Achievements/Trophies: Where do you draw the line?

[Cube]

I imagine one day, in the distant future, it'll be mostly digital download or serials to unlock important content.

 

Which can (by law) be transferred/sold on in the EU. So you can have second hand digital goods now.

 

Although it will likely be a long time before the new law is enforced, probably until some gamer is bothered enough to take it to court.

[jayseven]

@Magnus the collectathon in Revelations is bearable as you can get maps to show you the locations and there's no real difficulty. The pigeons in GTAIV and the trophies in Arkham City were just far too numerous.

 

Games that don't stack difficulty achievements are usually annoying - except for Shadows of the Damned, as that was a fun blast through. Currently aiming to do Fallout 3, though I didn't level up the 'boost' way to get achievements (use the perk to instantly give you another level to get achievement, then load previous save, do a bunch of bad/good stuff, do it again). There's a definite element of number crunching with this game but they're all part of the game anyway.

 

Sometimes I'm happy to run back through a game with a collectable's location guide. I do feel kinda duurty.

[Sheikah]

Which can (by law) be transferred/sold on in the EU. So you can have second hand digital goods now.

 

Although it will likely be a long time before the new law is enforced, probably until some gamer is bothered enough to take it to court.

 

Well they sell PC games with serials, and once the serial is used the game disc is useless preowned. I'm pretty sure if they ever wanted to implement this loyalty-achievement system they would at least have a single-use code to register your game to make the achievements count for something.

[Magnus]

@Magnus the collectathon in Revelations is bearable as you can get maps to show you the locations and there's no real difficulty. The pigeons in GTAIV and the trophies in Arkham City were just far too numerous.

Bearable' date=' yes (and I wouldn't have bothered if I hadn't been able to see the collectibles on the map), but a complete waste of time after the first thirty. If I go to the trouble of finding 100 collectibles, I expect some sort of in-game reward, even if it's just an alternate outfit or something.

 

I loved the collectibles in [i']Grand Theft Auto 3[/i] and Vice City, but found less than a dozen pigeons in Grand Theft Auto IV. In the previous games, you'd look behind that big mansion or make your way to the top of that large skyscraper and there'd often be a package/statue there, so I felt like I was being rewarded for exploring. In IV, the pigeons were in really strange places and were so hard to find that there were times when I was standing right next to one and couldn't spot it.

[jayseven]

The age-old "must look everywhere!" mindset. To this day, whenever my in-game guy goes down or up stairs I have to check under/behind the stairs for items.

[bob]

I generally just do the achievements that look fun/achievable. If it looks tedious or too hard, i probably won't bother. I remember i spent ages trying to do the long-drop-assassination achievement on Halo Reach, and i still never managed it. I swear it was broken on mine.

 

I spent ages trying to get all the purple tokens on Spiderman 2 on the Gamecube. No achievement for doing it, i just loved exploring that game so much i realised i'd found a large majority of them and so tried to find all of them. Eventually i had to resort to cheating, and even then i couldn't find the last one. I knew where it was supposed to be, but it wasn;t there. I think it was a glitch.

 

Yeah so basically i'll try to get some achievements, and the ones i can't get, i'll claim the game is broken.

[Hero-of-Time]

Here's a quirky little article from CVG that describes dodgy actions that need to be done in various games for achievements.

 

http://www.computerandvideogames.com/366241/blog/you-absolute-monster-achievements-to-feel-bad-about/?page=1#top_banner

[Dog-amoto]

Little Rocket Man.

 

That is all.

[Dcubed]

Achivements in of themselves are ok, but when they're tied to a wider metagame system, I hate them. They're dangerous skinner boxes that actively destroy game design (as devs are forced to incorporate them and design their game around them) and are designed to ensnare addicts into being locked to a certain system & to being forced to buy "easy cheevo" games in order to compete.

 

It's no less than the gamification of games themselves and publishers love them because they're an easy and cheap way of covering up bad game design with hollow rewards.

