOG giveaways and Amazon gaming free games. And lots of sale prices.

lol, it looks like I bought BG3 before Outer Worlds in 2020.

 

[CPX]

Bah. Finally went back and finished Ace Combat 7 while working through Project Wingman. I forgot how obnoxious the game gets toward the end...and the DLC finale is even worse. I get needing to make increasing challenges in arcade shooters, but the physics-defying drones and ridiculous AA spam sub were just...tiresome.

That, and the narrative style really needs a new trick. The main game pulled the "two narrators" from AC6 that spend entire scenes narrating the scene taking place in realtime in the ultimate "tell don't show" fuckup. The style worked in AC4 because the scenes were stills instead of realtime. But now it's just tired. That, and the anti-war message came across as super disingenuous given the game also glorifies your warfighting ability.

Also, fuck whatever dipshit decided to charge $5 per DLC plane.

 

[thrillgore]

TotalSpend 2589.19 USD

My oldest purchase recorded was Dec 2007. So 143.84 per year. I don't play that many games as it takes a long time for me to get through a game usually, but ok, some years I may purchase more than other years. I probably buy at least one thing each year.

I got ~$6,400 over 19 years, so about $336.84 per year.

I have not been on a date in four years. Furthermore, I need a girlfriend.

Also, fuck whatever dipshit decided to charge $5 per DLC plane.

I'm convinced Eurofighter makes its profits not off Typhoon sales, but off Ace Combat and Flight Sim licenses.

 

[Ecmaster76]

May I suggest a thread for Steam whoring:
https://meincmagazine.com/civis/threads/your-steam-top-20.1492522/

~$350 on my old spend (late 2003 to April 2015 is about 11.5 months) or $32 a year. I was kinda poor then and also definitely bought a lot of physical releases since my internet sucked much of that time

It would be interesting to compare everyone's "First 20"



Last 8 years is just under $2200 or $275 a year.

Probably a lot of that is TrainSim DLC.

 

[Thorvard]

Ok, that really scratched an old itch. just played through a few levels, including the first secret level, and it's all coming back.

I didn't even remember that level! I can't remember the last time I really spent time playing Q2(Played the RTX version for the new shinyness but didn't really play a LOT of it)

Played about 3 levels so far and it's more fun than I remember. I can remember being super pissed that Q2 didn't continue the Q1 theme and I'm not even 100% sure I actually beat the whole game. I did play a ton of LMCTF though.

 

[Alyeska]

Fired up DayZ for the first time in 5+ years. The game is both unchanged, and very much changed since I last played. The early survival is very difficult. But once you have a certain amount of gear it gets much easier.

Played on a medium population server. The one human I ran into was quite friendly. He spotted me in the distance and followed me for a while. He could tell I was a Bambi and posed no threat. I also didn't have much in the way of gear, but I was surviving quite handily. Chatted for a bit. He gave me a pistol and I thanked him and then we parted ways.

I can see the base building mechanic has been added. I saw someone had managed to lock up Black Mountain castle with a bycicle lock. I also found a structure in the woods someone was building.

 

[swiftdraw]

Surprised this hasn't yet appeared here. See just how much you've spent on Steam:
https://help.steampowered.com/en/accountdata/AccountSpend

Cheese and rice, wtf happened to my life post April 17, 2015 18:00:00 UTC. I quintupled the amount spent in Steam from what I spent since my account activation in October 2007 to April 2015.

 

[CPX]

Finished up Project Wingman last night. The final bossfight was much like the AC7 bossfights but I never felt frustrated in the same way. PW relies much less on mid-mission twists and enemy spawning. There's a few levels where an enemy ace squadron appears but that's it. The missions are mostly straightforward in terms of not trying to surprise you mid-mission with a short-notice, short-timer failure condition. The few missions you get no real enemy info to prep with aren't nearly so frustrating because you can bring a true multirole plane and loadout.

