So I stumbled across global steam achievements for skyrim today, and was kind of surprised that apparently 7% of the people who bought (or played?) it didn't finish the intro. I figured ok, maybe they just haven't had a chance to play it yet, etc. But while looking at the subsequent achievements (like reaching level 5), I noticed that player progress falls off a cliff.

I thought maybe they just weren't playing while online etc, so that steam achievements weren't being counted. But the high "finished the introduction" achievement rate suggests that at least nearly all of them are being tracked, but simply get no further.

I was getting curious, so then looked at Arkham City, and the stats were even worse. 17% apparently didn't get past the intro. The numbers drop off pretty quickly.

Ok, but that's two new games. What about a slightly less recent game which people have had time to play if they bought it? I checked out Deus Ex 3, and it's about the same. 10% of people never even earn the first achievement, less than 50% of buyers ever finish the game. Civ 5 was about the same (90% of people unlocked the most basic achievement) but did a little better with followup ones (sitting in the 80s and 70s for at least ten achievements). Portal 2 did not do so well, almost half of the people who bought it never finished it.

This surprises me a little. I know that not everybody has infinite time, but for tracked progress to drop off so dramatically could spell bad things for where devs might think is most worthwhile for putting their time (why bother focusing on a good ending if less than half the players ever even reach it?)

edit: Maybe it's just because its achievements are a little bit more difficult, but Shogun 2 looks very miserable, there were only 3 achievement markers that at least half of the players reached.

I've only played about 10 hours of Skyrim so far, not cos I don't like it, I think its awesome, I just haven't had time :(

Heh, just be glad that it's not the eclipse spellchecker.

Yeah I have a fair few games that I've barely touched (Assassin's Creed Brotherhood, Mirror's Edge, Abe's Exodus, etc). Fairly surprising that Portal 2 and Deus Ex have such low completion rates though (they've been out for a fair while now).

I'm luckily a uni student, and work casual so I have a shit load of time, thus a 110 hour play time in Skyrim, which in regards to main quest line, have only just seen the Greybeards. But other people might find it difficult to get such time as myself, having to work longer hours, kids etc.

thus a 110 hour play time in Skyrim, which in regards to main quest line, have only just seen the Greybeards

wow, wtf are u doing if u have 110 hrs and only just seen greybeards :/

Somewhat completed the Thieves Guild questline, I've been initiated and given clothing, but still have other stuff to do, many other side quests, companion quests, general exploring and ravaging, finding companions, which by the way found a wicked ass mercenary in Riften, his 500g to hire, equipped him in Forsworn gear, and he uses magic/shield+sword/bow when needed. Also heals me to.

Somewhat completed the Thieves Guild questline, I've been initiated and given clothing

bahahaha you're no where near finished.

the way found a wicked ass mercenary in Riften, his 500g to hire

i hired that guy and then sacrificed him for a quest.

Skyrim doesn't actually stop giving you achievements if you use the console. Don't know where that rumour came from, I've been using TCL to get out of glitched traps and still get achievements.

personally i really enjoy Skyrim, i have played about 20hrs so far, just haven't time to play more.. plus the random crashing kinda pissed me off for a bit.. i just need to find the time to play it..

I buy games, play a couple of hours of single player and then never touch it again. Instead I play only the multiplayer side of it.

I own Skyrim and haven't played it yet.

I used to finish all my games, then I took an arrow in the knee.

Somewhat completed the Thieves Guild questline, I've been initiated and given clothing, but still have other stuff to do.

You haven't even gotten up to the good part. :D

I think it's simply a question of time for most gamers in the 24 + demographic.

You just don't appreciate the games if you only play them in 15 minutes here and 1 hour there intervals.

Portal 2 is the only game that I've played through multiple times and I was only a few achivements off completion. I don't regard getting 100% of achivements "finishing the game" and have many games that I've completed the story line but don't want to "collect 100 floating space rings" or some horse shit

I've only just looked at this thread, and maybe hundreds of thousands of people miraculously have leveled up since the OP - however when clicking on that link it shows that 88% of players are over level 5 and a huge 80% are over level 10? Is the OP sure he wasnt just looking at his own stats? heh

I wonder if Skyrim is one of those games where there's so much stuff to do you get overwhelmed and just think, fuck it, and go play something else.

