Favorite, Keep, Uninstall, Delete: Cleaning Out the Collection 1

So here’s something I knew I’d eventually have to do. As I’ve said multiple times before, I have a massive Steam collection, with games of all sizes, accumulated through Humble Bundle, Steam bundles, games that used to be in my wishlist, or stuff I just saw and decided I wanted.

The advantage is that I’ll never run out of stuff to play for years. The disadvantage is that I am running out of space on my computer. Choices have to be made. Stuff has to go. It’s unfortunate, as I’ve been deleting most games I disliked, and in spite of that I still need more space. On Steam, a game stays in your collection if you uninstall it, and you have to manually delete it from your collection through Steam’s Help section, if you really don’t want it anymore. Meanwhile, there are games that you wouldn’t get rid of, no matter how big they are.

I have four choices that can combine in various ways:

-Favorite: 25% of the current selection. These are the games I would never, ever delete, I love them too much.

-Keep: The games I don’t like enough to set as my Favorites, but that I don’t yet feel like deleting or uninstalling. Will make up approximately 50% of the selection.

-Uninstall: Games that, for a reason or another, I will decide to uninstall. Doesn’t mean I’ll delete them from my collection – I keep them around in case I suddenly decide I’d like to play them again someday. No limit for this one, but I should try to keep it below 50%. These can be found in every other category: Every deleted game will have obviously been uninstalled, while I may also uninstall games Favorited or Kept in order to free space, the idea being that I can access them again later.

-Delete: The games that I just don’t have enough of an interest in; stuff that will not only be uninstalled, but removed entirely from my collection. Many of these aren’t bad games per se, sometimes they’re just the games I would like to keep, but won’t because I really need space. Sometimes, these can just be games that I’ve played to and through, and don’t feel the need to keep as I have done everything that could be done in them – so those games aren’t bad, just finished. These should be about 25% of the selection.

You won’t see the process because it’s probably boring and repetitive, but in my reflection, I judged each game on four points: Its file size, how much time I spent playing it, my original opinion of the game and whether it has changed or not, and the odds of me replaying that game someday. The file size may be a good reason to uninstall a game that may still be too good to completely delete, as an example.

The games are listed by size from biggest to smallest, as this has a much larger impact than you’d expect.

Favorite: Cuphead, Tabletop Simulator, Unturned, Surgeon Simulator, Bastion, DuckTales Remastered, The Disney Afternoon Collection, Card Hunter, 3D Ultra Minigolf Adventures Deluxe, DLC Quest

Keep: Dead By Daylight, The Beginner’s Guide, Goat Simulator, Q.U.B.E.: Director’s Cut, 2064: Read Only Memories, Castle of Illusions, RollerCoaster Tycoon: Deluxe, Chroma Squad, Splatter: Blood Red Edition, Audiosurf, Shantae: Risky’s Revenge (Director’s Cut), Airscape: The Fall of Gravity, Five Nights at Freddy’s, Game Dev Tycoon, Worm.is, You Have To Win The Game, Auditorium, Electric Highways, Floating Point, Rayman Origins

Uninstall: Dead By Daylight, Cuphead, The Beginner’s Guide, Q.U.B.E., Q.U.B.E.: Director’s Cut, Audiosurf 2, Castle of Illusions, Clockwork Tales: Of Glass and Ink, Chroma Squad, Splatter: Blood Red Edition, BEEP, The Desolate Hope, Camera Obscura, Brawlhalla, Beat Hazard, Five Nights at Freddy’s, Choice Chamber, Learn to Fly 3, Electric Highways, Floating Point

Delete: Q.U.B.E., Audiosurf 2, Clockwork Tales: Of Glass and Ink, BEEP, The Desolate Hope, Camera Obscura, Brawlhalla, Beat Hazard, Choice Chamber, Learn to Fly 3

Dead By Daylight: Keep, but uninstall

Cuphead: Favorite, but uninstall

Tabletop Simulator: Favorite

Unturned: Favorite

The Beginner’s Guide: Keep, but uninstall

Goat Simulator: Keep

Surgeon Simulator: Favorite

Q.U.B.E.: Uninstall and Delete

Q.U.B.E.: Director’s Cut: Keep but uninstall

Bastion: Favorite

2064: Read Only Memories: Keep

Audiosurf 2: Uninstall and delete

Castle of Illusions: Keep but uninstall

DuckTales Remastered: Favorite

Clockwork Tales: Of Glass And Ink: Uninstall and delete

RollerCoaster Tycoon: Deluxe: Keep

Chroma Squad: Keep but uninstall

Splatter: Blood Red Edition: Keep but uninstall

Audiosurf: Keep

BEEP: Uninstall and delete

The Desolate Hope: Uninstall and delete

Shantae: Risky’s Revenge Director’s Cut: Keep

The Disney Afternoon Collection: Favorite

Camera Obscura: Uninstall and delete

Brawlhalla: Uninstall and delete

Airscape: The Fall of Gravity: Keep

Card Hunter: Favorite

Beat Hazard: Uninstall and delete

Five Nights at Freddy’s: Keep but uninstall

Game Dev Tycoon: Keep

Worm.is: Keep

You Have To Win The Game: Keep

Choice Chamber: Uninstall and delete

3D Ultra Minigolf Adventures Deluxe: Favorite

DLC Quest: Favorite

Auditorium: Keep

Learn to Fly 3: Uninstall and delete

Electric Highways: Uninstall and delete

Floating Point: Uninstall and delete

Rayman Origins: Keep

I will split my games on my Steam collection as described here – set my Favorites, put the Keep games in the Reviewed Games folder, delete the rest. Soon you’ll see my upcoming gallery of games, with everything that I yet have to review (and the reviewed games blackened out). That should be done tomorrow. See you later.