What have you ACTUALLY played tracker - Modern Edition (2019)

[carlsson]

tl;dr: Play games from 21st century systems and post your times!

For the second season in a row, it is time for the Modern gameplay tracker. The following text is stolen from Thegoldenband with additions by Iwantgames:) who used to run this tracker at the beginning.

 

Here are the links to previous seasons of the tracker: 2018

So what is this?

The basic idea is to post what games you played during each week, and for how long. You don't have to time it down to the minute (though some of us do), and estimates are acceptable. Then, at the end of the week, the statskeeper (that's me) totals everything up and we find out which games and platforms are seeing the most action. Each week, we have top 10 lists for consoles/computers and for individual games.

Guidelines:

1. Be sure to list the system, the name of the game, and the length of time you play. Please note if the game has any alternate titles by which it's better known. If you list multiple games, please group them by platform. If you play on a backwards-compatible system, e.g. Xbox 360 games on the Xbox One or PS2 games on PS3, the game should be listed under the older platform's name. This also means that games predating 2000 played on a modern system should be posted in the classic games tracker. e.g. PS1 games played on PS2, GB/GBC games played on GBA, Wonderswan played on Wonderswan Color, Windows 95/98 games on a newer PC and so forth.

2. Each week runs Monday through Sunday (at midnight), though exceptions may occur around New Year. Try to post your times no later than night to Tuesday in your local timezone. I will generally wait until Tuesday evening Central European Time before compiling the stats. If you post after stats have been posted, your times will be counted for the next week. Feel free to indicate in your post which dates your times relate to.

 

3. Playing on actual hardware is preferred, although emulators are certainly allowed. In some cases (homebrews in development, rare arcade games) there's no alternative to using an emulator.

4. Our cutoff year is 2000. That is, eligible consoles and computers have to have been first released somewhere in the world after 2000. Basically any systems released around the PlayStation 2, XBox, GameCube, Game Boy Advance or after. Anything released before this time period (including the Sega Dreamcast) please post to the Classic Game Tracker

The same goes for computers: we count Windows XP or newer, but not 98 or older; Mac OS X or newer, but not OS 9 or older; and so on.

5. Arcade games released on or after January 1, 2000 are permitted.

6. You don't just have to post a bare list of times -- comments, stories, gripes, and helpful hints are always encouraged! If you're struggling with a level, got a new high score, or have some thoughts about what's great or what stinks about a particular game...well, that's the kind of stuff that makes this fun to read.

How to make the statskeeper's life easier:

- If you post a big list of games, please consider alphabetizing them first (after grouping them by platform).

- Posting your times in minutes, rather than hours + minutes, makes things a little simpler.
- Even if you don't know the exact time, it's better to post a specific number and say it's an estimate. If you say you posted a bunch of games for "between 20 minutes and an hour", I'll just average everything out to 40 minutes, but it's much better to have a sense of which games you played more and which ones you played less.

- If there's room for confusion or ambiguity, please address that in advance so I don't have to research it myself. Non-US releases, homebrews in progress, alternate titles, and expanded re-releases can get especially tricky.

That about covers it.

If you haven't participated before, or if you did and got busy with other things, consider taking part in 2019! You may find that it has some interesting side effects -- I've found that keeping a log dramatically changes how I think about my own gaming, and mostly for the better.

[+davidcalgary29]

Jan 1-8

 

Vita:

 

Persona 4 Golden, 1002 minutes. 54 hours in and getting tired of this one. Im going back to my classic systems next week and will probably put away the Sony handhelds for the year.

 

...

Ok, finally finished the damned thing at 61 hours.

 

...and re-started it with the finished game perks. 64 hours.

[Kurt_Woloch]

Sorry, no gaming on modern systems for me this week.

[Eltigro]

Only 1 game for me this week...

 

GameCube

Legend of Zelda: The Windwaker - 1393 min (My New Year's Resolution was to finally finish some games that I've had for a while but never finished. This is the first one. I got this game new back in the day... got it with the special 4 in one disc with Zelda, Zelda 2, OoT, and Majora's on the same disc. I've never finished any of those, either. lol It's hard to explain where I am or what I've done in game so far, but I just finished the Earth Temple and have done a lot of wandering and exploring and treasure hunting and such. There's lots of side things you can do in this game, obviously, and I'm doing almost all of them. There's one where you take pictures of all the different NPCs in the game for a gallery, but I'm avoiding that one as I think that's a large part of why I quit playing it previously. I thought about playing this on my Wii, but decided against it and I'm using my GameCube... blurry composite and all. I do keep wondering how much better it would be with one of those adapters, but I'm not gonna get one of those any time soon.)

[StormSurge]

Xbox One

COD Black Ops 4: 602 minutes

The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt: 255 minutes

[+wongojack]

MODERN:

DS

Retro Game Challenge 480

Xbox

Morrowind 856

XOne

Rise of the Tomb Raider 591

CLASSIC (ineligible):

PS1

Metal Gear Solid 1093

SNES

Zelda L2tP 427

I had a big week of playing games as I took some time off and chose to work on my backlog. You may remember from the classic tracker that I try to take a staycation every January, so that was this past week, and I got into some great ones.

