Steam Stats: 36% of Registered Games Unplayed

[Guest]

Ars Technica compiled 172 Steam profiles-worth of data to make the call that 36 percent of registered games remain unplayed.

Steam Stats: 36% of Registered Games Unplayed : Read more

 

[ddpruitt]

I have a whole bunch of Steam games I haven't touched. But that's because I wait for them to go on sale in bundles and then buy the bundles. Some of them have games I'm not interested in so they don't get played. There are very few games on Steam that I've paid full price for, Steam sales can be really spectacular.

 

[infernocy]

well bundles offer many games together and usually the person buys them for like 3 or 4 games only , and plays only those 3 -4 , i dont really find this hard to believe , most people are interested in multiplayer team play so most single player games in steam are left with out a touch . , they use steam as a platform to come together with friends and play specific games .

 

[pilsner]

Well, I can confirm this. I just checked my Steam library, and I have 16 games in the list which I never played or even installed. They all came with bundles, which I most often bought because of only one or two games (unlike Mr. Comment above, it's most often a single player game which I wanted, and the multiplayer shooters rot in the Steam library )

 

[wanderer11]

Most often in a Humble Bundle there are more games I don't want than those I do so I buy 5 or 6 games and only play 1 or 2.

 

[redgarl]

Well, I still have a pile of video games I need to go through. I might end up selling 20% of them since I don't have time. Totally normal when you see something at 10$.

 

[theje]

I'm actually on a campaign right now to play through my whole Steam library in my Theje's Catalog series.

 

[Evolution2001]

Yep, pretty much what everyone else is saying... I will get a collection of games dirt cheap from something like Humble Bundle. Maybe someday I'll go and play 'em, but maybe not. I really do it more for the charitable part of it more than the probability of me ever playing them. It's the same thing with my account on Origin, as many of the games are on both platforms.

 

[Avus]

This is the beauty of the frequent Steam/gamefly/greenmangaming/gog discount sales. M$ (Xbox) should learn from that... People always said console gaming is much cheaper than PC gaming, but it is actually not that true. Yes, PC hardware are more expensive than console. So the initial cost is higher. But the $$ you saved from games will off set the more expensive PC hardware cost very soon. Unless you are stupid enough to only buy PC games at launch. Of course console game also have discounts, but the discount % and frequency are not as high as PC games.

And "Gaming PC need to upgrade every .5/1/2 years are just myth. People said that usually know shit about computers.

 

[genz]

Well Steam Sales I think are probably the only reason I still game. When your budget goes through the floor you tend to stop spending money on luxuries, and through steam sales I'm still able to buy a game every now and then.

If it wasn't for that, I'd be a non-gamer, gamer that only played old games, or a pirate, god forbid.

 

[Bondfc11]

I think I have created an artificial jump in the Civ V numbers on my own - at 286 hours on that darn game!

 

[John Bauer]

I blame the Humble Bundle. Get 5 or 6 of them for 1 or 2 of the games in each, and all of a sudden you find that half your library (in my case about 60 games or so) are all bad indie titles. ie Rocketbirds, Sacred 2, Risen, Eets Munchies, and loads of others.

 

[mortsmi7]

I don't think my hard drive could fit all my steam games at once. I install the ones I want to play currently. A lot of older games I have already played or dismissed remain uninstalled.

 

[gm0n3y]

I've bought a few of the publisher bundles during the major sales and they contain many older games that I'll never play. I'd be surprised if I've played even half of the games in my library.

 

[jhansonxi]

So many sales, so little time. Multiple times I've accidentally bought the same game twice for Steam. Usually happens when I buy bundles from different vendors that use Steam keys. I wish I could turn the duplicates into gifts after purchase so I could clutter up someone else's Steam account. Even on Linux with Humble Bundle, Steam, Desura, Indie Royale, Indie Game Stand, and Kickstarter there are so many games that you just can't keep up anymore.

 

[4745454b]

I've got 115 games. (I think it's probably a bit higher then this as I've got a couple of bundles to redeem. I've installed 22 of them. I play on a REGULAR basis three of them. TF2 (paid), Blur, and audiosurf. In that order. L4D2, HL2:LC, Metro:2033, and both poker nights get some play time, but nothing worth mentioning. I have every intention of playing the other games. When I get around to it... It would cut into my TF2 time which simply isn't allowed.

 

[timaahhh]

I have over 100 steam games, almost half of them are un played. Many of them purchased in bundles or via the humble bundles. When I had to go to store to buy a game (and i miss those days) I played every game I bought. Granted that was when you generally didn't pay less then 15$ for a game.

 

[BranFlake5]

I think I have created an artificial jump in the Civ V numbers on my own - at 286 hours on that darn game!

I'm guessing you are about half way through a game then?

 

[sincreator]

A lot of the games not played could also be from video card purchases. The never settle bundles that AMD had last year included a lot of different games, and Nvidia was also bundling games as well. If someone buys two video cards for SLI/Xfire they get extra codes to redeem which also can unused. If anyone is looking for deals on games check out this site as well: http://cdkeyshere.com/ A couple buddies got FarCry 3 on the site for $19.99 a month after the game came out.

 

[bustapr]

I have 115 games in my library. Alot came from like 2 years ago when I just shelled out money on every steam sale. damn those sales. Also I believe around 40% of them are from humble bundles, most of which I havent ever played. Id say Ive never played half of my games and most of the other half hasnt seen more than 2 hours game time. I learned all too late how beautiful and deadly steam sales are.

 

[Alex Lawrence]

I've got 150 hours in Civ V, 3 times the next highest (Garry's Mod).

 

[archert24]

The title says "...172 steam profiles...". While the first sentence of the second paragraph states "...172 million steam profiles...". The former seems a bit of a small sample size. I'm assuming the latter is the correct figure.

 

[chicofehr]

When I get home from work, I am tired and can't play much before I fall asleep. No time to play like I did when i was a kid when I had no responsibilities.

 

[Someone Somewhere]

Same here - I picked up a humble bundle a while ago in case I ever feel the urge to really get into gaming.

 

[4745454b]

I wake up and play. While eating Bfast. Nothing like killing people for an hour to get you ready for work...