opinions on gamerscore/trophies

Edit history:

slowbro: 2009-02-14 07:03:47 pm

2009-02-14 04:12:01 pm

I've been scared to ask this, but I'd be very interested to hear what some speedrunners think of achievements and gamerscore. They run contrary to what we try to achieve, and I think all of us can agree that sharing a speedrun of a game is a much bigger thing than getting 1000 gamerscore.

That said, as a 360 owner since mid 2007, I have gone for gamerscore a fair amount. I've rented numerous games where the prospect of achievements was my biggest motivation. In a fair number of games I don't like that much, my main goal ended up being just getting a lot of achievements. But I never became such a nut that I stopped playing games on other systems :S Now I've earned like 180 gamerscore in the past month; I'm doing other things and for now I've lost interest.

To me, scoring near the top of a leaderboard is 10X more rewarding than getting the achievements, and working on an SDA speedrun is 100X better than leaderboards. (edit: to me sharing a video is so much better than just a score ... ) But I still like achievements, except when people take them way too seriously.

Thread title:

I've been scared to ask this, but I'd be very interested to hear what some speedrunners think of achievements and gamerscore.  They run contrary to what we try to achieve, and I think all of us can agree that sharing a speedrun of a game is a much bigger thing than getting 1000 gamerscore.

That said, as a 360 owner since mid 2007, I have gone for gamerscore a fair amount.  I've rented numerous games where the prospect of achievements was my biggest motivation.  In a fair number of games I don't like that much, my main goal ended up being just getting a lot of achievements.  But I never became such a nut that I stopped playing games on other systems :S  Now I've earned like 180 gamerscore in the past month; I'm doing other things and for now I've lost interest.

To me, scoring near the top of a leaderboard is 10X more rewarding than getting the achievements, and working on an SDA speedrun is 100X better than leaderboards.  (edit: to me sharing a video is so much better than just a score ... ) But I still like achievements, except when people take them way too seriously.

Eldar

2009-02-14 04:43:25 pm

I love achievements. Achievements can make a game even more fun or more challenging. Instead of just going through and beating the game, you can work towards something that could be rather difficult to get but while playing the through the game.

Lag.Com

2009-02-14 04:44:35 pm

sda loyalist

I like the idea of achievements. I designed a kind of memory-watching plugin-based system for detecting made-up 'achievements' for old PC games a while ago but, eh, who cares about that.

Maybe both ideas could be combined? I'm sure there's some game out there that would be interesting to watch a 'run of getting all achievements'. Smiley

VorpalEdge

2009-02-14 04:49:11 pm

welcome to the machine

I sometimes attempt achievements when they sound interesting and don't when they sound painful and tedious. Many of them are nice excuses to play the game in a new way. That said, since I don't have a next-gen system, I only actually have one game with achievements, so... yeah (for the curious: Sins of a Solar Empire). Also, I really don't care about gamerscore in the aggregate, since it mostly just rewards playing lots of games poorly.

I think you'll be pleasantly surprised by the responses, if how SDA monopolized the NES challenges booth at magfest is any indication.

slowbro

Edit history:

slowbro: 2009-02-14 09:17:28 pm

2009-02-14 05:06:25 pm

I thought responses would be more negative Smiley

Yeah, some achievements add new dimension to games, and achievements are a great way sometimes for a developer to suggest a goal they think players should shoot for. Course an equal number of achievements are stupid Roll Eyes

and some can lead to unenjoyable online play.

Ekudeht

2009-02-14 06:51:13 pm

I love YaBB 1G - SP1!

I don't bother with achievements. If I'm having fun with a game i'll play it, if I'm not then I won't - playing a game solely for achievements is not fun. I prefer going after leaderboards for games I love (such as Doom for the xbox 360 arcade) as anyone can get the achievements for that game but only a few people at any given time can be in the top 5, top 10, top 25 etc... And I wouldn't say working on a speedrun for SDA is 100X better than going for leaderboards.;-)

slowbro

Edit history:

slowbro: 2009-02-15 12:20:16 pm

2009-02-14 09:06:12 pm

That 100X thing is just me personally ... man I get more nervous/take more seriously recording for SDA than going for a leaderboard! I like sharing a video better than sharing a number.

