Let the ‘Of 2014’ Recap Begin

If by some strange fate of Google searching you only encounter my posts at the end of every year let me bring you up to speed from 2013. My back got better, the diverticula got worse and my eyes really took a beating. It should come as no surprise then that I played fewer games in 2014; 18 fewer than 2013 or 125 to be more exact. My laptop can still hang with most games but it’s probably all the bundles and deep sales that explain why the PC was still my number one platform of choice. And thanks to my efforts on YouTube I played just as many retro games as I did Xbox One games.

Overall I think 2014 was a really great balance of gaming for me. I jumped back and forth between Early Access indie games, brand new console releases and stuff that’s 20 or more years old. It’s not something a lot of people seem capable of; appreciating each game on its own merits in its own time. Virtual Hydlide never looked great but I didn’t have any problems hopping between it and Watch Dogs.

I’m also happy to have been even more frugal in 2014 than years passed. I paid full price for only 6 titles and caught 54 more on sale. Another 47 were either borrowed, free-to-play or “free” thanks to PlayStation Plus and Xbox Live Gold. And despite picking up loads of old carts and discs, the majority of my games (96 in total) were plucked from the digital ether as downloads.

As usual, you’re welcome to pour over the data if you’re really interested. My ‘Spreadsheet of Annual Playtime’ is all up to date for 2014 and the ‘Games I Played In…’ document continues to sprawl. But honestly, just check the site over the next 11 days. I’ll distill those tallies and totals into something much more interesting to read as I work up to my highly wishy-washy Top Five and Bottom Five games of the year.