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.
Showing posts with label Gamer Score. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Gamer Score. Show all posts
Friday, August 31, 2018
Thursday, November 3, 2016
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.
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.
Monday, August 8, 2016
1,000 Gamer score challenge completed
I did it!
I took a week off from work and went on vacation July 24th through the 31st and all I did (pretty much) was sit in the hotel room and play video games. It was great. I got 3 weeks worth of videos recorded in that week and I made my goal of 1,000 gamer score.
I'm not exactly sure which day I got the achievement that pushed me over the edge. It was either Wednesday the 27th or Thursday the 28th. Either way that is a month to get 1,000 gamer score. If I hadn't have gone on vacation I probably wouldn't have done as well as I did. I picked up 570 points just in that week alone. I only needed 140 before I left and I got it.
During that time I played some games just for fun in addition to the ones I've been playing for my YouTube channel. Below is a list of the games that I played while going for that goal and a list of games that I played while on vacation.
I would love to do that again. Get away from the house that needs cleaning, the dog that needs to be taken care of and a roommate that is annoying and just play video games. I've got another week vacation in September but I'm not planning on going anywhere so I'll just have to play games at home.
Even though I played a lot of games (or at least played them for a lot of hours) it really got me excited to play more. And do other things I love to do. Like read. It's been a struggle sometimes to find time to read and I haven't been that in to the books that I was reading. I don't know if it's a combination of the books I've read lately or this new energy to spend time doing the things I love (the bathroom can wait another day before I clean it right?) but I love reading again. I've recently read The Magician's Guild by Trudi Canavan and The Scorch Trails by James Dashner. I'm alternating back and forth between those two series (currently reading The Novice) and once I"m done I think I'll read The Name of the Wind by Patrick Rothfuss and start that series. Now I've just got to find the time to do everything.
Games played to meet goal:
Lego Star Wars: The Force Awakens (Xbox One)
Grand Theft Auto V (Xbox One)
Peggle 2 (Xbox One)
Plants vs. Zombies (Xbox One)
Rayman Legend (Xbox One)
Ancients of Ooga (Xbox Arcade)
Plants vs. Zombies 2 (Xbox One)
Gems of War (Xbox One)
Assault Heroes (Xbox Arcade)
Costume Quest 2 (Xbox Arcade)
Additional Games Played While on Vacation:
Red Dead Redemption (Xbox 360)
Rayman Origins (Xbox 360)
I played Assault Heroes because I was in the mood to play a racing game as I was searching through my games and stumbled upon that one. I know it's not a racing game, but it is a driving game and it would do (I was too lazy to look through the rest of my games and they are alphabetically). I was very surprised to get an achievement in that game.
Gems of War is my new Jewel Quest or Puzzle Quest addiction. They're just games that I play and chill out to. They don't stress me out and it's easy to get in a match or two before doing other things. I was playing it on vacation while I was waiting for videos to process and render. It fit the time perfectly.
I play Rayman Legend when I want to remember how fun playing Rayman Origins used to be. I haven't been having a lot of fun in that game for awhile. I'll still make videos in it and finish it, but I can only play a level or two before I start to get really frustrated and want to chuck my controller through the TV.
Ancients of Ooga is a game that I had the trail version for a long time before I bought the full game. I had tried playing it several times but just wasn't getting what I was suppose to do. I still liked the game even if I found it frustrating. I started playing it again for this challenge and for some reason things just clicked this time. I figured things out and I was able to get through a bunch of level . . . and then I got stuck so I moved on to something else.
I keep trying to play Plants vs Zombies with friends but it never seems to work out. They're getting offline just when I get online. I usually end up just messing around in the Backyard stuff before moving on to something else. I would really like to play some PvZ games with my friends.
Now that I'm pretty far ahead with my videos I have some time to really sink my teeth in to a meaty game. I think I'm going to play Red Dead Redemption. I've debated about if I will film the play through or not and I still haven't decided. If I do it will be very light on the commentary because I just want to play the game and enjoy it.
Have you played any of those games? How long would it take you to get 1,000 in gamer score? It took me a month. I think that's pretty good. If I do the same time of thing for trophies on my Playstation 3 what do you think my goal should be? Let me know in the comments.
I took a week off from work and went on vacation July 24th through the 31st and all I did (pretty much) was sit in the hotel room and play video games. It was great. I got 3 weeks worth of videos recorded in that week and I made my goal of 1,000 gamer score.
I'm not exactly sure which day I got the achievement that pushed me over the edge. It was either Wednesday the 27th or Thursday the 28th. Either way that is a month to get 1,000 gamer score. If I hadn't have gone on vacation I probably wouldn't have done as well as I did. I picked up 570 points just in that week alone. I only needed 140 before I left and I got it.
During that time I played some games just for fun in addition to the ones I've been playing for my YouTube channel. Below is a list of the games that I played while going for that goal and a list of games that I played while on vacation.
I would love to do that again. Get away from the house that needs cleaning, the dog that needs to be taken care of and a roommate that is annoying and just play video games. I've got another week vacation in September but I'm not planning on going anywhere so I'll just have to play games at home.
Even though I played a lot of games (or at least played them for a lot of hours) it really got me excited to play more. And do other things I love to do. Like read. It's been a struggle sometimes to find time to read and I haven't been that in to the books that I was reading. I don't know if it's a combination of the books I've read lately or this new energy to spend time doing the things I love (the bathroom can wait another day before I clean it right?) but I love reading again. I've recently read The Magician's Guild by Trudi Canavan and The Scorch Trails by James Dashner. I'm alternating back and forth between those two series (currently reading The Novice) and once I"m done I think I'll read The Name of the Wind by Patrick Rothfuss and start that series. Now I've just got to find the time to do everything.
Games played to meet goal:
Lego Star Wars: The Force Awakens (Xbox One)
Grand Theft Auto V (Xbox One)
Peggle 2 (Xbox One)
Plants vs. Zombies (Xbox One)
Rayman Legend (Xbox One)
Ancients of Ooga (Xbox Arcade)
Plants vs. Zombies 2 (Xbox One)
Gems of War (Xbox One)
Assault Heroes (Xbox Arcade)
Costume Quest 2 (Xbox Arcade)
Additional Games Played While on Vacation:
Red Dead Redemption (Xbox 360)
Rayman Origins (Xbox 360)
I played Assault Heroes because I was in the mood to play a racing game as I was searching through my games and stumbled upon that one. I know it's not a racing game, but it is a driving game and it would do (I was too lazy to look through the rest of my games and they are alphabetically). I was very surprised to get an achievement in that game.
Gems of War is my new Jewel Quest or Puzzle Quest addiction. They're just games that I play and chill out to. They don't stress me out and it's easy to get in a match or two before doing other things. I was playing it on vacation while I was waiting for videos to process and render. It fit the time perfectly.
I play Rayman Legend when I want to remember how fun playing Rayman Origins used to be. I haven't been having a lot of fun in that game for awhile. I'll still make videos in it and finish it, but I can only play a level or two before I start to get really frustrated and want to chuck my controller through the TV.