Oh my, I thought of a problem with 100% achievement speedruns ... you may need a new profile for every attempt. That is unless SDA would accept doing what's necessary without the achievements actually kicking in. edit: Then again profiles don't take much to set up if you're not interested in getting them online.

I'm sure there's a real chance 100% achievements could work as some game's 100% definition, but would depend heavily on the game. How about that long list of MM9 goals (not the 12 XBLA achievements).

low% = low/no achievements?! My personal guess is that is unlikely.

Sir VG

2009-02-14 11:11:03 pm

Fucking Weeaboo

Quote from slowbro:

How about that long list of MM9 goals (not the 12 XBLA achievements). low% = no achievements?! My personal guess is that is unlikely.

Actually, it's impossible to beat MM9 with no achievements. Here's ones that make it so.

Whomp Wily! - Clear the game once.
Eco Fighter - Defeat a boss with only the mega buster.

And I don't think anybody would want to watch a low% MM9 run where Waltz wasn't achieved either, since that's beating the game in 120 minutes (2 hours). And along the same token, Tango and Jitterbug would be beaten too. Almost Invincible would be stupid too.

(Note: These are based off of the Wii's list. Xbox 360/PS3 versions may vary.)

Master ZED

2009-02-15 12:09:17 pm

Quote from Lord_VG:

Eco Fighter - Defeat a boss with only the mega buster.

Rush.

slowbro

2009-02-15 12:17:12 pm

For Mega Man 9 I was thinking 100% challenges rather than low %, but that's probably not feasible either. That would include a completion taking no damage ...

Sir VG

2009-02-15 12:45:33 pm

Fucking Weeaboo

Quote from slowbro:

For Mega Man 9 I was thinking 100% challenges rather than low %, but that's probably not feasible either. That would include a completion taking no damage ...

Well, that's the least of the issues. Here's the real problems (again, based on Wii):
Gamer's Day - Clear the game 5 times in 1 day.
Daily Dose - Clear the game once a day for 3 days.
Truly Addicted! - Clear the game for the 10th time.
Truly Hardcore! - Clear the game for the 30th time.
Destroyer - Defeat your 1000th enemy.

Then this combo:
Last Man Standing - Defeat all bosses with only one pixel of energy left.
Or
Survivor - Defeat one boss with only one pixel of energy left.

Combined with:
Mr. Perfect - Clear the game without getting damaged.

Quote:

Rush.

Cheap, honestly. But whatever it takes, obviously.

mikwuyma

2009-02-15 06:09:20 pm

My feelings on The Demon Rush

100% and low% will never involve achievements.

Think of it from the game's perspective, not XBLA achievements.

Elpis_TK31

2009-02-15 06:50:30 pm

PAL 50Hz KILL ME NOW

Achievements make me want to hurt people...I don't know why...

Seriously tho, my main gripe against achievements is that I don't want a game to give me preset challenges, If I like a game enough, I might just go nuts and kill the minimal amount of enemies in a game, beat it upside down, or use only a single form or weapon (I'm talking Megaman ZX)...
However, I'm not about to go beat a game without getting hit just because the creators thought it would be a nice challenge...wich is why I am completely ignoring the challenges of MM9.

For me, achievements add nothing to the (play)value of a game.

-Elpis

InsipidMuckyWater

Edit history:

InsipidMuckyWater: 2009-02-16 12:59:17 am

2009-02-15 10:17:28 pm

Visit my profile to see my runs!

Quote from mikwuyma:

100% and low% will never involve achievements.

Think of it from the game's perspective, not XBLA achievements.