 

That being said, there are a few examples out there of games using them for good (Geometry Wars 2, Wii Sports Resort, Super Smash Bros Brawl etc). They're not evil of themselves, but rather the use of them in conjunction with a metagame system (like on PS360) is fundamentally evil.

[Hero-of-Time]

Achivements in of themselves are ok, but when they're tied to a wider metagame system, I hate them. They're dangerous skinner boxes that actively destroy game design (as devs are forced to incorporate them and design their game around them) and are designed to ensnare addicts into being locked to a certain system & to being forced to buy "easy cheevo" games in order to compete.

 

It's no less than the gamification of games themselves and publishers love them because they're an easy and cheap way of covering up bad game design with hollow rewards.

 

That being said, there are a few examples out there of games using them for good (Geometry Wars 2, Wii Sports Resort, Super Smash Bros Brawl etc). They're not evil of themselves, but rather the use of them in conjunction with a metagame system (like on PS360) is fundamentally evil.

 

Evil? Really?

 

Developers do need to put them into their games on the PS3 and 360 but in no way are they forced to build the game around them. If they wanted they could just do an avatar and allow the player to get them all in 5 mins. Its up to developers how to create and distribute them, surely?

[Dcubed]

Evil? Really?

 

Developers do need to put them into their games on the PS3 and 360 but in no way are they forced to build the game around them. If they wanted they could just do an avatar and allow the player to get them all in 5 mins. Its up to developers how to create and distribute them, surely?

 

The Gamerscore/Level system with PS360/Steam is designed to be as addictive as possible. It's there to provide a carrot for running on an endless treadmill and utilises the same techniques as used in MMOs and gambling machines in the aim to pray upon people with addictive tendencies.

 

How is that not intrinsicly evil? And there's no way to avoid using them since they're mandatory. You have to use them in some fashion, be it a shitty treadmill running task (kill 100 pigeons in GTA4 or find all flags in Asscreed), a tutorial framing device (Minecraft 360), an incentive to beat each level (Gears of War and most other level based games) or an incentive to explore alternative forms of gameplay experimentation (Geometry Wars 2). The point is that devs have no choice, even when it doesn't suit their game (Ico & Shadow of the Collosus) and oftentimes, it influences the rest of the game's design to be built around them (GTA 4, most EA games etc)

 

A game shouldn't require extrinsic rewards to be worth playing, publishers/platform holders shouldn't exploit vulnerable people and developers shouldn't be forced to design around a skinner box system.

Edited September 5, 2012 by Dcubed

[Cube]

I thought it was bad news when it was announced that the Wii U's achievement system wasn't mandatory.

[Hero-of-Time]

Yeah, I know they have to use them, but I still fail to see how a games design is built around achievements/trophies. Most of the time developers just slap them on in any fashion and its up to the player whether they decide to go for them or not.

 

The likes of GTA have always had collectibles, as have most games. Sometimes you got rewarded with an in game item, other times it was just for your own personal satisfaction.

[Shorty]

Although I have plenty of things to say on this subject, I'll just briefly mention two things:

 

1. Achievements are great little sub-goals that can give you a reason to keep playing, or to play in a totally different way. They have extended the life of many games for me.

 

2. Skyward Sword is about the only game I've played in the last year that didn't have achievements, and something about that was immensely refreshing.

 

Counter productive achievements annoy me as well. The most recent example is in Transformers FoC. There is an achievement where you have to play CFT and capture all 3 flags. Now when everyone in the game is trying get the achievement it stops the game from being played. You would carry the flag but none of your team mates would heal you. They will just walk behind you until you die and then pick up the flag for themselves and run to victory.

Without even knowing about this achievement, I captured the flag twice by myself (from their base to mine, not a dead teammate) yesterday, so I think I can probably score this one without it being too counter-productive Edited September 5, 2012 by Shorty

[jayseven]

@Dcubed I had to look up "skinner box" to see what you meant.

 

You think achievements are evil because they brainwash a player into playing a game into a certain way. Would you agree?

 

I don't think it's worth exploring other parts of your logic until I see your answer to this.

