achievement posts

Achievements across the genre

by Eliot Lefebvre Dec 3rd 2009 at 9:00AM

Filed under: Culture, Game mechanics, Opinion, Academic

By now, you've likely heard of the World of Warcraft player who managed to fill out every single achievement in the game, covering every single currently measurable objective. (If not, well, there you go.) Bio Break recently took the opportunity to discuss achievements as an interesting social feature in MMOs, a way of building community, while Overly Positive took the news as incentive to expound on achievements as an alternate venue for advancement. Most of the major titles out at the moment have some form of achievement system in place, ranging from Warhammer Online's Tome of Knowledge to City of Heroes and its variety of badges.

The problems with the system are brought up in the comments of the above entries -- achievements can often wind up being used as a form of highly-prohibitive gating, where someone lacking the completion achievement isn't capable of getting a group to move through it. As a whole, though, it allows for people to enjoy an entirely different venue of the game, and offers motivation to perform content that would otherwise be gathering dust after a certain point. Wherever you play, achievement markers are becoming more and more ubiquitous, and the fact that clearing them out is newsworthy just shows the degree to which they've permeated our consciousness and the genre.

Tags: academic, achievement, achievements, city-of-heroes, city-of-villains, coh, content-gating, cov, cox, culture, game-mechanics, opinion, war, warhammer-online, world-of-warcraft, wow

The Daily Grind: In-game achievements

by Lesley Smith May 25th 2009 at 8:00AM

Filed under: Game mechanics, The Daily Grind

When I'm not playing MMOs, I'm usually found on a console. Of all the numerous machines and debugs I own, my Xbox 360 is my favourite. It's the one console I saved hard to buy and waited the longest for. While I think it has some of the best games, it also has Achievements. It's really sad, I know, but I love that little ding and onscreen notification which lets me know I've achieved something in-game. From finding a secret area or finishing a game, there's something about that noise which is rewarding.

But now achievements have started popping up in MMOs (in the form of actual achievements or special titles for completion of certain quests) and it's so much fun. What is it about being rewarded? Are we just rats being given cheese for completing a maze or do achievements help keep interest in a particularly long quest chain or boring instance we'd never otherwise complete?

Tags: achievement, achievements, in-game-rewards, rewards, the-daily-grind, xbox360

A comprehensive look at WoW's Lunar Festival achievements

by James Egan Jan 25th 2009 at 1:00PM

Filed under: World of Warcraft, Fantasy, Events, in-game, Game mechanics, Guides, Tips and tricks, Quests

Holiday festivals in MMOs aren't limited to Christmas events. The Lunar Festival in World of Warcraft began this weekend, and is timed to coincide with the real world Chinese Lunar New Year (January 26th). WoW celebrates the holiday with quests to find Elders, unique items like season clothing, fireworks, and seasonal decor splashed all around WoW's major cities, Booty Bay, and Moonglade.

Our sister site WoW Insider has put together a comprehensive guide to all of the Lunar Festival achievements, and explains how to complete the meta-achievement "To Honor One's Elders." The WoW Insider guide is well worth a look if you want to get the most out of the annual event, this year being the fourth time around for WoW's Lunar Festival. The event runs from January 24th to February 12th, so there's still plenty of time to get in on the fun.

One of Azeroth's millions of citizens? Check out our ongoing coverage of the World of Warcraft, and be sure to touch base with our sister site WoW Insider for all your Lich King needs!

Tags: achievement, achievements, blizzard, chinese-new-year, elder, fantasy, guide, guides, holiday, holiday-event, holiday-events, holidays, lunar-festival, lunar-new-year, quests, to-honor-ones-elders, world-of-warcraft, wow

WoW armory revamped to show achievements and more

by Krystalle Voecks Nov 26th 2008 at 12:00PM

Filed under: World of Warcraft, Fantasy, Game mechanics, MMO industry, Endgame, News items

World of Warcraft players finally have the moment they've been waiting for. Well, okay, one of the many moments they've been waiting for. The armory has finally been revamped into the updated form Blizzard promised some months ago that will allow players to off the achievements they've earned. The armory version of achievements also contains the same tracking bars and lists for in-progress achievements as are on the in-game interface. For the World of Warcraft player who really likes achievments, this armory update should prove to be a gold mine of things to poke around and plan during lunchtime. (You'd never consider wasting company or class time reading about MMOs, we're sure.)

