The Pile of Shame

This week Nintendo has announced that they will close the eShop for Nintendo 3DS and Wii U in March 2023 (see here). They are also offering a page for your Nintendo 3DS and Wii U memories, where you can take a look at your play history, though with some bugs and issues (for me it shows 700 more hours in StreetPass Mii Plaza than I actually have).

Anyway, this was another painful reminder of all the games that I have yet to play or beat on these systems, despite owning them. My backlog includes Fire Emblem Awakening, Fire Emblem Fates, Fire Emblem Echoes: Shadows of Valentia, Luigi's Mansion, Luigi's Mansion 2, Bayonetta, Bayonetta 2, Splatoon, and more...

I wanted most of these simply for my collection, but it's still irking me from time to time. Meanwhile my Nintendo Switch collection kept growing and looks very similar by now, where the situation won't be resolved any time soon, or ever, because the new system has my primary attention. So, if I'm starting to clear house, it will be on Nintendo Switch, where games like Fire Emblem Warriors, Fire Emblem: Three Houses, Xenoblade Chronicles, Xenoblade Chronicles 2, and even Cadence of Hyrule are still waiting to get said attention. The last Nintendo Direct was another reminder of this, where most of these games are getting a sequel in 2022.

It also doesn't help that I've re-purchased some of the Nintendo 3DS and Wii U games that I actually had beaten / completed, like Donkey Kong Country: Tropical Freeze and Hyrule Warriors, again for the Nintendo Switch, because I liked them so much that I may want to play them again on the new system. Or that Nintendo decided to add content to the games that I already had completed, like Metroid Dread or Mario Kart 8 Deluxe. It just never ends...

Let's not start talking about digital libraries, though I'm mostly a physical collector when it comes to Nintendo, but I have some Steam sale skeletons in the closet as well, where the biggest ones are DOOM (2016) and Skyrim. Yes, I have never played Skyrim. Shame on me.

And most people who are interested in gaming have this problem: the so called "pile of shame" (commonly known as "backlog"). Whether you got the games because you are a collector or because they were cheap, it doesn't really matter, you've purchased a whole stack of products that you will likely never consume. And this often includes games that are generally regarded to be good, where many will advise you to finally play them.

But why haven't you? And should you really be ashamed that you haven't played these games yet? Or is it actually the other way around? Should maybe these games be ashamed that you couldn't be bothered to play them, despite all their accolades? Or is it just so that you haven't found the time yet?

Here is the thing: if you really want to play a game, you will make time to play it. Of course this isn't always easy, because life has so many more priorities, but when a game truly appeals to you, you won't be procrastinating it for months or even years. You will eventually find the time to play it, because it gives you the kind of enjoyment that you seek in your free time.

That's not to say that those virgin games are terrible, but they simply might not be for you, at least in the moment. In my case I really have to be in the mood to play the very slow-paced Fire Emblem games for example, which I rarely ever am. But this may change in the future.

And this is also a good point. It can't hurt to have these games ready for when you're finally ready for them, even when this may never happen. In the past, with all my video game systems prior to the Nintendo 3DS and Wii U, I only ever purchased the games that I truly wanted to play at the time. This was a very good consumer behavior and also helps with avoiding such a pile of shame in the first place. But then I got interested in some other games years later, only to realize that they were now hard to find in a good shape, because they weren't officially sold any longer. So, I found it more regretful to not own an interesting game that I could have bought back in the day than owning a game that I didn't play in the end. The latter can always be sold if I really don't want it any longer.

So, these are two sides of the same coin. And it certainly helps to view your unplayed games not as a "pile of shame", but as a box of toys, as a collection for your future entertainment whenever you want it. The more you feel an obligation to play all your games in possession, the more you're likely to be demotivated right away. But the best games are timeless anyway, so there is no need to hurry. Or... maybe I'm simply here to justify why I haven't played Three Houses yet. The truth is probably somewhere in the middle, as it always is...