I have been called. I must answer. Always.

Maybe it's just the beginning of the year. Maybe it's because I finished a bunch of crazy titles in 2024 and have a blank gaming slate now.

So here I am in 2025. I have a set of games I'm ready to play. They've been on the pile. A couple were picked up during the last 2 Steam sales. Jagged Alliance. Marvel Rivals. Cyberpunk 2077: Phantom Liberty. Expeditions: Rome. Pentiment. Even Homeworld, something I've been wanting to finish for decades. All great games, all of these and several others are ready to go on my hard drive.

For the last 2 weeks though, for some reason...Star Wars: Jedi Survivor just kept popping into my mind. I've had this game for about a year in my pile. I hadn't watched any new SW movies or shows. hadn't heard any SW music or YouTube videos. The game just kept...calling to me. So I gave in and installed it, and I actually felt excited to dive into this now.

Now to be fair, I am also suddenly diving into a bunch of Baldur's Gate 3 replays, but come on, that's BG3. The Sword Coast never leaves my mind.

But it's odd. Why did Cal Kestis reach out to me with the Force to install his game? Why that game? Why not The Witcher 3 (yet) or Fallout 4? I'm not talking about triggers, where you watch Band of Brothers and suddenly you're running through Company of Heroes, or you hear the Halo theme and now you're jumping Master Chief into a Warthog. There were no triggers to influence me.

I guess I just needed a sanity check on this one. Has anyone ever had a similar experience, where you spontaneously (and without an external trigger) just couldn't stop thinking about a game to the point you had to install and play? And if so, which ones?

This is generally how I approach all my backlog games. I never participate in the monthly backlog thread here because that's too much short term planning. If I say I'm gonna play x, y, or z, there's a large chance I'll be in the mood for game a, b, or c when the time actually comes to play.

Lately Rage 2 has been on my mind to finally get around to, so I finally fired it up this week and have had a great time so far. Similarly, i've been itching to play GTAV finally so that may finally be on the docket soon. Nevermind I've got Armored Core 6 and Octopath Traveler 2 either in progress or about to begin, respectively.

The backlog is eternal, plans are ephemeral, and really the best way to enjoy things is to do what excites us most in the moment.

I had to laugh at your mention of triggers, because that's exactly what I did last year after my wife and I watched Band of Brothers. Unfortunately there is no WW2 game that allows you to shoot Jimmy Fallon.

I get that "calling" feeling, but specifically with replaying games. It often happens about a year after I play a game that really made an impact. It's happened with Metal Gear Solid, Deus Ex, Dishonored, Oblivion, Skyrim, Bethesda/Obsidian Fallouts, Divinity Original Sins, and most recently, BG3. I also get it periodically with strategy games like Civ or XCOM. I agree, it's a mysterious feeling, because it seems to come from nowhere or deep within rather than any external stimulus.