New Year's gaming resolutions we're definitely going to stick to
What are yours?
Like the frost on the cars and ground this morning - and the inside of my single-glazed windows in my flat! - a new year has arrived. It's a time to take stock and look ahead and think what might be, and then run back into bed and hide under the duvet covers and refuse to come out. It's a time to plan and to begin aspirational journals you'll put down and forget about and never find again. A time to tackle the gaming backlog you keep talking about, fully in the knowledge you'll probably double it this year. It's fresh-slate time, promise time, all done in the hope you'll look back next year and discover you did something you intended to do. So, what do you want to do, from a gaming perspective?
Here, we look back at our gaming resolutions from last year to see how we did, and then we set some anew. Are you brave enough to commit yours to writing?
Jessica
I wanted to pay more attention to indie games last year, and while I certainly played more of them than I did in 2023, I apparently had a secret ambition to start more massive RPGs than ever before. It was hard to squeeze in time for those indie horrors and puzzlers when games like Final Fantasy 7: Rebirth, Metaphor: Refantazio, and Dragon Age: The Veilguard were all stealing 100-hour playtimes from me.
This year, I want to dial back the inventory management and take a bit of a breather, immersing myself in more peaceful landscapes. Spending so much time exploring Infinity Nikki's cutesy, fairytale-esque world has made me realise that whether it's a four-hour indie, or another 100-hour monstrosity, the time I spend feeling relaxed in one game is far more valuable than trying to work my way through a list - even if I am still looking forward to playing those games eventually.
Is this my way of giving myself a pass to just play Infinity Nikki this year? Maybe. But as long as it keeps its silly, mellow vibes that keep me feeling happy, I don't really mind if I'm missing out on the latest Game of the Year contender.
Tom
My new year's resolution is to become less of a completionist. I think it's becoming a problem. When I play games, I like to finish everything I can before moving on to the next area. I'm playing Indiana Jones and the Great Circle right now, for example, and I'm really keen to get out of the Vatican and back to the jungles and deserts that await. But I can't. Something inside me is making me hunt down photos of cats, and finish side quests and eat all of the biscotti I can get before I go. And that's great - it's a sign I'm enjoying a game that I want to be completionist - but the longer I linger, the more frustrating it can get that I'm not somewhere else already.
As I look to February and a likely 100 hours sneaking around feudal Japan in Assassin's Creed Shadows - a game that will probably be stuffed to the brim with distractions and collectibles, and whatever the feudal Japanese equivalent of biscotti is - it's a resolution worth making, I think. Ignore your bulging quest log, stop scouring for that last little thing. It's time to move on and get to more of the good stuff.
Marie
My resolution for last year was to complete the main story of at least three games I've not completed yet. Did I reach that goal? Technically no I didn't, but I'll give myself credit for coming close with two stories completed.
This year I'll be less strict, and less ambitious, with my resolution. I'd like to find myself returning to games that have previously brought me joy, specifically time-management or life simulators like The Sims 4. I spend most of my time on consoles with bigger games, mainly live services and RPGs, so it'd be nice to get back to the kind of PC gaming I used to love in games like The Sims and Rollercoaster Tycoon. There's something I find infinitely relaxing about managing the smaller details in those games (my parks are usually free with very expensive merchandise...).
Does this count as a resolution if it's so vague? I'd like to think so.
Chris
This year I'd like to play more games with other people. Specifically with my friends (my partner couldn't give two hoots about gaming and frankly I love that - it's nice to have our own hobbies!). But as my old group of friends has got older and busier and more spread out, gaming has been the best way to keep in touch with them. I fell out of the habit a bit in 2024 with all the usual, cloying tendrils of modern life getting in the way. This year, I'm going to reserve a little window of time, even if it's every other week, to check in with mates and play something together. That something will probably be one of the games we've been playing together, over and over, since we were spotty little teenagers, rather than anything new or exciting. But that's kind of the point.
