Weekend question: What game do you keep restarting but never finish?

[PCG Jody]

I ask the PCG staff a regular Weekend Question and post the answers on the site. This week the question is: What game do you keep restarting but never finish? If you'd like to throw in an answer here, I'll squeeze the best into the finished article!

Maybe like Tom you're finding it hard to finish RPGs. Maybe you're never happy with the character you create first time and have to go back, or you realize there's an essential mod but it's incompatible with existing save files. Or maybe you just keep forgetting the plot. I think we've all got at least one game we've started a bunch of times but never made it to the end of. What's yours?

 

[Zloth]

Well, actually, Europa Universalis 4 comes to mind. I have yet to complete a single game but I've played 122 hours.

 

[Blokeyman]

The original STALKER. I've tried and tried but I've never gotten more than a few hours in.

 

[Mazer]

I'm the worst at this. I've started The Witcher 3 about four times now, never even been to Skellige. I've started Dragon Age Inquisition maybe six times, mainly out of class/race regret after a lull in playing but also because I always forget to turn off lip-shine during character creation and only notice my elven mages sexy glossy lips after the prologue. I've started Skyrim easily a dozen times and played almost 200 hours between Special Edition and OG and I only know of Paarthurnax through cultural osmosis.

 

[DesolationGod]

for me witcher 2.... ive restarted it like 4 times and always lose interest in continuing around the same parts.. Dragon age inquistion was another, i made several characters but never finished the story fully on any, game is just so long and tedious

 

[Dan]

Pillars of Eternity. I've started the intro about 4 times, but never progressed any further.

 

[Sarafan]

It's Morrowind for me unfortunately. The game is great, but I never finished it. Sometimes I get bored before reaching the ending and sometimes frustrated when I can't find the desired person (no waypoints). It's a lot harder to find NPCs and items in a 3D cRPG than in an isometric one. I had a few tries and I hope I'll finally be able to finish the game some day.

 

[Zoid]

[Insert Bethesda RPG Here]

I have restarted Morrowind, Oblivion, Fallout 3, Skyrim, and Fallout 4 countless times now. It's inevitably always the same story: I start a new character and play for many hours until (A) life gets too busy for a spell, or (B) my fickle gaming interests shift to another game for a while. When I come back to revisit my playthrough I have either forgotten everything that I was doing or grown bored with my character build. Rinse, repeat.

 

[I Will Haunt You]

Kingdoms of Amalur. 72 hours of play time, but I've started over at least 3 times.

 

[Grindzombie]

Total War: Attila took me a good 10 restarts over the past 4 years before I finally felt like I hadn't totally borked my empire by turn 20. Think I'm finally on the path to victory now, though.

AI War is a game I want so badly to understand and eventually master, but damn if it isn't neigh impenetrable. And all that DLC... Sometimes I'll have a run that doesn't even make it past the title screen.

 

[Apollo]

Skyrim. I always end up getting lost in a save lock with something stupid like a bear, and I can't go back to the last save because I'd lose Cool Chestplate #4656847479301, so I make a new game. Rinse and Repeat.

 

[Krud]

Skyrim. I always end up getting lost in a save lock with something stupid like a bear, and I can't go back to the last save because I'd lose Cool Chestplate #4656847479301, so I make a new game. Rinse and Repeat.

Same here, except for me the problem is I mod the crap out of it until my saves break. At the beginning of the game I'm reasonable about it, only putting the basic necessities like SkyUI; but as time and levels go on, I slowly add more and more mods -- sorting and cleaning them along the way, thinking that will be enough -- until eventually at some point the game just stops cooperating, and I have to start over, because the alternative is to figure out which mods my earlier saves used. (I've read that Vortex has a solution for this, but the games I've modded through Vortex just end up breaking in different ways, it seems.)

Some time before Elder Scrolls VI comes out, I should make myself do a playthrough where whatever mods I start with are the only mods I'll have, and see how long that works.

Edit to add: My latest kryptonite is ESL mods, because they "don't take up a slot." But they still take up memory.

 

[Pifanjr]

Final Fantasy 8. I've tried several times, but I don't think I've ever gotten farther than disc 2. I think the main problem was that I didn't know about level scaling, so I was horribly underpowered and just gave up. I actually started a new game today, I'm curious to see how far I'll get.