Ancients of Ooga is a game that I had the trail version for a long time before I bought the full game. I had tried playing it several times but just wasn't getting what I was suppose to do. I still liked the game even if I found it frustrating. I started playing it again for this challenge and for some reason things just clicked this time. I figured things out and I was able to get through a bunch of level . . . and then I got stuck so I moved on to something else.
I keep trying to play Plants vs Zombies with friends but it never seems to work out. They're getting offline just when I get online. I usually end up just messing around in the Backyard stuff before moving on to something else. I would really like to play some PvZ games with my friends.
Now that I'm pretty far ahead with my videos I have some time to really sink my teeth in to a meaty game. I think I'm going to play Red Dead Redemption. I've debated about if I will film the play through or not and I still haven't decided. If I do it will be very light on the commentary because I just want to play the game and enjoy it.
Have you played any of those games? How long would it take you to get 1,000 in gamer score? It took me a month. I think that's pretty good. If I do the same time of thing for trophies on my Playstation 3 what do you think my goal should be? Let me know in the comments.
Thursday, July 21, 2016
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.
Tuesday, June 28, 2016
1,000 gamer score challenge
So I was watching Brownman's stream the other day with him streaming for 24 hours trying to get 20,000 gamer score in that time frame (spoiler: he got it with hours to spare) and I thought "could I do that?". Short answer: NO. Long answer: No way in hell. But it got me thinking.
Could I set myself a goal to get a set amount of gamer score in a set amount of time? If so, what amount and how long to get it? Would it be possible? What would be a stretch but also doable for me knowing that I have a full time job and other responsibilities that might interfere with my plans? So I thought of a slightly modified plan.
What if I just tried to see how long it would take me to earn 1,000 gamer score? Could I do it in a week? Probably not. A month? Maybe. How long would it take me? Maybe if I knew that, I could devise a better, more specific challenge next time.
So starting today (because Lego Star Wars: The Force Awakes just came out) I'm going to see how long it takes me to earn 1,000 gamer score on Xbox Live. I'm sure it will be a mix of Xbox 360 and Xbox One games. Starting with Lego Star Wars. Currently my gamer score is 34,517 as of this exact moment. So that means I would need to get to 35,517 to finish this goal.
I know I can get a big chunk of that from Lego Star Wars: TFA but I'm sure I'll play other games. Some new; some old. How long do you think it will take me to get 1,000 gamer score. Is there any games you'd like to see me play? Ones I've started that maybe I need to finish? Ones that I haven't started yet? Let me know. Maybe we can place bets. What do you think my over/under would be? Maybe you'd like to join me. How long will it take for you to get 1,000 gamer score? Let me know all of these things in the comments.
Could I set myself a goal to get a set amount of gamer score in a set amount of time? If so, what amount and how long to get it? Would it be possible? What would be a stretch but also doable for me knowing that I have a full time job and other responsibilities that might interfere with my plans? So I thought of a slightly modified plan.
What if I just tried to see how long it would take me to earn 1,000 gamer score? Could I do it in a week? Probably not. A month? Maybe. How long would it take me? Maybe if I knew that, I could devise a better, more specific challenge next time.
So starting today (because Lego Star Wars: The Force Awakes just came out) I'm going to see how long it takes me to earn 1,000 gamer score on Xbox Live. I'm sure it will be a mix of Xbox 360 and Xbox One games. Starting with Lego Star Wars. Currently my gamer score is 34,517 as of this exact moment. So that means I would need to get to 35,517 to finish this goal.
I know I can get a big chunk of that from Lego Star Wars: TFA but I'm sure I'll play other games. Some new; some old. How long do you think it will take me to get 1,000 gamer score. Is there any games you'd like to see me play? Ones I've started that maybe I need to finish? Ones that I haven't started yet? Let me know. Maybe we can place bets. What do you think my over/under would be? Maybe you'd like to join me. How long will it take for you to get 1,000 gamer score? Let me know all of these things in the comments.
Sunday, March 2, 2014
Dusting off the zeros
I've had a really hard time focusing on any particular game. As much as I psych myself up to play something, as soon as I get stuck or something goes wrong I quit the game and move on to something else. Which usually isn't gaming related. I need motivation. A purpose. A goal. Something competitive to get me really juiced up to play something so that I won't bail as soon as things get tough. So I decided to look through my game list.
After correcting my list to add 4 games that I owned but somehow forgot to add, I realized I had a LOT of games where I haven't earned any achievements. If I took out the Arcade titles, which were the majority of them, I would still have a bunch with a zero gamer score. I then narrowed that list down to stand-alone or first in a series games and I still had 17 games on my list. If I haven't finished the first game in a series I'm not going to play the sequels so those were easy to eliminate.
After I got this list I went through and wrote them down in order from the one I played the longest time ago to the the more recent. Oldest to newest based on when/if I've played them. That list is as follows:
Too Human
Sacred 2: Fallen Angel
Magnacarta 2
The Last Remnant
Jericho
Darksiders
Lost Planet
Rayman Raving Rabbids
Star Ocean
Tales of Vesperia
Enchated Arms
Guitar Hero III
Infinite Undiscovery
Star Wars: Republic Heroes
Dishonored
Dungeon Siege III
Dead Island
Some of those games I've played and tried get achievements in like Rayman, Lost Planet, SW, Dungeon Siege and Dead Island (although I just started playing with one since it's a free DLC game). I know I've played Guitar Hero several times but I can't believe I haven't gotten any achievements in that game yet. Oh well.
So last night I decided to play them in that order until I've gotten at least 1 achievement in each game. And if I like the game enough I'll keep playing it until I've finished . . . . or get stuck and quit.
I put in Too Human last night and played it for over an hour. I picked up 6 achievements for 45 points before calling it a night. I wasn't fairing well against a mini-boss and I couldn't figure out how to beat him. After dying twice rather quickly I decided to call it a night.
Now I know what you're thinking. Here she goes, giving up on another game because it got too hard. wah wah wah. That's not the case. I spent the rest of my evening looking for the strategy guide (which I swear I have) but couldn't find it. I then spent time trying to find the little insert that came in the game case to see if that would have the command info help that I needed. And I found it. Read through it. And now I'm better prepared to get back in the game. And yes, I will get back in that game just as soon as I'm done here.
The game was released in 2008 and thankfully they were still packing a manual with the game disc in the case. Now a days you'll be lucky just to get a slip of paper with the game's title on it. If that was the case with this game, I probably would have set it aside and moved on. After all I did get some achievements. But I actually like this game. I can go melee or I can go long range. I just wish there were more chests or things to open. And things to steal. Oh well.
So while I could move on to my next older zero game I think I'll stick with Too Human for awhile. At least until I get super stuck. But hey, my planned worked. I'm playing games. I'm focused. And I got some achievements. Of those zero achievements games on the list above, which ones would you like to see me play? Let me know in the comments.
After correcting my list to add 4 games that I owned but somehow forgot to add, I realized I had a LOT of games where I haven't earned any achievements. If I took out the Arcade titles, which were the majority of them, I would still have a bunch with a zero gamer score. I then narrowed that list down to stand-alone or first in a series games and I still had 17 games on my list. If I haven't finished the first game in a series I'm not going to play the sequels so those were easy to eliminate.
