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Parkingtigers

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Regrets, I have a few. The games that I most wish I had finished.

Over any player's gaming career, there are always some titles that you never quite get around to finishing.  There are many reasons for this.  Sometimes the game just isn't good enough to hold your interest; other times you get distracted; sometimes life just gets in the way.  All of us have a pile of games that we really should see about returning to at some point, and as I'm coming up for 30 years of gaming soon my pile of shame is larger than most, and is documented on my Backloggery page.


This list isn't just about unfinished games though.  No, this list is about games that I really should have finished.  Games that I can now never finish, or that I can only finish with either great difficulty or some kind of diminished reward due to it having taken so long.  With many titles, it doesn't matter that they were never beaten as they just weren't that good in the first place.  But the good games.  The great games.  The games that you know you should have moved heaven and earth to beat ... those games turn into painful memories of what should have been.

This is my list then.  The following are the games that I most wish I had finished.  These are in reverse order of regret, the deeper we delve the more it will sting me.

List items

  • Regret factor: Low. This game is on the list due to it being so damn difficult. I struggle with rhythm games in general. PaRappa just goes from repeating X, X, Triangle straight to X, X, L, L, Square, Triangle, Square, L, L, Triangle ohfuckslowdownwhatthehellisthisshit? in a matter of seconds. I literally only ever got to see the ending because my flatmate wasn't as retarded as I am. Not beating the final level myself still bothers me.

    Will I ever beat it? Unlikely. There's a PSP remake, which is a damn expensive way of getting my hands on the game. Maybe if they put the original on PSN I might pick it up. Considering how Um Lammer Jammy reminded me how bad I am at these games, I don't think I'd crack it anyway. 10 plus years of lost twitch reflex means I'll be even worse if anything.

  • Regret factor: Low. This one wasn't my fault, my disc would always get a read error at the same point during the final mission. Without that, I would have got to the end over a decade ago.

    Will I ever beat it? I rebought this on PSN, so the intention is there. Then I gave my PSP away, so it's going to sit unplayed for a while yet. Besides, it's kind of a difficult game to go back to, full of FMV cutscene hell. I'm not even sure it's worth the grind, but I was so close all those years ago that letting go is hard.

  • Regret factor: Medium. This was the best Castlevania game I played. In fact, I'm often tempted to call it the only good Castlevania game I played, as the DS games with all their anime bullshit and extraneous bullshit annoyed me as much as they amused me. Just give me a whip and point me at Dracula, that's all the boy wants.

    Will I ever beat it? Possibly, possibly. These days I'd likely have to run it through and emulator though, and I hate the trade-off you get by hooking up non-standard controllers, not to mention performance issues. Either way, it just won't be the same.

  • I was so close with this one. I bought this game along with a DS "phat" and I played the hell out of it. For my money, the best game in the franchise due to both the quality and the portability. I'm not the biggest fan of racing games, but this was always in my pocket and had the right balance of racing and power-ups. Snaking and blue shell spamming never bothered me.

    Alas though, as with any console early-adopter I ran out of decent games to play and I sold the system. I was one trophy away from having beaten the game, but that damn Rainbow Road was my nemesis.

    Regret factor: Low, I think I just wish I had beaten it in order to have a decent sense of closure to the game. As it is, I delude myself that one day I need to return to it.

    Will I ever beat it? Unlikely. I have the game, but not the time to dedicate to replaying through so many races that I already finished. Losing the original save file means that instead of a single last mile, I would need to redo the entire race.

  • Regret factor: Low. I played and completed Spellcasting 101, and in the days before you could just find help for every puzzle that obstructed you. It was a very hard-earned win, requiring much cleverness on my part. I would have liked to have beaten the sequel if only to prove the first one wasn't just a fluke.

    Will I ever beat it? Not a chance. Gaming has moved on too much, I can't return to playing semi-text based adventures again. Even if I did, the temptation to just load up GameFAQs every time I got stuck would kill the experience. Finishing the first game was only satisfying because it was so damn hard. The second one broke me, and it can't be fixed.

  • Regret factor: Medium. It was a good game, and I would have enjoyed figuring out how to beat the later levels.

    Will I ever beat it? Possibly, but unlikely. I did re-purchase this a third time on Steam, but two factors prevent me from playing it. First, I no longer have a Windows partition on my Mac. Second, when I booted the game up it ran at an unplayably fast speed. The game was hard enough without sentries moving at double-time. Looks like this is one war that'll have to go unfinished.

  • I bought this game twice, so really I have no excuse not to have finished it. Oh wait, yes I do, I have the excuse that it is the most non-logical adventure game ever made. No actions in the game produce expected reactions, and you literally have to brute-force trial and error your way through. I actually kind of hate it in many way.

