I absolutely hate games that come packed with achievements outside multiples of five or ten - hate it. There's nothing worse than hearing that satisfying 'ding', only to be greeted with an achievement value of 16G. The system has been around since 2005 and we've seen it evolve in so many ways. Achievement tracking, unlock percentages, and rarity to name a few, but still we're seeing achievement lists boasting a range of seemingly random numbers and it's painful. It has to stop.
The most recent offender of this was Cyber Shadow on Xbox Game Pass, which I was immensely looking forward to - especially with its art style very reminiscent to The Messenger. As I booted the game up, I thought I'd take a quick peek at its achievement list (even though from the reported difficulty, I'd probably only be leaving with one or two). Low and behold, EVERY single achievement is outside of being a multiple of five or ten. 16G here, 31G there - not a single award balances out the overall number, meaning at the very least, I would need five achievements to balance out to my perfect, even number.
I quickly deleted Cyber Shadow.
Now you may think it's weird or strange to hold achievement numbers to a high regard and over the years I've worked hard on not letting the carrot at the end of the stick influence my playstyle. Collectibles are no longer my priority and playing games on a lower difficulty, voiding potential other achievements, is fine by me now. But there's something about having a seven or a three at the end of my gamerscore that just refuses to sit well with me.
Mad Max was another offender, as it suckered me in with its "On the Road to Nowhere" achievement. It's awarded after travelling 1300 car lengths in a vehicle and sits at the random number of 8G. Why!? Outside of a few other achievements, the rest sit on multiples of five or ten. There was absolutely no reason for this and it stained my perfect achievement score I cherished so dearly. Sure, I could have easily gone and obtained the remainder of the random achievements, but it was unfortunately a game that I fell off of. To balance it out, I purposefully purchased Threes! and used a few of its obscure achievement numbers to bring me back on track. Don't judge me.
Maybe I shouldn't let achievement numbers infuriate me this much, but it seems like such a simple fix that would please a wide number of people. There's a whole achievement community out there that wince at the sight of these unpleasant numbers every time a list is revealed. Xbox, I love you, but can we please change this small detail? If not for me, then for the thousands of other achievement hunters out there who are also pained by this issue. Thank you.
Do you share similar sentiments? Let us know down in the comments below.
Comments 23
I love and hate this soapbox @Flurbdurb
I KNOW it's kind of pathetic to care, yet I do, it's inbuilt in my nature. A character trait like seeing untidy cables or a poorly arranged shelf. (Kinda/wanna/have to fix it)
For the record I still played Cyber Shadow but stopped after completing it as, by chance, I ended up back on a rounded 0.
(and breathe)
I might have to play Cyber Shadow to get my gamerscore ending in a 5 or 0 again. It's been stuck on a 4 or 9 for years. 😂
Mine ends in 7 so it’s happened to me somewhere but have to say it doesn’t really bother me.
What annoys me is getting 5 gamerscore in the likes of Gears for finishing an Act. 5, it just feels so unsatisfying lol.
@VenomousAlbino Basically every achievement is a 1 or 6 on the end. Great for those who need to 'fix' their gamerscore
I need a game pass game with an easy 17 achievement points. My score ends in 3. It's bugging me.
I find worse buying single player games with unobtainable achievements
Not gonna lie i find this very weird. Not the odd achievements or gamerscore, the OCD of having an uneven score. Now to each their own but achievements and gamerscore shouldn't be a factor in your enjoyment of a game.
What's an achievement? And how does that relate to playing video games?
@Krzzystuff Isn't the very idea of achievements the definition of OCD? I've never understood them. XB introduced them, Sony copied them, and I still can't understand the fettish they've picked up with so many people. Who plays a video game with the goal of checking off a list of to-dos as commanded by the OS? Apparently a lot of people, but I'll never understand why.
I did it on purpose for the first time ever on PS5 with Astrobot. I've never trophy hunted, but I figure it's a tiny game and I wanted more of it to play because it's a short tech demo and I really enjoyed it, so I'll try the trophy hunt thing and check out the OS's new interface, I'll go for my first ever platinum trophy! Wow that was boring. I sat there, phone in hand, running through the list of remaining tasks. Then there were the hidden trophies where I had to search in another tab for what those actually are to figure them out, then try to figure out which ones I'd done versus not done by scrolling through the list and comparing. Then loading levels and performing the menial tasks. "Jump on the waterfall in level x." "kill x with a y". "bounch a beach ball on your head 5 times in level z". "Have the widget punch the glass with 100 bots following you"....hooray you're a champion!
