50,000 and counting

I did it. My gamer score is finally at 50,000.  Well . . . actually it's at 50,011 but I still finally crossed that threshold. 

It's been 11 and half years in the making.  As best as I can tell I got my first achievement on January 6th, 2007.  I actually got 3 achievements on that day.  All of them in Hexic HD which came free with the Xbox 360.  I got Flower Child, Cluster Buster and Star Gazer.  And thus my journey began.

I remember the beginning of that journey.  I was not an early adopter of the Xbox 360.  All the stories of Red Rings of Death and such made we want to wait until Microsoft got their act together.  The Xbox 360 was out for more than a year before I finally got one.  I sat and watched all my friends rack up their gamer scores and I couldn't wait to start earning mine.  Unfortunately I was big in to playing on my PS2 and didn't play much on the Xbox 360 for quite awhile.  That all changed once I got Gears of War and found a great group of guys to play it with.

I was always lamenting how fast their scores seemed to increase versus how slowly mine was inching up.  But now, for some reason, getting over 50,000 seems a decent amount.  Of course I have several friends with gamer scores over 100,000.  But they don't have much of a life outside of video games (sorry guys, but you know that's true).

I had a goal of getting to 50,000 by the end of the year.  Getting it this early was a bit of a surprise.  What achievement was the one that pushed me over the edge?  It was in Minecraft (the new version).  Delicious Fish.  Catch and cook a fish.  It was just enough to put me over the edge.  And since that version is different than the Xbox One version I have the chance to double up on the achievements and get my gamer score even higher.

I wonder if it will take me another 11.5 years to get to 100,000.  I don't think so, but stay tuned.  You never know.

Goal setting . . . and achieving

I like setting goals or challenges for myself.  It gives me something to work for.  It seems I'm objective driven in my life.  I don't always meet those goals or succeed at those challenges but it's something to try for.

This summer I secretly set a goal for myself.  I didn't tell anyone because I didn't want the pressure of trying to meet it while everyone was watching.  I had about 37,000 in gamer score (can't remember the exact number I had at the time).  I wanted to break the 40,000 mark before the end of the year.  That meant I had to get almost 3,000 in achievements to do so (I think it might have been around 2,700 or so).  That's like finishing/perfecting 2 full games and then some.  Since I don't have all the time in the world to play games (I wish I did) I wasn't sure how long it would take me.  My goal was to do it before BM Vagabond cross the 100,000 threshold for gamer score . . . or by the end of the year in a worse case scenario.

I think I made this official the day Lego Star Wars came out.  I figured that was an easy 1,000 points to get.  I just needed to find another 1,700 or so to meet my goal.  I didn't know what games I would play to help me with that but I knew I would like to see my gamer score going up more regularly than in fits and spurts.

I also knew that I didn't stand a chance of getting my gamer score above 40,000 before BM Vagabond got his above 100,000.  After all, he plays video games for a living.  But I was hoping that he would spend a lot of time playing games he already had the achievements in so he's score wouldn't go up.  I also made sure to watch his twitch channel to keep an eye on his gamer score (sortamaliciousgaming).  Then the fateful night came.  He was going to stream and try to hit the 100,000 mark dead on . . . and before I hit my goal of 40,000.

Vaga was about the same distance away from his goal as I was from mine.  I checked weekly and we kept flip flopping each other as to who was getting closer.  On the night that he met his goal I had been almost 100 pts ahead of him and within 70 or so points of meeting my goal.  Unfortunately I have a full time job that doesn't allow me to play video games all day long.  There was no way I was going to be able to come home from work and get those 70 or so points in the hour that I had before his stream started.  So I didn't even try and just watched him try and play to get that score exactly.  It was fun.

I think I met my goal 2 or 3 nights later.  It wasn't anti-climatic for me because I was so excited to be out of the 30,000 and to finally see a different number in the front of my gamer score.  I think this happened about late August or early September.  That means I picked up almost 3,000 points in about 3 months.  Not bad. 

As of right this minute my gamer score is 41,027.  You can see I've picked up a few more points since then.  It's nice to see it moving upwards after it seemed like it was stagnate for so long.  It's still only 8% of the total gamer score I COULD have if I perfected all of the games I own.  If you don't believe me check this out from my log sheet:




I still have a long way to go, but I'm enjoying the ride and playing a lot more games that I have in the past.  I wonder where my gamer score will be at the end of the year.  45,000?  50,000?  Stay tuned and find out.

