...people are selling platinum trophies now?

[Sheleigha]

I think plot-centric trophies are used more as a stat-tracking method more than anything, as it allows you to (roughly) see how many people completed the game, and where people who didn't tended to stop.
Ones at the start I certainly find highly amusing at their pointlessness too though.

This is true, and a point I always forget about. I do now remember reading articles on how companies could see how far people got in a specific game. It's actually good market research too. If 90% of people only got the first few trophies, and only 10% actually beat through the main story, well, that might say something about the game being bad, boring, or whatever other negative reasoning.

...I still like to think it's funny with the "everyone's a winner!" mentality of giving out trophies like candy. And well, some games will do that!

Insane ideas like this are why trophies should never have been introduced...

There's nothing wrong with the idea of trophies. I believe it's helped lengthen a game's replayability. You can accomplish more than just beating the game, so some people feel that you really get your money's worth, instead of just beating a game and putting it aside. Now, you can go do extra missions, etc. The idea has been around in games for a while as a "do all these missions" or "collect all these things". 100%ing a game did exist back on PS2 etc.

Besides, if people want to pay to look like they accomplish things, well, there are people out there that do enjoy throwing their money away...

[vertical09]

I don´t undestand why people care so much about something that is completely useless, as far as I know trophys don´t let you buy games for less price or things like that.

Yeah, it's more for self-gratification more than anything (like how you'll level up to the level cap in a game even though you can kill everything already) and getting it this way even destroys that purpose.

[Clephas]

I disagree... trophies have turned video games from something to play to something to work at. I've met a lot of people who are so obsessed with trophies that they forget to just sit back and enjoy the games they are playing. This comes out in a really obvious manner with rpgs, where sitting back and enjoying the story is a big part of the pleasure you get out of it... Thankfully, I'm not one of those individuals, but some of the side-effects of trophies, like being unable to use cheats in pc games without some kind of needlessly complicated program (one of the greatest pleasures for me is to replay strategy games with cheats after beating them without them, and this trend has stolen that from me) are extremely annoying.

This act of selling trophies is just another example of the kind of negative effects trophies have on people.

[myskaros]

I disagree... trophies have turned video games from something to play to something to work at.

It's only work if you let it be work. The journey of first popping a game into your console or installing it on your PC to the ending credits can be interpreted as work for any game regardless of whether that game has trophies or achievements to obtain. If you don't enjoy trying to get trophies, then don't get them.

[Sheleigha]

I disagree... trophies have turned video games from something to play to something to work at.

It's only work if you let it be work.

Agreed. I have a friend who's HUGE into trophies. He really enjoys doing them and doesn't mind it being work, as it adds to the game. However, he will only do it for games he likes. If he starts a game, gets a few story-based trophies, and find out it's not a game for him, he stops playing it. An enjoyable game where it's not the world's most difficult task in getting 100%? Sure! A game with ridiculous trophies (like Mortal Kombat's "play every character for 24 hours"... so stupid and I'm sure heavily exploited/rubber-banded) and he won't do it.

Some people enjoy doing them, some don't. Some people are addicts to different things, whether it's games themselves or the addiction to collecting trophies. It's never the game's/trophy's fault for being 'addicting' though.

[Daverost]

I love trophies/achievement. They give me something to do when I'm done with the game's main goals and they're fun to show off. I kinda wish they had always been around. I'd love a way to show off my old Final Fantasy Tactics record where I mastered every job with Ramza (including Squire with Ultima and Summoner with Zodiac) or when I beat PSO Ep1 Very Hard at such a low level that it took me a few hours to beat the last boss. I mean, I'd have done that stuff anyway, but it would be cool if there was a way to show it to others as friendly competition.

Besides, people do some cool stuff with achievements.

http://www.1milliongamerscore.com/

This guy has held the world record for them for over five years and he's pushing for 1,000,000 gamerscore (obviously, even if you don't click the link). That's pretty awesome.

I don´t undestand why people care so much about something that is completely useless, as far as I know trophys don´t let you buy games for less price or things like that.

They don't, but that would be an awesome idea. Like, I guess if you have PS+ or XBL Gold and you have a certain trophy level/count or gamerscore, you could get a 5% discount or something.

[XCronoX]

Well trophies/achievements have technically been around for a long time, just that the ones from before were stored in game, there's always been stuff to do that recorded your stats and whatnot you just couldn't show them off unless you loaded up a game and showed people.

