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General discussionHas PC gaming changed the way you feel about achievements?(97 posts)(97 posts)
(97 posts)
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This is my favourite topic
Posted January 12, 2018
for how to implement achievements, try GemCraft - Chasing Shadows. Yes, there is only 419 of the little suckers, but really well implemented with gameplay impact.
Posted January 12, 2018
Hey. I definitely feel and act the same, PS4 trophies are welcome by me, great to check in console storage the screen cap for each attached to keep a trace of progress too, whereas i don't care at all on PC with the single exception of Uplay for winning points to spend.
Posted January 12, 2018
The effect is cheapened on PC because you can just download and use SAM and unlock 90% of your achievements on Steam with the click of a button. Of course if you're extremely obvious about it you'll probably get reported but the point is they will probably always be much less tied in to your Steam/GOG account for that very reason. Unless they're server side only, those are not so easily exploitable with programs like SAM.

I don't really mind them nor seek them out unless it's a game I already adore and know the guts of already. I enjoyed how GOG's popped up but often times it would break and not pop up past the first time. Typical GOG. Show me something cool then show me it completely breaking...
Posted January 12, 2018
I do not use Steam nor Galaxy, so I do not see "general achievements" which are tied to the whole system, not to the game itself. If achevements are inside the game (like in some MMO games) then it just a nice addition for me, but not requirement to enjoy this game.
Posted January 12, 2018
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SpartanSloth: I was thinking about how PC gaming changed my perception of achievements today. After years of being a console player, I decided to move to PC as my main gaming platform recently and realized achievements don't really matter much to me anymore.
Personally I've always found achievements extremely irritating and I'm glad they didn't exist in most older games. I can think of nothing more immersion breaking / patronising than sneaking up on someone in Thief, getting ready to pickpocket / blackjack them and a ridiculous distracting bright banner pops up saying "Congratulations! You just snuck up on your 50th person!"

Most of them feel completely arbitrary and forced, like the devs had to make a list of 50 but ran out of ideas after the 12th then made the other 38x cheap padding. The way people talk about them also causes me to believe they're aimed mostly at people with Obsessive Compulsive Disorder (the same gamers who like them also tend to think 2,000hrs of grind-to-unlock something in the latest pay2win AAA grind-fests is somehow "fun"). I'm also pretty sure there was / is an "Achievement Unlocker" cheat utility ("Steam Achievement Unlocker" or something like that) that unlocked the lot anyway, so "100% maxed achievements" bragging rights took like 5 seconds to "achieve" for anyone who's obsessed with bragging to their friends ego-based stuff.
Posted January 12, 2018
With some shorter games (notably first person shooters like Battlefield or Call of Duty) achievements give me an incentive to play a story I liked again. The first time I don't worry about unlocks and achievements, I experience the game fresh, but if I had fun with the game, finding the unlocks/collectibles whatever gives a reason to revisit the fights and the scenery.

With most games I play however, achievements are absent and I don't miss them. Some years a ago I started trying out console games, first a PS 2, than a PS 3, but I don't remember achievements from them. On a PC it's far easier to Alt-Tab to game page with or about achievements, with a PS 3 games I don't bother to open a browser to go look for hints where the collectibles are, as using YouTube or internet on a PS 3 is way too awkward.

That narrows the games where I keep track of achievements down to games using clients like Steam, Origin or UPlay on the PC and those are of course in the minority compared to the client- and DRM-free games on GOG that I play and that by their nature do without achievements.

*edit: that last paragraph uses the word that far too often and that of itself is a sure sign that my head is tired at the moment after the first week of work this new year. Sorry for that and that.
Post edited January 12, 2018 by DubConqueror
Posted January 12, 2018
There are some I care about I guess. The FTL achievements are cool, as are some of the StarCraft 2 ones in the campaign. I guess I appreciate the way they push me to play the game differently and point out different play styles I wouldn't necessarily explore on my own.
Posted January 12, 2018
I don't really care about achievements, but I found myself checking the list of them more often that in the past. I try to complete some of them if they come my way, for example if an achievement tells you to kill 40 enemies with a shotgun and I've killed 38 enemies with a shotgun, then sure, I'll wipe a couple more to get the achievement. But that's that, I'm not gonna change my playstyle chasing achievements nor I'm gonna replay the game because of the achievements. If I grab some of them along the way, it's cool.
Posted January 12, 2018
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bler144: I tend to like achievements when they are creative, or humorous, and esp. if they can prompt you to really approach a game or an encounter or a skill differently than you would if 'beating' it was the only point.

If, on the other hand, they are things you would normally do anyway in the course of completing the game, I'm not sure they're worth much.

But worst are achievements that are pure grind and zero thought/skill, clearly intended just to fill space and/or waste time.
Pretty much sums up my own thoughts on it.