About the only time I was super frustrated in PW was a mission where civilian targets were intermingled with enemies and collateral was instant failure. That would be understandable except the game arbitrarily allows you to target and fire at them. Multi-target weapons automatically do this without your say. This was absolutely stupid since the game already blocks active targeting of known friendly units. But this was a single mission. AC7 fails by doing this for TWO missions with "unknown" targets that you have to close in on and ONE collateral target on your part is a mission failure despite ALLIED TARGETS shooting at you explicitly until you ID them (and then massively fucking up your targeting since the game autoselects the next nearest unknown/hostile), so I was still more frustrated by stupid gameplay setups in AC7 than PW.

Narratively, the game feels smaller but I'm ok with that. PW exposes a lot more horror with all the implications of the modern wars. Instead of a nation "getting stirred up by a few conspirators and then repenting to fight the real bad guy, War Itself", the enemy nation responds to its loss of control and security with increasing scales of war crimes. I do wish the game spent some more time with an epilogue that reflected on that, but the lack of such epilogue does a pretty good job also reflecting on the toll that such all-out war can have.

All in all, play both games if you like arcade flight and hope that both studios can deliver even better sequels now that they exist in friendly competition with each other.

 

[Ryan B.]

Surprised this hasn't yet appeared here. See just how much you've spent on Steam:
https://help.steampowered.com/en/accountdata/AccountSpend

I was nervous to click that link, but it wasn't as bad as I had feared: $2594.74 since 2007, or $162.17 / year. My oldest purchase is Half Life, followed shortly by the Orange Box. My oldest unplayed* purchase is a bundle of three Tomb Raider games (Anniversary, Legend, and Underworld) that I got at fire sale prices in 10/2011.

* I played a little bit of Anniversary and the opening sequence of Underworld, which isn't enough for me to say I've really played them.

 

[CuriouslySane]

The Steam spend stuff is only within the platform. So if you buy a lot of bundles or discount keys elsewhere, then it’s probably a fraction of what you’re spending on games. I’m under a couple hundred per year in Steam dollars, but I’m definitely adding a lot of games from other sources. Still, it’s hard to beat gaming in dollar-to-value terms. I have more games than I could play in multiple lifetimes, and a few that are indefinitely engaging which amortizes very well compared to what I’ve put into nearly any other interest.

 

[Ryan B.]

The Steam spend stuff is only within the platform. So if you buy a lot of bundles or discount keys elsewhere, then it’s probably a fraction of what you’re spending on games. I’m under a couple hundred per year in Steam dollars, but I’m definitely adding a lot of games from other sources. Still, it’s hard to beat gaming in dollar-to-value terms. I have more games than I could play in multiple lifetimes, and a few that are indefinitely engaging which amortizes very well compared to what I’ve put into nearly any other interest.

We should probably include hardware in the cost of gaming, not just game purchases. But yeah, still a good deal.

 

[Apteris]

It's good they don't have a "/bought_on_steam_and_gog_and_maybe_also_a_third_service_youve_now_forgotten_about" API endpoint.

 

[Diabolical]

Murdle.
That ate up a solid amount of time. And I can get to it at work...

 

[Wrakkenruan]

Is there some link to see what I've spent on Humble Bundles? Haven't found such with my google-fu tonight...

fwiw, I'm at US$627.12 old-spend, and US$839.11 total via the Steam link above. GoG Galaxy shows me with 993 owned games, and I have many, many Humble Bundles I've not done anything with. I suspect Humble has gotten a lot more of my funds than Steam has...

 

[Yagisama]

The only useful thing about gigabit Ethernet is getting Baldur's Gate 3 in 15 minutes.

