I love the RPG genre and growing up I would dump hours and hours into games like Fallout 3 and the Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion. It was not even uncommon for me to drop a hundred hours into a Final Fantasy game. But as I have gotten older it has become more and more difficult to complete a long RPG game and the current victim is Final Fantasy XII: Age Of The Zodiac.

I have been progressing through the story and doing side quests. I had to take a long break because grad school was the bane of my existence. When I got back around to playing the game, every bit of my previous motivation was gone and it took hours of me wandering around before I remembered what I was doing before my long break. Final Fantasy XII at least had an objective reminder and a red flag pointing towards the main story objective.

Other games have been less friendly.

Fallout is my perfect example of the issue I have had with RPG’s since getting old. I have to take breaks from Fallout to do old man stuff and when I come back I am completely lost. I wander around killing random enemies and trying to remember the controls. Then I’m faced with the “build your own adventure” that is the modern RPG. Half the time I can not remember what random sidequest I was doing and it gets to the point where I feel like I have to restart the game just to get filled back in on the story.

Of course, this is never a viable option. No one likes to repeat things they have already completed. My issue is I get back to where I was lost and have to take another long break and the vicious cycle continues. I know this column normally looks at gamer trends, video games economics, and calling out games. Not this week. This week is me going full grouchy old man about how some games are so long I can’t complete them anymore.

I have to do this for Legend of Dragoon, Blackguards and Dark Cloud 2. I don’t even know if I remember the controls for Dark Cloud 2 at this point. While writing this I had to go check to see how many gray hairs I have. I booted up NBA 2K21 since I paid for it and might as well enjoy it. I had to completely relearn the controls and any small skill increase I had was gone. Now that I have PlayStation Plus, I can actually enjoy Star Wars Squadrons… if I remember how to play it and if anyone is even still playing it.

I’m curious if any of the readers have had issues like that. Where you realize you can’t play as many games of 2K anymore. Or you realize your Call of Duty reflexes have gotten rusty since you can’t play as much.I’m curious if it has stopped you from finishing a game. Put any thoughts or experiences you have in the comments. Remember to stay safe and keep playing games and check out the GiN Lounge.

Editor’s Note: We sympathize with you Neal, although most gamers want more content because that equals better value, if the core content is good. With that in mind, you better steer clear of the new Pathfinder: Wrath of the Righteous. We are almost 150 hours into that amazing game, and not anywhere near the ending, or even really, as Churchill once said, the end of the beginning!