My Backlog Progress in 2025

Ready the all out attack on Boss: Gaming Backlog!

As the end of the year comes ever so quickly, that means its time for all of my end of the year articles! I may have procrastinated a bit on these, but rest assured I’m not working on them the day of haha. Compared to last year, the end of 2025 for me was pretty empty and chill. Which, considering I was really busy for a couple months, was really nice. Hopefully I won’t get super busy again next year as I do want to get through my backlog. Well, I’ll see what happens next year. Right now, it’s time to see how I did this year.

As for what I have to say before we get into the stats, I have a little bit to say I suppose. I’ve kept my backlog spreadsheet up to date of course, but I did add some tabs. Tabs so I can see the most recently purchased games (based on the year 2024 and 2025) and a tab dedicated to pure visual novels. That last one will make sense later when I mention my goals for next year. Other than that, my computer died on me earlier this year. Which is devastating. I had it for years and I’m pretty sure the problem is related to hardware. Hopefully I’ll be able to get all of my stuff off of it, but I’m not sure whether I should see if it could be fixed or just buy a new computer. Which the universe might be pointing for me to do the latter since I’m someone that keeps using my electronics until I literally can’t anymore. And I was saying that for the past few years that I do want to upgrade but I also don’t because my computer was still kicking. Right now, I’m on a backup as I can’t afford to get a new computer yet. Oh and remember that I really wanted Metaphor ReFantazio and tried (and failed) to hint at wanting it for my birthday and Christmas? Well this year I got it for my birthday and I got it on sale! I’m still planning on playing the Persona 5 spinoffs and Soul Hackers 2 first, but I have it!

Well, lets get to the stats and graphs. While I did lose where I put these stats so I can look at them quickly, luckily I can just look at them the long way. First up, finished games which only include games I finished and not any endless or dropped games.

Honestly, I completed more games than I thought. The first half of the year and a little bit in the latter half my completed games number was pretty low. Like I barely got to 30 completed games in August and while I did panic a little bit, after a bit I kinda accepted it. And, well, as you can see it doubled between now and then lol. Funnily enough, I was actually originally planning on stopping at 50, which I got to early this month, without realizing that was the same number I landed on last year. So why is it ten more? Well, I got a bit antsy and played some of the short free games I had wishlisted or bookmarked. And I’ve been wanting to replay Dragon Age 2 for a while. And then I just had to put it at a good even number like 60. I have no idea how I doubled my completed games in four months, but I definitely worked my butt off haha.

Next up my backlog progress:

Honestly, pretty good. Especially better than last year. I honestly thought there would be a noticeable spike for October considering I did splurge for my birthday, but it didn’t. I started the year at 155 games in my backlog and ended the year at 130. Do I want to ruin that perfect number? Yes *looks at a couple games I want and on sale waiting for me to use the ‘ole Christmas excuse*. It’s pretty good considering how many games I ended up adding to my backlog. Last year I don’t have a complete list of bought games, but this year I made sure to. You may be wondering “what about the tab you mentioned towards the beginning?” and well, if I complete or drop a game, it’s taken off of all tabs. This list is one where the only time I edit it is to add a game. So how many games did I end up buying this year? 23. That’s still a lot, but backlog wise I still did pretty good. I’m slowly chipping away at it!

With that said, it’s time to reflect on how well I did on the goals I set the beginning of this year. I honestly didn’t keep count of completed, to the credits, backlog games, but my backlog did decrease by 25. Hey, I’ll take it. As for the no-buy year…yeah it didn’t last long haha. I tried, but I was tempted and I fell for it. I didn’t even get any of the three games I listed as exceptions. I hope I’ll be more successful next year. And finally, game subscription services. I did unsubscribe to Gamefly after I finished the OK KO and Steven Universe duo game. I really miss Gamefly, but looking back it was probably for the best. Especially since I was really busy for a couple months and I definitely wouldn’t have been able to play whatever Gamefly rented game I would have gotten. I do want to resub, especially since there are some visual novels I want to read, but not too sure if I’ll enjoy it. I also stayed unsubscribed to PS Plus, which was a bit easy to do considering the monthly Essential games weren’t any that I was interested in. There are some games in the Extra catalog that I’m interested in, but I’m waiting for the Essential monthly game(s) to catch my eye. Fun fact, I bought the Mafia trilogy pack so I didn’t have to rush through them as I unexpectedly really liked the first game. As for Game Pass, I’m not resubscribing after my sub lapses. Yeah I didn’t like the price increase and at that point I might as well just buy the game.

So what’s my goals for 2026? Well it’s not too different from this year’s. I actually want to get my backlog down to 100 games and keep it under 100. Although, I’m going to be a bit more realistic and set the goal at ending 2026 with 115 backlog games so it’s not as daunting. So like, one to two backlog games per month. My backlog progress is definitely going to slow down as the majority of games on my backlog are 20+ hours. Specifically, though, I do want to put a dent in my visual novel backlog. And even more specifically pure visual novels. I qualify a game as a pure VN if the whole game is just a visual novel or if the gameplay aspect is an extension of the visual novel aspect. So this doesn’t count games like Persona which uses visual novel cutscenes to tell its story, but it does count games like Jack Jeanne or Ace Attorney. I have 39 pure VNs in my backlog or 37 if you take out the early access games as I’m not going to play them until they’re finished. That is a lot and is a bit intimidating, especially as someone that puts a lot into her visual novel reviews (and especially her otome reviews). Visual novels takes up almost a third of my backlog, guys. So, yeah, I’m going to tackle it. There is another part to this, but it’s more related to my next goal.

My next goal is based on the other side of the coin: adding games to the backlog. I tried to do a no-buy year for the past two years and I have to be honest with myself. I can’t do it. However, maybe I can do a low-buy. Which lets my exceptions be a part of the low-buy. So what am I planning for my low-buy? Well, I was thinking of following what others did and only buy a game per quarter. So at least four games and I already have one in mind (Pragmata). I’m not sure whether I’ll count Ender Magnolia and Death Stranding 2 or count them separately as I don’t want to buy them until I finish Ender Lilies and Death Stranding 1 respectively, but I’ll get to that when I do. I am also going to make my birthday and Christmas as exceptions as if there’s any days you’re allowed to splurge it’s your birthday and Christmas. Oh, and the other part of the visual novel goal. Knowing that I don’t do well with no-buys, I decided to do a rule. For every 5 pure visual novels that I finish, I can buy 1 visual novel. I thought this would be good rule and that would mean that it would be 4 VNs off of my backlog and often times I don’t immediately go to play the VN that I got. So this also means I might be able to pick them up on a higher discount (which is what I’m doing with the Yakuza series, I don’t want to buy the newer ones until I go through the seven that I haven’t). Hopefully, these changes will allow me to be successful next year.

That reminds me, I have a third goal! I am going to try my hardest to also only buy a game if I’m sure I’ll play it within the week. I would say immediately, but I found that a lot of the time I’ll start the download and then play it the next day. And this does give me some leeway if I get the procrastination bug or working on a review.

Well, that’s it. I hope to see you guys next year. Wish me luck on my goals and I wish you luck on your goals!