Gaming For The New Year

I'll admit, I'm a cheap gamer.

It's not often I'll buy things brand spanking new.  While I fully appreciate the time, effort and dedication it takes for a team of developers to create a gaming masterpiece, not all games are masterpieces.  Game prices continue to soar and as a lowly (greedy) consumer I can't afford to buy all the games I want as soon as they are released.  Nor do I always have the time I would like to dedicate to them!

Some games offer a vast amount of playability e.g. Skyrim, some games offer far less e.g. Portal 2.  Both these games are fantastic creations but I felt more comfortable handing over a healthy chunk of money buying Skyrim on release day than I did Portal 2.  I love Portal 2, absolutely love it, for it's design, character and genius.  But I couldn't justify £40+ for less then ten hours of gaming.  Skyrim at 100+ hours is acceptable.

So, being the cheap gamer that I am, I enjoy the January sales.  There has been a recent trend in the high street game stores to offer less interesting deals on pre-owned games.  Some old games such as Hitman and Oblivion have seen a price hike (I got Hitman for £2.50 2 years ago, today it was £7.99!).  With Skyrim being released I assume interest in Oblivion has raised, hence the price change.  But again, 2 years ago I purchased the GOTY edition for £9.99 brand new.  Today the original release (no DLC) pre-owned was £17.99.  Similar patterns can be observed with the Assassins Creed series, Call of Duty and many others.

Two brief shopping sprees have left me with a nice pile of games to get through over the next few months.  By the time I've finished this lot, Assassins Creed Revelations and a few others will have dropped in price!

• Child Of Eden 
• Rage
• Dead Rising 2
• Far Cry 2
• Crysis 2
• Metro 2033
• Ninety Nine Nights
• Dark Souls
• Splinter Cell: Double Agent

Having just looked at the pile under the table I realise I still have this lot to start or play through properly!

• Skyrim - The missus is currently playing this
• Fable 2 - Which will undoubtedly lead to buying Fable 3
• Halo 3 - All the Halo love seems to of skipped me by.
• Left For Dead
• Left For Dead 2 - I've only been playing multiplayer with these!
• Star Wars: The Force Unleashed  - With which I suffered a rather annoying bug where I need to restart my game!

I'll check back at the end of the year and see how many I got through!