After I got this list I went through and wrote them down in order from the one I played the longest time ago to the the more recent. Oldest to newest based on when/if I've played them. That list is as follows:
Too Human
Sacred 2: Fallen Angel
Magnacarta 2
The Last Remnant
Jericho
Darksiders
Lost Planet
Rayman Raving Rabbids
Star Ocean
Tales of Vesperia
Enchated Arms
Guitar Hero III
Infinite Undiscovery
Star Wars: Republic Heroes
Dishonored
Dungeon Siege III
Dead Island
Some of those games I've played and tried get achievements in like Rayman, Lost Planet, SW, Dungeon Siege and Dead Island (although I just started playing with one since it's a free DLC game). I know I've played Guitar Hero several times but I can't believe I haven't gotten any achievements in that game yet. Oh well.
So last night I decided to play them in that order until I've gotten at least 1 achievement in each game. And if I like the game enough I'll keep playing it until I've finished . . . . or get stuck and quit.
I put in Too Human last night and played it for over an hour. I picked up 6 achievements for 45 points before calling it a night. I wasn't fairing well against a mini-boss and I couldn't figure out how to beat him. After dying twice rather quickly I decided to call it a night.
Now I know what you're thinking. Here she goes, giving up on another game because it got too hard. wah wah wah. That's not the case. I spent the rest of my evening looking for the strategy guide (which I swear I have) but couldn't find it. I then spent time trying to find the little insert that came in the game case to see if that would have the command info help that I needed. And I found it. Read through it. And now I'm better prepared to get back in the game. And yes, I will get back in that game just as soon as I'm done here.
The game was released in 2008 and thankfully they were still packing a manual with the game disc in the case. Now a days you'll be lucky just to get a slip of paper with the game's title on it. If that was the case with this game, I probably would have set it aside and moved on. After all I did get some achievements. But I actually like this game. I can go melee or I can go long range. I just wish there were more chests or things to open. And things to steal. Oh well.
So while I could move on to my next older zero game I think I'll stick with Too Human for awhile. At least until I get super stuck. But hey, my planned worked. I'm playing games. I'm focused. And I got some achievements. Of those zero achievements games on the list above, which ones would you like to see me play? Let me know in the comments.
Friday, September 20, 2013
150 points of Zombie killin'
So a long lost friend of mine (I'm looking at you HellWeasel) came back to gaming recently and we got together to play something . . . anything. We settled on Left 4 Dead. You know the first one. The one released in 2008. Yep. That one.
I had only played through the first campaign and thought I should give that game a go. Since I have a tendency to not know where I need to go in that game unless I'm playing with someone who actually knows what they are doing it was nice to have someone actually want to play with me in an old game. We played through all of the missions I hadn't done, or should I say finished, because of those missions looked very familiar. At the end of the night I had earned 150 Gamerpoints some of which were things I had done not related to finishing the mission.
I had to wait until we were done playing before I could look at them to see what I got because there's just so many zombies coming at you that you really do have to fight for your life. And if you're Weasell that means every special infected comes straight for you. I could be standing next to a spitter but they would attack Weasell. Made things a little easier for me but not for him. The good news was I was able to revive him a few times which counts towards another achievement. I figure if I play with him a few more times I'll have that one in the bag.
I'm thinking about trying some multiplayer action in that game (once I can get my account gold again). Anyone up for some head bashing, gut busting, zombie killing, friendly fights? If so just hit me up . . . unless we're on the same team.
I had only played through the first campaign and thought I should give that game a go. Since I have a tendency to not know where I need to go in that game unless I'm playing with someone who actually knows what they are doing it was nice to have someone actually want to play with me in an old game. We played through all of the missions I hadn't done, or should I say finished, because of those missions looked very familiar. At the end of the night I had earned 150 Gamerpoints some of which were things I had done not related to finishing the mission.
I had to wait until we were done playing before I could look at them to see what I got because there's just so many zombies coming at you that you really do have to fight for your life. And if you're Weasell that means every special infected comes straight for you. I could be standing next to a spitter but they would attack Weasell. Made things a little easier for me but not for him. The good news was I was able to revive him a few times which counts towards another achievement. I figure if I play with him a few more times I'll have that one in the bag.
I'm thinking about trying some multiplayer action in that game (once I can get my account gold again). Anyone up for some head bashing, gut busting, zombie killing, friendly fights? If so just hit me up . . . unless we're on the same team.
Thursday, July 23, 2009
I've got a picket fence
I did it! I finally beat the last boss in the expansion pack to Puzzle Quest and got those last 20 pts I needed to get my gamer score to exactly 11,111. I'm so proud of myself. And relieved. It was hard work making sure I didn't play games that might give me some points that I didn't want and then trying to play games to get the points that I did want. I'm exhausted.
Kralon congratulated me on my "picket fence" and I kind of like that idea. They almost look that way don't they? I think metallicorphen asked how long I would leave my score that way. Long enough to blog about it. It's not something I plan on hanging onto for a long time.
I'm also not like some of the people on gaming forums that I frequent that are flipping out because they've picked up an achievement that does not end in a number divisible by 5. They think all achievements should end in either a 5 or a 0. Oh, please. I remember when I started getting achievements in Cloning Clyde and the numbers were all funky. I thought it was brilliant. Sure, anyone can make achievements in nice 5 pts increments. But that's boring and cookie cutter programing. I thought it took real genius for someone to f*#$ with the system and do those funky amounts. And those amounts were what made it possible for me to get my picket fence.
I remember when I first got my Xbox 360 and my gamerscore was in the hundreds. A lot of my friends had scores in the 1,000s. I wanted to break that barrier. I finally did. Then I had to break the 10,000 point barrier. Done that. Now I don't really care. Until this opportunity came along. Could I do it? How much self-control would I have to exercise. I hate exercising. The hardest part was getting that last 20 points. I knew I had achievements I was close to getting, or could get easily, or so I thought. It turned out that last one was a SOB. But I did it so I'm happy.
Now that I have a spot open on my Gamer Goals I've been thinking about what new goal I could add. I thought about a gamer score of 12,345. That might look cool. And it's not far away, only 1,234 points to get. But that would mean I have to "even out" my gamer score to end in a 5. I think picking up the next achievement in Cloning Clyde would do that but right now I'm hopelessly stuck in that game. Not to mention extremely frustrated with it. It's those stupid sheep clones that I can't seem to control that get me every time. Maybe I'll pick a goal unrelated to my gamerscore. I just don't know yet, but I'll take suggestions. Do ya got any?
Kralon congratulated me on my "picket fence" and I kind of like that idea. They almost look that way don't they? I think metallicorphen asked how long I would leave my score that way. Long enough to blog about it. It's not something I plan on hanging onto for a long time.
I'm also not like some of the people on gaming forums that I frequent that are flipping out because they've picked up an achievement that does not end in a number divisible by 5. They think all achievements should end in either a 5 or a 0. Oh, please. I remember when I started getting achievements in Cloning Clyde and the numbers were all funky. I thought it was brilliant. Sure, anyone can make achievements in nice 5 pts increments. But that's boring and cookie cutter programing. I thought it took real genius for someone to f*#$ with the system and do those funky amounts. And those amounts were what made it possible for me to get my picket fence.