 

[Yagisama]

The Steam spend stuff is only within the platform. So if you buy a lot of bundles or discount keys elsewhere, then it’s probably a fraction of what you’re spending on games. I’m under a couple hundred per year in Steam dollars, but I’m definitely adding a lot of games from other sources. Still, it’s hard to beat gaming in dollar-to-value terms. I have more games than I could play in multiple lifetimes, and a few that are indefinitely engaging which amortizes very well compared to what I’ve put into nearly any other interest.

Yup, my other "hobby" is traveling and what I've spent on Steam since 2004 (2647.37 according to the link above) would pretty much fit in a miscellaneous travel expense category.

 

[Diabolical]

Yup, my other "hobby" is traveling and what I've spent on Steam since 2004 (2647.37 according to the link above) would pretty much fit in a miscellaneous travel expense category.

This reminds me: given the amount of travel you end up doing, what is your travel rig/platform of choice? I remember you were considering a Steam Deck at one point.. But given the time-in-the-air of a lot of the flights?

 

[Doomlord_uk]

Just bought the PS4 remake(?) of Star Wars Pod Racer. Can't remember when this game came out originally, I do fondly remember playing it all the way through on PC back then, what, 20+ years ago? Anyway, wow does it look rough on the PS4. I still love the gameplay but I think what is really great is the game music. I'm not a game music nerd at all, it's something I might enjoy but never comment on (possibly Doom being the exception....) but this game is just ALL THE MUSICS from the original movies. And I love it, I recognise all the themes and get all the feels. It's SO star-wars-y, in a truly good way. None of that JJ Abrams crap... just authentic original Han-shot-first Star Wars.

 

[Sulphur]

If you're interested, there's a fan-made remake for PC floating out on the internet. Obviously, check run your security checks and all that depending on where you get it from, but you might find it's a nice enough update.

 

[Deleted member 14629]

The positive reviews of BG3 coming from all over is really weakening my resolve. Unlike some of the conversation here, I know I will love a modern CRPG. But I have time-intensive commitments I will fail at if I start BG3 now...

Also, I'm posting it here and not in the BG3 thread because that will almost certainly cause me to break down and get it.

 

[Diabolical]

The positive reviews of BG3 coming from all over is really weakening my resolve. Unlike some of the conversation here, I know I will love a modern CRPG. But I have time-intensive commitments I will fail at if I start BG3 now...

Also, I'm posting it here and not in the BG3 thread because that will almost certainly cause me to break down and get it.

That time sink is also what makes me apprehensive. I’m changing shift schedules in a week, and my game time is going to drop dramatically (I expect). And if I get into it (as unlikely as that seems), that might be it for games and most other forms of entertainment-at-home for the foreseeable future. And I’m not sure I want that.

 

[Deleted member 14629]

That time sink is also what makes me apprehensive. I’m changing shift schedules in a week, and my game time is going to drop dramatically (I expect). And if I get into it (as unlikely as that seems), that might be it for games and most other forms of entertainment-at-home for the foreseeable future. And I’m not sure I want that.

Yah, I made the mistake of agreeing to write a book this year, and my backlog of things I want to do when I finish the book gets progressively longer. On the plus side, the revenue of said book should pay for a new gaming rig, right when mine will be about 5 years old.

 

[Thorvard]

The positive reviews of BG3 coming from all over is really weakening my resolve. Unlike some of the conversation here, I know I will love a modern CRPG. But I have time-intensive commitments I will fail at if I start BG3 now...

Also, I'm posting it here and not in the BG3 thread because that will almost certainly cause me to break down and get it.

Oh just get it.

I put about 30 hours into it the first weekend or so. I've been super busy recently so I've only played about 20 hours more but it's been definitely everything I expected/wanted.

 

[malor]

The positive reviews of BG3 coming from all over is really weakening my resolve. Unlike some of the conversation here, I know I will love a modern CRPG. But I have time-intensive commitments I will fail at if I start BG3 now...

Also, I'm posting it here and not in the BG3 thread because that will almost certainly cause me to break down and get it.

It's an excellent game, much better than the Divinity titles, but it's super time consuming. There is just so much to it. If you've got other commitments, you're smart to wait.

