Trying to beat my whole collection 100%... Anyone else try this?

[Gunstar Hero]

As the title states I'm trying to beat all the games I own in my classic collection. I don't have the largest collection but I have a solid 75 or so games. My goal is beating the games on the hardest difficulty and with 100% completion such as collectibles and all. Even if I beat the games before I'm going back to give it another go. My friends think it's a great idea and they want to help with co-op games too. I'm not going to completely nerd out and game multiple hours a day to do this. I just want to maybe play a half an hour or an hour every night or every other night and see how I do. I started this a couple days ago and already beat Mortal Kombat for the Genesis on the hardest difficulty.

Has anyone ever tried/done this?

Also wish me luck :)

[Captain_N77]

Playing 1/2 to 1 hour a night probably won't cut it, unless you're some sort of gaming god. That would work on a game like Legend of Zelda, where you can save, but some games like Ninja Gaiden or Ghosts n Goblins will take some serious dedication. Then there are games you can't really "beat", but the point is to get a high score; I assume you aren't counting those as part of the challenge. Good luck, you're gonna need it :)

I'd never be able to finish all of my games that are "beatable". For one, I have around 700 games. Some of the more modern games are really long, though not very challenging. Some of the older games would take me a lot of time to beat. If a game is really challenging, I tend to just play it until I feel ready to stop. Some truly challenging games I will push through to the end, but I have to really enjoy the game in the first place before I would consider that. On top of that, I know that some games are so insanely hard that they are pretty much out of my league to finish.

[MyTurnToPlay]

I predict you will fail. It takes a lot of time to beat crazy hard games...and also....you're probably not a good enough gamer.

So come back 2 months so I can tell you: "I told you so"

thank you.

[JakeM]

Good luck.

[WCP]

Yeah, I tend to agree that you're setting yourself up for failure by putting such a huge goal in front of yourself. Howabout picking say 5 games that you "wish" you had played all the way through, and just concentrating on those 5 games, and forget about everything else. Honestly, you really should just pick 2 or 3 games and concentrate on those. On weekends, you need to put some serious hours into the games to make a dent. During the work week, try to get at least 1 hour in each night. Pretty soon you'll start beating some games here and there...

[goldenband]

At 75 games, it's very doable if you're persistent. My NES collection was about that size when I was a kid, and I beat most of the games I owned at some point. And that was before the Internet (for hints) and emulators (for practicing tough parts of the game), both of which can make efforts like this a lot less painful.

My own collection is far too big to beat it all anytime soon, but I'm working towards beating a few subsets, and I really like beating games on their hardest difficulty before calling them done. I've had good luck with that approach so far, in part because it forces me to dedicate time and energy to a particular game rather than just breezing through it. Unfortunately, a few games are unreasonably tough on that setting, e.g. Shadow of the Beast II for Genesis which is just ridiculously brutal for a game that's so dependent on unpredictable timing and unavoidable hits.

[Guyra]

How doable this is really depends on what games you've got. Having 75 RPGs á la Final Fantasy or Baldur's Gate will take you huge amounts of time, while 75 retro platformers/sidescrollers á la Mario or Mega Man will only take a fraction of that time.

In any case, just remember to have fun. That's the most important thing. As long as you're having fun, all the other stuff doesn't really matter. :)

Good luck!

[Rickstilwell1]

I'm actually doing this right now. I sold my collection for much needed rent money and now the hours are back so I'm re-re-re-re-collecting games. The catch is this time my new boss, his roommates and my long time girlfriend are all interested in playing games now. So I am considering everything I can fully beat to be a good game. I'll be their quality filter. Then I'll have a separate smaller collection dedicated to very fun addicting arcade style games that I judge myself to be very skilled at, but that one comes after I get all the games with endings. I'm not just playing the hard modes though. I'm trying to be as thorough as I can so I'm beating the practice, easy, normal and hard modes as well. I'm beating fighting games using every character. Taking the time to do this will prove to myself that I like the games enough to re-play them and therefore get all the money out of them. How am I playing them before owning them? By thanking modchips, CD-Rs, emulators and flash carts for their existence.

