Making Video Game Spending & Buying Habits Easy to Track for 2024
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- Опубликовано: 7 июл 2024
- I hope some of you find this spreadsheet useful & that you'll join me in keeping track of our video game purchases for the year! Let me know if you added any cool categories to keep track of 😄
You can create a copy of the 2024 Game Buying Tracker spreadsheet here:
docs.google.com/spreadsheets/...
2023 Video Game Buying Audit video: • Auditing My 2023 FOMO ...
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Correction: I changed the spreadsheet to account for leap year! So February now goes to 29 instead of 28 in the dates section.
Just a quick update for your formulas you could use that would eliminate the need for the dates tab. This will also allow you to use this for any year without need to change anything, no matter how many days are in the month (Ex: Leap years having 29 days instead of 28 in February). This is the updated formula I used in cell B2 on the Acquisition Analysis tab.
ARRAYFORMULA(countifs(Purchases!$E:$E,$A$21,MONTH(Purchases!$A:$A),1))
You would just need to change the 1 at the end of the formula to reflect the month you want to look at. This also locks the cell references (with the $), as mentioned in another comment below, so that when you copy them to new cells you don't need to update anything.
You know you're in for a good video when Emily opens up Google Docs
Alright, I'll be _that_ guy. Sheets! 😂
You are doing God's work on this channel. The transparency is so helpful especially for people like me who freak out when the sales are around lmao
Thanks Bubbs 🥰 hope something like this tracking sheet can help you & others with bringing some perspective on our buying habits 😁
Hi Dr. Emily! You are truly the gaming focused spreadsheet Queen.
I feel like I've just taken a relaxing Google Spreadsheets business class and I'm absolutely here for it. Excellent work on putting in the work for this video as well as the strength of organization and attention you pay to your own finances. I do not know but this may be the only video for this purpose like this on RUclips. Well done Emily, I got my copy of this!
I don't think I've seen something like this in the gaming space yet, but I'm glad to contribute (& hopefully spur on some more about thoughtful collecting) ☺️
Ohhhhhhhh this spreadsheet makes my brain so happy wow. Phenomenal work, Emily-This is a work of art😭
Thanks Alex! I have another one I'll be releasing soon for tackling the backlog :)
You're recent videos about budgeting and recording costs with your collecting hobby have been super helpful and insightful. Thanks for tackling this topic as it's one not covered too frequently, but one that is relevant to game collecting or any hobby.
Keep up the great work!
Glad to hear these videos have offered some valuable insight :)
Having a Spreadsheet to track the games that you buy is a brilliant idea which is also a good way to learn to organize. I think i might implement that idea into future purchases.
GOTY 2024 is organizing your library and purchases. These are great ideas to enhance my own Excel doc. Great project.
It's always a great day when Emily uploads 😊
I was trying to make my own spread sheet to keep a better eye on my game purchasing habits for this year but really struggled as ive never made one before. This is so crazy helpful thanks SO much Emily! I definitely will be using the template youve made! I really want to keep under a strict $ amount monthly, especially since i got a little carried away this past holiday season with all the sales 😅
Happy to help! Best of luck with your strict budgeting this year :)
Your personally-crafted resources are always much appreciated. Thank you for the hard work. The "Double Dip" column is hilarious; I think that's 70% of my games.
This is a great idea, but it would give me such anxiety 😅 I’m sure this’ll help out a lot of people though, so thanks for sharing!!
I sat down shortly before my daughter was born - knowing that I would soon have **no time whatsoever** - and made a spreadsheet of all my digital download purchases. I gathered all sorts of interesting insights - for instance, that on average I buy a game 1.7 times (across a total of six formats). I knew that I’d bought duplicates in the past, but I didn’t realise before exactly how much of a weakness I had for it. And I’ve not bought a duplicate since…
Just a tip for the future - if you want to be able to drag cells and have them point to specific cells, you can use the $ notation like this:
A$22. (With $A$22, it will always point to the same cell no matter where you move the cell. With $A22, it will always point to the same column. With A$22, it will always point to the same row)
I read all that in an Indian accent.
I don't use Google sheets too often, thanks for the tip!
Thanks for noting this
I enjoyed this video more than some tops, reviews, or other videos from RUclips, which focused more on the videogames themselves. It was really fun to watch.
Wow, way more in depth than mine. I just have separate Google documents for each console's digital purchases, and one document for all physical purchases, grouped by console, all in alphabetical order.