1,000 Gamerscore update

I started this challenge on 6/28 and it's now almost a month later, so how am I doing?  Good so far.  I've earned 860 points since then in 9 different games.  Some old.  Some new.  That means I only have 140 points left to get to finish the challenge.  I'm hoping I can get them before I leave on vacation but I'm not sure.  Some of the achievements were a surprise to get.  Some I planned and worked for.  I'll post a list of all the game I got achievements in when I finally hit my goal.  It's been fun so far.  Maybe when I'm done with this challenge I'll start a challenge to get X number of trophies on my PS3.  We'll see.  Do you have any suggestions?  Let me know.

Double goose eggs, really?

So I was playing a couple of new games recently.  Nothing serious, just trying to dink around in some games to get a feel for them.  And I got a couple of achievements in the process.  But they weren't worth anything.

The first game I tried out was Metal Gear Solid V: Ground Zeroes.  It was free to Gold members on Xbox One so I thought I'd give a shot.  It's been a long time since I've played a Metal Gear Solid game.  I've been thinking of trying to play the whole series for my YouTube channel but that would take forever.  Plus there are a couple that I'm missing in order to complete the series.

There was also a couple of achievements highlighted for that game and one of them was to start the game within the time frame that that achievement was active.  So I did.  I started the game and the achievement popped up.  But there was no gamerscore tied to the achievement.  Bummer.

So I put in another game.  One I've played before, but not on an Xbox.  Abe's Oddysee for the original PlayStation was remade for the PlayStation 3 (and probably the PlayStation 4) and was now available for the Xbox One.  It's now called Oddworld: New 'n' Tasty. 

I played this game on the PlayStation and I wondered how it would translate to the Xbox One system and controller.  For starters, it looks stunningly beautiful.  I was blown away with the upgraded graphic and how smooth things were.  So blown away that I pulled a level to open up the floor before I realized that one of the Mudokans I was suppose to rescue was sitting on the trap, scrubbing the floor.  Oops.  Which is exactly the name of an achievement that popped up.  But it also wasn't worth any gamerscore.

What's the point of having "achievements" where you actually have to do something and achieve something if you don't get rewarded for doing it?  I'm not saying turning on a game and pressing the start button is worthy of an achievement, but if you're going to have it in the game, give me something for it.

And I know there's an achievement for rescuing all the Mudokans in a level and that's worth something.  Why can't accidentally killing one be worth something too?  If you give points for doing that you might have gamers actually feel sorry that they failed and got someone killed.  They might try even harder to save everyone the rest of the game.

There were a lot of these types of "no gamer score" or "stupid actions" achievements in the beginning.  Developers weren't sure about achievements and how gamers would react to them.  But hey guys, it's been awhile.  We all know what achievements are and what they mean.  People are obsessed with increasing their gamerscore (present company excluded of course, but you're not buying that are you?).  Developers, you can do better man.

I got both achievements in about 10 minutes of each other and that double dose of goose eggs were enough to turn me off of those games for awhile.  I will play them.  But right now I want to play games that reward me for playing them.  Is that so much to ask.

I finally achieved perfection!

Well, I finally did it.  I perfected an Xbox 360 retail game.  Now, I've perfected several Arcade titles, but those games don't usually require the time and effort commitment to getting all the achievements that a full retail game does.  Retail games are also a lot more gamerscore than Arcade titles (at least they were).  It's so much more fulfilling to see 1,000 in gamerscore next to a game instead of 200.

Now, technically I've "finished" several retail titles.  Meaning I've finished the story and gotten to the end credits.  But I've never perfected the achievements in a retail game before.  Now, I did it in Lego Star Wars: The Complete Saga.  And it's the third time I've played the game.

The first time I played that game I completed it with my brother, dain bramage, in co-op on the Playstation 2.  We completed all the Lego Star Wars games together on the PS2 and when we found out those games were out for the Xbox 360 we doubled up and got those games again for the achievements.  We knew what we were in for since we had already played the game and thought it would be a piece of cake to play those games again and get that allusive 1,000 perfect gamerscore.

So, for a second time I started playing the game.  This time we were working mostly on our own.  We did get together to play the arcade mini-game so we could get that achievement.  Other than that I've been playing the game alone.  And I don't remember it being that hard to complete.  Unfortunately some jackass(es) broke in to my house about 6 years ago and stole all my games . . . and more importantly my game saves and memory cards.  They stole a lot of items, but they also stole hundreds (if not thousands) of hours of my life in game saves.

At the time I was robbed I only had 2 achievements left to earn.  The one for collecting all Gold Bricks and the one for completing the game to 100%.  The last achievement I had earned was to get all the Mini-kits, which I had earned about a month or so before I was robbed.  I was that close to finishing the game.  But once I got all my stuff back, I had to decide if I was going to start the game over for a third time just for those last 2 achievements.  I had to make that decision for several games (Lost Odyssey being one I was about 4 hours away from finishing based on friend's estimates).

