Ah, indecisiveness... I have a terrible habit of playing a game most of the way through, then something (boredom, IRL events, hardware problems) inevitably keeps me away from it so long that I feel I owe it to myself to start all over so the story would be fresh.

I have restarted a handfull of RPGs half a dozen times since the early 90's (I swear I will someday beat at least one of the Final Fantasy games). I recently completed the last ~10% of The Dig - after not touching it for 3 months or so. It didn't feel good; I remembered the main plot points, but I'd forgotten all the intricacies of how I beat the puzzles and how I ended up where I was, and that really detracted from the feeling of accomplishment.

Once I tried making a cardboard die (i.e. dice, singular form), with the names of games I desired to complete written on it. This approach did not work at all! Invariably whatever game came up did not "fit my mood" at that moment.

What I do now is similar to downloadmunkey's method - I have roughly a dozen games installed, making sure only one or two are... I suppose "story-driven" would be a good description. The others are faster-paced games I can sit down and beat a level or a round if I don't feel like getting into the former, whether they be a fighting/racing game, puzzler, or other random indie games. I'm most of the way through Cave Story right now, so we'll see how it turns out.

More importantly, which brand of caviar do you tend to choose as your starter. Furthermore, what's the best way to whip a servant?

If you have all these games, you have too much. Perhaps stop buying them?

I "use" a simple game management method: When I feel like, I open "my account" section on GOG and I choose a game that fits my state of mind. I try not to care too much about the games that I will probably never play (those were bought because of the sales anyway).

My biggest problem is not choosing what to play, is the fact that I usually never get to finish them. I can stick to playing a game a week at most. And because I have a very limited play time during each day, I usually don't manage to finish the game in that time. I don't know why, but after a week I either loose my interest or I feel the need to take a break. Unfortunately, usually "the break" is taking a very long time...

Lately I discovered the Xbox360 and that got my full attention. It's easier to power on/off and start playing than my PC and I don't have to care about compatibility issues. That means that probably I'll move even more down on the priority list my PC games backlog. And also means that I'll be a little bit less sucker when it comes to buying PC games (and here I'm directly referring at GOG - don't worry GOG, you already got a lot of money from me...).

I don't! XD

Seriously though, I have an almost incomprehensable collection of videogames on my Backloggery, (which I won't link to since its REALLY out of date), and I know there is no realistic way of ever beating even say 10% of them.

But I'm OK with that, I know what type of gamer I am.

I am the Smorgashboard (sp?) Gamer. One who owns loads of games of various genres on several platforms.
Heck I just got an iPhone the other day and I already have like 6 games on it!

I just like to be able to play whatever I fancy at the time.
(Its just a shame that sometimes I'm just overwhelmed by choice, I can't decide)

Heh. my GOG collection alone spans over 200 titles, and my New Years resolution is to try to play some. XD

This is totally me. I'll often play a game for a while, get restless and play something else, and hopefully eventually get back to the other one. Hence why even games I finish can sometimes take me like a year to do it. The only games I've played straight through in the past couple years without stopping were the original Deus Ex and Plants vs. Zombies, they were that all-engrossing.

Yay! I'm not alone!

What's funny is I had a system down, then started playing DC Universe Online and two months later hadn't beaten a single game from my backlog, so now I havne't played DCUO, and I've already beaten like 2 or 3 games.

I use a file system with all of my desktop shortcuts. So I made a folder on my desktop called Game Shortcuts. Then I make folders for each genre like Action/Adventure, Turn Based Stratagy, RPG, Action RPG, Hack N" Slash, etc. Then I make a file for all the games I've already started to some degree or another. Then I make one out of all the games I've completed and within that folder, all the games I've uninstalled (just so I don't lose track of them and buy them on accident in the future). As I beat games, I just cut and paste the shortcut off my desktop into this completed folder.

Then, the games I'm currenlty playing, I place the desktop shortcut directly onto my desktop. So for instance right now I've got Dungeon Siege 3, Divinity 2 Dragon Knight Saga, Darksiders and DCUO desktop shortcuts on my computer and nothing else.

I also did really good this winter and only bought like 2-4 games from the sales on GOG and Steam, which might be bad since it also means I've spent way too much over the past year to have been able to reason out not spending money this holiday.

Now this may be harder for you or for others than for me, but I never buy games new anymore. So even though I keep track of the new releases that look cool like Skyrim, Heroes VI and Dead Island, since I've already got 100+ games to play as it is, I can wait until the next holiday sale to pick up those games when they'll all hopefully be under $10-15, and hopefully after I've cleared many, many more off my backlog.

I do deviate from time to time if I just suddenly feel like playing something else, like I did yesterday with Darksiders since I was playing DS3 pretty consistently over the past several days, but still, trying to manage 3-4 games is much easier than 20-40 at the same time.

A great question to answer, even if my answer is more of a description of my gaming habits rather than a backlog plan.

Let's see...my current backlog consists of:

10 retail boxed PC games
19 Steam games
3 PS2 games
3 GameCube games
6 GOGs
A whole shitload of Thief fan missions and Dark Mod fan missions

The rules that I've made up for myself:

1) I never play more than 2 games at once, and if I do have two games going at once, the second game is usually a pick-up-and-play indie game or a game where the story doesn't matter. Example: During my 90 hour playthrough of Two Worlds II, I played a bunch of VVVVVV and afterwards went through Serious Sam: TFE HD. I play Thief/Dark Mod fan missions whenever I want.

2) I try to avoid playing similar setting games one after another. Example: I won't play System Shock 2, then play Dead Space right after. I'll play something like Prince of Persia or a Tomb Raider game...something non sci-fi. The exception being if I want to tackle a whole series at once. I went through Deus Ex, Human Revolution and Invisible War one after the other recently.

3) I never play two RPGs one after the other. I'll finish off an RPG, then play a few 10-15 hour games before thinking of starting another RPG.

4) I try to avoid playing too many FPSs in a row. Same goes for brawlers.

5) I like to give my PC a rest now and then and dust off the PS2 or GameCube, but usually I'll still be playing an indie game now and then on the PC. Example, I went through Dark Cloud on the PS2 (72 hours) and was playing "And Yet it Moves" on the PC.

6) Finish every game I start even if I hate it. This ends up slowing my backlog progress at times, but I just can't leave a game unfinished.

Good news is that my PC is getting too old to play new games, so my backlog should shrink significantly over the next few years.

I like your strategies, reading them brought to mind that I use a bunch of them too. I'll also stress to the OP that you should mix up genres, if not, slogging through one RPG after another can get sort of boring, same with FPS after FPS.

And yeah, I'm just like you Thiefer, I can't leave a game unbeaten no matter how much I can't freaking stand the sight of it any longer. And it's only in these instances that I'll use a cheat or god mode just so I can clear it out of my memory and HDD if it's a section of a game that I just can't get through for some reason.

Those are pretty much the same as my rules. I find number 6 to be very annoying, but I just can't start a game and then not finish it. I don't even know why.

Ah, yes, the HD space is wholly important for me. I only have a 74.4 GB HD! Brutal!

Because we're not quitters! At least that's my reason. That or a mild form of insanity.

I salute you both.

I don't manage my backlog at all, because I don't want gaming to feel like a job. I know I'll get around to everything eventually :)

For me it's probably just OCD. I also can't play an RPG without exploring every area and opening every chest. It's annoying sometimes when I just want to finish the game.

That's the beauty of a backlog and being behind the wave. There's no point in playing a single player game along with everyone else (unless you really, really want to play the game), but this makes gaming a really cheap hobbie, cheaper even than going to the movies.

I watch my shelf get fuller and dream...