Im a big fan of turning your hobbies into over detailed spreadsheets, and so I am looking forward to the end of 2024 / beginning of 2025 when you review your "completed" spreadsheet 😅
Thanks for sharing this Emily!
I’m sure this will help me a lot to track everything.
I’m excited to test it this year 😊
My pleasure! Best of luck with all your tracking this year :)
Definitely appreciate the better mic you use here. You are helpful. You have a real calming voice. I like you’re organizing systems
Hi Emily. Hope you're doing well. You look amazing in this video. Not sure if you've done something different with the lighting, but it looks great. Keep up the great work. Love your videos and friendly demeanor
I love this video! Not only am I a videogame nerd, I am also a self-professed Excel geek! Yeah, I know you’re using Sheets but they are 99% the same. I am planning on diving into your spreadsheet and seeing what I can learn from how you approach things. It looks very organized which will undoubtedly be a huge plus for me! Thank you!
I'm not that advanced when it comes to working with Excel, but it was fun looking up some functions and making this spreadsheet aesthetically pleasing & easy to navigate :)
I applaud this overlooked part of collection, because its the darkside of compulsive behaviors linked to collecting.
Wow, this is impressive. I've learned there is something very zen about fighting FOMO 😊😊😊
Great video @Orbalology ! Thank you for making a copy of this document. I’m excited to do my own future audits now. Hope you’re having a good day!
Hope your audit goes well for this year :)
This isn't something you'd see on many gaming channels, but it's good to see you doing something different to the others. I have a strict policy of not using spreadsheets unless someone's paying me to but its a great idea for the more organised among us 😄. It's so easy for hobby spending to go kaka if you take your eye off of it. One of my other hobbies is scale modelling and I often look at the triple wardrobe* full of unbuilt kits and wonder how much they add up to, then I decide I'd rather not know.
*plus some boxes in the garage 😔
Thank you for your hard work! I've already started mine, and I edited a version for my books purchases. :)
Thank you so much for this informative Video!
It definitely inspires me to keep track of every game purchase I make this year.
Love it!
That is really cool that you are providing this to people. I should start keeping track as I haven't gotten much this year to cut down on the "why did I get this again?" I may add a Y/N FOMO purchase column as it is probably good to keep track of that (internally, I think we know when it is a FOMO purchase). Many bonus points for that Sky SC music playing in the background.
I'm going to have to take full advantage of this.
If someone told me I would be enjoying a video on google sheets I would laugh at them but I really did enjoy this :)
thanks for this Emily. bubbz took the words out of my mouth, these videos' have been really helpful in helping me keep track of all my stuff. god's work indeed.🙂🙂
I'm glad to hear that the videos in this topic have been helpful! ☺️
Thanks for sharing the Google Doc file. I'm thinking of using this to keep track of video games, Blu-rays, and figures I purchase this year.
These trackers are great for all sorts of hobbies! Hope this template helps with customizing yours 😁
These comments are great. Emily is amazing.
all right I think it is pretty clear u come from a scientific background and I don't even know what I bought yesterday ;) I download it tho thank you looks super!
Love these budget videos!!
This video came at the perfect time because I'm definitely planning on buying/ spending less on video games this year. I maybe should stay off twitter though because seeing pics of those beautiful analouge pocket screens is tempting me.
The Twitter deals & fomo is real! May be best to limit your time over there (something I've been considering as well 😅)
Thank you so much, Emily. I was just about to make my own google spreadsheets. Saved me a lot of work 😅
Glad I could save you a bit of extra leg work :)
Thank you!! I start using it you made it fun and easy. Very helpful!! 😉
Super helpful video! I just made a spread sheet, with my backlog as well as one with all my purchases I make! It helps to be organized!
It does! Spreadsheets can be great tools especially in the hobby space.
I work at a thrift store so I just trade stuff in that I find for credit so i barely pay anything for games!
I've just discovered your channel today. Not only are you a gaming nerd but a spreadsheet nerd. I love it. Keep up the great work 👏👏
Thanks! haha
Emily, you just helped me take things up a couple of notches. Thanks for taking the time to share this with al of us, but especailly for doing the legwork on the backend to set this whole thing up. It's much nicer looking than the thing I had cobbled together. Thankfully it's the first of the year, and the perfect time to start using it!