One clarification if you don't mind: do you mean achievements will never be involved in those particular categories, or do you mean achievements will never be involved in the criteria for any speedrun whatsoever?

I don't really care either way, but I guess I also don't have an issue with getting achievements as an additional challenge for speedrunning purposes. If you do not want achievements included in the 100% definition for, say Half-Life 2 Xbox 360 version, you could always create a new category called '1000 points run' (or something hopefully less lame), since surely there will be instances where 100% still doesn't cover novel challenges that the developers have created like getting through Ravenholm with only the gravity gun, or visiting obscure areas in other games, etc.

What do you mean from the perspective of the game? If the achievements are officially part of the Xbox360/PS3/PC version of the game, then how do they not pertain to it?

Just curious! Again, I don't ultimately care either way. There are certainly some ridiculous achievements out there I wouldn't want to see performed... but of course, I wouldn't want to see certain 100% runs, either..

EDIT: Okay, cool.

[quote="mikwuyma"]
100% and low% will never involve achievements.

Think of it from the game's perspective, not XBLA achievements.
[/quote]

One clarification if you don't mind: do you mean achievements will never be involved in those particular categories, or do you mean achievements will never be involved in the criteria for any speedrun whatsoever?

I don't really care either way, but I guess I also don't have an issue with getting achievements as an additional challenge for speedrunning purposes.  If you do not want achievements included in the 100% definition for, say Half-Life 2 Xbox 360 version, you could always create a new category called '1000 points run' (or something hopefully less lame), since surely there will be instances where 100% still doesn't cover novel challenges that the developers have created like getting through Ravenholm with only the gravity gun, or visiting obscure areas in other games, etc.

What do you mean from the perspective of the game?  If the achievements are officially part of the Xbox360/PS3/PC version of the game, then how do they not pertain to it?

Just curious!  Again, I don't ultimately care either way.  There are certainly some ridiculous achievements out there I wouldn't want to see performed... but of course, I wouldn't want to see certain 100% runs, either..

EDIT:  Okay, cool.

mikwuyma

2009-02-15 10:50:19 pm

My feelings on The Demon Rush

IMW: The latter, I don't really see a point of adding achievements as an SDA category. Most of them are incredibly arbitrary, and in many cases, achievements in the same game conflict with each other.

Pootrain

2009-02-16 12:34:12 pm

train kept rollin

Quote from mikwuyma:

IMW: The latter, I don't really see a point of adding achievements as an SDA category. Most of them are incredibly arbitrary, and in many cases, achievements in the same game conflict with each other.

I think it would be cool to have an achievment catagory for some games. Obviously some conflict like you said but A HL2 360 run would be good I think because of the different routes that would have to be made and things like the Lambda locations would force the player to make detours into areas you would otherwise miss.

slowbro

Edit history:

slowbro: 2009-02-16 08:20:46 pm

2009-02-16 07:34:42 pm

Quote from mikwuyma:

100% and low% will never involve achievements.

Think of it from the game's perspective, not XBLA achievements.

No complaints from me.

There might be one case in 1000 where achievements would make sense as the goal of a speedrun, but obviously I was wrong that Mega Man 9 might be one of them!

To make it work would usually require us to arbitrarily ignore certain achievements. Actually the MM9 no damage challenge plus one unit of health challenges were part of what I liked about the idea though; no reason a speedrun couldn't include multiple playthroughs, just my opinion of course.

Lag.Com

2009-02-17 03:59:52 am

sda loyalist

Yeah, like I said, "there must be one". I wouldn't bet on more than one, though.

Looking at the list of Mass Effect (game I am currently playing) achievements, for example... you need to complete the game 3 times at least. And one of those runs will be extremely slow as you try to take lots of shield damage etc. etc. bad choice.

Maybe there are some XBLA titles where the achievements aren't mutually exclusive. Hexic HD almost comes to mind, the problem is that you have to play all the game modes and also you need a 3-pearl cluster and a 6-pearl, both of which ends the current game. I guess you could finish Survival with one and Marathon with the other.