Dwarf Fortress. Every time I start playing, there will be some reason to take a break from the game for a few days and when I come back to it I don't remember what I was doing and don't feel the motivation to continue, so I just restart.
One of my last fortresses died of FPS death though. I didn't even realize how bad it had gotten until I restarted and I wondered why my dwarfs were running all over the map. It took a moment to realize that that was their normal movement speed when your game isn't slowed to a crawl because pathfinding became too intense after you discover the underground caves.

 

[I Will Haunt You]

for me the problem is I mod the crap out of it until my saves break

Gotta wonder what mods you use, because I have added tons of mods, including physics and animation mods stacked on QoL mods and better visual mods and new content mods. Other than having to finagle load order in Vortex for mods that change the same content I have never had a save broken. Maybe I'm just lucky?

 

[indigit5l]

I've tried Metroid Prime 2: Echoes three good times now. Got at least 50% through each time before realizing I don't like the game. I have my list of complaints, but I can't really figure out why I just can't finish it.

 

[Krud]

Gotta wonder what mods you use, because I have added tons of mods, including physics and animation mods stacked on QoL mods and better visual mods and new content mods. Other than having to finagle load order in Vortex for mods that change the same content I have never had a save broken. Maybe I'm just lucky?

I think the truth is I get complacent/lazy toward the end before it breaks and start installing anything that catches my fancy, unlike the beginning and middle where I'm super careful and meticulous. For instance, right now via mods there are probably three times as many people in Skyrim than vanilla, a couple new cities (not counting the ones that teleport you to entirely new locations), numerous survival elements, a lot of what you mentioned (QoL, visual, etc), new perk trees, and on and on. I think at last break I had 255 regular mods and [unknown number of] ESL mods. So it is definitely my fault, not the game's.

 

[kpluck]

Borderlands: The Pre-Sequel. Every time I start playing again it just reminds me how awful the game is and I stop. That is, until I think it wasn't that bad and try it again…lather, rinse, repeat.

-kp

 

[I Will Haunt You]

I think at last break I had 255 regular mods and [unknown number of] ESL mods. So it is definitely my fault, not the game's.

Damn!

I thought I was bad with roughly 80 or so mods. I can see why you have save issues.

 

[Frindis]

I hear Morrowind coming up a lot and it is the same here. I install tons of mods, enjoy it for 60-80 hours and then stop playing. When I get the itch again, my mods/savegames are gone because I tend to do a format at least once every 6 months and do not always remember to take backups.

 

[W8lifts]

Alien Isolation....Started that game like 10 times and then get scared lol and stop playing....I don't like scary games but love the Alien franchise.

 

[Mr.Vic20]

Its not the only one, but my most recent example would be Metro Exodus. I adored the previous entries but something about this one is just a little off for me. I'm in the 3rd area after 5 different attempts to play through. I'm just not loving the transition in both narrative tone and open world play. This game feels like a weird cousin of the Metro series.

 

[I Will Haunt You]

my most recent example would be Metro Exodus.....This game feels like a weird cousin of the Metro series.

I mostly regret playing that game because the last 1/4 was pretty bad.

 

[I Will Haunt You]

Alien Isolation....Started that game like 10 times and then get scared lol and stop playing....I don't like scary games but love the Alien franchise.

Alien Isolation? Alien...Isolation? Doesn't ring a bell...OH! You must mean Space Station Repair Simulator: Hide & Seek Edition.

 

[Mr.Vic20]

I mostly regret playing that game because the last 1/4 was pretty bad.

Well, that certainly heightens my desire to push on! ;P

 

[MorganPark]

Its not the only one, but my most recent example would be Metro Exodus. I adored the previous entries but something about this one is just a little off for me. I'm in the 3rd area after 5 different attempts to play through. I'm just not loving the transition in both narrative tone and open world play. This game feels like a weird cousin of the Metro series.

I hear ya! I got to the desert area and it just felt like the game had run out of new stuff. That's fine in a lot of games, but I guess I didn't love the previous area enough to do it all again. Still, I adore all of the tiny tools and mechanics in Metro games.