In the tradition of previous posts – and a bit late this year – it’s time once again for the year in review, game collection style!
I purchased a total of 102 games in 2009, spending just shy of $2200. Both of these totals were an increase from the previous year.
However other numbers decreased: the total number of systems for which I bought games dropped, as did the average cost I spent on each game. The dominant system was still the DS though, with outlier purchases on the Mac (WoW subscription fees) and the PS2 (a single game purchased in January ’09, which I haven’t even played yet!). Here’s the figures in a handy-to-read plot:
^– The above is the % totals per system (games bought)
^– % totals per system, dollars spent.
102 purchases mean an average of 2 per week, but there is a notable increase in purchases after August. This is almost certainly due to cancelling my World Of Warcraft subscription, and playing more console/handheld games thereafter. There’s also a peak in May/June, corresponding to the Japan trip (on which I averaged one game bought per day). The system for which I bought the most games – the DS – is away and beyond the system for which I own the most games in total; 234 at last count.
It’s interesting to note I purchased far more PS3 games than Wii games and yet the dollar amounts are essentially identical. This is because I buy a lot of downloadable games from the Playstation Network, and rarely spend more than $5 for each. In fact the predominance of downloaded games this year (about 20% of purchases) coupled with the (typical) abundance of DS purchases is what drove the average spent per game (about $21) to the lowest value ever.
So a record year for amount of purchases (only in 2006 did I buy more games) but not even top five in dollars spent. What does this mean? I’d say I buy (and play) more (or at least as many) games as I ever did, only I try and be a bit more cost effective about the process.
And in those 102 games, what – you surely must be asking – was the best? What would get my medal for Game Of The Year 2009?
Here’s the answer:
A bit of a no-brainer actually, since it’s easily one of my favourite games of all time!