I have unfinished games, and then I have unfinished games. Sometimes I start something, discover that I’m not particularly enjoying myself, and stop. No tragedy occurs. The game and I simply acknowledge that this relationship has run its course and go our separate ways.
The second category is considerably stranger. These are games I genuinely still want to finish, but something keeps getting between me and the credits. I haven't lost interest in them, deleted them from my mental future or decided they weren't for me. They're simply on a very long intermission.
Each one has its own little obstacle. Sometimes a game takes too long to properly grab me, sometimes another interest wanders past at exactly the wrong moment, and occasionally the gameplay itself starts testing our relationship. None of that means I've given up.
Baldur’s Gate 3, please get to the point
I want to finish Baldur's Gate 3. I know there is an enormous story in there, people love the characters, and everything I've seen suggests exactly the sort of RPG experience I should enjoy. My problem is getting far enough into it for the story to properly grab me.
I've started BG3 and put a few hours into it, but I still haven't made it through Act 1. It feels like it takes a little too long to get to the meat of what I actually want from the game. Apparently my attention span interprets a slow beginning as permission to wander off and inspect something shinier.
This isn't even a criticism that the beginning is bad. Plenty is happening, and I understand why a game this large needs time to introduce its world, systems and people. I just haven't reached the point where curiosity becomes obsession, which is usually what keeps me opening a game night after night.
I know myself well enough to recognise the danger zone. Once an RPG hooks me, we're fine. If it asks for another ten hours before things really get going, however, my brain has ample opportunity to notice three other games and somebody opening a packet of crisps in the next room.
Still, BG3 remains firmly in the one day pile. I want to know those characters and experience the story everyone keeps talking about. I just need to survive long enough for the game to sink its teeth into me.
Final Fantasy XVI was defeated by ADHD distraction
There isn't some grand reason I stopped playing Final Fantasy XVI. I didn't rage quit, hit a mechanical wall or decide I disliked it. I was playing it quite happily, and then my attention wandered somewhere else because ADHD distraction remains a more formidable opponent than most actual bosses.
This happens to me more often than I'd like to admit. A game doesn't necessarily have to do anything wrong for me to stop playing it. Sometimes another interest simply barges through the front door, puts its feet on the table and announces that this is what we're doing now.
FFXVI therefore occupies a particularly ridiculous category of unfinished game because there isn't even a problem to solve before I return. No hated section stands in my way, and I don't need to convince myself to learn some unpleasant system. I basically just need to remember to open the game again.
In theory, that should be extremely easy. My brain has declined to comment.
Persona 3 didn't catch me quickly enough
Persona 3 has a slightly different problem because it simply didn't capture me right away. That's not the same thing as disliking it. Some games establish themselves immediately, while others need more time before you understand why people become attached to them.
Persona 3 landed in that second group for me. I hadn't reached the point where putting it down felt harder than continuing, and that's dangerous territory for a long RPG competing with everything else I could be playing.
Slow starts are practically part of the furniture in this genre, of course. Stories need time to establish characters, routines and systems, and sometimes the payoff comes considerably later. I'm perfectly capable of giving a game that runway, at least theoretically.
The difficulty is that a game asking for patience is competing with all the games that aren't. Persona 3 therefore remains on the shelf waiting for the day I decide to give it another proper chance. Nothing made me think absolutely not. It simply hasn't made me think I need to know what happens next yet.
Undertale and I are engaged in negotiations
Then there is Undertale, which I have started more than once because I genuinely want to experience it properly. Its reputation has become enormous, and even avoiding spoilers doesn't prevent you from knowing that people really, really care about this game.
Unfortunately, parts of the gameplay frustrate me. That's a particularly effective way to derail my attention because the story can be sitting right there, waving enthusiastically, while some mechanical element stands between us demanding that I perform a task I'd rather not be performing.
When that frustration starts outweighing my curiosity, Undertale quietly returns to the unfinished pile. Eventually I come back because I still want to understand why people love it as much as they do, only for negotiations between me and the gameplay to resume.
At this point, Undertale hasn't failed to hold my attention so much as repeatedly lost a custody battle with my tolerance for the gameplay. Apparently I'm taking the scenic route to the ending, and the scenic route may involve several complete restarts.
I don't actually feel guilty about any of this
Gaming backlogs are often discussed like neglected household chores, with people talking about why we buy games we never finish and how to finally clear them.
Games are entertainment. I don't owe one a completed save file because money changed hands at some point. If I'm enjoying something else more tonight, I'm going to play the other thing rather than dutifully report for my scheduled shift at the unfinished RPG factory.
That also means I don't need to declare a game permanently abandoned just because I haven't touched it in a year. I'll get there when I get there. The game isn't offended, Steam hasn't sent anyone round to check on me, and Clive remains blissfully unaware that I've been distracted.
Not finishing a game doesn't mean I didn't like it
I think this is the part that gets lost whenever gaming backlogs become a productivity problem. Sometimes we stop because we don't like a game, lose interest or realise that the 80-hour adventure ahead sounds less appealing than doing literally anything else.
A perfectly good game can also catch us at the wrong moment. The opening might be slower than our attention span can currently tolerate, another game might arrive, or one mechanic can become irritating enough that we decide we'll deal with it later. Occasionally nothing happens at all and we simply wander away.
None of those things necessarily says much about the quality of the game. I've put books down and returned to them months later, and I've paused TV series halfway through before eventually finishing them. Games aren't fundamentally different just because a launcher can helpfully display exactly how long ago I last demonstrated commitment.
My backlog is not a to-do list
This is probably why the word backlog has never quite worked for me. A backlog sounds like work waiting to be completed, with accumulation, delay and a slightly disappointed project manager somewhere wondering why the deliverables haven't moved.
My game library feels more like a shelf. Some things on it I've finished, some I'm currently playing, and others I tried and probably won't return to. Then there are the games that have been sitting there for years while I continue insisting, with complete sincerity, that I am absolutely going to finish them one day.
BG3 is waiting for me to reach the part where its story grabs hold, while Persona 3 needs another chance to make its case. Undertale and I still need to resolve our gameplay differences. FFXVI mostly needs me to remember it exists at the exact moment my brain isn't fascinated by something else.
There is no schedule for any of this, and there will be no spreadsheet. This statement should not be interpreted as legally binding.
I’ll get there when I get there
There are games I stopped playing because I didn't like them, but these aren't those games. They're unfinished because finishing something and wanting to finish something turn out to be surprisingly different things.
Wanting to finish requires interest. Actually doing it also requires time, momentum and, in my case, the continued cooperation of an attention span with rather democratic ideas about who gets to be in charge.
So I'm not clearing the backlog or setting monthly completion targets. I'm certainly not forbidding myself from playing something new until I've defeated whatever boss has been waiting patiently since 2024. I'll play these games when I actually feel like playing them.
One day I will reach the credits on one of them and enjoy the quiet satisfaction of completing a perfectly reasonable short-term project.
Probably three years late, but who's counting?