I replay my favorites too much probably (mostly RPGs). I've played Deus Ex and Morrowind all the way through a dozen times probably, despite having many games I'd probably love sitting unplayed in my library.

Games I like a lot but don't love enough to marry I replay less though, probably once a decade or so. For example I just recently replayed Baldur's Gate for probably the first time in a decade or so. Over the course of my life though I probably will replay every RPG at least once, at some point.

More simple and quick games like Doom for example I often load up for a few levels and then stop. That kinda stuff just doesn't hold my attention like it did when I was a kid, but it's fun in short bursts.

Never. I don't even play them anymore. I just look at my GOG library and sigh.

Oh yes, sleeping dogs, have been through it two or three times. Doesn’t get boring. It’s better than GTA series. Probably top five open world . Would put The Saboteur in there as well. Rogue felt like an expansion for black sail.

Not entirely different. I usually don't re-watch movies (with a few exceptions) or re-read books very often, for the same reasons that I don't replay games. There is a significant difference in length and ... density? or substance though. With books and movies you repeat the story as well, but minus all the other stuff that you repeat in games (combat, inventory management, backtracking, platforming etc.). Some of these things could be precisely why you would want to replay a game, if they were particularly enjoyable, but they also stretch the length of the games and may become extremely repetitve and feel like filler content, at least on the second playthrough. Re-watching a story for 2 hours is different than replaying a game for e.g. 40 hours (with maybe 5 hours worth of story or so). Books take a bit longer, but they are also more condensed, and tendentially often a bit more substantial than videogame stories, I guess.

Now that I think about it, I did replay The Secret of Monkey Island once or twice back in the days, but that was a matter of one afternoon only. And I didn't have that many other games to play then. ;)

The games I am replaying are those I haven't played in at least a decade I started playing again 3 years ago after a gap of 5 years, so the handful of games I've played before were familiar, but did not seem repetitive.

For games that limit the content you can see in one playthrough (choice based RPGs are a good example), I really can't see myself playing through the rest of the game again just to experience a small amount of new content. As a result, I can struggle to play them as I don't know the best choice to make. Rather silly, really.

As it is, I have enough in my backlog that I don't need to replay anything to avoid boredom.

I never realized Crystalisis in that. I looked at it a few times but most of the games I saw weren't ones I wanted to play [or replay], but I skipped that one. Hey GOG! Make that list in the description bullet points instead of horizontal. Crystalis has always been a favorite of mine (except I have no problem cheating XP gain at the level-grind-always-required water area, unless that'll be different in this version than the NES version).

The version *is* the NES version, just emulated (and with the option of watching a video of the gae played, with the option to start playing at any moment, or alternatively you can play the Japanese version).

There's actually a way to skip that dungeon without using the warp code, but you'll still need to gain those levels at some point.

The majority of my games I play once only. Rarely twice or more often and when I do it's in rapid succession. To get the game out of my system so to speak. Elex was such a case. Finished it 5 times to 100% within 4 months. I guess you could also count Risen 1, which I recorded for a YT Longplay series, fist fighting my way through the game on hard difficulty.

I never play classics with fond memories attached to them. They had their respective time and after finishing it they landed on my disc/cassette/cartridge/DVD piles. Some I play every year around the same time, or used to play them, like NFS Porsche or Test Drive Unlimited. The lord only knows how often I played through them, raced every track, drove all the streets, solved all tasks given.

When I feel nostalgic what I do is watching others play on YT. Sometimes this offers new insights and as was quite often the case I started noticing so much more about a game and I love that! RPG are a particular favorite of mine to watch, playing with different classes, taking different paths &etc.

Lastly there are games I tried and never finished. There are quite many actually and most of those I keep trying to play through at least once. Sometimes I succeed and many times it simply leads to my wiping them again and starting another attempt months or years down the line.

It's impossible to quantify how many I played once, how many more than once, so I can't really answer that question so I don't try. :-)

I like re-watching movies (/tv shows), if enough time has passed since the last view.
I have a big backlog of games, many of them I believe to be good to great. I can't say the same about movies - I rarely discover good ones these days - they're usually passable at best. (I've seen a lot of movies in my life)

Do you guys feel stress when playing games, or stress over your backlog? If I play a game and feel "phew, glad I finally did that mission or finished that chapter", I see it as a sign that I'm not enjoying the game rather than any kind of pressure that I need to hurry up and beat the game so I can check it off my list. I don't look at my backlog as some kind of work inbox that I need to eventually clear, wondering how on earth I'm ever going to play 100% of them. Instead, I see my inbox as a kind of buffet, simply a large list of options for whatever I'm in the mood for at the time. Since almost all the games I get now are either free or dirt cheap, I don't stress about having blown a hundred on a game I'll probably never play.

I've also found myself watching blind Let's Plays for games I've done, both for the nostalgia of the game, for being able to experience the game "again" through new eyes, and to see if people discover new content I may have missed. I can also enjoy LPs for strategy games, seeing if others have tricks I can learn.

What does it do for you? Does it give you a certain vibe or feel, like just being in that game world is enjoyable, regardless of what you do? Or is that you find certain aspects of the game, like combat, graphics, music whatever enjoyable? Is it a nostalgia thing?

What's the appeal for you?

Not too often, but I've learned to recognize when I do. Sometimes it is exhilarating to overcome a challenge (the platforming challenge tree in Guacamelee comes to mind), but other times it's just exhausting and should make you reflect on the game. Just yesterday, I was trying to get through the 2nd to last level of Dungeons 2 (titled "Absolute Evil") and it was... unpleasant. I was drained and relieved when it ended. I LOST ONCE EVEN CHEATING. And then another time it bugged and didn't trigger end condition. Eventually on the 5th attempt (mind you, this is for a RTS game, so each attempt is hours), I used the "invulnerability" cheat and just went through it since I wanted to get it done with. And even then it took a lot of time with me skipping through most things.

I would have given up sooner, except I knew it was at the end of the campaign (I thought it was the last, but it turns out there was one more map after it, though it was an easy wrap-up scenario just for funsies). Looking things up about it, everyone agrees it's a terribly done stage. I'm glad I had cheats to lean on for that one that developers messed up (...too many games don't have such nowadays...). Had that happened earlier, like in the first campaign rather than expansion campaign, I would probably have stopped playing entirely.

(I'm on to Dungeons 3 now. I'm almost certain I'll never play [or need to play] Dungeons 2 again.)

You could be wording your question differently: "what's the appeal for you to repeat something with which you connect nice memories?"
The question contains the answer, already.

That was soooo spot on! That bloke conveyed my feelings perfectly.

I am not alone in this world with my thoughts after all.