Gaming,
Who finishes a story game?
Fewer than one in three players reach the end of a story-led game. We asked 1,400 of them where they stopped, and why.
Story-led games take years to make and are sold on their endings. Yet in our panel, only 29% of players who started one of this year’s major story releases, including Tessellate Interactive’s Ironbloom, reached the credits.
Where players stop
Most drop-off happens early. Half of the players who never finished stopped within the first five hours.
- Ran out of time: 41%
- Started another game: 26%
- Got stuck on a difficult section: 19%
- Lost interest in the story: 14%
Shorter games are finished more often
Games that take under 15 hours to finish had a completion rate of 47%. Above 40 hours, it fell to 18%.
“I want to see how it ends. I just don’t have sixty hours.”
Compare how running time affects cinema trips in The ninety-minute comeback.