Games: Cost per hour

[FatherJack]

Using my XFire stats, I compiled this list of the top 20 or so games I've played, with their approximate cost per hour.

Subscription games have the cost for the number of months I have been playing and add-on packs have been included too:

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Name                   Hours Cph(£)
Half Life 2 + CS         139 0.29 
Eve Online               289 0.42 
Oblivion                  69 0.58 
World of Warcraft        112 0.89 
Dragonshard               39 1.03 
Football Manager 2006     35 1.14 
Guild Wars                33 1.21 
Battlefield 2             56 1.25 
The Movies                32 1.25 
Call of Duty 2            31 1.29 
Call of Duty UO MP        19 2.11 
Dungeon Siege II          17 2.35 
Rome - Total War          16 2.50 
Black & White 2           16 2.50 
Sin Episodes - 1           6 2.50 
Quake 4                   15 2.67 
City of Heroes            26 2.69 
Empire Earth II           12 3.33 
Rise of Legends           11 3.64 

The cheapest per hour are an interesting mix of titles - which I found quite surprising - I thought one would dominate the other, given the radically different payment methods, but things even out over time.

[Joose]

Iiiiiiiiiiiiinteresting. I would do the same, but im about to go on holiday. I shall try it when I get back.

However, I fear i will run afoul of a few divide by zero style errors, due to the amount I tend to "pay" for my games.

[Dog Pants]

Hmmm. As long as someone posts another reply to this thread I'll do this myself tomorrow (probably). If they don't I expect I'll forget.

[Guybrush]

Football Manager 2006 35 1.14

was that all in one session?

I daren't install that daman game! I'd never leave the house again, lol!

:D

[FatherJack]

Football Manager 2006 35 1.14

was that all in one session?

I daren't install that daman game! I'd never leave the house again, lol!

:D

It was England from 2006 to about 2012, and maybe 2 seasons of Coventry City.

The 07's are out soon, Premier was supposed to yesterday, but I haven't seen it in the shops yet. I usually pick up LMA for XBox and CM for the PC every year since basically ever, but switched to FM last year as CM5 was bugged to buggery.

[Guybrush]

The game's is like a drug though - at one point I was playing 12 hour sessions, lol!

I can picture the scene now - I can't make it into work today, boss - we're in the playoffs!

[Gunslinger42]

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Name               Hours   C.P.H(£)
Battlefield 2      405     0.12
Swat 4             15      0.00
Call of Duty 2     53      0.47
Half Life 2        442     0.13

That's with all the addons/mods (Special horses/CSS/DoDS/Ep1) included. I'm also just guessing at most of the prices since I can't remember exactly how much each one cost when I bought it.

[MORDETH LESTOK]

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EVE  1000hours  0.045/hour

[FatherJack]

I did it as a kind of "value for money" guide, so it's only really makes sense when compared to the other games you play, and how much you generally pay for games - I kind of assumed £40 for ones I couldn't remember.

Games you didn't pay for don't make a lot of sense as their value for money to you is instantaneously infinite, adding their approximate retail price at the time you obtained it (SWAT Gold was £13.99 btw, £2/h currently for me) might help to place them in context with your other games.

I compiled this a couple of weeks ago, so it isn't really a response to recent comments about the expense of pay-to-play games, it just reminded me to post it.

Also it's a bit of a moving target - non-subscription games will become cheaper over time, whereas games you're subscribing to, but not playing will become increasingly more expensive.

I can't honestly say I've enjoyed 100% of the time spent in these games, either - but that's too subjective to catalogue, it perhaps worth noting that the only games on my list I'm still actively playing are CoD, BeeF, Eve and CSS. I'm subscribed to WoW until mid-September, but a mate has had my account for the last six months.

[Dog Pants]

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COD:UO / COD: 
111h / £0.18

Eve: 
579h / £0.23

BEEF 2: 
99h / £0.40

COD 2: 
37h / £0.68

Oblivion: 
32h / £0.91

CIV4: 
25h / £1

UT 2004: 
9h / £1.33

The Movies: 
9h / £2.77

Battlefield Vietnam: 
7h / £3.57

Brothers In Arms: 
4h / £6.25

Not all of those have all my hours logged on xfire, but it's shown me a few things I hadn't realised, like how few games I've actually been buying recently. Notably, half-life 2 is missing because it doesn't show up on xfire for me. Also, if you compare these games to other forms of entertainment, such as cinemas and football matches, they're pretty cheap really.

[Fred Woogle]

looks to complicated to work out

[Lee]

My top 3 best value are:

Eve: 555 hours at 16p per hour, although theres probably 100+ hours unlogged

CSS: 166 hours at 18p per hour

Beef: 119 hours at 21p per hour

My worst value is Splinter Cell Chaos Theory at £25 for 1 hour

[pixie pie]

However, I fear i will run afoul of a few divide by zero style errors, due to the amount I tend to "pay" for my games.

I think you'll find you'll only have divide by zero errors if you never play games, not if you don't pay for them. *Smug bastard*

[amblin]

.

[Joose]

I think you'll find you'll only have divide by zero errors if you never play games, not if you don't pay for them. *Smug bastard*

ah yes, my bad.

I do have a slight anomaly in mine though. Although I payed for about a year and a half of EVE (two years from start to finish, but with a few breaks in between), I sold my account at the end. Ive just worked out that after you take that into acount, EVE for me may have the best ratio of everyone on here:

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Eve - 367hrs - £-0.016 per hour

anyway, heres the more normal ones:

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GAME   COST   TIME   £/hour

CoH           126    199  0.633165829
GW            20      74    0.27027027
BF2            30      62    0.483870968
C&CG         30     76    0.394736842
WoW          0	     57	   0
UT2004	    30     44     0.681818182
CoDUO	   30	  34	 0.882352941
OBLIVION  30     32     0.9375

Of course, this is all a bit broken, as some of those were not exactly paid for

Ive actually counted WoW as free, as ive perfectly legitimately never paid for it, being on many betas and free trials.