With Lionheart it was always like i started playing and it was awesome and then it stopped being awesome so i abandoned it and then all over again until one time i actually tried hard to overcome how tedious it becomes halfway through and i finally finished the game.

Why is everyone counting breaks in-between as playtime? That makes it look like games take way longer than they actually do.

DROD 1 is the first thing that comes to mind. I started to play the Architect's Edition (which is freeware) in 2008 and finally completed the game (the more polished commercial version) about a month ago.

I disagree. IMO asking how long it takes to complete a game is different than how many hours does it take to complete a game. The former is talking overall length of real time, while the latter specifically is speaking of playtime, which is recorded in many games.

I've got over 325 hours into Skyrim. But I've been playing it for over 6 months. If one asked how long it took me to get where I'm at, the answer would be six months. If one asked me how many actual hours of playtime it took, the answer would be 325 hours.

I think it's entirely fair to say a game with say 400 playtime hours took 13 months to finish. Or 13 years.

Hmm...
Baldur's Gate 2, but that's because around 8 years ago my classmate lended it to me, than asked it back a few days later, and I only bought it on GOG recently.

The original BG took me years, but that's because I didn't speak a word of English, and I had no idea what to do, and I was just walking around randomly :P I only finished it for the first time after I got my hands on a fan-made localisation.

Might and Magic 6 The Mandate of Heaven took me years for the exact same reason: zero English knowledge, I was just randomly walking around killing everything... again, I finished it years later, when a fan-made localisation was made :P

Also, chapter 2 in The Witcher took me six months... >_>

Forgot the most obvious: Monkey Island 2!! I only finished it this year for the first time, and I had it since.... idk, but I was still an emelentary school student. But again, it was because of language problems. I understood that I have to combine items, to get more items, but I was just trying randomly XP Never made it out of the 1st island, until recently :D

Oh yeah, Might and Magic 6 for me too...got sick of the castle with all the floating Eyes in it, so took a break for a few days (turning into a few years) and finally finished it after buying the GOG version last year.

I still hate that castle with all the Eyes in it!

Fair enough but to get context one should likely specify playtime and overall time. My reaction was based upon those that only mentioned overall time.

It's in the thread title. "[...] years on the pile of shame". The implication is that you bought and played a game but never got around to finishing it until years later.

Most of my GOG catalogue is a pile of shame, a long line of games that taunt me daily. 'Quitter', 'Are you sure you are happy playing next-gen-over-the-shoulder shooters?' and 'Am I just a 70% off prostitute to you?'

That's basically what I was wanting to see, yes. It is nice knowing I am not alone in this - the pile of shame is currently approaching Kilimanjaro size, moving up to Everest :/