Cromarty

2009-02-17 04:25:20 pm

astral guard

Achievements/"gamerscore" remind me too much of Star Ocean 3's battle trophies, which I hated. The whole system seems forced, unwanted, as if the games' existing goals were not enough.
In particular, why bother with achievements designed to increase difficulty when a higher difficulty mode would serve better?

Mercury.Com

2009-02-24 08:57:30 am

Sea of Green

I don't have a 360, so I don't have an opinion on gamerscore; but I still enjoy seeing little random, "You've Acheived BlahBlah!" notices when you do something in a game. (Like the random achievements in Metroid Prime 3: Corruption.) I won't go out of my way for achievements, though I think they're neat especially when I wasn't trying to do anything in particular.

gia

2009-02-24 11:18:05 am

I love YaBB 1G - SP1!

Quote from Cromarty:

Achievements/"gamerscore" remind me too much of Star Ocean 3's battle trophies, which I hated. The whole system seems forced, unwanted, as if the games' existing goals were not enough.
In particular, why bother with achievements designed to increase difficulty when a higher difficulty mode would serve better?

I found extremely fun the achievement "Jack of all Trades" on Day of Defeat Source, you are forced to kill enemies with five different gun types (rifle, sniper, grenades, smg and machine gun) in one life, you must scavenge the guns since you dont start with all of them, the sniper, mg and grenades being limited. You can always cheat but the idea is to not to of course.

The other achievements are not fun but make people try different classes, weapons and map types.

The Hand of Shame

2009-02-24 11:46:41 pm

I wear pants

I originally liked the idea of achievements, but then I discovered that in the vast majority of games it's impossible to get all achievements if you don't play online or co-operatively. I gave up.

Even worse are meta-achievements that have nothing whatsoever to do with actually playing the game. For instance, Team Fortress 2 requires you to play a game with seven people from your friends list. Not only is that unreasonably difficult and even impossible for many players (unless they go to achieve360points.com and try to set something up), but it has nothing to do with your skill or determination. It has nothing to do with the game.

Then there are semi-impossible achievements that only a couple of people in the world will ever get.

Basically achievements are bullshit and a massive waste of time. Microsoft should enforce reasonable standards instead of letting developers do whatever the fuck they want.

jp

2009-02-25 12:03:44 am

Quote from The Hand of Shame:

For instance, Team Fortress 2 requires you to play a game with seven people from your friends list.

Solution: Find a busy game and send a Friend Request to everyone. Eventually you'll find yourself in a game with enough real friends and enough people willing to accept a random request.

Of course that doesn't solve the issue of you not actually "Achieving" anything...

Part of me enjoys achievements, especially the ones that are difficult to obtain in games that I already enjoy playing. It often gives me an excuse to continue playing or play in a way I wouldn't have otherwise. The other part of me hates them for "making" me play a game in a way I don't want to just because it bothers me not having Super Duper Space Points that I know I'm perfectly capable of getting. These days I try my best to ignore achievements prior to playing through the game at least once (but that sets you up for a lot of narrowly missed achievements that you would have gotten with just a little extra effort... what a pain).

[quote="The Hand of Shame"]
For instance, Team Fortress 2 requires you to play a game with seven people from your friends list.
[/quote]
Solution: Find a busy game and send a Friend Request to everyone.  Eventually you'll find yourself in a game with enough real friends and enough people willing to accept a random request.

Of course that doesn't solve the issue of you not actually "Achieving" anything...

Part of me enjoys achievements, especially the ones that are difficult to obtain in games that I already enjoy playing.  It often gives me an excuse to continue playing or play in a way I wouldn't have otherwise.  The other part of me hates them for "making" me play a game in a way I don't want to just because it bothers me not having Super Duper Space Points that I know I'm perfectly capable of getting.  These days I try my best to ignore achievements prior to playing through the game at least once (but that sets you up for a lot of narrowly missed achievements that you would have gotten with just a little extra effort... what a pain).

slowbro

2009-02-25 11:40:27 pm

Might as well share all viewpoints ...

