[Moogs]

So there's this Flash game:

Achievement Unlocked

It's a single-screen platformer wherein you control a little elephant with the arrow keys. Housed within this simple and tiny game are 99 achievements to be had, and a 100th achievement for getting all 99 achievements. You have infinite lives and no time limit. The timer in the upper left corner is simply there to inform how long it's taking you to finish this nonsense.

It's pretty great! The list of achievements are in a side bar on the right of the playfield. It doesn't tell you how to get any of them, but as you move and leap around you'll find yourself unlocking these things at such a rate that you'll have earned five or so in a few seconds. I haven't had this much fun with getting pointless awards since Dead Rising.

I don't really care about achievement points (I have about 6000 points total across two 360 gamertags), but I actually got all 100 achievements in this little Flash game here. It was an enjoyable 2500 seconds.
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[Persona-sama]

I sent the link to my friends and together we discovered how to clear the game.


It's kinda fun in a super simple way.
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[analogos]

"Get Off Your Seats" is the only one I ended up getting a hint on.

Cute, though.

[kzkb1]

The "New Xbox Experience" is a fairly repugnant thing, yes.

[dmauro]

Contra level select eh? Somebody hasn't played "too much Contra." :/

edit: Game Snob Achievement Unlocked!
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[alice]

Yeah, that contra one was pretty.

I only needed hints on get off your seat, countdown and for the love of me I could not figure out THIS IS SPARTA. (Like I freaking knew it was suppose to be a number too).

[Leau]

Off topic, but still tangential;

Whether you give a rat's ass about them or not, I'll never understand how people don't have more achievements. It's not like you can turn them off. And most games give you about 300-500 for just beating them, doing little out of the ordinary.

I've had my current 360 since October and it always surprises me to look at gamertags with 3 to 4 times as many different games as I've played with far less than half the pts I've just gotten casually. And I've not played any of the easy 1000/1000 games like King Kong or Avatar or whatever. In fact the only game I can recall playing more than once to get points is Dead Space. I guess it is as I've always suspected; most people just don't beat games. It's just odd to me.
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[astralpancakes]

GOTY!


I love achievements, but I don't obsessive-compulsively go out of my way to get them (like join multiplayer games were people take turns spartan lasering each other for achievements -- that sort of thing). I don't really see why people complain -- it's not like they're any more pointless than any of the other reasons you do stuff in games.

[Kilroy{ZTC}]

706 seconds. Somewhere between the 80-90% mark I think I started cheating, but only because the game called for it.

I don't really buy the prevailing arguments against achievements really, they're just kind of there and you can choose not to care if you want. I suppose after a point they're a distraction but I honestly can't remember any point in time where I went "damn, that achievement totally ruined the mood". Maybe I just, uh, don't get totally immersed in the gameplay experience or something.
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I has a blog

Older blog (Home of my Mother 3 article)

[eskaibo]

I think that the argument of people like dessgeega is that they're more a symptom of the state of things than the cause. Like sure they might be fun, but it's pretty hard to see them as resulting from a thought process not along the lines of "Shit shit guys how're we gonna get people to play this game more?"

Though they're originally a system-based thing, so uhh I dunno?

Actually man how did they originate, I wonder? Were developers clamouring for something easy to lengthen the Experience with, or did Microsoft think of something the developers would just love, or what?

('Developers' is probably interchangeable with 'publishers' in the above.)

[astralpancakes]

I'm guessing they came up with the idea for gamerscores first (supports the "community" aspect when you can compare scores with your friends, and at the same time helps sell games because the one with the most games tends to win by default), then started thinking about how points would be awarded.

[eskaibo]

Hey, clever!

[spinach]

It reinforces obsessive compulsive playing.

Think of the skulls in Halo 3.

That sort of bullshit.

[CubaLibre]

I only care about the achievements that reward you for doing cool stuff, stuff you might not have thought to do without the achievement. This includes some of the Episode 2 achievements and almost all of the Left 4 Dead achievements. And uh, that's about it.
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[CubaLibre]

Contrast, like, the Resistance 2 achievements, which are like "Kill 20 enemies with each weapon! Kill 50 enemies with explosions! Kill 30 enemies with headshots!" guh.
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[boojiboy7]

[Moogs]

I still think Bullet Witch has the best achievement ever: ONE point for beating it on the hardest difficulty setting.
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[astralpancakes]

[Predator Goose]

[boojiboy7]

Most of the skulls in Halo 3 got players to figure out new ways around the environments, and then also had some interesting effects on the game. (YAY!!!)
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[Leau]

I thought Lego Batman had some genuinely fun achievements. Like kill two cops and two criminals in one stage as two face. Or die nine times as Catwoman (cause cats have nine lives right?)

It's worth noting that Japanese developers just don't seem to "get" achievements in my opinion. There are some exceptions (like the aformentioned Dead Rising) but most japanese developed games I've played have exceedingly lame ones. I don't know why.
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[Flackon]

[spinach]

[spinach]

[Mr. Mechanical]

[parker]

I finally played that new Silent Hill recently, on an Xbox. Everytime I killed a new enemy, or say, shot my mother in the head (spoiler) it'd do the old *ploop!* Achievment Unlocked! deal. Way to take you right out of the damn game, which was already doing it's best fuckin effort to frustrate my every attempt to enjoy it on it's own. First thing I saw when I hit New Game was a loading screen with the main character guy laying flat on his ass and it offering some helpful tip for bouncing back up after you get knocked down. Imagine your first sight in Silent Hill 2 being James laying on the ground with his feet raised up in the air, like some excited kid rolling around on the floor, before it cuts to some serious shit involving a dead wife and a shit hole restroom.

What I can't stand is how they're forced on you, I don't want any part of this bullshit but there's no way to turn it off. How is that even legal, I mean there should be something in the bill of rights about this. It's invasive to my videogame playing. And Sony, way to roll over and paw the air at the first sign of the forum rabble batting their eyes and sucking their thumbs because your machine doesn't work exactly like an entirely separate machine that does it's own thing just fine.
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When asked how to avoid lust of the flesh, Diogenes began to play God Hand in answer. When rebuked for doing so, he replied, "If only I could soothe my hunger by playing Cooking Mama."

[Shapermc]

[haze]

just for the record, it's really OCPD, not OCD

I point this out because I am such a perfectionist.

[Intentionally Wrong]

[haze]

[Chuplayer]

Hahaha! That game was fun!
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Boycotting Digital Press for blatant anti-Semitism.
"Hotaru is just freaky like that. Just look at the select screen. She's between Dong and Butt." - Goh_Billy

[spinach]

[CubaLibre]

[parkbench]

[ghost_dinosaur]

Here seems to be as good a place as any to ask. I've checked all over my 360 settings and couldn't find a way.

Is it impossible to turn off the Achievement pop-ins?

They're finally starting to bother me when I've completed a very satisfying game and want to sit back and bask in the post-ending glow only to hear that loud BLIERNK. Even being able to turn off that sound would be enough.

[Schwere Viper]

[ghost_dinosaur]

How did I miss this?

Awesome. TY muchly.

[BenoitRen]

I finally played this today, and I had to laugh at the ridiculousness of it while playing it. I had fun. :)
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SeaMonkey - surfing the net has never been so suite
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[Kilroy{ZTC}]