Ah, the backlog. The final boss that even the most seasoned of gamers struggle to slay.
It is an entirely understandable conundrum to wind up in. Those Steam sales are too good to pass up. Even worse are the bundles, containing a single game you want to play now, and half a dozen you swear you’ll play eventually.
My personal crux is retro gaming. All too often I’ll enter my local retro game store with the intention of window shopping and leave with a bag full of PS2 games. It is a real problem.
Your backlog can be conquered, however! Or tamed, at the very least, I can attest to this myself! After struggling to play anything in my backlog for most of my life, I’ve managed to cross off close to a hundred games over the past few years, in addition to keeping up with current releases, and I swear it hasn’t been at the expense of my social life and hygiene!
Through making a few choices and developing a strategy you can commit to, you too can make a serious dent in that ever-expanding list of games.
Set Reasonable Expectations
The first step to clearing your backlog is to be honest with yourself about what you are trying to accomplish. Are you really looking to clear every untouched game from your Steam library, or are you merely looking to play the games you’ve put off for ages? It is important to decide what your specific goals are, so you can form a plan of attack.
In my case, I was indeed looking to play my way through my Steam library, and the first step was to cull it. This might seem antithetical, but it is important. Being honest, there are very likely entries on your backlog that you will never actually play, and it is best to simply cut these from the list.
My penchant for buying bundles has resulted in a massive Steam library full of chaff, and I need to be realistic about my chances of ever giving Canyon Capers a proper chance. I’m sure Cobi Treasure Deluxe is wonderful, but I don’t know how it got in my library to begin with, and I am sure I will never touch it. So, what is the answer? Remove them from the backlog!
Culling your backlog down to a consolidated list of games you will actually play is a massive first step in conquering it.
Keep Track of Your Backlog!
This isn’t a mandatory step, but it is one everybody could benefit from.
Take the time to figure out what your backlog consists of. Converting it from a nebulous list in your mind to actual writing can transform your perception. For me, simply seeing my backlog in the form of a list had a big impact. Seeing it in practical form was very motivating.
There are numerous approaches to this. The simplest is to grab a blank journal, and jot down every game you want to play. Go through your Steam library, your console digital media libraries, and the physical media collecting dust in your closet. Go through all of it and come up with an actual physical backlog you can look at and interact with.
There are more sophisticated ways of handling this of course. I know several people who’ve had success organizing their backlog with a spreadsheet program like Excel, which offers you the ability to manually define and even sort your games by a number of attributes. This could be by console, release date, or anything else. When a game is completed, you can cross it out, delete it from the list, or transfer it to a separate sheet for completed games. The downside is that everything must be entered manually, but you get maximum flexibility.
My personal approach to keeping track of my backlog is to utilize Backloggd, essentially a Letterboxd for video games. I’ve had a largely fantastic experience with the website. Games can be marked by the progress you’ve made, meaning you can even keep track of games you’ve dropped and plan to pick up later. I appreciate the ability to leave a review and rating on every game I complete, so I can reference my thoughts in the future. You can organize games into individual lists, and adding games is as simple as using the search function, with all the attributes already associated. Best of all is the randomize feature, which I utilize to determine which game I will play next.
Whether you use a notebook, word document, or something more in-depth like a spreadsheet or a service like Backloggd, translating your backlog from your mind to an actual list is hugely beneficial.
Find a Comfortable (and Consistent) Way to Play
I’ve been in this scenario too many times to count. I sit down to play an RPG from the late 90s I’ve had my eye on forever. I boot the game up, get through character creation or what have you, and start playing. The game is old, my attention span is low, and it hasn’t hooked me yet.
Then I get a Discord notification.
My friend has a funny YouTube video to show me. Sure, why not, I’ll watch it and then get back to the game. Only as the video ends, I see a 2-hour video essay about an old RPG from the late 90’s, and evidently I would rather hear somebody yap about it for hours than play it. Halfway through, I decide to boot up Overwatch so I can “play something mindless” while I listen, and before I know it, I’m shutting my PC off for the night.