Now we have a visual representation to show off, as for me I only go for easy/non time consuming plats I also sometimes can't meet the requirements for a trophy either due to lack of skill and or time/patience.

[Sheleigha]

http://www.1milliongamerscore.com/

This guy has held the world record for them for over five years and he's pushing for 1,000,000 gamerscore (obviously, even if you don't click the link). That's pretty awesome.

0_0 Wow... And judging by this quote:

I'm heavily anticipating tomorrow's new releases: Max Payne 3, Battleship and Game of Thrones.

it sounds like he's legit! I wouldn't doubt that someone out there wouldn't have that high a number, but with cheats, exploits, etc. it's easy to be skeptical. Still, *snickers* I hope he has fun with Battleship :p A (bad looking) game based on a (bad looking) movie based on a (classic, but irrelevant) board game >_>

I couldn't imagine buying every PS3/360 game that comes out to try and get everything unlocked but wow...

[AsukaYui]

If only the trophies earned could add something on the game like Catherine did with the Jukebox

[Hero]

If only the trophies earned could add something on the game like Catherine did with the Jukebox

Sometimes Trophies will unlock content in PlayStation Home... it's usually just a t-shirt or something lame like that, though. Same goes for Xbox 360 Achievements and Avatars.

[servant]

trophies for Final Fantasy XIII unlocked wallpaper

[Sheleigha]

trophies for Final Fantasy XIII unlocked wallpaper

That, I actually liked and was a pleasant surprise for me. A nice bonus, especially for a game I wasn't planning on platinuming and just got the trophies I happened to earn.

[Clephas]

Also, another thing about trophies, achievements and the like is that - using them as an excuse - a lot of new games can't be played at all without using an online medium like Steam... as an example, the Total War series. Even if you buy the game at the store, it requires you to install steam and be on the net to play it even if you aren't even the least bit interested in the side crap like multiplayer or trophies. However, what if your net is down? What if you don't want to connect to the net while playing? I am one of those people that prefers not to be connected to the net while playing solo, as I don't like to connect my gaming pc to the net if I can possibly avoid it simply because I don't want to expose it to viruses, cookies, spyware, and other crap like that clutters up a pc and makes it run below specs.

Ok, that is more of a complaint on digitalization, but it still more or less outlines my outlook on things... I don't want people - whoever they happen to be, whether they are corporations or individuals who randomly look at steam profiles or psn profiles - to know how or what I play or what I've managed to do with an individual game. I'm not interested in bragging rights or the game-maker's idea of what an achievement is in a game. More importantly, I don't want to be sending information to anyone for any reason without my knowledge. It feels too much like spying and it is a poisonous trend that is rather rapidly encroaching on every bit of privacy we have.

[Ringwraith]

trophies for Final Fantasy XIII unlocked wallpaper

That, I actually liked and was a pleasant surprise for me. A nice bonus, especially for a game I wasn't planning on platinuming and just got the trophies I happened to earn.

There have been games to toy with other ideas too, Mass Effect being a prme example, as most achievements gave you some form of in-game bonus that translated across any character. The first one had the most of these, dueto being a more stat-heavy game, but there's a few in a second, and even less in the third (sadly).

Also, another thing about trophies, achievements and the like is that - using them as an excuse - a lot of new games can't be played at all without using an online medium like Steam... as an example, the Total War series. Even if you buy the game at the store, it requires you to install steam and be on the net to play it even if you aren't even the least bit interested in the side crap like multiplayer or trophies. However, what if your net is down? What if you don't want to connect to the net while playing? I am one of those people that prefers not to be connected to the net while playing solo, as I don't like to connect my gaming pc to the net if I can possibly avoid it simply because I don't want to expose it to viruses, cookies, spyware, and other crap like that clutters up a pc and makes it run below specs.

Steam has an offline mode, thus you only have to connect it to the internet once to get it up-to date before you can play it. This is not always-online DRM (which is laughably unreasonable and oh-so broken, Diablo III being the latest offender), so you can still play it single-player offline, and achievements aren't even enabled in offline mode, so even those won't bother you if dislike them anyway.
You can also make your Steam profile private so no-one can look at it (except Valve themselves obviously).

[AweOfShe]

If only the trophies earned could add something on the game like Catherine did with the Jukebox

Sometimes Trophies will unlock content in PlayStation Home... it's usually just a t-shirt or something lame like that, though. Same goes for Xbox 360 Achievements and Avatars.

Yeah, when I finished reading through Steins;Gate the other day, the final achievement unlocked a Gamer Pic. I guess it's better than nothing, but yeah...