I remember when I first got my Xbox 360 and my gamerscore was in the hundreds. A lot of my friends had scores in the 1,000s. I wanted to break that barrier. I finally did. Then I had to break the 10,000 point barrier. Done that. Now I don't really care. Until this opportunity came along. Could I do it? How much self-control would I have to exercise. I hate exercising. The hardest part was getting that last 20 points. I knew I had achievements I was close to getting, or could get easily, or so I thought. It turned out that last one was a SOB. But I did it so I'm happy.
Now that I have a spot open on my Gamer Goals I've been thinking about what new goal I could add. I thought about a gamer score of 12,345. That might look cool. And it's not far away, only 1,234 points to get. But that would mean I have to "even out" my gamer score to end in a 5. I think picking up the next achievement in Cloning Clyde would do that but right now I'm hopelessly stuck in that game. Not to mention extremely frustrated with it. It's those stupid sheep clones that I can't seem to control that get me every time. Maybe I'll pick a goal unrelated to my gamerscore. I just don't know yet, but I'll take suggestions. Do ya got any?
Wednesday, July 15, 2009
40 points and counting
Speaking of Gamer Goals I'm close to crossing another one off my list.
One of my goals was to get my gamer score to 11,111 exactly. I was stuck at 10,981 for the longest time. That is only 130 points away so I thought I would put in Lost Odyssey and finish the game. You get 125 points for finishing each disk and I am working on the last one. That would mean I would only need 5 more points to reach my goal. Very doable. But after looking through the achievements for Lost Odyssey I decided against that.
There are a couple of achievements that I'm probably close to getting and it would be just my luck to finish the last disk and have several achievements pop up putting me over the magic number. So as mush as I want to play that game and finish it up I'm not going to put it in for awhile.
So that left me trying to find a way to maintain control over my score and get the points I need. That's when I started playing Battlefield: 1943. I've picked up several achievements in that game and now I'm only 40 points away from my goal. Those achievements are very easy to get and I'm sure I can control which ones I get and when I want them. Of course that might me I immediately jump out of a game when I get my 40 points just so I won't accidentally pick up another achievement.
Anyway, I wouldn't be surprised if I finish this goal before the weekend is over (since I'm sure to get some Gears of War matches in as well). I'm sure I'll blog about it when it happens and everyone will have to check out "my sticks". Maybe my next gamer score goal should be 12,345. Do you have a gamer score goal? If so, tell me about it. Please!
One of my goals was to get my gamer score to 11,111 exactly. I was stuck at 10,981 for the longest time. That is only 130 points away so I thought I would put in Lost Odyssey and finish the game. You get 125 points for finishing each disk and I am working on the last one. That would mean I would only need 5 more points to reach my goal. Very doable. But after looking through the achievements for Lost Odyssey I decided against that.
There are a couple of achievements that I'm probably close to getting and it would be just my luck to finish the last disk and have several achievements pop up putting me over the magic number. So as mush as I want to play that game and finish it up I'm not going to put it in for awhile.
So that left me trying to find a way to maintain control over my score and get the points I need. That's when I started playing Battlefield: 1943. I've picked up several achievements in that game and now I'm only 40 points away from my goal. Those achievements are very easy to get and I'm sure I can control which ones I get and when I want them. Of course that might me I immediately jump out of a game when I get my 40 points just so I won't accidentally pick up another achievement.
Anyway, I wouldn't be surprised if I finish this goal before the weekend is over (since I'm sure to get some Gears of War matches in as well). I'm sure I'll blog about it when it happens and everyone will have to check out "my sticks". Maybe my next gamer score goal should be 12,345. Do you have a gamer score goal? If so, tell me about it. Please!
Friday, February 20, 2009
Gaming Goals
I've decided I'm going to set goals when it comes to my gaming, but I'm not going to call them New Year Resolutions. Why? Partly because I haven't been very good at setting them at the beginning of the year (and finishing them in the year as well). And partly because setting a resolution sounds like you're trying to make yourself do something that's painful or distasteful . . . like a diet. I've decided to call my goals "Gaming Goals" and I can set them any time I like. A "goal" sounds much more pleasant than a "resolution". And it means you're working towards something, not forcing yourself to do something. But maybe that's just me.
For now here are the Gaming Goals I've sent for myself. Their deadline is open-ended unless otherwise stated.
1. Finish Final Fantasy VII (I think this one has made the list for the last three years in a row) by June 15th
2. All achievements in Lego Star Wars: The Complete Saga (2), Lego Star Wars II (9), Catan (2), Puzzle Quest (3), and Spyglass Board Games (1)
3. $100,000 bankroll achievement in Texas Hold 'em
4. Get my gamerscore to 11,111 exactly
5. Post on my blog at least 3 times a week (feel free to rag on me about this one if I don't keep it up)
6. Finish Lost Odyssey story
7. Get that pesky achievement in Soltrio Solitaire for winning at all classic games (not including expansion packs) (I forget what the achievement is called)
8. Finish Insane mode with Evil Ric in Gears of War (the first one)
9. Finish that last @#$%! level in Feeding Frenzy
10. Find my Star Wars The Force Unleashed disk (I still have boxes to unpack)
So what do you think? What are your Gaming Goals?
For now here are the Gaming Goals I've sent for myself. Their deadline is open-ended unless otherwise stated.
1. Finish Final Fantasy VII (I think this one has made the list for the last three years in a row) by June 15th
2. All achievements in Lego Star Wars: The Complete Saga (2), Lego Star Wars II (9), Catan (2), Puzzle Quest (3), and Spyglass Board Games (1)
3. $100,000 bankroll achievement in Texas Hold 'em
4. Get my gamerscore to 11,111 exactly
5. Post on my blog at least 3 times a week (feel free to rag on me about this one if I don't keep it up)
6. Finish Lost Odyssey story
7. Get that pesky achievement in Soltrio Solitaire for winning at all classic games (not including expansion packs) (I forget what the achievement is called)
8. Finish Insane mode with Evil Ric in Gears of War (the first one)
9. Finish that last @#$%! level in Feeding Frenzy
10. Find my Star Wars The Force Unleashed disk (I still have boxes to unpack)
So what do you think? What are your Gaming Goals?
Friday, January 2, 2009
Pity the failure that I am
So I didn't make it. I was 234 points away from breaking the 10,000 point barrier with my gamer score. Yet another New Years Resolution I didn't achieve. And to think I was one boss battle from picking up 125 points in Lost Odyssey. So close, and yet so far.
I not only failed at getting the score but I failed at playing Lost Odyssey. I got into an area that I couldn't handle. The regular enemy encounters were killing me . . . literally. I fled like the little coward that I am. I love that game, but it got to a point where all I wanted to do was rip the disk from the drive and chuck it out the window. Maybe this weekend I'll take some time to focus on the game and strategies to help me survive instead of rushing through it to get points. Besides, if I finish the game then I can go back to Blue Dragon.
When my attempt to get gamer points from Lost Odyssey failed I started playing Gears of War on insane. I figured if I could get achievements for finishing chapters on insane I would also get the achievements for hardcore as well. Doubling up is always nice. It didn't work out that way so the clock turned over past midnight and I was at the same gamer score I had the night before.