I'm trying not to buy more games for the newer systems until most of the current ones I have are done. I have 5 3DS games and I've fully beaten 3 so if I can beat Sonic Generations and Ocarina of Time 3D it will be time to pick out a new 3DS game. Wii, PS3, and Xbox 360 I have a long ways to go on with what I already have. Especially my PS3 games which are comprised mostly of RPGs.

I haven't yet decided what requirements I'll give myself to buy complete in box games. Perhaps do a second playthrough of everything and record the footage for my youtube subscribers. Then I can keep the CIB neat on a shelf and have the cart onlies be the ones I let my woman and friends use with me.

[The 1 2 P]

This wouldn't even be possible for me. I have hundreds of games and because of work and my social life I wouldn't even be able to make it thru half of them. But 75 games is doable depending on certain factors. Your age is the first factor. If you are still young enough(let's say a teenager) then you wouldn't neccessarily have as many life responsibilities as an adult would. This leads directly into factor number two: free time. Thats a luxury that many of us with full time jobs and families just don't have. But if you have those two things going for you it wouldn't really matter how long or hard the games are because you could devote a good 5+ years towards your goal. Keep in mind that the speed at which you complete each game will depend largely on your skill level, unless you picked the 75 easiest games in the world.

[Rickstilwell1]

This wouldn't even be possible for me. I have hundreds of games and because of work and my social life I wouldn't even be able to make it thru half of them. But 75 games is doable depending on certain factors. Your age is the first factor. If you are still young enough(let's say a teenager) then you wouldn't neccessarily have as many life responsibilities as an adult would. This leads directly into factor number two: free time. Thats a luxury that many of us with full time jobs and families just don't have. But if you have those two things going for you it wouldn't really matter how long or hard the games are because you could devote a good 5+ years towards your goal. Keep in mind that the speed at which you complete each game will depend largely on your skill level, unless you picked the 75 easiest games in the world.

Yeah and skill level also depends on whether or not you've played a certain percent of those games before.

I have learned something though with the older RPGs like Dragon Quest/Warrior II - If you play the best graphic remake first you'll have an easier time getting thru the game the first time because the difficulty is usually toned down a little and attacks redirect. Then if you play the original version after that you have a basic idea of where everything is and you'll basically be playing it on hard mode because of the original's difficulty being higher and being gimped of the automatic attack redirecting. I have also learned that better graphics in an RPG help ward of the ADD that gives you the urge to play something else. For me the 8 bit versions and 16 bit versions are night and day in that sense.

[Dangerboy]

While I wouldn't do the hardest setting (usually Normal or Easy just because I prefer the experience over the challenge), I do plan on beating every PSone game in the US library. I've been wanting to do this for a long time, and I'm probably at the 200+ done mark as far as normal play since the system came out in 1995. The problem comes in sports games, Game Shows, and Infinite games. Do you play a whole season (I'd kill myself before doing a full baseball season in a video game)? With the game shows, do you try and reach a proportionate amount of winnings based on in-game money levels, etc.

I most certainly do this with my Neo CD set, but then how do you 'finish' a fighting game? Use every character, or just a once through counts?

[Zing]

I have less games than you and would be troubled to do this in my entire life at 30 minutes a day. Unless you collection is all Mortal Kombat length and difficulty, I can't see it happening.

I am also a little annoyed that you suggest it's a "nerd out" to play more than 30 minutes a day.

[goldenband]

The problem comes in sports games, Game Shows, and Infinite games. Do you play a whole season (I'd kill myself before doing a full baseball season in a video game)? With the game shows, do you try and reach a proportionate amount of winnings based on in-game money levels, etc.

Sega-16 has been doing a project where we're trying to beat all the licensed US Genesis releases in a calendar year, and one of the interesting things has been finding out what constitutes beating a lot of the sports games. With most of them, you'll eventually get some sort of ending sequence in season mode, however trivial. When I play sports games for the project, I've been focusing on baseball and tennis, and thankfully all of the baseball games have had an option for a short season of 15-20 games. That's a far cry from the insanity of Bases Loaded.

