I will never finish these games.  I’ve reached the point of no return.  The moment you realize that you would rather the system off and put the game away instead of launching your controller into a table, wall, etc.  With The Witcher 2 and Deus Ex: Human Revolution the problem was a boss battle.  Heavy Rain I grew tired of having to mimic every nuance of my character’s motions. Ninja Gaiden has the worst camera controls I’ve ever experienced in a game.  And Assassin’s Creed: Brotherhood I grew tired of the gameplay.

Who Takes The Blame?

Who is to blame when you do not finish a game?I’m old enough to take some responsibility. My skills might not be as sharp as they used to be and I’m not as patient with level grinding as I was back in my teens.  But shouldn’t some of the blame fall on the developer?  When I was having trouble with the ‘witcher vs witcher’ fight in the Witcher 2 I was forced to go online to find a strategy.  To my surprise I wasn’t the only person having this problem.  Forum post after forum post was filled with players asking for assistance because they were having the same problem.  It was during my research that I decided that this was not going to be the game for me.  As a gamer I feel more comfortable putting the blame on me. I don’t want to blame the people who created the game for including “design flaws” in their game.  But it’s hard not to blame developers when:

• There is no clear path to victory
• A large percentage of gamers are having the same problem

Where Do We Go From Here?

There are many stages that we go through as gamers when we decide not to finish a game.

• Rage
• Denial
• Relapse
• Acceptance

A mature gamer knows when to walk away. When you realize that you will not beat every game that you purchase, two things happen: Less stress and smarter choices.  I know what to look for from a design standpoint and I know what I like and what I don’t like.  I still believe we should hold developers accountable for this missteps in their games. Games are supposed to fun and challenging, but when the challenge seems impossible you have a problem. We must also be willing to accept that as we get older our skills will wane and our success rate with “hard/extreme” difficulty will decrease. We can’t put all the blame on the devs, we have to take some too.

As much as I don’t want to trade in these games, their presence in my library would only serve as a highlight on my list of games that I have finished. They will find better homes at GamesStop, while I use the money to buy Tomb Raider.  It’s for the best, I’m sure my “donation” will serve as future entertainment for some young kid.