Glad I could offer some cool tips! Best of luck with this year's tracking 😄
Hi Emily. I'm really happy that your eyes are alright & better. I really love your spreadsheet. I'll be honest with you, I've never seen any gaming channels I watch do a spreadsheet. I am more connected with you now watching this spreadsheet of yours because I want to minimize my spending & also I am curious now on what you will be buying & spending throughout the year.
I'm feeling much better, thanks! And I'm glad to hear the spreadsheets look useful for you. I'm looking forward to sharing how my year goes with this tracking too 😄
Thank you for the Purchase Tracking Spreadsheet template. This will certainly help with my video game spending.
Thanks to you, this is the first year I’m keeping track of my purchases. It’s so helpful
Best of luck with all your tracking this year!
This is PHENOMENAL! I’ll definitely be using this spreadsheet!
Aww yay! Would love to hear how your year goes if you would like to share 🥰
Thank you for sharing! I am going to do my best to keep track of my spending habits for the next year, and see if it can temper my self control a little. I hope you have a happy year of gaming :)
Thank you! And happy tracking to you too :)
Definitely going to use this this year. It’ll be fun to see the numbers at the end of the year but hopefully it’ll also slow me down during the year if I go a little overboard, great idea
Do you really collect for the Sega Pico🤩? My first thought was "That is a name I haven't heard in long time." Then Trash! 🤣 LOL!
Good job on the spreadsheets and thanks for the personal finance video a few months back. People under utilize the real power of spreadsheets. I've only seen a few people really use a spreadsheet like a pro in the past at my organization.
Love it. now im going to be down a rabbit hole customizing it.
Damn u are super technical this is very kool me i would just meh it when it comes to spreadsheets and documents I'm way to lazy for that 😅
Amazing video Emily! Thank you.
Honestly Terrified to do this after my Doordash Audit. But now you have me Curious! Gonna have to do it!
Yay! Hope you find tracking this useful (& insightful) 😊
I've been waiting for you to upload today as soon as I saw your announcement. Your videos on these are very informative and also entertaining and very useful. I know I spend a lot of games for sure 😮😊.
I hope you find this spreadsheet helpful! 😄
EXCELLENT topic, and great tools to help us spenders of video games! Also appreciate the detail you had in explaining the concepts.
The devil's in the details as they like to say 😂 I hope lots of folks find this spreadsheet helpful ☺️
Thanks so much for this. Collecting games has always been a fun, but pricey pastime. Its nice to have an easy tool to help put into perspetive how much money I annually spent on this hobby.
There's always a fine line to walk with expensive hobbies like this! Glad to hear this is an easy tool to help put some things into perspective :)
Now in glorious 4K! Lookin' great!
I buy games as the fitness way of life. When I want volume I bulk then I cut. Same for the gaimz...I bought them all then I have a cutting season where I don't buy anything at all. That's it, keep grinding.
I usually never comment on videos but thank you! I'm someone who budgets, but just puts video games under my "fun budget". I realized at the end of last year I have no idea how much gaming took from my fun budget so this will help a lot.
Thanks for commenting! Last year I only made a 'gaming' category in my monthly budget sheets so I'm looking forward to seeing how these added categories may influence my buying habits.
Number 2! 😂
Lol you're so organized. I'm like obsessively organized myself. I get such "teacher" vibes from you lol. Were you a teacher ever?
Nice spreadsheet. Will use it to keep track of my game purchases this year. Although I had to tweak the list to go up to like 150 games lolol. Considering I only beat 26 games last year. Maybe I shouldn’t buy so much? Nah I still will.
another great video emily, as someone who needs to control his spending this will help lol would you ever be open to doing another switch collection video showing us you undated library?
I've been thinking of sharing some updates on certain collection videos - my Switch collection has greatly changed since my last video :)
29 days in feb this year, Emily! Love the vid take care
Great catch! Thank you.
Holy sheet, this is outstanding!
...got any more? You know, for backlog management, collection tracking, etc.
I may have a backlog spreadsheet coming later this month :)
you know, spread sheets always overwhelm me, but this one is very interesting and easy to follow.
Glad to hear this was easy to follow!
@@orbalology 🤍
I will be making half the money almost this year so I gotta cut back for sure lol
This content was made for me.
I use an app on my phone to track all spending, have about 10 years of data. If I look at the total spent on things like games or technology over that time, it’s scary numbers!