AdamL also has a nice project where he's documenting what it takes to finish all of the NES and SMS games. Unfortunately it's stalled for a while, but it's got tons of useful information (though there are occasionally some small errors or things he overlooked).

[bigbacon]

nintendo age has the same thing going for just about every nintndo system.

[recorderdude]

I've been trying to do this for my collection and, so far, it's been going great. Of course, given that the games I most enjoy collecting are 8 and 16-bit platformers, it's a bit easier for me (not that the games themselves are easy all the time...)

Beat quackshot for genesis in a little under 2 hours tonight. Surprisingly tough for disney and DEFINITELY harder than castle of illusion, but thouroughly enjoyable; I'd highly reccomend it for any other platformer nuts.

[goldenband]

nintendo age has the same thing going for just about every nintndo system.

Yep, that's (part of) what inspired the Sega-16 effort. I've beaten a few games for the NA ones (I think around 15 games total between last year and this one).

[bb_hood]

I hope you dont own Tetris

[JSoup]

For those saying it's not possible or otherwise won't happen, I encourage you all to visit the Backloggery for evidence to the contrary.

I'm attempting to work through the last of my unbeaten games, but my road block isn't time or talent, it's frustrating gameplay.

[Gunstar Hero]

With a good hour a day with some more on weekends or rainy days this is doable everyone. I'm not trying to do this in a week or anything I'm just going to take my time to master and enjoy the games and have fun with it and if I get frustrated I'll take a break thats all haha :) This is a self goal. I'm not trying to prove I'm the greatest, I just want to beat my games so I can experience the full glory of all of them. It's really an incentive to play and appreciate more and challenge my own playing abilities so I improve.

To those actually wishing me luck on this journey, thank you :)

[buzz_n64]

Has anyone ever tried/done this?


As for me, hell no! Some games are just unbeatable, like old Atari games and puzzle games. As for all the games I have that are beatable, I would need to dedicate all of my time for at least a year or two or more in order to do this, and I don't see myself doing this. I own 1,500+ games, and that would be a feat.

[kupomogli]

For those saying it's not possible or otherwise won't happen, I encourage you all to visit the Backloggery for evidence to the contrary.

I'm attempting to work through the last of my unbeaten games, but my road block isn't time or talent, it's frustrating gameplay.

You should sell FF13. No one should have to go through that. :P

[JSoup]

You should sell FF13. No one should have to go through that. :P

Aside from the final run, I enjoyed FF13 and look forward to 100% it, whenever I can be bothered to make those fucking auto-haste boots.
And, assuming I finish that and 13-2 this year, I fully plan on getting 13-3.

[The 1 2 P]

I hope you dont own Tetris

That can be beaten provided he's only doing mode B.

[sloan]

My collection has gotten quite large since its beginnings in 1980. 4000+ games means the answer to that question is a resounding, "no". Plus, as has already been mentioned, many early VCS, INTV, 5200 and Colecovision games are older high-score fests with no definitive ending.

Best wishes in your quest to do so though.

[WCP]

I'm not trying to say it's impossible, I'm just saying that you should start off with baby steps. For example, pick 3 games from your collection, and only play those 3 games until one of the 3 is beaten.

Then add one more game, so that you have a group of 3 again. rinse and repeat, over and over and over.

[Aussie2B]

I hope you've already confirmed that you like all 75 of those games. Beating every game in my collection is pretty much impossible just based on the numbers alone, but I have made it a goal to beat all of my Game Boy, Game Boy Color, and Game Boy Advance games. It's pretty manageable because I only have about 50 GB/GBC games, and then another 20 games for GBA. But the real sticking point is that some games are just so thoroughly broken, ridiculously difficult, and/or unpleasant to play. Some even sneaked up on me, like Magi Nation, which I bought expecting to enjoy based on all the praise only for it to become a completely miserable slog that I abandoned half way through years ago and have yet to push myself to finish.