    Regret factor: Low. It's on the list out of principle. That bloody game double-dipped my wallet due to me wanting the fully voiced version of the game. My regret in this case is that this game, which is balls hard, made me its bitch and I never repaid the compliment. Gameplay faults aside, the dialogue was great and I do like the setting overall.

    Will I ever beat it? Probably. I mean, it's officially freeware now and can be downloaded and played through SCUMM. There's also an iPhone version, with a built in hints guide (and fuck me if ever a game needed a hints guide it's this one). One day I'll try and find a couple of afternoons and just cheat my way through it to finally close off this part of my life.

  • Regret factor: Medium. I'm not usually good at finishing JRPGs, but on my second attempt (having got distracted during the first) I was a hefty chunk of the way into the story.

    Will I ever beat it? No, not unless it gets ported again. No Dreamcast, and no GameCube. A shame, as despite combat being nothing more than charging up the super-giant-fuck-you cannon attack I enjoyed charging up the super-giant-fuck-you cannon attack.

  • I was very proud of having beaten the original Ecco game on the Mega Drive. That game was hard (balls hard in fact) and it was in the days before YouTube, GameFAQs, or any of the other means of external help the kids have today. Great game, so of course I had to get the glossy 3D version that came out for my beloved Dreamcast. Got a bit lost early on in a maze of passages and put it aside for later. Of course in gaming, later never arrives.

    Regret factor: Medium. It was a beautiful looking game, and nostalgia for the Mega Drive version (which was a truly unique experience) makes me sad to think I'll never know where they went with this title.

    Will I ever beat it? Highly unlikely. Unless this game gets ported across to XBLA then I'm physically unable to even attempt it as I'm not in a situation that will allow for ownership of a Dreamcast. And that saddens me too, because damn the Dreamcast was one hell of a console.

  • Notice that I didn't choose an individual game for this entry, I chose the entire franchise. That's because I have a serial habit of starting a Pokémon game, getting about 16 hours in, and then getting distracted. I did this on Yellow, Silver, Pearl and Platinum. They are all basically the same game, so just finishing any of the games once would be like being freed from the nagging reminder that I wasted so many hours on partial runs of the franchise.

    Regret factor: Medium/high. Medium because there is always a chance to cross this off the list, high because goddamn it they shouldn't still be on this list.

    Will I ever beat it? Well I'm sure I'll put another 16 hours into a run at some point. Going beyond that though ... *sigh*

  • Regret factor: Medium. It still wasn't an absolute classic, but they took a game that I only kind of liked and remade it into so very much more. The shark section was particularly good as I recall. The sheer scale of the production was fantastic, while keeping the feeling of playing the original game.

    Will I ever beat it? As per other GameCube games, I am without the means to ever be able to play it, so no. Guess I'll never find out what enhancements they made to the latter half of the game.

  • Regret factor: Medium/high. As with other games on this list, this is a game that I've started on three different occasions. Each time I get about 12 hours in, reach the big saucer city, and then get distracted. Three times. As this is the only Final Fantasy game of the series I've been able to tolerate, I really want to get past that point so that I can say I've finally finished one.

    Will I ever beat it?

  • Man I have been not-finishing this game for over a decade now. I completed most of the game on my flatmate's copy, and then restarted when I moved to a different town and got my own cartridge. Sort of put it aside too long before eventually selling the console to declutter my life.

    Regret factor: Medium/low. It doesn't keep me awake at night or anything, but it's a good game with decent mechanics and I just should have already put this one to bed. The fact that it's been 12 years now is what puts it on this list. Chances are I started playing this game before some readers of this page were even born. If that's the case GET OFF MY LAWN.

    Will I ever beat it? I do have the XBLA version as I'm stubbornly determined to close the case on this one. I completed two levels, got distracted by something shiny and ... look, I'll sort it alright. Jeez ...

  • Regret factor: High. This game has happy memories for me, my best mate owned this on both his Atari ST and then his Amiga when he traded up. We must have played through those starting levels dozens of times. Inexplicably, we would get to a certain point and then always just have more fun starting over. (Hey, we had to make our own fun in those days.) One of us would take charge of the combat, while the other would use the numpad to move us around. Good times. Good times.

    Will I ever beat it? I'm still determined to go back at some point, and it's available in all sorts of cloned versions for every operating system. It'll be much harder without a numpad though, and as I only rock laptops from this point out I'll always be stuck with using the mouse to control the entire game.

  • This was pretty much the sole reason that I bought a slim PS2 when the redesigned console was released. Had heard lots about it at that point and I had a real hankering to play it. I loved the game, but the notoriously broken "Supply Lines" mission eventually brought me to a complete halt.

    Regret factor: High. It's a damn fine game, back when Rockstar were actually putting fun things to do in their games. (At least Rockstar Leeds continue this tradition.) This is very much a case of unfinished business.

