It's time for a tolerance break

Dear Mother,

How do I stop finishing games? By which I don't mean playing the game until I see the credits roll, I mean utterly spending the game. Poking around until I've trodden (off) every path, quested every quest, collected every collectible, smashed every smashable, read every volume of the Lusty Argonian Maid. And when all that is done, installing mods and doing it all over again.

Not even linear games are safe, every game can be replayed, poked in unexpected ways, attempted to be broken, just to see if there's more of it beyond the obvious design.

Now, I'm not saying I don't enjoy playing games this way. I get easily absorbed by games' worlds and atmospheres, my head living in them even at times when I don't play. I love the deep escapism this provides but not every path leads to a nice view, not every smashable yields a worthy reward and not every quest feels like a quest rather than work. Worse than that still, playing games the completionist way means that I don't get to play many games.

How do I fight the compulsion of falling into the comfort of the same game again and again, and play new games, see new worlds instead?

Sincerely,
Compulsive Completionist

Dear Compulsive Completionist,