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Denver, 4:18 PM
Sun Nov 15
19 posts in the last 24 hours
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10/29/09
I particularly resonated with the idea of performance vs learning goals in games and how those relate to actually giving the players the feedback they need to improve, rather than just the you fail/try again model. For me, with combat-heavy games, there is nothing more frustrating than dying over and over while trying different strategies, only to then succeed when I resort to full-on button mashing. It's this type of thing that makes me feel like I'm missing some key innate ingredient and thus I will never improve. There's no satisfaction in that type of success, and so I move on to a different game.
Maybe Miyamoto is on to something with the demo-play thing. I think a lot of people, especially when they are new to a genre, learn a lot of the basic strategies from their friends or siblings. Unfortunately, not everyone has someone that can show them how to improve, and the gaming community at-large is often discouraging and derisive to new players, as evidenced be the prevalence of the term noob. I think it would be great for more game designers to not only think about ways for their games to provide challenges, but also how to teach the player as they work towards the challenges. A recording of someone beating a level my not be a very sophisticated way of doing this, but it may be surprisingly effective.
I don't think this means the the game can't be hard. As a player I want to be challenged. I've seen a lot of feedback from Demon Souls that while deaths are frequent, they are always 'fair'. You know why you died, you can adjust it and you improve. On the other hand, games that aren't challenging and don't force you to learn anything are ultimately unsatisfying.
As far as achievements/trophies are concerned, too often they focus on arbitrary goals that simply force you to play in a way that is not fun. I think they could be used better, but ultimately they should be considered 'extras' and not instrumental to the enjoyment or completion of a game. The real goal setting should be built into the game and add to the experience.
10/29/09
- I play a game with the goal of finishing the story. I never look at the achievements page, because I don't want to worry about achievements as I'm playing... I feels it detracts from the experience as it diminishes immersion.
- After I finish the game, if by playing and finishing I've achieved a significant amount of the total points (say, at least 50%, but more like 75%), then I go for the rest. I don't usually get the 100% though (I only have 100% for 3 games so far).
- If otherwise, I've finished the game, and the amounts of points I've gotten is a small percentage of the total, I'm usually put off by that and move on to something else (thinking: I'll come back later on to get those). This applies even more if it's a rental, which I want to return as soon as possible.
Some games require a ridiculous amount of work after completion to get all the points. When I finished Blue Dragon, I only had 30/1000 points! I had put something like over 50 hours on that game just to get 30 stupid points. On top of that, it was a rental. There was no way I was going to keep going with that :-P ... #gamerscore
10/29/09
10/28/09
10/28/09
Taking a look at the titles here, of the ones I've played, I've completed them to my satisfaction. My motivations have been plot and challenge orientated and that's reflected in the achievements I have and haven't earned in these games.
For example, in both Gears games, I completed the campaign mode in co-op on the highest difficulty. I have very few multiplayer achievements because that just isn't my thing. I wanted to get a certain experience out of the games, and I did. (I also played Army of Two and RE5 in co-op for the same reasons and again my achievements reflect that).
When you have achievements that are based on different experiences within the same game, you are going to have people who don't get them because even if they tried everything, they enjoyed one mode more than the others and didn't feel the need to complete arbitrary benchmarks in modes that they don't enjoy playing. #gamerscore
10/28/09
For example, on the PS3 front, I hadn't played LittleBigPlanet for a few months, and I was scrolling over my trophies one day. I saw a few pretty cool trophies I hadn't unlocked, so I booted up the game to try to get them and before I knew it, I was hooked again.
For me, sometimes they work. Sometimes they don't. Games that actually have cool achievements sucker me into play more. But games like that NBA game that was posted about a few weeks ago where an achievement was to have 10,000 people log in online at once, I ignore.
I must say, though, that they've done a good job in this tight economy to keep me from going out and splurging on a ton of games. Instead, I look back at my old library, see fun games that I haven't played in awhile, and see what trophies I have left to earn. If it looks like there are some that are fun to unlock, I think less about that new game I really want! . . . and hopefully long enough for the price to drop. #gamerscore
10/28/09
Are you trying to attack your readers character or something?
How bout achievements are kinda tacked on gimmicks. Not everyone is suckered so easily. Remember this is the first generation to have these exterior goals. If there not particularly neat goals I don't go for them. And lets face it most achievements are for repitious activities (replaying the campaign on each higher difficulty level) or are simply mundane. #gamerscore
10/28/09
It's not attaching your character. Boredom is the developer's fault for not providing more exciting replay value / better achievements. #gamerscore
10/28/09
Actually, I was one away in Viva Pinata, but there was no way I was going to play for 50 hours when I had already done everything I wanted to do. My only other close one is Orange Box. I would have it, but my achievement progress for the Portal Challenges was reset when I was 5 away.
Also, whenever I rent a game, I feel more pressured to get 100%. Yet when I actually buy games, I feel I have all the time I need and I get lazy and eventually just give up. #gamerscore
10/29/09
10/28/09
10/29/09
10/28/09
10/29/09
10/28/09
When an achievement is beyond the skill level that I want to attain in the game, or is just grind work, (or worse, requires peripherals), I won't make any real effort to get it.
BURNOUT REVENGE
I have 1000/1000 in burnout revenge, basically because I was highly skilled (I used a Nixon for my entire career and could hold my own with 95% of the revenge racer users), and I played the game enough that I eventually just got all of the achievements.
Even there, "Crash Addict" was the last achievement I earned, because I think that the VS crash mode in revenge is broken. So I only did it when it was the last achievement I needed, just to be complete.