Now if I had spent some time playing those games earlier in the week instead of playing Gears of War 2 with my friends I might have met my goal and finally cross one resolution off my list. But you see, I like playing with my friends. As crazy and emotional as they sometimes tend to get, they're a bunch of real stand up guys. So I blame my failure on them. Yeah, that's it. It's all their fault. If they would just act like jerks so I wouldn't want to play with them then maybe I'd actually achieve a goal I set for myself. I'd like to try and see them be a jerk . . . without laughing about it either.
There are a lot of other New Year Resolutions that I didn't achieve either. I still haven't finished Final Fantasy VII, Mario Sunshine, Summoner or Jedi Outcast like I've been trying to do as a challenge with my brother dain. I guess those should be on my resolution list this year as well. Oh well. I guess my resolution of world peace didn't quite work out either.
With all the house/moving stuff that's been my life the last couple of months I haven't given it any thought about what my 2009 resolutions should be. When I get a chance I'll review where I came up short with my 2008 ones and see what dreams/goals I want to complete this year. Does anyone have any Prozac they could share?
I not only failed at getting the score but I failed at playing Lost Odyssey. I got into an area that I couldn't handle. The regular enemy encounters were killing me . . . literally. I fled like the little coward that I am. I love that game, but it got to a point where all I wanted to do was rip the disk from the drive and chuck it out the window. Maybe this weekend I'll take some time to focus on the game and strategies to help me survive instead of rushing through it to get points. Besides, if I finish the game then I can go back to Blue Dragon.
When my attempt to get gamer points from Lost Odyssey failed I started playing Gears of War on insane. I figured if I could get achievements for finishing chapters on insane I would also get the achievements for hardcore as well. Doubling up is always nice. It didn't work out that way so the clock turned over past midnight and I was at the same gamer score I had the night before.
Now if I had spent some time playing those games earlier in the week instead of playing Gears of War 2 with my friends I might have met my goal and finally cross one resolution off my list. But you see, I like playing with my friends. As crazy and emotional as they sometimes tend to get, they're a bunch of real stand up guys. So I blame my failure on them. Yeah, that's it. It's all their fault. If they would just act like jerks so I wouldn't want to play with them then maybe I'd actually achieve a goal I set for myself. I'd like to try and see them be a jerk . . . without laughing about it either.
There are a lot of other New Year Resolutions that I didn't achieve either. I still haven't finished Final Fantasy VII, Mario Sunshine, Summoner or Jedi Outcast like I've been trying to do as a challenge with my brother dain. I guess those should be on my resolution list this year as well. Oh well. I guess my resolution of world peace didn't quite work out either.
With all the house/moving stuff that's been my life the last couple of months I haven't given it any thought about what my 2009 resolutions should be. When I get a chance I'll review where I came up short with my 2008 ones and see what dreams/goals I want to complete this year. Does anyone have any Prozac they could share?
Tuesday, December 23, 2008
Bah Humbug!
I realized last night while getting ready for bed that I haven't wrapped my Christmas presents yet. Since I will need to deliver them tomorrow on my way home from work that gives me tonight to wrap them all. Can I tell you how much I hate wrapping presents? I'm terrible at it. Especially those gifts that are oddly shaped or have gaps in the packaging. Besides, you go through all that trouble just to have someone rip it right off anyway. They only time they notice your hard work is when you tape it up so much they can't even get into it. I've got a ton of presents to wrap tonight so who knows when I'll be able to get on and play. I only have 310 points to go and just over a week. I need all the play time I can get at this point.
Thursday, May 8, 2008
My best effort . . . and my worst
I found a site a couple of months ago when I was looking for a way to put my Xbox Live profile graphic on this blog. I still haven't made up my mind about that because I do play other systems besides the Xbox 360. No, really I do.
The site is MyGamerCard.net and it has a really cool feature that I use often. After you sign up you can view a list of all the games you've played. It will show a progress bar for the gamerscore and number of achievements you've earned in that game. It lists your games by "last played" by default (although it might be slow to update some times) but you can switch that to alphabetical A-Z or Z-A. It also has a sorting option to display your games in order of the effort you've put in to them compared to the rest of the registered users of the site. You can sort by Best to Worst or Worst to Best effort.
For instance, if you look at my profile my 'best effort' game is Chromehounds. My gamerscore of 580 out of 1,000 is a 349.06% overachievement above the sites average score of 129.16. Considering how hard this game is to get some of the achievements I can believe that. A score of 720 in Chromehounds is the equivalent of 1,000 in any other game.
Now, let's look at my score in Uno. I've finished the game so I have 200/200 points. But that score is only a 54.97% overachievement above the average (129.06). When they released this option on the site they explained that "finishing" Avatar: Burning Earth and getting those 1,000 gamer points will only give you a 3.75% overachievement score. Why is that? Because everyone is playing that game and getting those easy achievements. Not much effort there.
Hopefully you'll have more games listed with a positive or overachievement rating than games with a negative or underachievement rating. But if you're like me you've dabbled a little bit in a lot of games. I've played a lot of Puzzle Quest recently but my gamerscore of 70 in that game is below the 81.34 average so I have an underachievement rating of 13.94%. And then there's Yaris. A game I've only played 2 or 3 times (hey, it was free) and my gamerscore of 10 points is only just short of the 19.79 average (a 49.47% underachievement).
I do have a lot of games with an underachievement rating of 100% because I haven't scored any achievements in them yet. I've played Bejeweled 2 many times, for long hours, but I still haven't heard that little bleep and seen an achievement pop up. But while my gamerscore of 0 has an underachievement rating of 100% it's not that far below the average score of 25.38.
And then there's Tempest. Based on the fact that no one on the leaderboards has received all the achievements for this game so you can bet this is one game that's hard to get achievements in (whether through gameplay or tough achievements). If you couple the leaderboards with the fact that the average gamerscore for this game from people on the site is only 3.73 points any achievement earned in this game is going to be an overachievement. My score is currently 0 so even if I get just one little 5 point achievement in this game I'll go from 100% underachiever to a 1.34% overachiever. It's not much but my number will go from in the red (underachievement) to green (overachievement).
It's really cool to see what games I'm underachieving in but within an achievement or two or the site's average and then try to play that game in order to get those achievements. I'm only a 1.56% underachiever in Luxor 2 by only .95 gamerpoints. Any achievement there will turn things around. Some of my other marginally underachieving games are Gauntlet, Boom Boom Rocket, Zuma, Joust, Word Puzzle, Tetris Splash, Poker Smash, Ikaruga, and Gears of War. An achievement or two in any of those games would put me on the plus side.
There's a leaderboard where you can look at the leaders overall, by a specific game or by gamerzone (i.e. Pro, recreation, etc.) or other options. You can also check out other people's scores and progress and see what games they've underachieved in and then point that out to them when they start bragging about their game prowess. There's a forum (the only video game forum I can access while at work) and a LiveTracker that lets you see which games registered site users are in at that time. Right now there's 27 in Call of Duty 4, 13 in Gears of War, and 198 in Grand Theft Auto 4 (that's down from the near 400 usually) and a lot of other games.