There are, I think, three games on Steam for which I have all the achievements, and I got those because I played those games a lot and enjoyed them.
Deus Ex: Human Revolution, for instance, has the kind of achievements I dislike (getting to certain points in the story, which you'd do anyway if you don't just quit the game halfway through), but it also has some interesting ones - playing through Missing Link without ever upgrading anything, which was an interesting challenge and fun to play. In that sense, at least the existence of the achievement made me do something fun I'd never have thought of on my own.
So basically, I don't care much, but sometimes achievements can make games more interesting in a way.

(Meanwhile, Grow Home has an achievement for drowning like 5 sheep. No way in hell I'm doing that!)

I do sometimes compare achievements with friends on Steam out of curiosity, but I'm not competitive in general, so seeing someone with an achievement I don't have won't motivate me to go and get it.
Posted January 12, 2018
Here are my thoughts:

First, there is no reason that achievements need to be tied to an online store.

With that said, there are a few types of achievements, some of which are good, but some which aren't:

1. Unavoidable achievements. These are achievements that, barring major skips, you can't avoid if you want to complete the game. Unless the game is *really* short and hard (I'm thinking TGM difficulty here), it doesn't really make sense to have these sort of achievements, unless they affect something in the game. (These work, for example, in Cookie Clicker where there actually is a benefit to getting achievements, but then again that game has no end.) On the other hand, post-game achievements aren't so much of an issue here.

2. Unfair achievements. These typically include those that would require a connection to an online service that won't be around forever. Even worse is those that might, for example, require placing first on an online leaderboard; even if the leaderboard isn't hacked, that's not something one could reasonably expect more than one player to ever get.

3. Interesting gameplay achievements. These are the type I like, that involve doing interesting things (or getting interesting things to happen). For example, an achievement for skipping part of the game would work (though the problem here is that, if the skip is not intended or discovered by the developer, the achievement can't appear in the first release of the game). Another would be an achievement for dying in an interesting way, to encourage players to search for deaths (particularly interesting for adventure games and roguelikes, both of which sometimes have funny death messages).

4. Score progress achievements. These are achievements for doing well in games that are more arcadey in nature (Cookie Clicker notwithstanding). For example, getting a high score, or perhaps reaching a level that most players will never reach. For example, in Tetris the Grand Master 2, reaching level 500 in Death mode is not an easy task, and would be worth an achievement. There could also be achievements for passing level 500 and for clearing the game (again, talking about Death mode). These differ from 1 because the tasks are difficult enough that not every player will be expected to accomplish them.

So, 1 and 2 are bad, while I think 3 and 4 can be good. Again, however, there is no need for a client or internet service to implement achievements into a video game.
Posted January 12, 2018
I like cheevos, but I'm not obsessed with them.

I'll usually play a game through once and largely ignore them during that playthrough - that's to say, my playstyle isn't focused on achieving them. I'll occasionally look through and see if there's any low-hanging fruit to be easily collected, but I won't spend hours on something just for the purpose of getting a trophy or achievement.

After that point I might look through the list and see how easy it would be to get a full set of achievements. If there are online-dependent achievements, I won't usually bother, especially if they require a ridiculous amount of games to be played or victories gained. Capcom's fighting games are notorious for this.

Some games tend to let you collect cheevos naturally over the course of game and leave just a few secret ones towards the end. I played The Sexy Brutale recently on PS4, and having completed the game, I had 17 of the 20 trophies, so there is a motivation there to get the last three, which by the looks of it are wholly reasonable challenges. Same with Crash Bandicoot on the PS4.
Posted January 12, 2018
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GR00T: I do have to admit that achievements did provide me with one of my most hilarious moments in gaming though. A number of years ago I was playing Risen (on my Steam account - this was before it came to GOG) and I managed to walk off a cliff - not for the first time. Of course, the character died, but the achievement that popped up was "IDIOT". I laughed my ass off. One of the few achievements that I actually appreciated.
That is awesome.

I was just playing through that a few weeks ago, but I guess need to walk off cliffs more often.

As for me. I don't mind achivements if they're there, but I never usually go out of my way to do them. And I hate when games have an additional reward structure built around them.
Posted January 12, 2018
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dtgreene: Again, however, there is no need for a client or internet service to implement achievements into a video game.
True. I've actually played a few games with in-game achievements (I think Grim Dawn is one of them). The only difference is you can't show those off to other people, which is apparently important.
Posted January 12, 2018
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dtgreene: Again, however, there is no need for a client or internet service to implement achievements into a video game.
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Crackpot.756: True. I've actually played a few games with in-game achievements (I think Grim Dawn is one of them). The only difference is you can't show those off to other people, which is apparently important.
Couldn't you just take a screenshot of the achievement page and post it somewhere online, like on social media?
Posted January 12, 2018
Achievements add to a game for me when done right. I'd just prefer if it were restricted to the game itself and not tied to a client like steam.
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This is my favourite topic
Community
General discussionHas PC gaming changed the way you feel about achievements?(97 posts)(97 posts)
(97 posts)