The Adrenaline Vault has posted an excellent and humorous article which looks at the many reasons gamers don't "play through" to the end of video games. As many of us at IMG are games reviewers ourselves, we can particularly sympathize with the author in this case. And it is an interesting phenomenon that many gamers --who would most likely never put down a good book or leave a movie early-- will leave a game unfinished. This may be particularly relevant as Mac users who, it seems, must fight and claw for each title yet are always looking for the Next Big Thing. Here's an excerpt from the article:

What keeps us playing all the way through to the end? Motivating players to complete a game is like motivating young minds to learn, by getting them to desperately want to get to the bottom of intriguing intellectual puzzles about which they cannot stop thinking. In other words, you have to stimulate the curiosity of the gamer to make the often massive expenditure of time worth the effort. A typical reason to make it to the finish has often been to confront your nemesis, the arch-villain who is the source of all evil, and this can be quite effective in keeping players from calling it quits along the way. Other traditional rationales include that you desperately want to restore order and save the world, or alternatively that you must unravel a truly hidden and earth-shattering mystery. But, as the game-playing public has become exposed to these kinds of ultimate goals over and over again, often something more is needed.

Article on Finishing Computer Games at Avault

Do you play through games to the end?

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