I picked up 15 points in Solitaire last night and that jumped my overachievement rating from 120.89% to 159.07%. Now you might think I'm crazy and obsessed with achievements or gamerscores . . . okay maybe I am just a little . . . but it's nice to know how my game playing stacks up with everyone else. It use to be the mark of your game playing skills and effort was getting to put three letters in next to your high score at the arcade. Now, it's achievements and gamerscores. And if I'm hoping to break the 10,000 gamerscore point barrier this year knowing where my best efforts are being made is nice. Besides all those negative ratings just make me want to take a day off and turn those negatives into positives. Oh wait, I'm already taking Monday off to play games. Too bad my job can't get me this motivated and productive. Maybe if my job had achievements too.
Beep.
Achievement Unlocked.
Arrived to work on time 5 points
The site is MyGamerCard.net and it has a really cool feature that I use often. After you sign up you can view a list of all the games you've played. It will show a progress bar for the gamerscore and number of achievements you've earned in that game. It lists your games by "last played" by default (although it might be slow to update some times) but you can switch that to alphabetical A-Z or Z-A. It also has a sorting option to display your games in order of the effort you've put in to them compared to the rest of the registered users of the site. You can sort by Best to Worst or Worst to Best effort.
For instance, if you look at my profile my 'best effort' game is Chromehounds. My gamerscore of 580 out of 1,000 is a 349.06% overachievement above the sites average score of 129.16. Considering how hard this game is to get some of the achievements I can believe that. A score of 720 in Chromehounds is the equivalent of 1,000 in any other game.
Now, let's look at my score in Uno. I've finished the game so I have 200/200 points. But that score is only a 54.97% overachievement above the average (129.06). When they released this option on the site they explained that "finishing" Avatar: Burning Earth and getting those 1,000 gamer points will only give you a 3.75% overachievement score. Why is that? Because everyone is playing that game and getting those easy achievements. Not much effort there.
Hopefully you'll have more games listed with a positive or overachievement rating than games with a negative or underachievement rating. But if you're like me you've dabbled a little bit in a lot of games. I've played a lot of Puzzle Quest recently but my gamerscore of 70 in that game is below the 81.34 average so I have an underachievement rating of 13.94%. And then there's Yaris. A game I've only played 2 or 3 times (hey, it was free) and my gamerscore of 10 points is only just short of the 19.79 average (a 49.47% underachievement).
I do have a lot of games with an underachievement rating of 100% because I haven't scored any achievements in them yet. I've played Bejeweled 2 many times, for long hours, but I still haven't heard that little bleep and seen an achievement pop up. But while my gamerscore of 0 has an underachievement rating of 100% it's not that far below the average score of 25.38.
And then there's Tempest. Based on the fact that no one on the leaderboards has received all the achievements for this game so you can bet this is one game that's hard to get achievements in (whether through gameplay or tough achievements). If you couple the leaderboards with the fact that the average gamerscore for this game from people on the site is only 3.73 points any achievement earned in this game is going to be an overachievement. My score is currently 0 so even if I get just one little 5 point achievement in this game I'll go from 100% underachiever to a 1.34% overachiever. It's not much but my number will go from in the red (underachievement) to green (overachievement).
It's really cool to see what games I'm underachieving in but within an achievement or two or the site's average and then try to play that game in order to get those achievements. I'm only a 1.56% underachiever in Luxor 2 by only .95 gamerpoints. Any achievement there will turn things around. Some of my other marginally underachieving games are Gauntlet, Boom Boom Rocket, Zuma, Joust, Word Puzzle, Tetris Splash, Poker Smash, Ikaruga, and Gears of War. An achievement or two in any of those games would put me on the plus side.
There's a leaderboard where you can look at the leaders overall, by a specific game or by gamerzone (i.e. Pro, recreation, etc.) or other options. You can also check out other people's scores and progress and see what games they've underachieved in and then point that out to them when they start bragging about their game prowess. There's a forum (the only video game forum I can access while at work) and a LiveTracker that lets you see which games registered site users are in at that time. Right now there's 27 in Call of Duty 4, 13 in Gears of War, and 198 in Grand Theft Auto 4 (that's down from the near 400 usually) and a lot of other games.
I picked up 15 points in Solitaire last night and that jumped my overachievement rating from 120.89% to 159.07%. Now you might think I'm crazy and obsessed with achievements or gamerscores . . . okay maybe I am just a little . . . but it's nice to know how my game playing stacks up with everyone else. It use to be the mark of your game playing skills and effort was getting to put three letters in next to your high score at the arcade. Now, it's achievements and gamerscores. And if I'm hoping to break the 10,000 gamerscore point barrier this year knowing where my best efforts are being made is nice. Besides all those negative ratings just make me want to take a day off and turn those negatives into positives. Oh wait, I'm already taking Monday off to play games. Too bad my job can't get me this motivated and productive. Maybe if my job had achievements too.
Beep.
Achievement Unlocked.
Arrived to work on time 5 points
Monday, April 14, 2008
Your gamer score IS something to brag about
My youngest brother kaiakapero is borrowing my spare Xbox 360 and some of my games . . . and dain's too. I've tried to get him to play the story mode of Gears of War with me but he said he's not that into single player games. When I tried to tell him of the achievements you get and the points for your gamer score he said his gamer score doesn't matter to him.
But yesterday when we were all over at my parents house to hear about their latest cruise he comes up to me and says:
kai: "Guess what?"
me: "I don't know. What?"
kai: "My gamer score has gone up. I've played a couple of Arcade games and picked up some achievements. I'm now over 100."
me: "Well I'm over 6,000."
kai: "Yeah, well, you play more than me and have more games."
He does have a point there. I do have more games then him (especially when most of the games he has are mine to begin with). And I do play more than him. He works an evening shift and his wife won't let him play violent games in front of his young kids (wise idea) so he's usually left to playing the games he likes on Sunday and Monday nights when he doesn't work.
He said that he lets the kids play some of the Arcade games like Uno and Feeding Frenzy. Last night he started a game of Uno and gave the controller to his 4 year old daughter to play. She knows what to do, she's just a little slow before she acts. While she was playing, dain comes over to me and says she just got an achievement for bluffing. And then I think she went on to win the game. I don't know if that set to well with kai. He's tried to bluff, but couldn't. And he hasn't won a game himself. I guess it's kind of hard to get up staged by your 4 year old daughter. He should be use to it now since she can beat him (or give him a run for his money) when we play bowling on the Wii. Just don't remind him of that.
I don't know if he's a total convert to the "higher is better" club when it comes to your gamer score like I am. His play time and limited games will probably help curb any obsessive tendencies he might have towards that. But for him to go from some one who didn't care what his gamer score was to some one who took great pride in getting it over 100 I think he might be brought around to my way of thinking. For me now, a gamer score of 100 is laughable. But I remember when I broke that three digit barrier with my score. I was thrilled. It looked much more legitimate than a two digit gamer score, but not as legitimate as a four digit one. Now I'm working on breaking the five digit barrier. So your gamer score IS something to brag about no matter how much (or how little) it is.
