How I Finally Got My Gaming Backlog Under Control

At one point I had 200+ games across Steam, PlayStation and Switch. I'd finished maybe 40 of them. The rest were sitting in various states of "I'll get to it eventually" – which, if we're being honest, means never.

I didn't need another app to tell me my backlog was big. I needed to see it in a way that made me actually do something about it.

The sale trap

Steam sales are the worst thing to happen to backlogs. You see a game for $6 that was $40 at launch and your brain says "that's basically free." So you buy it. And the next one. And three more. You now own 5 games you didn't know existed 20 minutes ago, and you haven't finished the game you were playing before the sale started.

I added up my unplayed purchases from one year. $340 on games I never launched. Not once. They just sat in a library being "owned." That number changed my buying habits more than any backlog app ever could.

What I track

Every game gets a row with:

• Title, platform and genre – basics for filtering and charts
• Status – Backlog, Playing, Finished, Abandoned or Shelved
• Hours played – either from the platform or my own estimate
• Start and finish dates – auto-set when I change the status
• Rating – only after finishing or abandoning
• Source – where I got it: bought, gifted, subscription, free

The important thing is the status. That's what turns a list of games into a backlog management system. Seeing 47 games in "Backlog" and 3 in "Playing" is a very clear signal.

Completion rate is a reality check

My completion rate for 2025 was 31%. Out of the games I started, I finished less than a third. The rest were abandoned or still "playing" (which, after 4 months with no activity, is just abandoned with extra steps).

That number isn't supposed to be 100%. Some games aren't worth finishing. Some just don't click. But seeing it as a percentage made me more selective about what I start. If I'm going to add another "Playing" game, I should probably finish one of the three I already have going.

The backlog didn't shrink because I played more. It shrank because I stopped adding to it faster than I could play through it.

The "Abandoned" status is your friend

This was the hardest part for me. Admitting that a game isn't worth finishing feels like admitting you wasted money. But you already spent the money – playing 20 more hours of a game you're not enjoying doesn't un-spend it.

I have a personal rule now: if I haven't opened a game in 3 weeks and I don't feel any pull to go back, it gets marked "Abandoned." No guilt. It just moves from one column to another. The data tells me my average play time before abandoning is about 6 hours – so now I give every game a 6-hour trial. If it hasn't hooked me by then, I move on.

Genre data changed how I buy

After a year of tracking, my genre breakdown told me a clear story. I finish 70% of RPGs I start. I finish 15% of strategy games. I keep buying strategy games because I like the idea of them, but in practice I bounce off after a few hours every time.

Same with open-world games. I've finished exactly two open-world games in the last three years. I have twelve in my backlog. Something doesn't add up, and the spreadsheet made that impossible to ignore.

Hours played is more honest than completion

Not every game has a clear "finished" state. Multiplayer games, roguelikes, simulation games – they don't have endings. For those, hours played is the metric that matters. Did I get 60 hours out of a $30 game? That's $0.50 per hour. That's good value regardless of whether I "finished" it.

I stopped worrying about completion rate for games that don't have endings and started looking at cost per hour instead. The perspective shift is useful.

Tips for managing a backlog

The "one in, one out" rule

Before buying a new game, finish or abandon one from the backlog. This doesn't mean you can't buy new games. It just means the backlog stops growing. Some weeks I rush through an okay game just so I can justify the new release I want. That's fine – at least something got finished.

Don't add subscription games to the backlog

If you have a game subscription, resist the urge to add every interesting title to your backlog. Only add games you've actually started playing. Otherwise you'll have 50 subscription games in "Backlog" that create false guilt.

Set a yearly goal for finished games

Mine is 12 – one per month. It's not aggressive, but it's enough to keep me finishing things instead of endlessly starting new games. The monthly chart on the dashboard shows if I'm on pace. If I'm behind in March, I pick a shorter game next.

Track hours honestly

Most platforms show you this number. Use it. When you can see that you spent 180 hours in one game and 2 hours in each of twenty others, the pattern speaks for itself.