On the other board where I post/spam a lot, way back when I first got a 360 I posted something like "At first I thought I don't need someone to tell me when I 'achieved' something but now they're fun to go for," and another member posted right away that to him achievements are the best invention ever in video games. He doesn't go for every achievement in the games he plays, but he mentions his achievements frequently and he's about to hit 50,000 points Smiley

He apparently only averages 400 a game, so obviously he's played a lot of 360 games! Not that it matters, but he's not a youngun; he's a teacher and likes to brag he's been 'gaming since '74.'

Myself, yeah I go for achievements a lot when I play 360 non-Community games, but like I said with the speedrun idea I arbitrarily pick a lot of them that I don't want, either because they're too hard or require too much effort or are online or I just don't like them. I know some people live for 1000/1000s, but personally I don't value them. My standards tend to change one way or another when I really like a game.

My first experience with achievements was interesting and a little funny. My only 360 game was Geometry Wars, which I got free on a memory card. For me personally that game's achievements are hard to get; to this day I only have 30/200. After a lot of effort I finally won my first 10-point achievement, and I thought that maybe achievements really all were accomplishments, course I didn't know most XBLA games give away their first achievement so they can say 'purchase the full version now to keep the points you earned.'

The Maw has another of those achievements that have nothing to do with the game: play at six specific hours of the day. Haa, I bet I am only one of 1-3 people who have gotten that 'legitimately,' without messing with my 360's clock. Course I was playing competitively and eventually recorded a speedrun.

Gamerscore is new, but of course the basic achievements idea is not. Any Kirby Air Ride player knows the joy or frustration of going for tasks on a goal board. Those were fun Smiley

too bad so many 360 achievements are kind of dumb.

Might as well share all viewpoints ...

On the other board where I post/spam a lot, way back when I first got a 360 I posted something like "At first I thought I don't need someone to tell me when I 'achieved' something but now they're fun to go for," and another member posted right away that to him achievements are the best invention ever in video games.  He doesn't go for every achievement in the games he plays, but he mentions his achievements frequently and he's about to hit 50,000 points :)  He apparently only averages 400 a game, so obviously he's played a lot of 360 games!  Not that it matters, but he's not a youngun; he's a teacher and likes to brag he's been 'gaming since '74.'

Myself, yeah I go for achievements a lot when I play 360 non-Community games, but like I said with the speedrun idea I arbitrarily pick a lot of them that I don't want, either because they're too hard or require too much effort or are online or I just don't like them.  I know some people live for 1000/1000s, but personally I don't value them.  My standards tend to change one way or another when I really like a game.

My first experience with achievements was interesting and a little funny.  My only 360 game was Geometry Wars, which I got free on a memory card.  For me personally that game's achievements are hard to get; to this day I only have 30/200.  After a lot of effort I finally won my first 10-point achievement, and I thought that maybe achievements really all were accomplishments, course I didn't know most XBLA games give away their first achievement so they can say 'purchase the full version now to keep the points you earned.'

The Maw has another of those achievements that have nothing to do with the game: play at six specific hours of the day.  Haa, I bet I am only one of 1-3 people who have gotten that 'legitimately,' without messing with my 360's clock.  Course I was playing competitively and eventually recorded a speedrun.

Gamerscore is new, but of course the basic achievements idea is not.  Any Kirby Air Ride player knows the joy or frustration of going for tasks on a goal board.  Those were fun :) too bad so many 360 achievements are kind of dumb.

Carcinogen

2009-02-26 07:53:11 am

My gamerscore has never broken 4000 since I bought my 360.

There are guides to making 10,000 achievement points in 24 hours, though. Hrm.