It felt like work, except the attaboy doesn't involve free lunch in the break room. And you don't get paid for the hour of the life you wasted.
@NEStalgia it is an odd thing as i like achievements and the sound it makes but i want to play the game and enjoy it. On shorter games it's easier to go back and just finish off the odd jobs but in bigger titles i would rather just play it naturally and get whatever achievements I get. I did hunt the easier ones for the 10K quest but other than that I'll just enjoy the sound when it pops up randomly.
Sounds like you have OCD
I currently sit with a '3' at the end. I have no idea how that happened and until seeing this write-up, never even thought about it!
Games like GRAW and Cloning Clyde messed me up for a long time. I have no intention of seeing anything other than a 5 or 0 at the end of score going foward.
Downloaded Moving Out just to finish the tutorial and even out my Gamerscore with the 1G achievement...
Best thing I did years ago was to turn off all notifications for Achievements and Trophies. Means I don't have to pay attention to nonsense like this.
The fact you wouldn't play a game because of how it would reflect a secondary meaningless system is insane....
@NEStalgia Same. If it's not something you can generally do in a normal run through, i'm not interested. It's not like you gain anything from the achievement either, like a better weapon or an upgrade or whatever. Just some numbers and a digital trophy that i'll never look at again.
I've far too many games to play without worrying about trying to 100% each one especially if it's a long game and i'm already getting to the point where I just want the damn thing to finish.
I never started Mad Max on my account either Xbox or PS and now they've made it impossible to 100 percent it ie 1000 or play, I probably never will. Other games are changing achievement requirements when online servers are closed but not Mad Max. Its annoying.
ohh, no, no, no... forget about that! this is no reason to pass on cybershadow, the game is quite good. even if difficult and punishing...
i though the 16 was odd .. perhaps it's a reference to 16 bit?
but i've just started my account a couple months ago, so i guess that is why to me its a non-issue.
now, if i had three achievments of 33.333333 and gamer score was not adding up to 100, welllll ... 😁
I had a good chuckle at this article, then checked my gamerscore. It ends in an 8. Now I'm pacing the room, sweating bullets, and hearing voices beckoning me into the well.
This definitely comes off as an OCD article, and I know a thing or two about being OCD when it comes to game consoles. For example I love to have my games library neatly organized with sequels and games that go together in the same rows, and I am pretty serious about having all the games I like installed and available to play. Part of the reason why I am in no rush to get a next gen console, I like the recent feeling of having very little work to do in terms of my library. That said I never cared about my gamerscore really, and I've been building it up since the 360 launched. Probably because I just cash in my rewards whenever I got enough for a $5 or $10 discount code, doesn't really matter if I zero it out or not.
I've never got this fuss over achievements or trophies, I have a few platinum trophies (is there an Xbox equivalent?) but only for games where I was already going to do what they required anyway. I mean I quite like the sound effect for rare trophies but when I play on consoles which don't have them, I never miss having them.
Its like with Skyrim and that 60fps mod and there's a work around to not disable achievements, why would you not be playing with all those other fantastic mods anyway? My stepson even said but you won't get any achievements, so what? The game will be more enjoyable for the entire time and I just won't get a little notification once every 5 hours or so
Can I get a... yeah:
Amen.
@Poskito
This game also 'fixed' my Gamerscore too, but it was purely unintentional... However after playing the tutorial and gaining the achievement I decided to uninstall so that I wouldn't 'break' my score again!
I actually had a score that ended in an odd number for years and didn't really care, but it just looks better sat at the top of my dashboard now. Its weird really, I am not OCD about numbers otherwise, I have no lucky or unlucky numbers either.
@pip_muzz
Each to their own, but for me achievements aren't meaningless, but are actually an additional 'game', a game that is OS level and ties up all my history of playing games together and gives me a score.
The score going higher feels like the old days of arcade games where it was all about the number going up and getting to the top of the leader board. Its just a fun thing for me personally and also fun amongst friends with the monthly scoreboard and the banter that comes from the competition.
I enjoy trophies on PlayStation too, although as that's a secondary platform to me, not as much.
When I use my Switch I feel that it really is missing something without a reward system/history.
Don't get me wrong, I am not trying to convert or convince you, I'm just explaining why and how it adds another level of 'Game' to my games.
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