New Years Resolution

I only have one real resolution for 2013. There's the whole "get better with money and go to the gym more" thing, but that's an ongoing process rather than a specific-to-2013 goal.

I aim to buy no videogames for myself this year:. The idea popped up on The Society of using the PlayStation Plus subscription as your sole source of new games, and the rest of the year would be spent clearing your backlog or on more worthwhile pursuits.

I don't have the kind of backlog that some people do; there are maybe a dozen titles on Steam that I've never given a fair shake, but not too long ago we went through and cleared out a load of old stuff, and in the last few years my purchases have been pretty low anyway.

I figured it couldn't hurt to have a definite limit though, so the 11p-per-day* gaming challenge seems like a good way to prevent any spur-of-the-moment temptations.

This does, of course, largely rely on the PlayStation Plus subscription's "Instant Game Collection" keeping the quality up - and on my ageing PS3 staying afloat. I've had a few hard lockups recently playing Arkham City which have made me very aware of its age (it's a 60GB launch model, which I bought second-hand) and I've got the feeling it's going to be dead before the year is out - especially with the increased workload this "no games" year is likely to present. I've also got to contend with an almost-full hard drive, but spending £80 on a larger disk seems foolish for a machine that could be on its last legs - better to save the cash for now in case I need to replace the whole machine for a larger-capacity model in a few months anyway.

I almost cracked and bought FTL on the 1st when it popped up on the Steam sale, but managed to restrain myself before this - frankly, not especially difficult - resolution failed less than 24 hours into its life.

There are some caveats built into the resolution; the participants in this challenge on The Society have given themselves slightly different rules, from a limited number of wildcards to mentioning specific titles they won't be able to resist.

In my case, I'm going to let myself buy The Last of Us. I'm also not going to count games bought for me by others (although Catherine isn't going to be suddenly picking up my slack), or those I buy with Microsoft Points or PlayStation Network credit I already have, or that's bought for me. Only stuff bought with my own money counts.

I just hope I don't end up spending all the money this is supposed to save on movies or jazz albums instead.

* This is the cost of a PlayStation Plus subscription (£39.99) divided by 365, which works out as just under 11p per day.