Also: Larian is fixing hundreds of (small) bugs per hotfix. Waiting for at least a month or two will probably make the experience smoother.

 

[Apteris]

Just bought the PS4 remake(?) of Star Wars Pod Racer. Can't remember when this game came out originally, I do fondly remember playing it all the way through on PC back then, what, 20+ years ago? Anyway, wow does it look rough on the PS4. I still love the gameplay but I think what is really great is the game music. I'm not a game music nerd at all, it's something I might enjoy but never comment on (possibly Doom being the exception....) but this game is just ALL THE MUSICS from the original movies. And I love it, I recognise all the themes and get all the feels. It's SO star-wars-y, in a truly good way. None of that JJ Abrams crap... just authentic original Han-shot-first Star Wars.

Probably my favourite racing game of all time. Pods (is that the term?) go zoom, the music swells, and that one track where if you fall on the lower of two possible paths you've just lost can absolutely go to hell.

Still a good game though.

 

[Ecmaster76]

It's SO star-wars-y, in a truly good way. None of that JJ Abrams crap... just authentic original Han-shot-first Star Wars.

Phantom Menace is definitely Greedo shot first Star Wars. Special editions were the warm up act for the prequels

Shakes fist at cloud

 

[krimhorn]

Probably my favourite racing game of all time. Pods (is that the term?) go zoom, the music swells, and that one track where if you fall on the lower of two possible paths you've just lost can absolutely go to hell.

It hit all of the same notes that F-Zero X did but with a Star Wars skin. It helps that was one of the few parts of the movie that was unambiguously a Star Wars event (even if it did go on too long).

 

[CuriouslySane]

Yah, I made the mistake of agreeing to write a book this year, and my backlog of things I want to do when I finish the book gets progressively longer. On the plus side, the revenue of said book should pay for a new gaming rig, right when mine will be about 5 years old.

Hold out until Starfield, and then you’ll have a different (same) problem.

 

[Elore]

Racer is easily the best thing to come out of the prequels. There's very few games that can match that sense of speed without it being too finicky to control. I picked up the PS4 port a while back myself and played it through start to finish again. Such a phenomenal racing game still.

 

[Ardax]

The positive reviews of BG3 coming from all over is really weakening my resolve. Unlike some of the conversation here, I know I will love a modern CRPG. But I have time-intensive commitments I will fail at if I start BG3 now...

Also, I'm posting it here and not in the BG3 thread because that will almost certainly cause me to break down and get it.

Bro, same. We should start a support group.

 

[Deleted member 14629]

Hold out until Starfield, and then you’ll have a different (same) problem.

Nah, that's easy. It's gonna be a buggy mess at launch, and I want to build a new PC for a next-gen title like that.

 

[Thorvard]

It's kinda sad that I have low expectations for Starfield. I just don't trust them anymore(but boy would I love to be proven wrong)

 

[crombie]

Having just jumped back into PC gaming I was burned by The Last of Us and Star Wars Survivor issues at launch. I actually had to sideload console commands to finish Survivor. I am about to check and see if all the updates I have seen for Last of Us makes it playable.

I am still on the fence about pre-ordering Starfield, but I am almost sold. If I finish Last of Us before it comes out I might go for Diablo IV. As for Baldurs Gate 3, I still have the remastered original version waiting to try. I have actually not played any of that genre of games except for Bards Tale on my iPad in years.

Heck, I have three versions of Planescape Torment that I really should finish at some time, every version of Nevewinter Nights from the original release.

Man. I need to retire to get through my backlog!

 

[CuriouslySane]

Nah, that's easy. It's gonna be a buggy mess at launch, and I want to build a new PC for a next-gen title like that.

Fair enough, though if it’s halfway not broken, I’m expecting the launch hype for it to be as thick as anything in recent memory that wasn’t Elden Ring.