[Dcubed]

@Dcubed I had to look up "skinner box" to see what you meant.

 

You think achievements are evil because they brainwash a player into playing a game into a certain way. Would you agree?

 

I don't think it's worth exploring other parts of your logic until I see your answer to this.

 

It's not the achievements themselves that are the problem, it's the OS level Gamerscore/Level points metagame system that is the issue. Achivements are just behavioural modifiers that encourage a person to play a game in a specific way, but these metagame/gamification systems utilise the same staggered reward scheduling techniques as what MMOs and slot machines use to pray on people with OCD tendencies in order to install addiction.

 

Combining the two together is very effective in encouraging people to buy and play through games they wouldn't otherwise enjoy in order to raise their gamerscore/trophy level (ask yourself how many people you've seen asking how many trophies a game has, or saying "no achievements/trophies, no buy!")

 

The combination of the two changes the very game that vulnerable people play. Now they're no longer playing Gears of War or GTA, but instead they're playing the achievements game (where these games are reduced to being a barrier between an addict and their gamerscore)

 

That's why I don't like the typical OS level achivement system (though per game achievements are fine, because there's no addictive element involved in them that would otherwise not be there in the game itself)

Edited September 5, 2012 by Dcubed

[Jonnas]

Reminds me of this:

 

 

In the original site, the artist comments that he played a bunch of crappy games for easy achievements (something that takes hours, I suppose)

 

I believe this illustrates the point Dcubed is trying to make.

[Hero-of-Time]

I'm not as bad as that guy, I played Bulletwitch for an hour or so and sent it packing. Awful game.

[Ganepark32]

I think calling Achievements/Trophies out for preying on the OCD tendencies of the vulnerable is a bit of a stretch, especially pushing at the Skinner Box idea. Granted, the idea of classical conditioning is ingrained within gaming culture and these things are now commonplace but they aren't really the behavioural modifiers you think they are.

 

People put the effort into 100% a game with all the achievements/trophies not necessarily because of OCD tendencies. Given the price of games these days and that they've become shorter (at least as single player experiences due to larger numbers of games being released compared to in the 80s or 90s), it's more likely that people are just aiming to get everything out of the game that they can to justify that £40 or so that they are spending, and the number of people doing so will increase with the next generation of consoles as the games will presumably carry higher retail prices.

 

Rarely do achievements/trophies cover the area of behavioural modifiers when it comes to unlocking them. As I said, classical conditioning is ingrained within gaming and it a fundamental way for game progression. The drip feed of content just as you get tired of something to keep you pressing on. That in itself is more of a reward than any achievement and because it's been used in games for so long, people aren't really going out of their way or modifying how they play games just to unlock an achievement/trophy as it's how they've been playing game prior to these things being around and newer generations of kids are being brought up with them as part of the experience so there is no modification of behaviour there.

 

Even if you consider the metagame of the Gamerscore or a Level that is displayed alongside a profile, it's egocentric more than anything else. You could go so far as to say that Gamerscore or Level has replaced traditional leaderboards. Because we can compare them, we can see what achievements people have or don't have and go after them to match or better what someone else has got for a game and, ultimately, their Gamerscore or Level. This in itself is nothing new as it's just competitive nature, which is part of everyone's personality. And yes, perhaps some people will go out of their way to get an achievement or trophy but it's part of our nature to push ourselves to achieve something/test our capabilities, thus being that badge of egotistical honour; the 'I can do it, you can't' notion of competition.

[Daft]

When it comes down to it, if you like them they are a good thing. If you don't like them, they mean nothing to you and this whole discussion is irrelevant.

 

As for them being behavioural modifiers? Please, how cities are constructed and laid out are behavioural modifiers, the bloody sun rising is a behavioural modifier, a hell of a lot of things modify behaviour - it would be absurdly naive to assume this is some kind of rare occurrence that isn't in fact intrinsic to the functioning of society.

