Gaming Backlog 2025 - Part 1

Update on my gaming backlog so far in 2025

When I started this substack, I did a post on the state of my Gaming Backlog back in October 2024.

I had a goal of playing 50 games that year, mostly short indies, with some rules around dropping games if I don’t enjoy them.

Anticipating that I might move from part time work to full time work, coupled with the fact I have played most 3-5 hour games on my backlog, I have a different goal for 2025.

I am hoping to play around 20 games this year and complete most of them.

Side note: there is no way I will ever complete the backlog considering how many free games I picked up over the last year. I spoke to a friend about this and he is now very picky even about picking up free games. I am not there yet though, I like getting all the free things. I think I have as many free games as games I have bought now. Do you just mindlessly add free games to your backlog?

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My Gaming Backlog rules

1. A game is complete if I have finished the main story. I do not need to play 100% of it. In my gaming history there are a handful of games that I ever 100% completed anyways and Hollow Knight is haunting me with it 112% completion.

2. If I dislike a game I should give it a good amount of time to see if it grows on me (2 hours). A good example is Owlboy. I tried for 6 hours to like it but I just didn’t like it, so it has been shelved.

3. I can have more than one game on the go. While this doesn’t happen often I sometimes have a story heavy game on the go, such as Blasphemous 2 while playing something more mindless like Brotato or less demanding game play wise such as Little Nightmares.

   I am also using “How Long to Beat”, to help me prioritise and vary the type of stories and games I am playing to not get fatigued.

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So how am I doing with the backlog?

As of today 11th May 2025 I have played 18 new to me games of which I have completed 15. (I have also added more hours to like Hollow Knight and Vampire Survivors but these do not count in my stats).

I am starting to have more games in progress, and I know deep down that many I won’t complete any time soon. These mostly include Bullet hell games, rogue likes and even simple puzzle games. An example of a few games I have played many hours of and I think I know enough of to maybe even review without having completed them are:

1. Hades

2. Dead Cells

3. Vampire Survivors

4. Little Nightmares

Games I might just not complete because we aren’t clicking:

1. Alan Wake

2. Absolute Drift

3. Rainworld (This breaks my heart as I should love it and I do but I am awful at it)

4. Brotato

Favourite games that I have played this year so far:

1. Avowed

2. Frostpunk

3. Thank Goodness you’re here

4. Tunic

5. Cookie Cutter

6. Stray

So completing my actual gaming challenge shouldn’t be a problem this year especially as with the new Switch 2 coming out, I will play some Mario Kart and maybe even Zelda’s Breath of the wild (I have no interest in ToTK since it looks so much bigger).

I actually wondering if my “challenge” was actually useful for me or not. I know I want to play games and write about some of them for fun. So why all this pressure to play a certain amount? I don’t really know. I might not do another Gaming backlog check in, just a “end of year summary”. :)

Are you also tackling an ever growing gamer backlog? How do you decide what to play next?