Game session length


2017-05-03
I've been thinking that there might be interest to mark games with exceptionally short and long required play session length.

Examples:
* Broforce – each session is 1-5 minutes long, in this time you've completed a missions or several, though later missions can drag out in some instances.
* Dark Souls – varies, session can be any length since the game state is almost perfectly preserved with quit, this however can drag out to usually something like 3-15 minutes if player is in online mode and they get invaded (the game blocks quitting, but you can kill the game on Windows at least, or just unplug your network cable).
* Any turn-based game – depends on when you can save the game.

I would say games that can be progressed in within 5-15 minutes with the progress saved (assuming the game has save function) deserve some kind of marker for being playable in short sessions. Or if they can be completely finished in 5-15 minutes. One could argue that this can be split farther into "notable" progress and unnotable progress, in which case Dark Souls and Divinity: Original Sin probably wouldn't count for short sessions, since you can progress in them, but it's so little that it's not very impactful, but with both games you can play through them in 15 minute segments anyway.

Additionally, even if the game lacks a pause function, a game may be left running with no negative effects. Some games are not like this however.
Examples:
* Divinity: Original Sin – unless you stand in something that's already harmful, the game can be left unattended indefinitely.
* Dark Souls – unless player is offline, game can not be left unattended except in very few locations (e.g. Firelink), otherwise they risk being subjected drop-in PvP.
* Chess and other turn-based games – as long as there's no turn timer, game may be left unattended indefinitely.

Basicly mark games that can't be safely left unattended, since the rest are somewhat obvious if they can or can not with other info (turn-based, timers, pause function, etc.)

On the flipside of those are games with exceptionally long session length and minimum attendance time, games that require hour or two of your time to finish.
Domina as recent example has no save function and the dev has stated the game takes about 2 hours to finish (though players have been reporting 3-4 hours on their first completion). Domina does not have long session length, just long required game run time, since due to the game's modal design the game auto-pauses at certain times so game session length is quite short, but the game can't be quit between such sessions.

We already have short tag for games that are exceptionally quick to beat in comparison to rest of the games in their genre, which relates to all this.

2017-05-03
I don't favor tags with a tendency to subjectiveness.

2017-05-03
I would agree that subjectivity is especially problematic in this case. What exactly defines a session? The average length of a Nethack or Moria game from start to death is easily measured in seconds. Winning the game can be done in weeks. But people can play for years to win, or after years, die.

If some way to tag long and short that reduces subjectivity is thought of, then I'm all for it.

2017-05-04
Session here refers to any time you start playing the game and can leave it without losing progress (while still making some, so games like Nethack/Moria have short session length). The benefit here with tags is that they're searchable unlike the currently broken user ratings, because I believe there's groups of people who especially want fast games (short sessions) or avoid those with very long sessions.

2017-05-04
Then ... Let me revamp the user rating editing, and making them searchable.

2017-05-11
Then ... Let me revamp the user rating editing, and making them searchable.

That would be nice, yes. Though user ratings are still broken, so data can't be entered with them.

2017-05-14
I just got it fixed, finally.
Ratings can be entered as before.