But yesterday when we were all over at my parents house to hear about their latest cruise he comes up to me and says:
kai: "Guess what?"
me: "I don't know. What?"
kai: "My gamer score has gone up. I've played a couple of Arcade games and picked up some achievements. I'm now over 100."
me: "Well I'm over 6,000."
kai: "Yeah, well, you play more than me and have more games."
He does have a point there. I do have more games then him (especially when most of the games he has are mine to begin with). And I do play more than him. He works an evening shift and his wife won't let him play violent games in front of his young kids (wise idea) so he's usually left to playing the games he likes on Sunday and Monday nights when he doesn't work.
He said that he lets the kids play some of the Arcade games like Uno and Feeding Frenzy. Last night he started a game of Uno and gave the controller to his 4 year old daughter to play. She knows what to do, she's just a little slow before she acts. While she was playing, dain comes over to me and says she just got an achievement for bluffing. And then I think she went on to win the game. I don't know if that set to well with kai. He's tried to bluff, but couldn't. And he hasn't won a game himself. I guess it's kind of hard to get up staged by your 4 year old daughter. He should be use to it now since she can beat him (or give him a run for his money) when we play bowling on the Wii. Just don't remind him of that.
I don't know if he's a total convert to the "higher is better" club when it comes to your gamer score like I am. His play time and limited games will probably help curb any obsessive tendencies he might have towards that. But for him to go from some one who didn't care what his gamer score was to some one who took great pride in getting it over 100 I think he might be brought around to my way of thinking. For me now, a gamer score of 100 is laughable. But I remember when I broke that three digit barrier with my score. I was thrilled. It looked much more legitimate than a two digit gamer score, but not as legitimate as a four digit one. Now I'm working on breaking the five digit barrier. So your gamer score IS something to brag about no matter how much (or how little) it is.
Tuesday, March 25, 2008
The NEW New Year Resolutions
Okay, with it being this far into the year can these really be called New Year Resolutions? Anyhoo! These are the next batch of Resolutions or goals or whatever you want to call them, that I hope to accomplish this year, or this quarter, this month, or whenever. Feel free to offer support or attempts to discourage me, whatever your personality dictates.
1. Finish Final Fantasy VII
2. Finish Lego Star Wars II
3. Finish Lego Star Wars: The Complete Sage
4. Finish BioShock
5. Break 10,000 point barrier with my gamer score
#1-4 should be easily doable (except for the undefeated flight missions in Lego Star Wars II). #5 on the other hand could take some doing. If I get close (and desperate) maybe I'll have to resort to Avatar: The Burning Earth. Here's hoping I don't have to. Cheers!
1. Finish Final Fantasy VII
2. Finish Lego Star Wars II
3. Finish Lego Star Wars: The Complete Sage
4. Finish BioShock
5. Break 10,000 point barrier with my gamer score
#1-4 should be easily doable (except for the undefeated flight missions in Lego Star Wars II). #5 on the other hand could take some doing. If I get close (and desperate) maybe I'll have to resort to Avatar: The Burning Earth. Here's hoping I don't have to. Cheers!
Tuesday, February 19, 2008
New Poll - Is it wrong to play Avatar: Burning Earth for quick achievement points?
So my brother and I are locked into a gamer score battle. With no end in sight. You see we're both competitive people and neither one of use can stand that the other one might have a higher gamer score than the other. His score currently stands at 5,010 and I'm at 4,967. Now if I could just stop playing Call of Duty 4 online I'm sure I could make up the difference.
We have a lot of the same friends in common and now they're starting to get in on the competition. They help us out when we're stuck trying to get an achievement. They've offered to "distract" the other one into playing something (that won't get them achievements) so one of us can work on achievements in peace. I've even had one of my friends offer to play a game for me to earn the points while I could play something else. And then there's the suggestion, from just about everyone, to play Avatar: The Burning Earth.
The game only has five achievements and if you watch the YouTube video you'll see that it only takes about 10 minutes to get all those achievements. Instant 1,000 points. As appealing and tempting as this is there's a downside to having those 1,000 points in your gamer score. It doesn't matter what game forum you go to but everyone looks down on those that have played the game for the points. You're scum. You're slim. You're an achievement whore.
That may be, but it’s 1,000 points! That would mean I would be 5,967 and my brother would still be 5,010. I'd be ahead of him by a large margin. Of course there's nothing to stop him from renting the game and getting those 1,000 points himself. Which would mean he be ahead of me again.
So I guess it comes down to whether I want to beat my brother's gamer score (yes) and look like scum on game forums (like I care what they think anyway) or play and EARN achievements for games that I actually like (yes, yes, and oh . . . yes). Vote in the poll and tell me what you think.
We have a lot of the same friends in common and now they're starting to get in on the competition. They help us out when we're stuck trying to get an achievement. They've offered to "distract" the other one into playing something (that won't get them achievements) so one of us can work on achievements in peace. I've even had one of my friends offer to play a game for me to earn the points while I could play something else. And then there's the suggestion, from just about everyone, to play Avatar: The Burning Earth.
The game only has five achievements and if you watch the YouTube video you'll see that it only takes about 10 minutes to get all those achievements. Instant 1,000 points. As appealing and tempting as this is there's a downside to having those 1,000 points in your gamer score. It doesn't matter what game forum you go to but everyone looks down on those that have played the game for the points. You're scum. You're slim. You're an achievement whore.
That may be, but it’s 1,000 points! That would mean I would be 5,967 and my brother would still be 5,010. I'd be ahead of him by a large margin. Of course there's nothing to stop him from renting the game and getting those 1,000 points himself. Which would mean he be ahead of me again.
So I guess it comes down to whether I want to beat my brother's gamer score (yes) and look like scum on game forums (like I care what they think anyway) or play and EARN achievements for games that I actually like (yes, yes, and oh . . . yes). Vote in the poll and tell me what you think.
Wednesday, January 2, 2008
Gaming New Year Resolutions?
I made New Year Resolutions in other areas of my life but I haven't made any as far as gaming is concerned. Should I?
I started this blog because I needed a kick in the pants about a deal my brother and I worked out for finishing games. It's been a year and a half since then and we haven't finished any of the ones we chose. Should I make a New Year Resolution to finish a game?
How about ranking up in matches? Should I make A resolution to reach and finish a level or two of prestige in Call of Duty 4 before the year is out? Or to reach the highest rank in Chromehounds?
What about earning achievements and raising my gamer score? What would be a good resolution? Raise it 1,000 points this year? 2,000? My achievement and gamer score points come in fits and spurts. I might only get 20 points for a couple of months but then rake in 200 points in the space of a couple of weeks. And that doesn't have anything to do with playing a new game and getting all those "easy" points. I think I'm around 700 points or so from crossing the 5,000 point barrier so that would be a reasonable achievement, don't you think?
I'm just thinking as I type here and I just might have my resolutions. Feel free to hold me to them . . . or make it frustrating difficult to achieve them.
My New Year's (Gaming) Resolutions:
1. Finish Final Fantasy VII.
2. Reach rank #55 and complete one level of Prestige in Call of Duty 4.
3. Raise my gamer score to 5,500 or more.
I have until December 31st, 2008 to accomplish them. Do you think I can do it? What else do you think I should set as a goal this year? What are yours?