On the modern side, it was time to try and make some progress in Morrowind. I've never finished the main storyline, so I got back to it. Playing it makes you understand why Bethesda made some of the changes they did in Skyrim. Major and Minor skills made sense for the genre but didn't make playing your character more fun. Also, not being able to hit something right in front of you is kinda lame and makes leveling up "Marksmanship" a tough thing to do as a miscellaneous skill. Overall, I'm glad to finally be playing such a foundational game, and I am enjoying the main storyline very much.

[digdugnate]

Nintendo Switch:

 

Diablo 3 -- 582 minutes

Super Mario Kart 8 -- 53 minutes

Super Mario Odyssey -- 1156 minutes

Kept plugging through Super Mario Odyssey and finished the game, plus started collecting more of the moons. I have a little over 1/3 of the total moons (999).

The Darkening of Tristram event was going on in Diablo so I made sure to grab the pet (since I hadn't yet).

I wanted to play Mario Kart 8 more, but my son was whining that I had the cart so I had to give it back.

[Skippy B. Coyote]

Nothing to report from my household for the first week of the new year, but we did log a fair bit of time for the classic gaming tracker.

[+wongojack]

Only 1 game for me this week...

 

GameCube

Legend of Zelda: The Windwaker - 1393 min (My New Year's Resolution was to finally finish some games that I've had for a while but never finished. This is the first one. I got this game new back in the day... got it with the special 4 in one disc with Zelda, Zelda 2, OoT, and Majora's on the same disc. I've never finished any of those, either. lol It's hard to explain where I am or what I've done in game so far, but I just finished the Earth Temple and have done a lot of wandering and exploring and treasure hunting and such. There's lots of side things you can do in this game, obviously, and I'm doing almost all of them. There's one where you take pictures of all the different NPCs in the game for a gallery, but I'm avoiding that one as I think that's a large part of why I quit playing it previously. I thought about playing this on my Wii, but decided against it and I'm using my GameCube... blurry composite and all. I do keep wondering how much better it would be with one of those adapters, but I'm not gonna get one of those any time soon.)

 

I love your resolution. I also fell behind over the years on 3d Zelda games and have tried to catch up. My advice is don't try to play more than one in the same year. They are very similar and tend to feel like a grind after a while. They did on me anyway. If I only play like one every 2 years, I find that I enjoy them more. 2d Zelda on the other hand seems to be fatigue proof, but I'm not exactly slamming those back to back or anything . . . now where is that Oracle of Seasons cart anyway?

[Eltigro]

 

I love your resolution. I also fell behind over the years on 3d Zelda games and have tried to catch up. My advice is don't try to play more than one in the same year. They are very similar and tend to feel like a grind after a while. They did on me anyway. If I only play like one every 2 years, I find that I enjoy them more. 2d Zelda on the other hand seems to be fatigue proof, but I'm not exactly slamming those back to back or anything . . . now where is that Oracle of Seasons cart anyway?

 

Thanks... I'm taking a few days away from it as we speak. I played for about 4 hours Saturday and had a huge headache... may have been how I was sitting or something, but that noise that the mirror shield makes in the Earth Temple certainly wasn't helping. Other Zelda games tentatively on the list are Link's Awakening and Link to the Past, but we'll see.

[carlsson]

Week 01

 

Top games

1. Legend of Zelda: The Windwaker (Gamecube) - 1393 min.

2. Super Mario Odyssey (Switch) - 1156 min.

3. Persona 4 Golden (Vita) - 1002 min.

4. Morrowind (Xbox) - 856 min.

5. COD Black Ops 4 (Xbox One) - 602 min.

6. Rise of the Tomb Raider (Xbox One) - 591 min.

7. Diablo 3 (Switch) - 582 min.

8. Retro Game Challenge (DS) - 480 min.

9. The Witcher III: Wild Hunt (Xbox One) - 255 min.

10. Super Mario Kart 8 (Switch) - 53 min.

 

Top systems

1. Switch - 1791 min.

2. Xbox One - 1448 min.

3. Gamecube - 1393 min.

4. Vita - 1002 min.

5. Xbox - 856 min.

6. DS - 480 min.

 

Total 6970 minutes and 10 different games on 6 different systems.

 

2019 starts with a strong week, three games over 1000 minutes each. Legend of Zelda: The Windwaker is new to the tracker and takes the individual crown, though just like last year the Switch wins the battle of systems.

[digdugnate]

Nintendo Switch:

 

Diablo 3 -- 95 minutes

Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild -- 67 minutes

Super Mario Kart 8 Deluxe -- 490 minutes

Super Smash Brothers Ultimate -- 734 minutes

I borrowed my son's Mario Kart cart again and played a fair amount through the 100cc cups. I picked up Smash Brothers Friday and spent my free time there unlocking stuff and being generally awful at the game, lol- for me there was a pretty high learning curve to actually *doing* stuff in the game.