I didn't make that decision right away because just the thought of it overwhelmed me.  All those game saves lost.  Pieces of time ripped right out of my life with no hope of ever getting those moments back.  Did I want to do it all over again?  For every game?  Was it worth it?

I've always wanted to perfect a game and I figured that Lego Star Wars: The Complete Saga would probably be my best bet.  So I restarted the game . . . for a third time.  I would play the game when I was interested so there were times when I didn't pick up the game for months.  When I finally get all my shit together to start recording gameplay and posting to YouTube I made a decision that I would use that medium to motivate me to finish the game and finally perfect it.  It worked.

Even when I didn't want to play the game anymore I knew I had to make a video to post online.  So I took out the game and played it.  There are times in the videos that you can probably tell how frustrated I was getting with the game.  A lot of that came from the fact that I was replaying it for the 3rd time and I thought it would be easier.  It wasn't sometimes.  And that made it more frustrating for me.  But on Sunday night I finally finished the last missions and the game showed me 100% completion.  Except the achievement didn't pop right away.

The same thing happened when I "earned" the achievement for getting all the Gold Bricks.  The game showed I had all the Gold Bricks (160 of them) and it let me build the fountain, but didn't give me the achievement.  I had to go in and complete a level before the achievement would pop.  The 100% achievement did the same thing.  Can I tell you how anti-climatic that is?  You work really hard and play the game for over 60 hours (for a third time), finally earn the final achievement but the game doesn't give it to you unless you do something else instead.  And you couldn't just jump in a level and jump out.  No. You had to play and complete the level.  Just give me my damn achievement!  I earned it.

I played the extra level and finally got the achievement to pop.  Woohoo!!!  I did it.  I perfected the game.  Below is a breakout of the levels you have to play to complete the game.  Since I didn't do very well in some of the levels I had to replay some of them multiple times.  That hellish Into the Deathstar blue barrels flight mission was the worst.  I think I played that level more than 20 times before I could get all the barrels in the time limit.

36 Story based levels (6 per movie)
36 Freeplay based levels (6 per movie)
36 blue barrel levels (6 per movie)
12 extra movie based levels (2 per movie)
36 "Super Story" based levels
6 extra game based levels (including revised levels, Lego City and New Town)

That's a total of 162 unique levels to play.  You can't say the game doesn't offer up enough content.  Even if it's the same 36 levels over and over and over and over again.  But at least it's done.  In the Lego Star Wars II game the only achievements I haven't earned are to play the vehicle missions without dying (and you can't have any extras turned on).  I think I'll wait on working on those achievements until sometime later.  I'm a little burned out on Lego Star Wars right now.  (But if any of my friends would like to jump in to my game save and see if all my achievements will pop up for them in their game, let me know.  It will cost you an hour of multiplayer game play in a game of your choosing [provided that I own that game]).

The closer I got to finishing the game the more I decided to set myself a goal and reward.  I would finish the game by the end of July (actually finished it August 2nd) and reward myself with finally buying an Xbox One.  I refused to buy and Xbox One until I had completed, or perfected, a game on the Xbox 360.  Now that I've accomplished that, I can finally get my XBO.  I get paid on Friday so look for me online this weekend on my new system.  I earned it.

Lego Star Wars: The Complete Saga = the game from hell

So I've been focusing on finishing up Lego Star Wars: The Complete Saga because I'm so close to the end.  I've even put Dark Souls on hold until I can finish Lego SW.  After this last week I was beginning to think that would never happen.

For some reason I had a lot of problem collecting all the blue barrels in Jabba's Palace.  Not all of my failed attempts were due to my stupidity.  Three times my game glitched on me and I got stuck in a room with no way out except a Jawa door that wouldn't let me through.  It was really frustrating to spend four and half minutes just trying to get through a door when I only have 10 minutes to play the level and my game is going "uh oh, not for you".  It's frustrating.  Almost enough to quit the game no matter how close I was to finishing.

But that level has nothing on Into the Deathstar.  That level is a BITCH FROM HELL level!!!!!  I think I tried that level more than 20 times before I even started to get close to finishing it.  The first couple of times I spent 8 out of my 10 minutes just clearing the first area of the 4 Star Destroyers.  It's kind of hard to find and pick up 8 more blue barrels in only 2 minutes.  Impossible is more like it. 

