Sign in to follow this  
Jake

Idle Thumbs 67: Dot Gobbler

Recommended Posts

I'm strictly a PC gamer and I've always had achievement notifications turned off in Steam, so I've never had the pleasure of seeing "Goodnight sweet prince!" pop up accompanied by the sound of an achievement fairy getting it's wings when one of my buddies die in Far Cry 2.

But is it really not possible to turn notifications off when you're playing an Xbox? Or do you guys have them on because of some other social thing you need to stay in touch with?

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

I'm amused when Jake is giving the dateline and he says "2012" as if he thinks that's my name.

"It's August 3rd, Twenty Twelve!"

"Stop calling me Twenty Twelve!"

***

Famous asks: "I don't know if players want to have a character with lots of baggage. Maybe they want a blank slate like Gordon Freeman?"

That's the last question I want to hear from a developer. I want to hear you say, "We've got an excellent idea for creating a game around this character who has lots of baggage, and we're going to polish it until it works so well that even players who don't like that kind of thing will be BLOWN AWAY (ign.com)."

Actually, I don't want to hear you say that either because then the internet will just poop on you for sounding too cocky. But you should definitely be thinking that. Don't give me what I want. Give me something I didn't know I wanted until I played your game.

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

But is it really not possible to turn notifications off when you're playing an Xbox? Or do you guys have them on because of some other social thing you need to stay in touch with?

You basically have this right. You can turn notifications on or off. But it's notifications for everything so if you turn off notifications you don't get the achievement popups, but also no notifications if people message you, or if someone appears online. I think it's a real bummer that you can't select what sort of popup messages you'd like to receive because I'd like to know if someone sent me a message, but find the constant pop ups letting me know that so-and-so is online to be totally annoying and tedious.

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

I'm strictly a PC gamer and I've always had achievement notifications turned off in Steam, so I've never had the pleasure of seeing "Goodnight sweet prince!" pop up accompanied by the sound of an achievement fairy getting it's wings when one of my buddies die in Far Cry 2.

But is it really not possible to turn notifications off when you're playing an Xbox? Or do you guys have them on because of some other social thing you need to stay in touch with?

It is possible to disable notifications on the 360, but i believe it disables all system notifications in a blanket fashion, not just achievement pop-ups.

Honestly though, i still prefer hearing the achievement ding in most cases. (The 360 still has the best achievement ding, heh.)

Seeing an achievement pop for something really difficult can be an awesome little moment of catharsis.

I mean, but I completely agree that it is ruinous for the establishment of tone in a narrative scenario.

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

Really interesting discussion about the interpretation of dialogue choices. This seems to vary a lot from game to game. Haven't played Walking Dead but tempted to check despite my ambivalance towards zombies. It seems to me there's a genre-divide in how such choices are presented. Adventures usually go with "these are things the character would say" where RPGs tend to favour "this is you defining who this character is"... or at least "this is your interpration of the role".

Regarding achievements, I'm really dissapointed with Sony that they added trophies to Shadow of the Colossus/ ICO HD. It's like they don't understand why their game is good. On PC, I routinely turn off Steam Community In-Game to be rid of pop-ups. It boggles my mind that there is no option for disabling pop-ups (and that annoying sound) on PS3.

As long as notifications can be turned off I'm not entirely against achievements in certain types of games, but progression-based markers, or worse, achievements highlighting dramatic moments or important choices in a narrative context need to go away.

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

I really loath the kind of achievements that require actions outside of the scope of the intended gameplay.

Dead Space infamously had an achievement that encourages people to play the entire game using only the plasma cutter.

So great, they're encouraging people to have a less than ideal experience, smart move guys.

Or they're trying to provide an incentive to continue playing their game; in this case, the incentive is the (egotistical and slightly masochistic) need to collect as many achievements/points/awards as possible.

I don't really have a problem with achievements like: 'play the whole game using only this hammer as a weapon!' or 'play the game on the super secret double hard mode.' It doesn't interfere with your initial play through and it gives you a reason (or an excuse) to go back and play the game again. If you don't want those achievements, you can just ignore them and play the game the way you want to play it.

Overall though, I'm not a huge fan of achievements, for all the reasons listed above and in the podcast. I understand why they're there and why they appeal to a lot of people, but they're not really my cup of video game playing tea.

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

Even when achievements are at their best, they're a lazy method for rewarding players for doing a difficult task. There are better ways to reward or acknowledge that effort. Most of the time achievements are not at their best and they're just awful, I echo Chris "fuck achievements" Remo.

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

Even when achievements are at their best, they're a lazy method for rewarding players for doing a difficult task. There are better ways to reward or acknowledge that effort.

Like what? I've seen that argument made a few times, but I can't think of a lot of examples of in-game rewards that would actually motivate me to do a difficult/weird task like that just for the sake of getting the reward. Maybe if it let you unlock a sweet character or weapon or something, but personally I find arbitrarily locked-off content like that much more annoying than achievements. Plus, any kind of reward that makes a substantial difference within the game is going to be a non-trivial amount of development time. I'd imagine it's hard to justify spending that on something that only the nuts who accomplish that ridiculous task will see, when you could just make one API call to award the achievement.