Zelda rounds out my time this week but I haven't had much time to play it- I'm hoping to see some more time on the tracker next week for this one.

[Eltigro]

Just one game again... still working on Wind Waker.

 

GameCube

Legend of Zelda: Wind Waker - 409 min (Still going through and finding the treasure maps and going and getting those. Using a guide to find the ones I'm missing. Haven't really progressed much farther in the main story, but will probably do the next dungeon (Wind Temple I think it's called) this week."

[zylon]

Xbox-

Wolfenstein Tides Of War- 1hr 5min

 

*actually played via my 360

Edited January 14, 2019 by zylon

[StormSurge]

Xbox One

COD Black Ops 4: 729 minutes

Another quiet, uninspiring week.

[Kurt_Woloch]

Oops... I accidentally posted my times in the tracker for last year, so here it goes again:

 

Here are my times for this past week (January 7th through 13th) on modern systems...

 

PC (Windows up to XP?):

Visual PinMAME - Baby Pac-Man - 65 min. in 4 sessions

Visual Pinball - 8 min.

 

I've included the Visual Pinball and Visual PinMAME times from the Classic tracker here as well since I'm still not sure how to count them... Visual PinMAME probably works on the Windows 9x family and definitely works on XP, though I don't know if it runs on Windows Vista, 7, 8 and 10 as well since it uses COM objects for connecting the ROM's to the pinball tables. The ROM for Baby Pac-Man is definitely a "classic" game though...

[+wongojack]

Xbox

Elder Scrolls III: Morrowind 480

[+Cafeman]

Hooked up my Wii again, but playing GameCube games on it.

 

GCN Sonic Adventure DX, 60 mins.

GCN Sonic Adventure 2 Battle, 60 mins.

GCN Pitfall the Lost Expedition, 90 mins.

[Skippy B. Coyote]

No modern gaming in my household this past week I'm sorry to say, though we did log a little bit of time for the classic gaming tracker so Carlsson would still have something to do.

[Agamon]

PC (Win10)

Banished (420 min)

 

I was on a city sim kick over the holidays (Frost Punk and Avon Colony was played, as well), but that itch is scratched, so I'll probably not go back to any sim games until the new Civ6 expansion hits.

 

Xbox One

Celeste (150 min)

 

I come back to this every couple weeks, then once I get frustrated I put it down for a while, haha.

 

Halo: Master Chief Collection (190 min)

 

My brother got an Xbox late last year, so we're playing some co-op games online.

 

PS4

Spider-Man (810 min)

 

Loving this game; traversal, combat, story, all excellent!

[carlsson]

Week 02

 

Top games

1. Spider-Man (PS4) - 810 min.

2. Super Smash Bros. Ultimate (Switch) - 734 min.

3. COD Black Ops 4 (Xbox One) - 729 min.

4. Super Mario Kart 8 Deluxe (Switch) - 490 min.

5. Elder Scrolls III: Morrowind (Xbox) - 480 min.

6. Banished (PC) - 420 min.

7. Legend of Zelda: The Windwaker (Gamecube) - 409 min.

8. Halo: Master Chief Collection (Xbox One) - 190 min.

9. Celeste (Xbox One) - 150 min.

10. Diablo 3 (Switch) - 95 min.

 

Top systems

1. Switch - 1386 min.

2. Xbox One - 1069 min.

3. PS4 - 810 min.

4. Gamecube - 619 min.

5. Xbox - 545 min.

6. PC - 420 min.

 

Total 4849 minutes and 15 different games on 6 different systems.

 

A slightly less intensive week, but with three games on three different systems in a close battle for first place. Spider-Man makes a last minute entry and grabs first place, though it still is Switch at the top of the systems.

 

The Virtual Pinball and PinMAME games now are tracked in the classic tracker, as those seem to be playable on Windows 95/98.

[Kurt_Woloch]

Here are my times for this past week (January 14th through 20th)...

 

sorry, no modern games this week.

[+Cafeman]

GCN Pitfall the Lost Expedition, via Wii. About 6 hours, so 360 minutes.

 

I beat the game for the first time. I've owned it over 10 years, and remember Caf Jr playing it. I found it quite good and well designed. I enjoyed how the game includes many elements of Pitfall, Pitfall 2, and Mayan Adventure, like crocs, scorpions, vines pits, mines, jaguars, QuickClaw, electric eels etc. I did need to refer to a guide a couple times.

[Agamon]

PS4

Spider-Man (1075 min)

 

Not much variety this week, this game has me webbed-up, as it were. The map shows 90% completion, so almost done, though I did pick up the deluxe edition with the DLC over the holidays, so there's that, too.

[StormSurge]

Xbox One

 

COD Black Ops 4: 736 minutes

Peggle 2: 89 minutes