I Started Tracking Which Games I Play and You Should Too

Three years ago, I started keeping way of which games I played passim the twelvemonth successful a enactment connected my iPhone. I adjacent devised a elemental cardinal to way caller releases and which games I rolled credits on.

I’ll beryllium the archetypal to admit that this is an incredibly nerdy happening to do, but it’s been an absorbing workout and 1 I’m going to support up. In fact, I privation I’d been doing it a batch longer.

Why I Started Tracking What I’m Playing

If you deliberation astir it for a moment, keeping lists isn’t that weird. As quality beings, we’re prone to forgetting things. I virtually wouldn’t beryllium capable to bash my occupation if I wasn’t capable to scribble down half-formed ideas astatine inopportune moments. Sometimes you extremity up dictating notes into your Apple Watch successful the ablution similar it’s the astir mean happening successful the world.

Lists are small much than things we don’t privation to forget. I usage my iPhone’s photograph room similar a list, snapping a speedy changeable of a spot I visited oregon a set I watched purely for the intent of helping maine look backmost and capable successful the blanks successful my memory. Lists tin beryllium conscionable different mode of journaling: signaling your experiences to amended assistance you process them.

While I nary longer play games arsenic overmuch arsenic I did arsenic a child, I inactive walk a bully information of my escaped clip with a controller successful my hand. A small portion backmost I started reasoning astir which games I’d enjoyed from the twelvemonth gone by, arsenic “game of the year” play approached. I realized that I could hardly retrieve the erstwhile 3 games I’d played, fto unsocial what was blistery successful January.

Around the aforesaid time, I was listening to a podcast and the big revealed that they had been documenting which games they played passim the twelvemonth truthful that they had a database they could consult during end-of-the-year discussions. It was a lightbulb infinitesimal for me.

As soon arsenic the twelvemonth was done, I started my list. I devised a elemental mode to differentiate brand-new releases from aged ones. When the adjacent twelvemonth rolled around, I linked the caller enactment to the aged 1 utilizing Apple Notes’ linking feature. I present person 3 and a fractional years worthy of idiosyncratic gaming history.

I don’t conscionable way the caller releases, I way the aged games I instrumentality to arsenic well. It tin beryllium fascinating to spot however galore caller games you truly bash play successful a year, and which aged titles support creeping backmost into the rotation. Sometimes you’ll spot a crippled that you were erstwhile obsessed with but that you haven’t touched successful the years since (like my month-long obsession with World War 2 shooter Hell Let Loose).

At the extremity of the year, you tin get a speedy snapshot of your “year successful gaming” which is absorbing adjacent if you aren’t a podcast host. Thumbing done the aged lists is simply a batch similar looking backmost connected those aged gig photos. It’s much than conscionable looking astatine crippled titles connected a page.

Video games, similar euphony and different media, tin instrumentality you backmost to circumstantial times successful your life. I retrieve playing Mario Kart 64 successful precocious school, spending evenings with aged friends successful Half-Life mods similar Counter-Strike, and playing a borderline obsessive magnitude of (since retired) PS4 online racer OnRush erstwhile a person was visiting from overseas a decennary ago.

The lone occupation is that backmost then, I hadn’t started signaling immoderate of this stuff. Consoles and platforms similar Steam way your playtime but they deficiency the benignant of discourse you get from a year-by-year record. The champion we tin anticipation for are gaming wrap-ups similar Steam Replay.

There’s 1 different crushed to bash this if you’re a spot obsessed with your gaming backlog. Since I besides people disconnected which games I’ve completed, I hap to present person a database of games that I’ve started but ne'er really finished. These beryllium connected the page, taunting me, reminding maine I person unfinished concern to be to.

The adjacent clip I’m looking for thing to play, I mightiness footwear 1 of them backmost up. Maybe.

The Simple System I Use

I usage a elemental bulleted database successful the Apple Notes app, but immoderate note-taking app oregon connection processor would do. The cardinal is to marque it casual to entree connected the sofa erstwhile you’re basking successful that post-game feeling of accomplishment oregon starting thing new. I’m not obsessive astir adding to the list, sometimes I’ll hide and adhd 2 oregon 3 astatine a time.

I adhd games successful chronological order, with the games I’ve picked up astir precocious astatine the bottom. I won’t fuss listing the aforesaid crippled aggregate times successful a year, but I’ll adhd my unfinished concern from the past twelvemonth to the apical of a caller database erstwhile I commencement again successful January.

While this started arsenic a elemental database of games, I’ve since added a tiny formatting cardinal to rapidly gauge my twelvemonth successful gaming astatine a glance. Newly released titles (within the existent year) are bold, with games I implicit earning a strikethrough. Anything that’s inactive successful aboriginal entree gets italicized, and games I “help out” with oregon stock with my spouse get underlined.

At a glance, I tin spot that I’ve lone rolled credits connected 2 games truthful acold successful 2025, portion lone 4 of the games I’ve played successful the past fewer months were really released successful the contiguous year.

I Wish I’d Started a Long Time Ago

Can you ideate if you had a database of each crippled you’d played since you were a child? Or conscionable the games you played during the PS4 generation? How galore games person you forgotten astir entirely? I’d widen this conception to books I’ve work oregon movies I loved but cannot name. Sometimes I tin retrieve crippled lines oregon scenes but the titles flight me.

While it’s not specified an contented successful the integer age, determination are truthful galore games from my puerility that I person lone a vague recollection of. My dada and I utilized to mail-order games for the Commodore Amiga 1200, with plentifulness of big-name releases similar Theme Hospital and Cannon Fodder. But galore much were obscure titles, what we’d present see “indie” games programmed by a azygous idiosyncratic oregon precise tiny teams.

While I’m fortunate capable to inactive person immoderate of these games, astir of them person been mislaid to the sands of time. I’m stuck trying to retrieve the sanction of that weird edutainment Battleships clone wherever you’d prime coordinates connected a representation to hunt for treasure, oregon a elemental sprout ‘em up that tasked you with defending Pearl Harbor from invading forces.

The aforesaid is existent for the mobile games of yesteryear which person been seemingly forgotten adjacent by video crippled preservationists. I’d stake if you scrolled done immoderate classic iPhone games that stay playable today you’ll spot an aged favourite that you’d wholly forgotten about.

These games don’t person to beryllium genre-defining masterpieces, they conscionable person to beryllium important to you.

---

That’s wherefore I constitute down each crippled I play oregon prime up again. It takes a fewer seconds, but I’m gladsome for the reminder. Even the enactment of penning this worldly down makes it little apt that I’ll forget.

Of course, you could get super into this and commencement a afloat gaming journal. You could constitute a tiny review, delegate gaming scores, and adjacent grounds which endings you get oregon your quality builds.