Almost half have reached level 25, which takes a fair amount of playing to do - many games can be finished in the time it takes level that high

last game i "finished" was fallout3 & although i tried to do all side quests i think there was possibly content i missed.

i am @ 86hours of skyrim, 16/50 achievements unlocked, 32%. i followed the main quest for a while then just started doing my own thing to get new spells & equipment. only 2 sets of scales away from full legendary dragonscale armour :D

i wouldn't put much stock in steam stats... they seem pretty broken from people leaving old accounts vacant & starting new ones & stuff like that.

I usually go straight to MP or SP-hard+

Its definitely getting harder to keep up with the constant stream of games coming out lately, especially if you game on console & pc.

from a stream stats point of view you can... 50 outta 50 achievements would read as 100% even if you hadn't sampled all of the content.

Yeah, I hardly ever finish games.

why bother at all then?

if it's a game like battlefield 3 i can understand, i didn't even play the single player at all.

but other rando games that aren't multiplayer focussed..

last edited by paveway at 11:39:48 06/Dec/11

Can you even finish Skyrim?

You can "finish" the main storyline. But in regards to finishing the game itself, no, it has infinite quests, and a soft cap of level 50. That means when you hit 50, you stop gaining perks, but you can level every skill up to 100 if you so please.

I've only ever not finished 2 games this year. Deus Ex and Assassins Creed Brotherhood. I didn't complete Brotherhood because I got up to about 70%, and then had to restart because I forgot to copy my save file over before doing a fresh install of Windows. Deus Ex I could just not get into. Felt crap to me compared to the older series, and was to gimmicky.

using npcs for help in skyrim is noob, mode, just like not playing on masters..

Bunch of guildies set up a list of rules like, master difficulty, no pts (only resto heal) etc. Makes the game soo much more challenging, frustrating and enjoyable :D

The real trend i'm finding in games these days is that it's less focused on story and more focused on random achievements and challenges to fill out the game, which ultimately makes the game less enjoyable.. i mean if you rushed the batman story line you could have prob done it in like 4hrs (which is fuck all time for a pure SP game)

I would have a 6 foot list of game I have not finished. I am a serial slacker.

I've intentionally stopped playing WRPG's like the Oblivion/Fallout/Skyrim franchise because of the respective amount of time invested vs the 'enjoyability' that the game returned.
(Not saying that this will be the case for everyone, this is simply my approach)

My big problem w/Oblivion was that there was no consequence to 'ignoring' a quest... if you didn't want to 'go save someone urgently, their life is being threatened' you didn't... revisit it months later, and bang, walk straight in, and save them. For me, that doesn't represent a feature in an RPG style game (admittedly, if all RPG's used very rigid game mechanics about this sort of thing, they wouldn't be as enjoyable as a game type...)

That being said, I've noticed that I need to tone down some of the time I invest in some games...
I know I racked up in the order of 600 hours in BF:BC2 over a 18 month period... and I don't want to do that again (I nearly repeat offended with BF3 racking up 20 hours in just 10 days)..

I did recently enjoy the Dead Space Franchise ~20 hours between 1 and 2, and the story (despite appearing to have been poached quite heavily from Movies like Event Horizon) was quite good, but more importantly, the interactive nature of the game, really engrossed me!
I also quite enjoyed Batman Arkham Asylum. (now just trying to find a 'steam-able' copy for less than $50au (I missed it on steam @ $40... :/ )


TL:DR
Not a surprise that ppl don't finish many of their games... let's face it though, $50-70 on a game 5-10 times a year is still cheaper than a drug addiction...

This is pretty interesting, especially from a monetisation perspective.

I've only played 40 hours of Skyrim since it came out, and to me that was putting alot of time in! Haven't had time to pay anything else.

I'm trying to get all the skyrim achievments, just so i have them.

80% done. They're fairly easy to get and without trying I think you can get most of them anyway from just completing missions. Doubt I'll get Arkham City's achivements, they're way more involved.

67 hours into defence grid. Wow. You must love tower defence. You tried other similar steam games - Revenge of titans, rock of ages, orcs must die, sol survivor? I recommend them all.