Also added in this pipin' hot armory update is a series of statistics tracked on accounts since the 3.0.2 Echoes of Doom patch. Everything from how much gold your character has made to how many times you've wound up spending special cuddly time with the floor due to overaggro is there in black and white for you (and anyone else) to read. Additionally, there seems to be additional information in regards to overall World of Warcraft guilds. Whether or not any of this new information - like say, the achievements showing you've cleared certain endgame raid instances - will play into other things like guild recruitment or choosing guilds to join is unknown. With so much information openly available, we're going to hear more about this, we'd bet.

Tags: achievement, achievements, armory, blizzard, breaking, echoes-of-doom, statistics, world-of-warcraft, wow

Log into World of Warcraft tomorrow for free achievement and pet!

by Michael Zenke Nov 22nd 2008 at 10:00AM

Filed under: World of Warcraft, Fantasy, Events, in-game

We've got a hot tip directly from WoW Insider for you this morning. If you've got a currently active World of Warcraft account, and there's any way at all you can spare the time tomorrow to log in, do it! Tomorrow is WoW's fourth birthday, and Blizzard is handing out some presents for all the players logging in on this auspicious occasion! Simply logging your character into World of Warcraft tomorrow will net you an achievement and an in-game pet. The pet is the cutie-patootie shown above, a "Baby Blizzard Bear".

The achievement is a one-of-a-kind can't-get-it-any-other-way feat of strength achievement. Other achievements handed out for this include other date-based events, things players will never be able to get again. So, if you want to add another one of these once-in-a-lifetime notches to your belt, make sure to log in tomorrow! Oh, and Happy Birthday World of Warcraft!

Tags: achievement, birthday, blizzard, breaking, pet, world-of-warcraft, wow

World of Warcraft achievements will expand to other Blizzard titles

by James Egan Aug 1st 2008 at 6:00PM

Filed under: World of Warcraft, Fantasy, Expansions, News items

It's no secret that World of Warcraft will feature an achievement system that will roll out with the Wrath of the Lich King expansion. The writing's been on the wall for a little while now. New details have emerged, revealing that the achievement system will not be limited to World of Warcraft alone. Ultimately, the achievements will connect WoW with Blizzard's other major titles, namely Starcraft II and Diablo III.

MTV Multiplayer's Tracey John recently spoke with WoW Lead Designer Jeff Kaplan about the impending first incarnation of this system, which will be character-specific, as well as Blizzard's plans for account-level achievements that focus more on classes and professions. Hit MTV Multiplayer for more details on account-based achievements, WoW points, and the 'Blizzard Level' -- that all-important ranking which will soon command the attention of most Blizzard fans.

Tags: achievement, achievements, blizzard, diablo, diablo3, expansion, gamerscore, jeff-kaplan, mtv, mtv-multiplayer, starcraft, starcraft2, wow, wow-points, wrath, wrath-of-the-lich-king

70 new badges in Issue 11

by Jonathan Northwood Nov 13th 2007 at 2:00AM

Filed under: City of Heroes, City of Villains, Patches

A full listing of the new 70 new badges available in City of Heroes and City of Villains is available on Badge-Hunter.com's site.

While Issue 11's new badges are split into Exploration and Achievement areas, the vast majority seem to be focused on the new Ouroboros-based missions. I'll even give you a hint on where to find the Chrononaut badge: it's placed in a similar location to two of the badges found in Atlas Park.

And don't forget that you can change or clear your badge title at any time. After all, why be known as a Keeper of Secrets when you can be perceived as Justice Incarnate?

[Via Kill Ten Rats]

Tags: Achievement, Badges, Beta, City-of-Heroes, City-of-Villains, coh, cov, CoX, Issue-11, Ouroboros