I Wasted 1,500 Hours On a Game I Hate, Here's Why

Added: 2026-05-12

[00:00:10]Imagine this.

[00:00:12]You open up a game you have thousands of hours in.

[00:00:15]You're tired, you're bored, and honestly, you don't really want to be playing anymore, but you just can't stop.

[00:00:22]Why?

[00:00:24]Well, in economics, we have a name for this, and understanding it might just help you in aspects of your life way more than just games. Hi, I'm Stephen, and this is the Scarcity Show. Today, we're talking about sunk cost fallacy.

[00:00:38]Something that takes not only your money, but your energy and your time.

[00:00:44]Let's start with the basics. A sunk cost is any time, money, or energy you've already spent that you can't get back.

[00:00:51]The keyword is already. It's done, in the past.

[00:00:55]The sunk cost fallacy is when you let those past costs influence the decision you're making right now, even when it doesn't make logical sense to.

[00:01:05]Here's a simple example.

[00:01:07]You buy a movie ticket. You get to the theater, the movie is terrible. You leave, or do you stay and suffer through two more hours of misery?

[00:01:18]Most people stay, cuz they paid for the ticket. But, here's the thing. The money is gone either way. Staying doesn't get it back. The only thing you control is what you do with the next two hours of your life.

[00:01:32]This is what's called a logical fallacy.

[00:01:35]A flawed reasoning, if you will. When someone says, "I've already put so much into this, I can't quit now." That sounds logical, but it's not. Cuz what you've already invested has zero bearing on whether continuing is the right call.

[00:01:49]The question you should always be asking is, "If I started fresh today, would I still choose this?"

[00:01:57]Now, let me tell you about my own experience with a little-known game called Destiny 2.

[00:02:06]I played it for quite a while. I have over 1,500 combined total hours across platforms, and at some point I genuinely couldn't tell you when I stopped having fun, but I kept playing anyway.

[00:02:20]Now, most people when they talk about sunk cost fallacy in gaming, they talk about the battle pass. And sure, you drop 15 bucks on a battle pass, and suddenly you feel obligated to log in every single day to get your worth out of it.

[00:02:36]But, for Destiny players, there's so much more. Think about your vault. Think about the hundreds of hours you spent farming god rolled weapons, that perfect fate bringer, your full set of artificer armor with the right stat distribution, ships and ghost shells you spent real money on, exotic catalysts you completed, titles you earned.

[00:03:01]Cuz when you think about leaving Destiny 2, you're not just thinking about leaving that 15 bucks you spent on the battle pass, you're thinking about all of the hours you have in the game, all of the money you spent on the DLC, and everything in between. And your brain [music] says, "I just can't walk away from that."

[00:03:22]That's sunk cost fallacy at its most powerful. And it's not one sunk cost, it's hundreds of small costs layered on top of each other over years, each one making it a little bit harder to leave.

[00:03:39]And Bungie knows this.

[00:03:41]The entire live service model is built around making sure your sunk costs keep growing. New exotics, new cosmetics, new seasons, new things to chase, cuz the more time you have invested, the harder it is to walk away.

[00:03:55]Okay, so why does this work so well on us?

[00:03:59]There are three concepts I want to talk through.

[00:04:02]Number one, opportunity cost.

[00:04:04]Every hour you spend on something is an hour you're not spending on something else.

[00:04:10]That's opportunity cost, the value of the next best thing you could be doing with your time instead.

[00:04:16]When I was grinding Destiny 2, I wasn't building or studying or reading or even sleeping.

[00:04:23]And here's the truth, I wasn't even having fun.

[00:04:27]I was grinding cuz walking away felt wrong.

[00:04:34]Two, loss aversion.

[00:04:36]Loss aversion comes from behavioral economics, the study of why humans make irrational decisions.

[00:04:43]Research shows that losing something feels about twice as painful as gaining the same thing feels good.

[00:04:50]So, when you think about walking away from a game with thousands of hours and a full exotic collection, your brain tells you to treat that like a massive loss. Even though you're not actually losing anything. It's already yours.

[00:05:04]Pain of leaving it behind feels real.

[00:05:07]And that pain keeps you logged in.

[00:05:10]And three, cognitive dissonance. This one may be the sneakiest of the three.

[00:05:16]See, cognitive dissonance is what happens when you hold two conflicting beliefs at the same time. [music] In gaming, it sounds like, "Man, this game isn't fun anymore." And also, "I can't stop playing it."

[00:05:30]Those two things can't be true at the same time.

[00:05:33]Or at least your brain doesn't want them to be. So, it resolves the tension. Your brain starts lying to you. It tells you [music] it'll get better next season. It tells you the new exotic will change things.

[00:05:45]It tells you that you're just in a slump and you'll feel it again soon.

[00:05:50]That's cognitive dissonance doing its job. It's your brain protecting your ego from the uncomfortable truth that you've been spending time on something that stopped being worth it a long time ago.

[00:06:01]And when you combine all three of these, the lost opportunity costs you're ignoring, the loss aversion making leaving feel painful, and the cognitive dissonance convincing you it's still fine.

[00:06:15]You've got a perfect psychological trap.

[00:06:18]One that game developers are very very good at building.

[00:06:23]So, how did I get out of it? Well, here's what's worked for me.

[00:06:29]Ask the right question.

[00:06:31]Stop asking how much have I put into this and start asking, "If I started fresh today, would I still choose this?"

[00:06:39]That question cuts through the sunk cost trap almost every time.

[00:06:43]Name the cognitive dissonance. When you catch yourself saying, "It'll get better next season." Ask yourself if you actually believe that or not or if you're just trying to justify staying.

[00:06:55]Be honest.

[00:06:58]Set the rules before you start. Before a new season, decide your condition for quitting. "If I'm not having fun after 2 weeks, I'm done."

[00:07:07]It's way easier to make that call before you're emotionally invested.

[00:07:11]And finally, give yourself permission to walk away.

[00:07:15]The exotic collection isn't going anywhere.

[00:07:18]The hours are already gone and the only thing you're deciding right now is what to do next.

[00:07:25]Sometimes, the smartest economic decision you can make is to cut your losses and move on.

[00:07:32]I eventually quit Destiny 2. And honestly, I sort of got my life back.

[00:07:37]The sunk cost fallacy isn't just a gaming thing, though. It shows up in everything from your Netflix queue to your gym membership to your relationships. Hell, you and your college degree.

[00:07:48]And honestly, anywhere you've invested something, your brain is going to try to use that against you in order to make you stay even when it shouldn't. But now you know your tricks. The past is gone.

[00:08:03]The vault's still there.

[00:08:05]And the only question is, what will you do now?

[00:08:09]If this hit home for you, go ahead and hit subscribe.

[00:08:12]I love making content like this and I'd love to be able to do more of it.

[00:08:16]So, remember to also leave a like and maybe a comment down below. Thank you.

[00:08:22]Have a good day.