Victoria
Last year I resolved to play The Sims more honestly, with no cheats greasing my hypothetical wheels to the top. Did I manage it? Well, not exactly. I tried. Hand on heart I really did. But the allure of spamming that money code is just too dang strong. I like being rich in The Sims, with all the hot tubs and space rockets that come with it. I don't like waiting for my characters to come home from work, for them to then watch shows on a crap TV which is always at risk of breaking. So while things started off well enough, I soon gave into temptation and deployed the motherlode code. I have no regrets.
As for this year, I am actually still a tad undecided. Since starting at Eurogamer, I have broadened my video game horizons tenfold, and in the last couple of years I have played more indies and other games than I ever would have. Last year, my personal Game of the Year was actually I Am Your Beast, and there is no way I would have given it even a glance a few years ago. But I absolutely loved it.
So I guess I'll do a similar thing again: resolve to keep trying games that may not initially sound like my cup of tea. Perhaps like last year, I will be pleasantly surprised by the results.
Katharine
I made a resolution last year to finally play GTA 5. Did I play GTA 5 last year? Did I heck. There's probably not much point in trying to do so now ahead of GTA 6 coming out if I'm being honest, but the GTA series as a whole has always been a bit of a blindspot for me, as have Rockstar games more generally. I just never quite have the time to dedicate myself to them properly, you know!? Maybe I'll resolve to finally play Red Dead Redemption 2 instead this year - the setting and tone of it is much more appealing to me as a concept than GTA, and I've always admired the horses in it as well. Honestly, nobody does horses quite like RDR2 does.
Bertie
I did it; I can't believe I actually stuck to a resolution. Last year I said I'd start streaming and I did. I joined a Dungeons & Dragons group called Chaotic Questers and began streaming roughly once a week on Twitch. We even went to a castle on the Scottish border for a weekend, to record there, which was fun, especially when our car broke down for good on the way back. It's been quite an adventure getting to know and understand the world of streaming from the inside, and it has increased my respect tenfold for the people who do it. Standing beside the M6 near a gang of cows - they were threatening, actually - while waiting for the RAC to appear was quite an experience too.
Oh, and while I didn't manage to start my own personal video game stream, my partner did, so that's probably worth half a point? I also didn't manage to run a tabletop RPG, though D&D formed a central part of my gaming year. I'm still reading TTRPG books, though, and tinkering away on my own campaign, so I came close. Another half-point?
This year, I'm being more specific. I'm almost embarrassed to admit it but I've never properly played through a From Software game. I've dabbled in them - in Demon's Souls (the original!) and Dark Souls and Bloodborne and Elden Ring - but I've never persevered for fear of being too aggravated by a game late at night. But I realise - Path of Exile 2 helped me realise - that I actually relish a combat challenge, so this year I'm seeking to change things. I promise to beat five bosses in Elden Ring, and you can hold me to that. And I'm phrasing it that way so I don't baulk at the prospect of beating the entire game, though that is my eventual goal, of course. I'm determined to do this - so determined I'm going to start tonight before my determination wanders, which it has an annoying habit of doing.
That's it. Nice and simple. Beyond that, I'm going to challenge myself to play games in genres I don't normally, but that's a much more vague thing to pin down.
Lottie
I've been playing RuneScape for more than half my life, which makes it my most successful relationship outside of my family. Considering this, you'd expect I'd have long maxed out my character's levels. Well this isn't the case. See, I've been sitting at Level 88 Herblore for the last seven years. In fact I don't think I've gained more than 10,000 XP in the skill during this time.
The issue is I just detest training Herblore. Outside of mini-games, the process is so tedious. Get herb, clean herb (yes, you have to clean it first), get second ingredient, buy vials, fill vials with water, put ingredients in, most likely empty vials so you can do the process over and over again. It just takes forever.
Yet, that Level 88 has been burning a hole in my eyes over the past year so, in the grand year of 2025, I shall attempt to reach Level 89 Herblore despite the pain. (And no. I won't use XP lamps. Don't bring such nonsense into my house.)