"Grudge O'War" was time consuming to get, but I just kept playing with the same people and eventually earned it in the course of playing.
GUITAR HERO 3
OTOH, I have beaten guitar hero on Med difficulty, but only have 145/1000 GS for the following reasons.
1) I don't play on hard/expert mode.
2) Because of that, a lot of the score based achievements are out of my reach.
3) A lot of the achievements are co-op based, and most of the folks I game with these days are online. And you can't do online career co-op.
4) The rest of the achievements are grinds. "Buy everything from the store", requires you to essentially beat every song in the game over and over in order to build up enough money to clear out the store.
GUITAR HERO WORLD TOUR
170/1000, even worse than GH3 because a lot of the achievements require you to be in a band. Although this time you can play with folks online, try finding three other folks (including some poor sap to be the vocalist) to complete an entire band career.
Throw in nearly 20 secret achievements basically I won't even bother looking them up.
-------
Number of Games: 46
Total Score: 15560 / 43770
Total Achievements: 865 / 2015 #gamerscore
10/28/09
It's an interesting chart but, it you can't get any relevant information out of it. #gamerscore
10/28/09
But just about every game has a couple asshole achievements that require an incredibly obscure/challenging feat, or require an insane amount of time/grinding. So even all of the people with 95-99% of the achievements in a game don't end up contributing to the tally of 100% completion. #gamerscore
10/28/09
Bad example, anyone should be able to earn 980gs in COD4 in under a month regardless of skill level (I suck at it, but managed to do it because strategy skill). The only difficulty is the Mile High Club achievement.
GH3 would have been a better example as you need to 5 star all songs in all difficulties and be successful in a variety of multiplayer modes.
But the point of the completion rates is that the way developers motivate players to continue affects how likely people are to complete the game.
If you are just told to complete arbitrary milestones you're not going to do as well if you can see how you're progressing and the improvements you've made. #gamerscore
10/28/09
Another way of reading it is that the average gs earned for GH3 is 90 and for COD4 it's about 450.
If you read it as % of players who earned 100% of achievements, the numbers are way too high. #gamerscore
10/28/09
Though yeah, as you say, those numbers would be pretty high. I've looked at the global achievement stats on Steam, and those percentages are surprisingly low for even some of the super easy to get ones. #gamerscore
10/28/09
I have about 64% gamerscore completion, and a lot of that comes naturally for me due to my general desire to squeeze every drop out of the games I buy.
I find that most often I draw the line at Multiplayer achievements. On a lot of my older games, this is because I didn't have xbox live and I haven't bothered to really pick them up again now that I have the interwebs at home. However, more often than not the MP achievements require me to wade in amongst the retards and assholes that populate the xbox live corridors and unless I'm really into the game, or I have friends to go in with, I simply don't enjoy that enough to pursue some of those achievements.
There are a few games that just flat require amazing skill to max out (I'm looking at YOU Guitar Hero III) so I don't even bother with altering my gameplay to get those. If it is more work than fun I just don't care.
There are also a few games that I hated and couldn't bring myself to pursue. I think after I played through Call Of Duty 3 once I ripped the disc out of the drive and took it directly to gamestop. So that has to factor in as well.
Finally, DLC acheivements; I don't buy every expansion or DLC for the games I play so those gamerscore opportunities usually go untapped. If I am going to throw more money at a game it will be because the content is so good it compels me to do so. If you took achievements added via DLC out of the equation I'd have closer to 75% complete I think.
In general, however, if its a fun game with mainly single player achievements I'll chase down most of the points because it is usually fun to reach those goals and they add depth to my gaming experience.
10/28/09
While I don't have anything really against acheivements, I do feel that they have been a detriment to multiplayer gaming. The obvious problem of boosters aside; you always get some jerk who instead of playing the game to help his team, is playing specifically to get acheivements. Like that punk who won't switch his sniper for that SMG or shotty on his back, even though he's got multiple enemies in close proximity, because of course he is going for his sniper acheivement. #gamerscore
10/28/09
10/28/09
There are no respawns in Shadowrun. If you die a team mate must resurrect you. That teammate gets 100 points for rezzing you and then half of what you earn after. There are no health packs in Shadowrun. If you are hurt, you have to stand by a tree of life to heal. Whoever planted that tree will earn points for healing you. There are no stolen kills in Shadowun. If you do 95% of the damage to the enemy and someone else comes and fires that shot that finishes them off, you still get 95% of the points for the kill.
Obviously the people who rez and plant trees are doing a lot to help their team win a match, and that help is fairly represented in the game rankings. #gamerscore
11/03/09
11/03/09
10/28/09
Is that why they don't curb achievements that are blisteringly impossible to get? Like Godlike in Shadowrun?
Or how about Multiplayer achievements at all? If you are late to the party, or play against anyone particularly skilled and/or serious, you can forget that right there.
Or achievements where you are actually encouraged to boost (aka cheat)? "I am Doom" in Marvel Vs. Capcom 2 was laid out like this in IGN's video on the Xbox dashboard.
Or achievements that require an unreasonable time commitment? I'm looking at you, Dynasty Warriors 6.
Or achievements in games that are glitched, but never patched? You have to trick Fallout 3 in order to get past that invisible hole in the roof in The Pitt.
And how about letting people add achievements to the game later through DLC? I had 1000/1000 in Halo 3 because I played it so much. Now it's up to 1750. o.o Jeez!
This is a problem of Microsoft's own making and if they wanted gamers to care so much about gamerscore, they would have let it become a source of frustration for us.
I'm not the first to say this, but it bears repeating. A game that isn't "fun" quickly turns into "work".