To answer my own question, my favorite in-game reward for "achieving" something is the way that when you beat the Special Zone in Super Mario World, the map's color palette changes and the piranha plants turn into weird jack-o-lanterns and the koopas wear Mario masks.

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

I agree with your point about developer time and locked content, although I do enjoy content that you can't get to without a show of skill I understand I'm in the minority. The example that comes to mind immediately is in Bastion, the first time you fall off the side of the world the narrator gives you a funny, clever little piece of dialogue, and he never says it again. That could easily have been a punny achievement name popup, but the developers had a better idea: to give the player an in-game piece of content.

If developers don't want to spend the time creating content of some kind or other, then it's not important enough to slap an achievement there anyways.

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

I think the reason I like achievements is the same reason I like ridiculously detailed stat-tracking. If Dota 2 tracked how many trees I destroyed on each hero I played, I would love it, even though it's a completely meaningless number. I enjoy having that acknowledgement and record of what I've done. Achievements are just an extension of that desire, for me. U:

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

I don't see how those two examples are similar other than they're both attached to a number. Care to expand?

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

I like pointless stat-tracking? I'm not sure how I can expand from there.

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

Like what? I've seen that argument made a few times, but I can't think of a lot of examples of in-game rewards that would actually motivate me to do a difficult/weird task like that just for the sake of getting the reward.

Yeah, I'd agree that in-game rewards aren't necessarily the way to look at this. For me, achievements are often off-putting because they kind of rob your ownership of your choices, if that makes any sense. For me, a lot of times the crazy shit is so hilarious and entertaining because it seems unique and sometimes transgressive, even. Having an achievement pop up for it is the game slapping down that feeling, and pointing out that your actions were in some way expected.

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

Me and a buddy have long fantasized about a dynamic achievement system that somehow magically acknowledges that you just did some CRAZY SHIT without being actually baked into the game. Oh, if only fantasy were reality.

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

Yeah, I'd agree that in-game rewards aren't necessarily the way to look at this. For me, achievements are often off-putting because they kind of rob your ownership of your choices, if that makes any sense. For me, a lot of times the crazy shit is so hilarious and entertaining because it seems unique and sometimes transgressive, even. Having an achievement pop up for it is the game slapping down that feeling, and pointing out that your actions were in some way expected.

I'm kind of of two minds about that. I'm the kind of player who likes to poke at the edges of the game systems and try to do things that aren't what I'm obviously intended to do, but I do find it kind of delightful when I try to do something weird that I don't really expect to work and it turns out that they actually made a special case for that and the game responds appropriately. That still breaks the illusion that my actions were unexpected, but it feels more like discovering a little easter egg that the developers left there just for me to find, whereas if they gave you an achievement for it, everybody would find it because they'd just be loading the achievements list on GameFAQs and checking them off one by one.

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

Shammack that brings me to one of the things I really dislike about achievements: because they're almost always linked to some kind of points pool that peoples' base lizard-brains force them to want to grow, it creates the 'checking off a list' mentality for some people. I think Chris even described a similar thing with TF2 achievements way back when, except the driving motivation was getting sweet new guns for him. If there are achievements, for some people that means they feel pressured into playing in a way that is ultimately less enjoyable.

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

I generally agree with the thumbs on achievements, but there is one extra case where I find achievements add to true game experience: when the achievements encourage you to try new challenges, playstyles, or odd tricks that the developers included. The biggest example of this is the heroic achievements in World of Warcraft (like "One Light in the Darkness") or Valve's achievements for Half-Life 2 (carrying the gnome all the way through the game). I still find the achievements' pop-up annoying, but they add a depth of gameplay and encourage enough interesting new experiences that I can forgive them.

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

If people are weak enough to let some arbitrary point value pressure them into doing otherwise completely optional shit they don't enjoy, then they deserve it!

As an aside, the TF2 example sucks just because they tie actual in-game rewards to completing arbitrary, sometimes anti-team goals.

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

If people are weak enough to let some arbitrary point value pressure them into doing otherwise completely optional shit they don't enjoy, then they deserve it!

That's not entirely fair. A lot of gamification and achievement culture is designed from the ground up to tap into subconscious and compulsive responses that have nothing to do with the weakness or strength of a given individual. It's like saying that someone is weak for getting a TV jingle stuck in their heads.

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

UGH it was a joke calm down

maybe you should adopt this as a house motto

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

maybe you should adopt this as a house motto

Did that years ago!

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

That feeling that Chris described of learning the Fez language just by sheer amount of exposure reminds me of my experience playing the IF The Gostak. That's a bit different because it's not an explicitly translated language, it's all context based, but by the end I definitely had the implicit understanding of the language just from playing it so much.

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

Created an account just to say...

Rampart was released way back in 2007 on PS3/PSN. Unfortunately, it seems like it's no longer available for purchase from the PSN Store... It's still on my download list here though.

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

Create an account or sign in to comment

You need to be a member in order to leave a comment

Create an account

Sign up for a new account in our community. It's easy!

Register a new account

Sign in

Already have an account? Sign in here.

Sign In Now
Sign in to follow this