I love you
It won’t last forever. Even if you spend at least $10k-20k or so building up your collection (like I think I did), things will level off, and you’ll have what you want and will just be adding new stuff as it releases or maybe the occasional grail here and there. Budget accordingly and enjoy!
I'm scared 😢 but since I think I beat your 2024 update video just in last month... 😅
I hate to be a negative Nancy but I am curious about your: total shipping and duties paid, total expired Nintendo gold points from not opening sealed games, and purchase periods comparing when the game was released to when you acquired it. Knowing how important the information in this spreadsheet must be to you: how many backups of it do you have, and how do you store your master copy? External Hard Drive or Micro SD?
I can’t really keep track of what I spend on games because I don’t spend much when I have two kids and most of the games I get are from yard sales. They are cheap cheap cheap 😊
You should go on Caleb Hammers show.
You must be popular at work for all that exceling. My next buy will be Final Fantasy Rebirth because it's only next month away and I like Honkai: Star Rail and FF Pixel R.M. Collection so no need to start spending more.
My annual gaming budget plan: act like I'm not buying as much stuff as I am :)
☺✌
I feel like I don't need a spreadsheet to know that I overspent by a lot, but I can always use them in the future to avoid it. Thank you for providing a copy and template!
Hope this spreadsheet can help curb some of your spending if that's one of your goals this year 😄
Please save me from the Unicorn Overlord collectors edition lol. The dang card game included is gonna get me!
I have a few friends who are always tempted by limited editions that include card games inside. I on the other hand usually avoid them because I know I'll unlikely ever play them 😅 Unicorn Overlord looks like a really neat game nevertheless.
Charts and statistics, an RPG fans best friend. It's a good video, I just wanted to make a joke.
How do you sell a DLC? I suspect anything digital can't be sold.
Do you buy from places like Walmart, Target, or Vintage Stock? I don't know if you have a Vintage Stock\Entertainment Mart in your area. Vintage Stock\Entertainment Mart are usually more for used games including the older systems. They also take the hardware. I suspect you got at least one Walmart and\or Target in the area.
I really enjoyed this video and learned a few things that I may have forgotten. How did you get so efficient in Excel?
You probably can't sell dlc easily unless you get it on steam during the return window. I sometimes buy from those stores but I almost always have to shop online because I don't have many local options near me. And the ones I do have a very limited gaming selection.
Excel I use a little in my work, but I looked up a few things on Google while putting this spreadsheet together.
This is awesome and thank you so much for sharing :)
Personally I don't use Google docs. Do you (or anyone really) know how to make it keep formatting in excel? I go to File / Download / excel to download a copy and convert it to an excel spreadsheet. The problem is it just leaves each page as the straight text currently shown on the Google doc. All drop down menus are gone completely.
Is their a way to work around this or would I basically just need to recreate it?
Admittedly I might be jumping ahead lol. I'm about 6 minutes into the video so far :)
I looked into it and it looks like some functions on Sheets do not convert to Excel sadly. But you can use similar code if you reference sheets to recreate in Excel if that's your preferred platform. What I like about Sheets is that it automatically is saved to the cloud so I can pull it up on my phone or computer anytime.
@@orbalology Wow, thank you so much for taking the time to look into this! Same results I found but was hoping I was just overlooking something haha.
Yeah, I prefer excel but could make an exception in this case. Thank you again! You're awesome
Hello Emily
Fev in this year go until 29
If I preordered something from PlayAsia in December and it arrives in January, would that be a 2023 purchase or a 2024 purchase? Just curious
I would mark it for whenever your payment went through! So if you paid for the items in December, that's part of last year's budget (imo).
Do you use any web. services or applications to track your collections?
I prefer entering things by hand than using apps. It helps make me a bit more conscious about which games I add to my collection.
@@orbalology Feel the same. But I've just started and my collection has more than 1,000 games. So I'm seeking a way to automate it somehow :)
I went on a spending spree.. I am being super strict this year.. except Tekken 8.. and FF14 Dawntrail 💀💀
Best of luck with your buying for the rest of the year!
I already have 14 games pre ordered in the first 3 months I failed already at cutting back 😭
There's still 11 more months! Don't count it as a failure just yet :)
@orbalology thank you 😊
What games are you looking the most forward to in the coming months?
I just have a few preorders I'm committed to this year that I covered in my last video. Hoping I won't be too tempted and wait for the rest I'm interested in to go on sale before picking them up 😅