I started this blog because I needed a kick in the pants about a deal my brother and I worked out for finishing games. It's been a year and a half since then and we haven't finished any of the ones we chose. Should I make a New Year Resolution to finish a game?
How about ranking up in matches? Should I make A resolution to reach and finish a level or two of prestige in Call of Duty 4 before the year is out? Or to reach the highest rank in Chromehounds?
What about earning achievements and raising my gamer score? What would be a good resolution? Raise it 1,000 points this year? 2,000? My achievement and gamer score points come in fits and spurts. I might only get 20 points for a couple of months but then rake in 200 points in the space of a couple of weeks. And that doesn't have anything to do with playing a new game and getting all those "easy" points. I think I'm around 700 points or so from crossing the 5,000 point barrier so that would be a reasonable achievement, don't you think?
I'm just thinking as I type here and I just might have my resolutions. Feel free to hold me to them . . . or make it frustrating difficult to achieve them.
My New Year's (Gaming) Resolutions:
1. Finish Final Fantasy VII.
2. Reach rank #55 and complete one level of Prestige in Call of Duty 4.
3. Raise my gamer score to 5,500 or more.
I have until December 31st, 2008 to accomplish them. Do you think I can do it? What else do you think I should set as a goal this year? What are yours?
Wednesday, April 25, 2007
I want my Gamerscore on my tombstone
My Xbox Live Gamerscore is going to be the death of me.
I'm a competitive person by nature so I was expecting a little competition among friends when it comes to our Gamerscores, but now I've been consumed by the beast. Is it healthy? Probably not. Do I care? Not as long as I keep unlocking achievements. But that's the rub.
When I first got my Xbox 360 at the beginning of the year I was embarrassed about my Gamerscore. 25 points? For Hexic? That wasn't anything to brag about. But I was just learning about and messing around on the whole online dashboard. Then I got in to some actual gameplay.
Now I want to hear that little bleep. I need those achievements. It was all well and good while I was one of the early people from my old original Xbox friends list to get a 360 (we were having too much fun playing Star Wars Battlefront to worry about a new system, besides I wanted some time for them to get all the bugs worked out of the new system's launch). My 120 Gamerscore beat their big fat zero any day. And that was just for starters. Then one by one they all started to get 360s.
I still have a few holdouts that are content with their original Xboxes but they'll come around in time. One of them just got his 360 last weekend. Now Ice is a very nice guy and a good player but I wasn't all that happy to see him go from zero to a 115 Gamerscore in just a couple of hours. Give him another week or two and he'll be busting my butt again in whatever games we happen to be playing together. He's just one damn good player. I'm thrilled that I'll finally get to test my mettle against him in Gears of War, but in no time at all he'll leave my paltry Gamerscore behind.
Now I know I could hatch a plan with my friends to set up a ranked match in Gears for just us so we can work on all those 100 kill ranked achievements in the game but to me that's just cheating. If I get an achievement I want to earn it. Fair and square. But I'm not against hedging my chances though. I set up a Hearts game last night and invited my brother (someone who hasn't played Hearts but whose Gamerscore is climbing faster than mine) thinking I could use him to get a few wins and hands in towards an achievement. What does he do? He shots the Moon . . . and the Sun in the same game. What do I do? Come in last place. So while I walked away with ZERO points for my Gamerscore he walked away with 40 points without really trying.
I remember when I broke the 1,000 point barrier. I was excited. It looked more like a serious score than the laughable 990. Why? I don't know. With all my friends getting 360s and increasing their Gamerscore my competitive nature kicks in and says I need to stay ahead of them. My brother, once more than 300 points behind me is now only 20 points away from matching my score. I have too many other friends creeping up behind me . . . and some passing me that all I want to do is play video games and listen for that bleep.
When at work, I check out my friends list hourly on http://www.xbox.com/ just to see who's recently unlocked an achievement and in what game. I take notes of what achievements I think I can unlock that night when I get home. I've sent messages out asking friends for advice on how to unlock those pesky ones that I can't seem to do on my own. But despite my best efferts I don't always get to hear that blessed bleep. I need to hear that bleep. I need the points for my Gamerscore. It's consuming my life and I don't know how to stop it.
My Gamerscore will be the death of me. And even if it is I want it carved on my tombstone, but only if it's better than everyone else's.
I'm a competitive person by nature so I was expecting a little competition among friends when it comes to our Gamerscores, but now I've been consumed by the beast. Is it healthy? Probably not. Do I care? Not as long as I keep unlocking achievements. But that's the rub.
When I first got my Xbox 360 at the beginning of the year I was embarrassed about my Gamerscore. 25 points? For Hexic? That wasn't anything to brag about. But I was just learning about and messing around on the whole online dashboard. Then I got in to some actual gameplay.
Now I want to hear that little bleep. I need those achievements. It was all well and good while I was one of the early people from my old original Xbox friends list to get a 360 (we were having too much fun playing Star Wars Battlefront to worry about a new system, besides I wanted some time for them to get all the bugs worked out of the new system's launch). My 120 Gamerscore beat their big fat zero any day. And that was just for starters. Then one by one they all started to get 360s.
I still have a few holdouts that are content with their original Xboxes but they'll come around in time. One of them just got his 360 last weekend. Now Ice is a very nice guy and a good player but I wasn't all that happy to see him go from zero to a 115 Gamerscore in just a couple of hours. Give him another week or two and he'll be busting my butt again in whatever games we happen to be playing together. He's just one damn good player. I'm thrilled that I'll finally get to test my mettle against him in Gears of War, but in no time at all he'll leave my paltry Gamerscore behind.
Now I know I could hatch a plan with my friends to set up a ranked match in Gears for just us so we can work on all those 100 kill ranked achievements in the game but to me that's just cheating. If I get an achievement I want to earn it. Fair and square. But I'm not against hedging my chances though. I set up a Hearts game last night and invited my brother (someone who hasn't played Hearts but whose Gamerscore is climbing faster than mine) thinking I could use him to get a few wins and hands in towards an achievement. What does he do? He shots the Moon . . . and the Sun in the same game. What do I do? Come in last place. So while I walked away with ZERO points for my Gamerscore he walked away with 40 points without really trying.
I remember when I broke the 1,000 point barrier. I was excited. It looked more like a serious score than the laughable 990. Why? I don't know. With all my friends getting 360s and increasing their Gamerscore my competitive nature kicks in and says I need to stay ahead of them. My brother, once more than 300 points behind me is now only 20 points away from matching my score. I have too many other friends creeping up behind me . . . and some passing me that all I want to do is play video games and listen for that bleep.
When at work, I check out my friends list hourly on http://www.xbox.com/ just to see who's recently unlocked an achievement and in what game. I take notes of what achievements I think I can unlock that night when I get home. I've sent messages out asking friends for advice on how to unlock those pesky ones that I can't seem to do on my own. But despite my best efferts I don't always get to hear that blessed bleep. I need to hear that bleep. I need the points for my Gamerscore. It's consuming my life and I don't know how to stop it.
My Gamerscore will be the death of me. And even if it is I want it carved on my tombstone, but only if it's better than everyone else's.
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