I even got desperate enough to send a message to all my friends that I thought might have the game and be willing to help me out.  I told them I was desperate.  I was hoping that they would come to the aid of a damsel in distress.  While I was waiting for them to respond I opened up my game to strangers.  Big mistake!  I had a someone jump in and he spent the whole time just switching ships.  He never fired his gun.  He never collected a blue barrel.  He did absolutely nothing.  Well . . . not exactly nothing.  He did change his ship every second or two and then tried to fly in whatever opposite direction I was trying to fly in.  Since you share the screen (even over Xbox Live) you can image how well that got along.  I think I had to kick him out of the game 4 or 5 times before I finished the level.  Well, actually I ran out of time to be honest.

After that disastrous experience I changed my settings to set my game to invite only and thought I would give it one more try before giving up on the game entirely.  It turns out I'm glad I gave it another shot.  I was able to finish the level and ended up with just over 2 minutes to spare before time ran out.  I was completely shocked, stunned and utterly bewildered, befuddled and confused.  But also extremely ecstatic and thrilled.  I couldn't believe how close I was to giving up and crying myself to sleep and never playing this game again when the very next play through I beat it with time to spare.  I haven't listened to the audio for that level yet so I hope I don't sound like a complete idiot.  It's just that I've been working on trying to finish that level for almost 2 weeks and I finally did it.  It will be awhile before that video is posted, just don't judge me to badly for my reaction.

Now that my blue barrels were all collected I could focus on the remaining 4 gold bricks I needed in order to get all 160 gold bricks.  I had to do the original Gunship Calvary level, the alternate New Hope level and the Lego City and New Town levels.  I've tried Lego City and New Town before but could never get all 1,000,000 studs before giving up.  It took a couple of attempts for Lego City and I had to pause my own recording of New Town to watch a video online to find out what I was forgetting to do before I could finish New Town.  But all of those are now done.  Unfortunately I'm not done with the game like I thought I would be.

When I got the last gold brick I waited patiently for the achievement to pop up.  It didn't.  I couldn't figure out what I needed to do to get it to pop.  I even went outside the Cantina and built that gold fountain with all the gold bricks.  Nothing.  After the Deathstar blue barrel fiasco I was so furious that my anger went immediately to a cold blue fire.  Bypass the yellow, red and white hot stuff.  I was glowing blue.  If it wasn't so late at night I probably would have gone nuclear too.

I was able to calm down enough to go online and see if anyone else had problems with getting the gold brick achievement to pop.  Turns out lots of people got all gold bricks but didn't have the achievement pop.  Even back to 2011.  I read several posts that said you need to go in to a level and play it with all your 'super Jedi powers' and then the achievement will unlock.  Eh?  The achievement isn't for playing a level (all or which you've already completed in order to get the 160 gold bricks) after you've got all the bricks.  It's for getting all the gold bricks.  Period.  End of achievement.  If you want someone to play with all those 'super Jedi powers' make that a separate achievement, or put it in the description of the achievement that we're required to do.  It's bullshit and it makes no sense.

I haven't gone back in to a level and played it to unlock it because I realized that I'm not actually done with the game like I thought I would be after I got those last 4 gold bricks.  It turns out I forgot about the "Super Story" levels in each movie.  That means I have to play all those levels all over again and finish each move in less than an hour and I think I have to get 100,000 studs as well.  Yeah me!  My completion percentage is somewhere at 97.6% or something and I still have to play through all levels, all movies, all over again.  Someone shot me now.

I don't remember the game being this torturous on the Playstation 2.  My brother and I played and completed both Lego Star Wars games to 100% but I don't remember it being anything like this.  Since we completed this game on PS2 and I had almost completed this game before my stuff got robbed, once I do complete the game it will be for the third time.  And I will never play it again.  If any of my friends want help picking up achievements or collectibles they are going to have to pay up big to get me help them.  Sorry guys.  That's just the way it has to be for me. 

Right now I've got 6 more levels to play and film and then I'm done.  So at least 6 more hours in hell.  Let's hope that it only takes one run through for each of the super stories.  With my luck this hell will keep me sucked in for an additional 6 hours on top of that.  How many levels are there in Dante's Inferno (the book, not the game).  I'm sure Lego Star Wars: The Complete Saga has got to be one of them.

New Achievements!

So I picked up some new achievements this weekend.  It's been awhile since I've earned any so I'm excited.

The first one I picked up was in the Arcade game Scramble.  I haven't played that game in a long time.  Actually the last (and only) achievement I earned in that game was from 6/1/2007.  Wow!  Talk about some time lag. 

I wasn't really looking to play that game.  I was actually seeing if I still had the digital download for Gears of War Judgment and I came across that game.  I couldn't remember what type of game it was so I loaded it up and tried it out.  Within in the first two minutes I got the achievement.  Maybe subconsciously I knew how close I was to another achievement and that's why I started it up.  Maybe I should listen to those voices inside my head more often.  It might help my Gamerscore.