    Will I ever beat it? Actually this one I should be able to cross off the list at some point. I'll need to find a copy of the game for Xbox (it's not in the on demand section of XBLA in my Xbox region) and they fixed the broken mission when they ported it across.

  • I definitely bought this game twice, and I may have bought it a third time at some point. This game rewrote the book on how to present a story in games, and I loved the seamless nature of it all. The sequel was a pale fish compared to this classic. Though to be fair, I did at least finish the following games. I got as far as the big chamber with the gribbly beast that reacted to sound, and I just had too little health to advance. I thought I'd restart later. I didn't.

    Regret factor: High. This was one of the most immersive games of all time, and rightly regarded as a classic. My regret at not completing the story is finding out (thanks to the internet) that apparently the ending is a bit pants. Even so, I would liked to have judged that for myself.

    Will I ever beat it? Very unlikely. I object on principle to buying this game again, I just can't bring myself to do it. Even if I go with a copy that falls off the back of a ship, I'm not keen on the idea of returning to a mouse and keyboard setup for an FPS again. I'm old, and using a mouse just hurts after a few minutes these days. Hey, don't mock, it'll happen to you one day.

  • Regret factor: Medium. Wind Waker never really grabbed me that much at the time, the writing seemed kind of juvenile coming after the N64 Zeldas. I had just been settling into a good run when the game glitched on me, locking up and losing 5 hours of progress. Couldn't face playing through that again, so I put it aside.

    Will I ever beat it? I don't have a GameCube any more, and I can't justify picking up a Wii, so I guess it's no dice on this one. It has been long enough that I'm willing to return to it though, and having played, and loved, Phantom Hourglass I really wish I'd seen this one through to the end.

  • Regret factor: Medium. I was a fool to ever start this one, I bought a Wii just after it had been released even though I knew I would need to sell it on within a month. It's a long story, but at the time I wanted to experience the new console and I knew I wouldn't really take a financial hit due to the resale value. I just didn't have time to get far into this, and while it was no Ocarina of Time I definitely wanted to see the end of the story.

    Will I ever beat it? Unlikely. As much as I'd like to get a Wii, I don't think I can get another console anytime soon. Chances are I'll end up missing out on this game.

  • Regret factor: High. Ocarina of Time is one of my most treasured gaming memories, and the sequel has more of the same feel. I sort of liked it a little less because it was so different. But on the other hand, I felt it was shaping up to be much better than OoT because it was so different. Got distracted for a while, lost my place in the story and ... well, guess I'll never find out now.

    Will I ever beat it? Almost certainly not. Not unless Nintendo take a break from endlessly re-releasing Ocarina of Time and put this out to buy again. Re-buying a Nintendo 64 is out of the question, but this could be a reason to buy a 3DS if they give it the remastering treatment.

  • Regret factor: High. I love turn-based strategy, and this game is the daddy of the genre. I really felt involved in the fight against the extra terrestrial menace.

    Will I ever beat it? The chances of beating this grow less every year. I adore the game, but the interface seems ever more clunky as time goes by. There is always talk of a sequel, but they never just remake this almost perfect game. There is always talk of fan remakes, but they never pan out. Trying to run this ancient game in a stable and playable manner isn't easy. I doubt I'd find the time needed to run through an entire campaign now anyway. Oh to be young, and have that amount of gaming time again.

  • Oh my Dreamcast, trailblazing online console gaming. You were just born too soon my love, but those of us that knew you still adore you. PSO was a great game for blundering onto servers, grabbing some random people, then heading off to blast through some quests.

    Regret factor: Very high. There was something about the setting and the game mechanics that really set it apart. I wanted to go deeper into it, and the sequels just don't seem to have that same magic.

    Will I ever beat it? Impossible. It's an online game for a dead console. Sure you can single-player it, but that's not the real game. This was really a game that had to be played then. I paid the price for having too many games, and not enough time to focus on the ones that deserved it the most.

  • The original Shenmue was one of my favourite games of all time, and I played it to completion twice. Despite the often terrible English dubbing, it was a classic of its time that could still hold its own today despite it being a decade later. The sequel was a Christmas gift from my wife, but at the time I was just too busy to finish it.

    Regret factor: Massive. I was a damn fool not to have played this to completion when I had the chance. The first Shenmue was one of my favourite games of all time, and while there will never be a conclusion to the story it would have been nice to have concluded this part of it at least.

    Will I ever beat it? I'll certainly never get my hands on the Dreamcast version again, so my only hope would be to get hold of the Xbox version. That means English audio again. On the plus side, it will match my experience with the first game more closely. I'll still need to track down a copy though, which is getting difficult and expensive. If only it could come to XBLA.
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