EPT
Let me be very clear: I love Achievements (trophies, w/e you call them). Having a meta-game running throughout all of your gaming experiences adds an additional level of competition that, while not stimulating from a gameplay standpoint, is totally worthwhile. There are some people who take achievements very seriously and more power to them – everyone needs a hobby. Especially with extremely difficult tasks in games, getting rewarded beyond “Hey you did it!” is very cool. Certainly, achievements shouldn’t be touted as a feature – they don’t actually add anything. If you don’t care about achievements, then you never should have to. Unlocking achievements shouldn’t be keys to unlocking content. They’re simply extra bits if you want to play the IRL Achievement Game (it should be noted here that I think gamification is pretty damn awesome).
On the other hand, there are achievements that are there for no explainable reason. For example, I recently bought Persona 4 Arena (since I will buy anything and everything Persona related, possibly multiple times). It’s a fighter, and I’m sure it has plenty of “legitimate” achievements (I honestly haven’t looked) for regular, game-beat-y kinds of things. However, upon making it to the title screen, I see my first achievement pop up: “Welcome to the Midnight Channel (10 p).” AKA “Congratulations! You bought and turned on P4A.”
…
This has two potential implications.
1) The Developers think you need a pat on the back immediately upon starting the game. That the player is so desperate for an accolade that they need to give you one immediately upon starting so you won’t weep at your own inadequacy. So they give you a free one to whet your appetite, keep you invested, and get you psyched to lodge more points on your account. Like a crack dealer.
2) The Developers think that you turning on your console and putting in their game is a very real accomplishment for you. Congratulations! You’ve managed to extricate yourself from the cave-like indentation you’ve impacted in your couch long enough to clean the Cheetos dust and Red Bull drops off of your hands, shakily limp over to the XBox to slide in our game, and depress the goddamn ON button. And you did it without developing a hernia or having a heart attack, though undoubtedly the sweat has soaked through your faded, yellowing Halo T-shirt.
When you start the game, you have accomplished nothing. This robs achievements of the only merit they have because now they mean literally nothing, since you get one entirely without effort. That’s bad enough.
And then there’s this bullshit.
On the other hand, there are achievements that are there for no explainable reason. For example, I recently bought Persona 4 Arena (since I will buy anything and everything Persona related, possibly multiple times). It’s a fighter, and I’m sure it has plenty of “legitimate” achievements (I honestly haven’t looked) for regular, game-beat-y kinds of things. However, upon making it to the title screen, I see my first achievement pop up: “Welcome to the Midnight Channel (10 p).” AKA “Congratulations! You bought and turned on P4A.”
…
This has two potential implications.
1) The Developers think you need a pat on the back immediately upon starting the game. That the player is so desperate for an accolade that they need to give you one immediately upon starting so you won’t weep at your own inadequacy. So they give you a free one to whet your appetite, keep you invested, and get you psyched to lodge more points on your account. Like a crack dealer.
2) The Developers think that you turning on your console and putting in their game is a very real accomplishment for you. Congratulations! You’ve managed to extricate yourself from the cave-like indentation you’ve impacted in your couch long enough to clean the Cheetos dust and Red Bull drops off of your hands, shakily limp over to the XBox to slide in our game, and depress the goddamn ON button. And you did it without developing a hernia or having a heart attack, though undoubtedly the sweat has soaked through your faded, yellowing Halo T-shirt.
When you start the game, you have accomplished nothing. This robs achievements of the only merit they have because now they mean literally nothing, since you get one entirely without effort. That’s bad enough.
And then there’s this bullshit.
Read on at the N3rd Dimension.