The next achievements I got were in a new game.  I put in Rayman Origins and made a video in that game that should be released later this week.  Yes, I know it's one of the options in my poll which doesn't close yet, I just wanted something fun and bright and cheerful to play since Lego Star Wars was driving me crazy.  So much so, that there will be a "swear count" in the credits at the end of one of my videos once I post it.  I'm not done editing it (or counting swear words) so it probably won't be up for another day or two.  When you watch it, you'll understand.  At least I hope you will.  And it's all my fault.

I also spent some time today working towards 3 achievements in Gears of War Judgment.  And no, I don't seem to have the digital copy on my hard drive anymore.  I'm working on finishing the campaign on insane and I have a friend that is helping me out.  I'm playing on insane.  He's playing on casual.  We were able to play the 3rd chapter before we called it quits.  I should get the achievement for hardcore, insane and co-op once we finish everything.  That will be 125 points for my Gamerscore.  After we do that, we talked about working on the getting the stars and declassified mission achievements.  I think that will bring in another 100+ points, but those are much further down the road.  Let's just try to get through the campaign first, shall we.

I am seriously trying to get to (and possibly over) the 30,000 mark with my Gamerscore before the end of the year.  I've got a full time job that sucks the life out of me Monday through Friday, plus a bunch of other things going on in life.  It's doable.  It's just going to take me awhile.  That's kind of one of the reasons why I wanted to start a game that I haven't played to help me get some achievements.  And to experience something fresh and new.  But, mostly for the achievements.  What can I say.  I like achievements.

Minecraft has new achievements

So there was an update to Minecraft that added some new achievements.  I haven't played Minecraft in awhile because I was starting to get frustrated.  I needed to tame 5 wolves but I ran out of bones after taming 2 of them.  I was also trying to build a nether portal with the bucket method and I think my dimensions were off with it being 1 too high.  I'm building my own castle in Minecraft but I'm not doing it in Creative mode so I have to mine everything I use.  Now you can see why I got frustrated.

But there's new achievements.  Who can't say no to that?  I couldn't.  I put Minecraft at lunch today and played around in the tutorial area and picked up 6 achievements.  I think for a total gamer score of 115.  Or something close to that.  If you want to see how I did you can check out my video on YouTube.  The audio still sucks but at least it's live commentary and not a voice over. 

And I realized that I say um a lot.  I should work on that . . . and more achievements.

More Achievements for me

So I pulled Borderlands 2 out of the tub on Monday and picked up an achievement.  I even played it Tuesday as well, just for fun.  But I wasn’t really in the mood so I didn’t keep it up. 

On Wednesday I decided to pull another game out of the tub and this time I picked Scene It? Box Office Smash!  I was okay with that choice as long as I could find where I put the special controllers for the game.  Yes, I know I could use the standard Xbox controller but those special controllers make it more fun.  It took awhile before I found them and then I figured I should probably get some batteries because who knows how long ago I used them and if the batteries were still good.   Turns out they were.

I had to disconnect my Xbox controller and just use the game controller otherwise it was thinking there were 2 players in the game.  I wasn’t sure if I could navigate the menus with the special controllers but it wasn’t that bad.  I wondered if there was a way to play a regular game with those controllers.  I figure it would have to be a platformer or puzzle type game.  There just isn’t any fine tuning to the movement with those buzzers.

After I got the controller issue figure out, I started a game.  Just a short game; nothing too fancy.  And at the end of the game I got an achievement.  Whoo Hoo!!!  I played another short game and picked up 3 more achievements.  So . . . I played a third game, but sadly I didn’t get any more achievements.  I think I was close to getting one but just missed out on it.

I tired finding an online match but nobody seemed to be playing this game besides me.  Oh well.  I didn’t think I would get those online achievements anyway.

Well, so far I’m 2 for 2 in playing games out of the tub and getting achievements for them.  I’ve picked up almost 100 gamer score in 3 days so getting to 30,000 is very doable.  I’m sitting at 27,662 right now so I only have to get 2,338 more.  I’m sure if I keep this up I might cross 30,000 long before the end of the year.

I figure this success rate isn’t going to last.  I’m going to run in to a game that’s going to take a lot more work to unlock an achievement than what these last two games have done.  Like, I’m on disk 2 for Blue Dragon but I haven’t unlocked an achievement in a very long time.  Maybe that means I’m close, but I really don’t think so.  Most of the achievements in that game seem to be for completing things or maxing things out.  I figure those achievements will pop up closer to the end of the game.