That exact scenario might be a me-problem, but I think most people can relate to the struggle to actually play backlog games, especially older ones. That is why the most important part of conquering your backlog is to find a way to play these games that is both comfortable and consistent for you.
This can come in a variety of forms, so I’ll explain how this can manifest in a few ways.
I really do struggle to sit at my computer and play older games because of all the distractions that come with the internet age, and I know I‘m not alone in this. What has worked for me, is detaching myself from the PC as often as possible.
Whenever it makes sense for the game, I will play on my Steam Deck. At any given time, I have 5 backlog games installed on my Steam Deck, so I can jump around if I get bored. Once I’ve beaten a game, I uninstall it and randomly select a new game to play. The comfort that comes with the Steam Deck’s portability has made this possible for me. Even the simple ability to lay in bed and play a game I’d normally be rooted to my office chair for, has seen an immense increase in the likelihood of actually playing my backlog.
Before I had a Steam Deck, I had similar success with routing my PC to the TV instead of my monitor and playing with a controller. Anything to get me away from the mouse and remove my ability to give into the countless websites and programs vying for my attention at every given moment. On the TV, I can simply focus on the game.
Naturally this doesn’t work for many game types, such as 90s CRPGs as mentioned above, which must be played on a PC with a keyboard and mouse. The answer is to find a creative solution to silence distractions and focus on your game. In my case I am currently playing Fallout 2 on an old laptop running Windows XP, entirely detached from the internet. Not only does this lend a fun retro feel, but I have an immensely easier time concentrating on the game. I’ve also had success with just unplugging my ethernet cable so I cannot be bothered by alerts.
I love retro gaming, but I really struggle to sit down and play anything older than the PS3/Xbox 360 era. Gradually though, I realized it was because I was primarily playing them via digital storefronts on newer consoles. Playing Zelda II: The Adventure of Link on my Nintendo Switch is a fun time, until I hit a slow part and can’t help but consider that Tears of the Kingdom is only a few button presses away.
The solution for this problem is that I moved to playing my retro games on actual hardware. It turns out that when I am playing Adventure of Link on an NES plugged into a CRT TV without instant access to a hundred other games, I have a much easier time focusing on it. I’ve been absolutely flying through my PS2 library by playing them on my PS2, instead of digitally on a PS4 where I am 30 seconds away from booting up Overwatch at any given time.
These are just examples to get your mind going, but the point is clear: Find ways to play your backlog games that is comfortable, convenient, and can be easily replicated. If routing your PC to your TV is a big hassle because of your setup, you probably won’t do it often! So, find an alternative approach. Get creative and find ways to concentrate on the games you play.
Find the Time!
This is vital. The most important step in this list.
Find the time to play your backlog and commit to it.
Every person has a unique life, and your schedule will look different from mine no matter what. Some people have plenty of time for gaming, and others have very little. But if you want to tackle your backlog, you need to find the time.
Pick a time of day to play that will be easy to maintain. For me, it is right before bedtime, around 10 PM. Set a minimum time you will exclusively focus on backlog games no matter what, I do an hour. Then, commit to it!
Now naturally this is going to vary hugely. Perhaps you have a tricky on-call job that denies you certainty in schedule, in which case you can forego the specific time of day and simply find some time to play a backlog game. Maybe you cannot commit to playing every day, so playing your backlog becomes a Friday evening tradition. Find what works for you.
But make sure you do it! Consolidating your list is a great first step. Writing it out is fantastic. Figuring out a convenient setup is proactive. But if you do all the setup and then never actually play your games, you’ll be in the exact same situation as before.
In Closing
I hope this guide at least gave you some ideas about how to approach your backlog. I understand some of you might roll your eyes at my suggestions, but I simply offer what worked for me as somebody who has finally succeeded in getting on top of their backlog after a decade of floundering.
Consider this a jumping off point to discovering your own process. The most important thing is to find something that works for you, that is replicable, comfortable, and above all, something you are likely to do.
Talk is cheap, you gotta act.
Did you find any of this advice useful? Do you have some alternate suggestions on approaching a backlog? Let us know in the comments down below, or over on Discord! And be sure to return to Boss Rush every week for more helpful articles!
Featured Image: Backloggd, Nintendo
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