 

Also, "vulnerable" people? Who exactly is anyone to judge who is vulnerable? I could make a similar comment about Harry Potter taking advantage of vulnerable simpletons who wouldn't know true literature even if flights of angels serenaded them to sleep with lyrical perfection. It comes down to cultural competence, and while some people's cultural contextualisation of Achievements/Trophies provides them with little desire to collect them other people may find that they offer something much more than merely fulfilling their OCD tendencies - and you know what, both are perfect valid views - but it's never nice to belittle people, especially when some can invest a lot of their time into the pursuit.

 

Personally, I think they're a great way of recording what I play and when. I still remember my first Platinum. And when I finally got Late Boomer on SSHD, I was euphoric, genuinely euphoric.

 

TL;DR - Don't make sweeping generalisations. You get out what you put in.

[MoogleViper]

I really don't understand why people put so much feeling into achievements. I can understand the idea of playing something differently (such as L4D), but when people go out of their way to get stupid achievements then I find that incredibly sad. It's mindless gratification. Is that really worth the hours of mindless grinding (and don't say you find it fun)? I've even seen people on here say that they'll pay extra for the PS3/360 version because they want achievements over trophies or vice versa.

 

Personally I pay very little attention to achievements. I usually stroll through them to see if any of them offer some sort of mini game/interesting way of playing. But I'm certainly not going to spend hours on AC2 to try and get a few feathers just so I can get 1000/1000 of a meaningless number. I've got far more important things to do with my life, and I'm saying this as somebody whose life is quite meaningless.

[Sheikah]

It's the same mindless gratification that you get from collecting 151 Pokémon; there's not much point to getting every single one since you likely won't use them all, it's because we're pretty compulsive creatures. Some people are massive completionists and get that content feeling from 'doing everything'.

[jayseven]

Indeed, saying it's 'mindless' is just saying that you don't mentally approach gaming the same way. I could say to you that I think it's mindless to spend £40 on a game and stop playing after x hours, whereas me and my 'mindless' achievement hunting means I'm playing the game for another x hours.

 

If the person playing the game is enjoying the time spent, then does it matter?

[Ville]

It's the same mindless gratification that you get from collecting 151 Pokémon; there's not much point to getting every single one since you likely won't use them all, it's because we're pretty compulsive creatures. Some people are massive completionists and get that content feeling from 'doing everything'.

 

Well, at least that was a calculated decision by the developers themselves, and not something they had to add on...

 

The point is that devs have no choice

 

Pretty much just this. I think it's idiotic that the developers are forced to come up with achievements, especially when the gamer score doesn't even do anything! : o This forced nature can then be seen in the quality of the achievements: some are really good, and some just utter crap. However, there's no separating the two, because gamer scores accept any kinds of points all the same. Thus you have a system that feels both artificial and rather pointless...

 

When it comes down to it, if you like them they are a good thing. If you don't like them, they mean nothing to you and this whole discussion is irrelevant.

 

Not irrelevant at all. If developers have to include achivements, then the question is that how much do they affect game design and in which way? Does it guide the devs to come up with new ideas, or force them to spend time on pointless things? Are they just add-ons, or even taking away from the original game design? For example, do players need so many in-game rewards anymore, if they can get achievements? Does it deter developers from making highly-polished, integrated reward systems to increase player motivation, since "hey, well we can just slap on some achievements?" Now that's what I'd like to know...

Edited September 5, 2012 by Ville

[Daft]

I really do think those questions are utterly irrelevant. If devs don't like them they do a Terminator Salvation and have about 7 Trophies, one for completing each level. If they do, then they'll implement them well, like in SSHD. On a side note, this is why I think Trophies are much better than Achievements; I know a shitty Platinum when I see one (I recognise how hard it is to get the Platinum on Wipeout over some crap like Hanna Montana) whereas with Achievments, you can accumulate 1000G from a whole bunch of games.

 

To repeat myself, (although in a lightly different context) you can't make sweeping generalizations about how devs implement them. They get out as much as they want to put in.

 

Also, what is a "highly-polished, integrated reward systems to increase player motivation" if not Trophies?