Instead of dipping in to the tub again today I might try playing some Gears of War Judgment.  It’s the free Games with Gold for the first part of April and I downloaded to the game last night.  My Gears of War games are some of my most completed games for achievements.  I’ve got 77%, 93%, 81% and 35% in them (in release order).  Judgment is the lone 35% completion in that group.  I should really try to make that more acceptable since I love the Gears of War franchise, even if I didn’t like how Judgment told its story.  So maybe I’ll stick with that game for awhile and see what achievements I can earn there.

I also added Terraria to my list of Xbox Live Arcade titles.  It was also a Games with Gold freebie.  I had the trail version and played it briefly.  It’s one that I considered buying if/when I had the money and/or time to play it.  At least now I didn’t have to buy it and I can spend my money on other things.  I wonder how easy it is to get achievements in that game.

Watch me pull an achievement out of a hat . . . and other news

Watch me pull an achievement out of a hat.  Well, it’s not actually a hat.  It’s a plastic container with a lid.  And I did pull an achievement out.  Sort of.

I seemed to have lost a lot of my motivation when it comes to prolonged playing of video games.  I like getting on for an hour or so, but then I just start loosing interest and would rather do anything else.  Like watching paint dry or counting the bumps on my popcorn ceiling.  It’s weird for me to feel that way and I’ve been trying to think of something to do to get myself out of this funk.  And I came to a solution.

I printed out a list of all the Xbox 360 games I own, cut them up into little stripes with one name per slip and put them all into a plastic container.  My plan is to pull a game out at least once a week and play in that game until I’ve at least earned an achievement and/or hopefully find renewed interest in playing video games for longer periods of time.  Who knows.  I might find that one game that gets me out of my funk and start playing games for hours on end every night.  At worse I play something until I get an achievement and then put it aside for something else.  At least my gamer score would be going up.  I had a new year's resolution to hit 30,000 last year, but I didn’t make it and I won’t let that happen again.

So after I finished cutting everything up, I shock it around and pulled a game out.  The first one I pulled was Rock Band 2.  At first I was okay with that, but then I realized that I had just played a lot of Rock Band Blitz (and picked up a bunch of achievements – see the sidebar) and wasn’t even remotely in the mood to play another music game.  Plus, I’m not sure if my guitars even work anymore.  I put the game back in the tub and spent the weekend thinking about what an idiot I am.

Today though, I decided to give it another go.  This time I pulled out Borderlands 2.  That’s a game I’ve played and had 165 points in so far.  I stopped playing the game because there’s one side mission that I can’t seem to do fast enough and it was really annoying me, so I quit.  Plus I’m having a hard time with the fact that you can’t carry health vials with you when you get hurt.  I always forget to keep an eye on my health so I die a lot.  I wasn’t sure how long it would take me to get another achievement in that game but this time I was going to make the effort to play it and see what happens.

At lunch I put the game in and started to play.  There was a side mission right where I was located so I didn’t have to go far.  It was to Assassinate the Assassins so I jumped in and started playing.  I remembered I had a gun turret as my special and I should try to use that more often to help me fight a lot of enemies while I take cover while my shield recharges my health.  So I threw the turret out for fun while I figured out all the controls again, and after 2 kills (puppy skags, no less) the achievement for getting 100 kills with the turret pops up.  I got 20 gamer score points for that in less than 2 minutes in the game.  I could have quit and done something else (taking a nap before going back to work sounded like a good idea) but I stuck around and completed the mission and turned it in.

It was nice playing that game (even without health vials to use) but I was so rusty with the controls and how to find things in the menus.  I got better by the end of my lunch and I just might try some more missions after work.  I put a tick mark on the slip of paper for Borderlands 2 and put it back in the tub.  This way I’ll know I’ve played it and gotten an achievement if I happen to pull it out again later.

I did include sequels in the tub even if I haven’t played the first game in a series.  Who knows, I might find playing Halo 3 more engaging than playing the first Halo even if I don’t know what’s going on in that world.  I just want to get back in to the habit of playing video games like I use to.

And speaking of playing video games, I’m seriously looking in to getting an Xbox One.  The only problem is I have to get a new TV if I want to play it.  My current TV is a big 32” CRT monstrosity of a TV.  It doesn’t have any HDMI connections, although it does have component video.  The X1 seems to only be an HDMI connection so it won’t do me any good to buy one if I don’t have a TV to play it on.  I’m hoping to take care of the TV part by next weekend.  The X1 might have to come a little later because I have some other plans I’m trying figure out that will definitely put a crimp in my finances. 

Specifically I’m trying to find and buy a new computer.  I would love a laptop, but realized that I could get something cheaper if I got a desktop instead.  I want it to be a gaming PC so that I can get back to gaming on the PC which is something I haven’t done in a VERY long time (X-Wing vs. Tie Fighter anyone?).  Depending on how much I spend for the computer depends on how much I have left over for the X1 system.  Plus there’s other things factoring in to my decision but I can’t divulge those plans just yet.  You’ll just have to stay tuned and see what happens next.

