We’ve all felt it. We’ve looked at our achievements, especially for a game we’re playing, and we’ve felt a little tug when we see one. I could do that. It’d be easy.
I’m currently fighting it right now, actually. After reviewing Sleeping Dogs and Darksiders II, I actually sat down to play them as a gamer, not as a critic (and yes, that’s a compliment to both of these games). The problem is that they’re both open world games with a lot of trophies and a lot of collectibles.
And they’re both maddening in their own way. Sleeping Dogs has a relatively small number of collectibles, and completing dating sidequests puts the locations on your minimap. Darksiders II, meanwhile, is gigantic and crammed so full of collectibles it’s giving OCD gamers fits.
Which is starting to make me wonder if 100% completion is such a good idea.
There are very, very few games I have 100% on. In fact, I can only think of one: Double Fine’s Stacking, and that’s more through accident than design. I just really liked the game and collecting all the doll sets was fun enough (and it must be said, simple enough) that I wanted to do it. Similarly, going back and solving the puzzles in a different way was also pretty fun.
But most games I look at the trophies and it makes me exhausted. Take the upcoming Dishonored and its achievements: just trying to hit those alone will require at least two playthroughs. Many games at least make it possible with a New Game Plus, but even then that’s asking a lot. I just don’t have the time, and I can’t be alone in that one.
To go back to Sleeping Dogs, I left a lot undone in my personal playthrough. I didn’t do all of Roland’s jobs, I didn’t unlock all the lockboxes, I didn’t hijack five trucks, and I didn’t kill somebody with a fish.
But I still enjoyed the hell out of it, and the side missions weren’t necessary to complete the game. Similarly, with Darksiders II, I’m missing God knows how many collectibles but I’m still enjoying myself. Still, on some level, not having everything bugs me.
So, it leaves me asking… is 100% completion, and rewarding it, even with only a little digital trophy, really worth encouraging? Or does it get in the way of the game?
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I don’t usually care about the completion, and I find the Xbox live achievements to be kinda silly. Some of them are funny just because of the names and it’s kinda nice when you trip over one. I usually just play a game on story mode through completion and then I’m done. My kid however takes great pride in 100% completion and I find it to be a sad Pavlovian response that he’s submitted to.
Sometimes I can get caught up in trying to get everything, but normally I’m cool if I miss a or thing or two.
What really pisses me off though is when their are multiplayer trophies/achievements. When I do play multiplayer I do it so I can give my brain a break, not worry about getting a 5-kill streak.
I only have 3 games 100% complete. Borderlands, Dragon Age 1, and Mass Effect 2. The dlc made all those pretty time consuming but I really enjoy those games. I wouldn’t have gotten that far though if any of those games had those stupid get 100 out of 100 feathers, hidden orbs, spray paint tags, or whatever. I absolutely loathe those types of achievements. The data packets on ME2 were annoying but there was only like 6. Track down 200 feathers in AssCreed 2! F that noise.
Really, I only try to get 100% achievements if the ones I am missing look easy and not time very time consuming and I enjoy the game immensely. I wont be chasing around the nearly impossible, like finish Ninja Gaiden 2 on Master Ninja difficulty, or do those that are incredibly boring. I spent too much time driving around the tunnels in the first Dead Rising trying to run over 100,000 zombies or whatever. I know better now, its not worth it.
I don’t know if I understand what “get in the way of the game” means. But as to whether it’s worth encouraging, I think so. Trophies prompt you to do things in the game that you wouldn’t normally do if left to your own devices, and those things are frequently enjoyable, like playing through a game with only one weapon, or playing with some mechanic that you never thought of using before, or… I don’t know, stuff like that.
I do agree with Dragon_Sack that the big collection achievements are annoying, but I usually find around half of them without really looking, and if I enjoy the game enough and I plan to get all the other trophies, more enjoyable trophies, then I’ll spend an extra hour or two to pick up the shitty collection-type trophies too. But this does really depend entirely on the game’s overall fun level and particular mechanics. Like Metroid Prime, for example — I enjoyed that game very much, but getting a 100% in it, if it was even possible at any given point (which it often wasn’t, because of the many one-time enemies you needed to scan and the areas to which you couldn’t return to get a collectible of some kind), would be a nightmare, with all the respawning rooms you’d have to clear. Which is to say, I did it in Metroid Prime, but not MP2 or MP3. Though, to be fair, at least the collectibles in that game provided gameplay rewards and occasionally interesting info (in the case of scans). And if I don’t really enjoy a game (BioShock, Killzone 2), or it has a lot of multiplayer trophies (Killzone 2), then I usually don’t bother. But if it’s a game I simply want to play again (Far Cry 2), I sometimes rely on trophies to keep it interesting and make my 2nd play-through different from the first.
So, uh… I would say that if you’re gonna debate the goodness of 100% trophies, then you’ve gotta debate the goodness of trophies in general — because even if there was no % figure or platinum trophy to look at/obtain, you’d still be able to see that incomplete trophy list. Andd I think trophies are definitely a good thing. Even if not having the 100% itches occasionally, the fun that’s to be had by chasing certain trophies is enough to justify their existence.
100% game completion sucks! i usually beat the game first doing a few side missions, then go back and try the rest. but i end up quitting. does anyone have 100% on any gta’s? those kill me.
That’s funny that you mention GTA as that is EXACTLY what I had in mind on my post. I got pretty close on Vice City, but that game is so fun to just mess around in the created world (climb on a building and get five stars of cops after you and see how long you can live for example). I don’t find that to be the case in most games.
I have Red Dead Redemption, Burnout Paradise (two times), CoD MW 1, CoD MW 2, CoD BO, Halo Reach, Resident Evil 5, Just Cause 2 (technically 80%, but that gets you all of the achievements because the game is so massive), Little Bg Planet, Skyrim (well the achievements at least), Borderlands, Twilight Princess, Super Mario Galaxy 1 & 2, and SSBB (hardest one to complete) 100% completed.
I love completing games.
As I approached the end of The Godfather, I torched a store front of my last rival in Brooklyn because I was feeling my oats. I didn’t quite realize how close I was to finishing it. I had gotten all of everything. All of the bullshit cinema reels. I’d blown up all but one of the other families’ compounds. I was inordinately pleased with myself. But I jumped the gun and took out the last compound before the store front had regenerated. Which, of course, I didn’t realize.
99% completion. Locked in forever. I’m not good at vidja gaming.
I absolutely adore GTA IV but I don’t know of anyone that has killed the 100 fucking “flying rats” for the achievement.
I killed them all.
*adjusts feather in cap*
There’s a difference between completing a game 100% and getting all the achievements/trophies. I’m an XBL achievement whore, so if 100% is a requirement to earning an achievement, I get it. But, case in point, for a game like Assassin’s Creed Revelations, in MP you only have to get to Level 20 for the max MP achievement; levels 21-50 only give you more abilities/unlocks and I don’t enjoy the MP enough to go for 100%.
100% run? That’s nothing? Try a 100%/Ghost/Pacifist/Easter Egg Hunt + All Achievements-run o.O
I’m playing Deus Ex: Human Revolution at the moment. I’m 194 hours in.
It is a fantastic game, bugs and all.
Sadly it doesn’t help my probable ‘OCDness’.
A couple of days ago I had 125+ games I wanted to boot up and play. I’ve decided to choose the crème de la crème of innovation and excellence and I’ve managed to whittle that figure down to a dozen or so titles so that’s too bad.
I am saveable…for now.
Not too bad I meant. Doh
LOL OCDness strikes again…hehe..he….
well i have 100% you dont unlock anything that i know of not infinite ammo or health double ammo or damage a good car none of it