Gaming

Umm. It sounds more like that you are just trying out new things and genres and finding that it's not always a hit with you. That's healthy.

Surprisingly, Baldur's Gate 3. I absolutely love D&D, but I tried playing through the Pathfinder video games, Pillars of Eternity, Divinity: Original Sin 2, and nothing stuck with me. I just wasn't a fan of the CRPG genre, despite me playing in-person tabletop RPGs multiple times a week.

I bought BG3 thinking I probably wouldn't get hooked, but I didn't want to miss out when literally every one of my friends is playing it. Well, I am absolutely hooked and have 40 hours in the game and will likely do multiple playthroughs, and I kind of "get" the genre now. I know PoE, PF, or DOS2 may not be as good, but I feel a lot more confident at the prospect of playing them now.

So in this case, FOMO helped me a great deal.

Mass Effect Andromeda. The reviews convinced me I'd hate it, but I couldn't stand the thought of possibly missing some lore after I loved the first 3 so much. Turns out it was actually pretty good.

No Man's Sky. It looked slow and grindy but people kept hyping it up. I caved, and forced myself to play 20 hours trying to find the good bits. I never found them.

Cyberpunk 2077. I was pretty skeptical of it before it came out (didn't really feel like it was doing anything unique), but it was such a big release I picked it up to have an opinion on it.

Don't think I'm gonna do the same for Starfield, though, that's just a pass

Cuphead and I fucking hated it. Lovely art style and retro feel but my god. I play video games to unwind and have fun. What the hell maaaaaaaaaan.

Elden Ring

The glowing review and how people say its the best time to try a souls game made me buy it.

Not a game for me.

(Just in case people start saying I need to get good. It has nothing to do with the difficulty. I am thoroughly enjoying AC6 now.)

Minecraft.

Way back in its beta days, a couple of mates couldn't put it down. They couldn't explain why digging holes was fun nor placing cubes. I really didn't get it after a demonstration from them. Eventually had a LAN with a mate that was vaguely curious but also didn't think it was going to be interesting.

We didn't sleep for the next 36hrs, nor notice it was a new day until my family got up and started making breakfast.

Diablo 4. Played it for 10hrs then I got bored of running 30m, fighting a group of demons, running 30m, fight demons, repeat. Haven't touched it since.

That's not what fomo means. I have a bad case of FOMO right now with Genshin Impact. I genuinely like the game, but it forces me to login twice a day with the resin system (basically energy that accumulates over time), otherwise it caps and I lose progress. Also a lot of their content is in the form of limited time events. They do this for the obvious reason of it being extremely profitable. This is why you should be very cautious about getting into live service games.

A lot of the Zelda games, for me. I tried Ocarina of Time and Majora’s Mask and they were not my thing. A lot of people raved about those games but I couldn’t get into them. Then there were a couple on the DS that I couldn’t get into, either.

But then I found Wind Waker and absolutely loved it, and then loved Breath of the Wild and Tears of the Kingdom (so far), too!

Subnautica, because lots of people said it was a great game and there were things that could be spoiled, so that indicated a neat story. The beginning was freaking awesome! But I hate crafting survival games, so I didn't play for very long.

Among Us. But it was free and I only needed a couple of rounds to figure out I don't enjoy it much

Only multiplayer games, since a single player game is usually available forever someway or another. Multiplayer games live and die based on popularity. No players = no game. And the longer the game is around, the fewer players it generally has so I like to get in right when they come out if I'm interested at all.

Fallout 3 was one. I had just transferred to a new college and was dorming. Several of the guys were playing FO3, so I decided to get it, even though I knew almost nothing about FO games. But I knew it'd be something to talk about with people. And it worked, even though I didn't get that far into the game. Made friends; some that 15yrs later I still talk to on occasion. As far as the game itself, I haven't played another FO since; just generally not my kinda game.

My gaming buddies now, who I've known them for several years, have the attention span of goldfish, so I've largely stopped FOMO games purchases. I can't keep spending money on games they'll play for a week or two, or less. Though if it appears there's some longevity, then maybe I'll jump in. Barotrauma and Project Zomboid are a couple where the FOMO eventually won out, but it did pay off. We've sunk hundreds of hours into each game over the last 2-3yrs.

I grabbed Elden Ring on sale for $40 and I wish I hadn't

FO76 and had paid the pre order and I was hoping to do roleplaying but it was so buggy and the controversies made me no longer play it.

Nier Automata. I really hated the replaying it part. The combat gets incredibly boring after the first two playthroughs. I also found the supposedly "deep" story to be extremely lacking, very on the nose and, like way too much japanese entertainment, bipolar when it comes to emotions.

Valorant, Fortnite

I bought every FromSoft game up to DS3 during various sales because I'd heard unanimously how amazing they were.

Then I eventually played Bloodborne. Haaaaaated it. Never touched any of the other games I bought, and never plan to.

Yeah, I've got the same thing with playing previous games in the series. This summer I've tried playing BG1 and then BG2 prior to BG3's release - and I did not go very far (did not like the UI).

Those aren't really FOMO in my opinion, more like being curious about what the praise was about. It's trying new stuff, and rather healthy I'd say, even if you realize some of those really weren't for you in the end. Yeah, I had quite a few of those too.

To me, FOMO would be anxiety about stuff that you really can miss "forever" and regret afterwhile.

In games, it's weaponized with artificially limited stuff because whoever is pulling the string wants you to fear a missed opportunity and make an impulse decision.

It's stuff like preorder "bonuses" you will never have another chance to get otherwise, time-limited content, battlepasses, daily rewards etc.

One of the most pathetic recent example I can think of being Nintendo making the translation of a 1990 Famicom game available only for a couple months. "Quick, buy Fire Emblem now, before it disappears forever!!!"

Overwatch was basically the only way I could socialize with my friends for a while, even though nothing about it really spoke to me. I thought for sure the allure would wear off with my friends quickly, but they stuck with it for a long, long time, until after it became Overwatch 2, though the sentiment had turned on it before that.

I’ve also been stuck in the mentality of if I want to play a game in a series I need to play the prior games.

I do this too. I just played through Baldur's Gate 1 and 2 before starting 3, and I already know there's at least one recurring character who will show up in this new one; it's that kind of thing that makes me want to see what came before. However, if I was playing Armored Core 6 right now (which I'm not, but if I find the time, maybe I will), I won't be compelled to play the earlier games in the series. I tried Armored Core 4 back in the day, and the story is as much as "you're a mercenary; shoot stuff". Not a whole lot lost there, and that means that the sequel is more of an upgrade to the software than it is a totally different chapter in a continuing story.

Breath of the Wild. My first Zelda game. Not one single regret.