So, I consider my drawing plan to be a success.  I played a game and got an achievement.  It don't know if it is enough to get me out of the funk, but it's a start.  Hopefully I'll re-find that gaming spark and pull myself out of this funk when I pick a game.

Trophies vs. Achievements

So I've had my PS3 for awhile and even picked up a few more games (Journey, Flower, Flow (?), Resistance 1, 2 & 3, Little Big Planet, and Overlord: Raising Hell).  I've even finished (play to credits) Journey and got a lot of the achievements . . . I mean trophies for that game.

It took me a while to get comfortable with calling something trophies instead of achievements but I don't get hung up on it as much any more.  That doesn't mean I like it though.

There's only 3 levels of trophies to get.  Bronze, Silver and Gold.  There is a Platinum level but so far those trophies are only for getting every other trophy in a game.  How lame is that?  I'm assuming the Bronze trophies are easy-peasy ones to get.  The Silver will take a little bit more moderate work to get.  And the Gold are ones you might have to plan out and carefully do something to unlock those.  I don't know because I don't have any Gold trophies.

The biggest problem I have with trophies is that I don't really think of them as a reward for doing something (unless it's Gold).  I've been in enough dance competitions in my life to know and associate a Bronze trophy with being a loser.  A Silver trophy with being the first loser.  They're consolation prizes as far as I'm concerned.  If you get a Bronze trophy that just means that there are 2 other people who did the same thing, but better than you.

I know that's not how the trophies are created and assigned to tasks in video games.  But that's how they are associated in my mind.  Since the Bronze trophies are the easiest things to get they fall under the impression that anyone can do that.  If so, what's so special about a trophy for that?

Now achievements for Xbox are assigned a point value.  They could be 5 points, 10, 15, 20, 25, 50 or even 100 points or more.  The value of the points does have some correlating relevance to how difficult it might be to get a particular achievement.  If you're gunning for a 100 point whopper you can expect to have to spend a good deal of time working towards that achievement before you unlock it.  Also, there are some 5 point achievements that you might not get because you made a choice in the game that steered you away from that particular achievement.

There's an individual value to each achievement earned.  You and a friend could have played the same game but have different achievements and also a total different gamer score in the game.  You can compare your 675 with their 550 and know who's probably played more and invested more in the game.

With trophies all you get is a number.  Ten trophies earned: 7 Bronze, 2 Silver and 1 Gold.  Your friend might also have ten trophies but they could have 9 Bronze and 1 Silver.  You both have ten trophies, so how can you tell how much one has played the game more than another?

And what does the levels mean?  I was just barely level 2 and I earned a Bronze trophy and my percentage went up 6 percentage points.  After my next Bronze trophy my level percentage only went up 3 percentage points.  What gives with that.  I just don't understand how one Bronze trophy could be weighted more than another Bronze trophy when they are exactly the same thing.  If you're only giving Bronze, Silver and Gold trophies you can't have one Bronze trophy counting for more than another Bronze trophy without telling me how or why.  Seems a bit suspect to me.

As for the Platinum trophies, I don't get it.  It's like "here have another one because you got all the others".  I think the satisfaction you get with earning trophies or achievements should be for those individual tasks.  Passing out another trophy just because you got all the others is stupid and has no value.  Getting the last trophy (not counting Platinums) or achievement in a game should be all the reward you need for having "completed" a game.  But getting these "finishing" Platinum trophies is like going to a dance competition and winning all the awards that they have categories for, but then having the judges say "here's one more for winning them all".  There's nothing tied to the trophy.  Your 100% completion for trophies and achievements could already been seen on your list without getting another one just to say "way to go".

I understand that Playstation was trying to duplicate and "improve" on Xbox's achievements, but doing things in their own way.  I just don't get it.  I feel less impressed and motivated with trying to get trophies because there are only 3 levels of skill and work involved in getting them.  And don't get me started on the lame notification pop-up that shows when you get one.

Trophies also feel vague and tacked on to activities without any thought on how a game is played or the challenges at certain points in the game play.  "Oh, this looks like a good spot to earn a trophy".  They seem to highlight some of the "not that exciting moments" in the gameplay.  Sometimes if feels very anti-climatic when you do unlock a trophy.

In Final Fantasy X HD remastered there's an achievement for winning your first Blitzball game.  The first game you play you really haven't learned how to play that much.  But winning or losing will generate a different outcome after the match.  So why not have a different trophy (or harder trophy) to earn if you can win the first match the very first time you get to play Blitzball.

