Playing vs Beating Games blog - RedTentacleStudios

I read an article in Game Developer Magazine (you shall be missed) about the ratio of games played to games beaten (although that is a great simplification of the information presented in the article). The thing that surprised me is that a blockbuster game that does very well is still only likely to get a 20% completion rate (ie 20% of the people that play it will do so to the end of the game). Meaning that your average game is probably well below 10%. The numbers went deeper into the subject, but even just looking at that overall picture it really means that you have very little chance of having people beat your game. All that hard work making that epic final boss, and only a tiny percent of the people that try your game will ever see it. I am no better than this lot, as I too probably only finish a small portion of the games I pick up (and I still consider myself a gamer???). This thought has actually encouraged me to go back and start finishing games, and to finish the ones I've started. In only the last few weeks I've finished up a few games (some which had very little left!) and I will endevour to continue this trend, as I feel that finishing a game should be important. With modern games going towards multiplayer and dlc it has become less and less important to beat the game, and in fact many games don't even have endings anymore. Call me old fashioned, but in my day we played a game to completion, even if it meant sleepless nights or emptying all the quarters out of the piggy bank. Ahhhh, the good old days when an endless game just meant it went from level 99 back to 01 (I'm looking at you Duck Hunt!).