When I played FFX on the PS2 I didn't win my first time.  Or my second or third time trying that first game.  I think it took my 5 or 6 tries and reloading the save before I understood enough about Blitzball to win that first match and get Wakka the trophy.

That's a challenge for a gamer and what we thrive on.  We play and replay games to try something new or earn achievements/trophies for doing different things.  If we're going to have these challenges, the least thing they can do is reward us for completing them comparative to the effort we put in to achieve them.  But please, just not with a Platinum trophy.

I blogged a LONG time ago that I wanted my gamer score on my tombstone when I died.  Unfortunately I can't say the same thing about my count of PS3 trophies.  They'll just have to collect dust in my PSN account and no one will ever know.

I’m really not this organized.

I’ve had several people ask me how I keep track of my games and how I’m doing in them.  It’s not hard and it’s not a secret.  I use an Excel Workbook.

When my brother, dain bramage, and I started playing together we didn’t have very many games.  We would give each other games as gifts if we hadn’t bought that game for ourselves previously.  After a while it got hard to remember who had what game.   We both sat down and created an inventory of every game we owned.  It was just a simple Excel spreadsheet.  One for each system.  We also added a column for “dain owns” on mine and “Pengwenn owns” on his.

Once we did this it was very easy for him to pick the games for our little challenge that started this blog oh so many years ago.  It was also easy to figure out what games to get the other person.  And when I got robbed it was a godsend for filling out those claim forms.  Plus it is an easy way to check off the games I had replaced as I was recovering from the theft.

Here's a snapshot of the first couple games on my Xbox 360 tab.  You can see I haven't play these games very much.  (I did changed my brother's name because I don't call him "dain bramage" in real life but that's what you know him here in my blog world.)

If you have a lot of games (I also have a similar list for my movies) I would highly recommend creating an inventory for said games (or movies).  There’s so many useful things you can do with this information.  You can search for games that are almost complete in their achievements so you can focus on those and finish them off.  If you marked which ones you’ve finished you know what ones you can blog about . . . of help your friends with or recommend something.  It’s also helpful to seeing trends in your game buying.

I went through a “buying only RPG” phase.  Don’t remember what set that off but I have a bunch of games I know I got at around the same time and they’re all RPGs.  Most of them I haven’t even played other than to put it in the machine to make sure the disk will load.  I also went through a “FPS” phase after I got my Xbox 360.  That phase I can point to Gears of War and Call of Duty 4 specifically.

Another way I’ve organized my list is by games with strategy guides.  If I have a guide I’m likely to play the game knowing that if I get stuck I’ve got something handy to help me get unstuck.  But even though I buy the guide for most games I really don’t like to use them unless I’m desperate.  I much prefer to figure things out on my own even if it will give me headache while I’m trying to do so.

I’ve also been able to organize my list by games with no gamer score.   I don’t like seeing games without a gamer score.  There’s just something about that “0” that screams “YOU NEVER PLAY ME” and while that might be true I feel terrible about neglecting one of my games.  There are just so many hours in the day so it’s unavoidable to not getting around to certain games.  But that doesn’t mean I’m not at least thinking about them.  Now that I can isolate which ones they are I can work on playing them and getting some achievements.  It worked for Too Human.  I now have 150 points in that game. 

Until recently I had the games listed alphabetically, but by release dates for collective franchises.  That means that while Assassin’s Creed would list 1-4 first before Brotherhood and Revolution my list was showing them in order of the release date.  That way I could play them in order as they were meant to be played without messing up the timelines.  Unfortunately the last sort I did messed that up and I haven’t gone back and corrected that mash-up.

And speaking of release dates, I have a separate list with the release dates of all the games.  Why?  Because I feel bad for not getting around to playing Batman: Arkahm City, but I feel even worse for not playing Kamino.  Why?  B:AC was released in October 2011 but Kamino was released November 2005.  It was a launch title and I haven’t gotten very far in the game.  That game (among others) have been sitting around longer so I’ve had more time to play them, but haven’t.  But whatever you do don’t get me started on my original Playstation games that I haven’t played.  The number of those un-played games will just spiral me down into depression if I think about that too long.  Again, not enough time in the day.

Despite this fancy, organized spreadsheet I’m not running a well oiled machine here.  I still can’t decide which games to play.  I still play games I’ve finished but can’t get enough of.  I still can’t get to all my older games.  And I still give up to easily when things go south.  

 I’ve been really trying to evaluate any new purchases on a scale of what I’m really dying to play (there’s a spot on my list for those games as well).  Unfortunately I occasionally give in to the hype and buy a game that I had originally planned on passing on.  I won’t mention any name Call of Duty: Ghosts.  I might look organized but I just say “meh” and play whatever I’m in the mood for at that time.