New gamerscore policy just makes sense

Gamerscore means completely nothing to me. Oh big deal, you've played many games and got to aspects of those games that some have not. Does this make you a better person. I don't play to highten my score, I play for the entertainment and enjoyment of the game. I don't think anything of those with higher or lower scores than I. I deal with people on a person to person basis. Put me in a room with a guy who had 1000 times the gamerscore than I do, he's still just some guy to me until I get to know him on a personal level and at that point, gamerscore doesn't apply either.

What happens if there's a game that doesn't have quite the scope to justify that many points or that many achievements? You're gonna end up with a game with 4 achievements of 250 points each... and they'll likely be easier than Gears's "Broken Fingers" achievement, which only yields 30 points.

Theres no feeling greater than when you see "Achievement Unlocked" flash on your screen. Well maybe there are a few, but thats another matter!

I'm with The Phil on this one. Gamerscore means absolutely zilch to me. I'd rather if they had just kept achievements and left this point tracking system out of it.

I think gamerscore/achievements have kept me playing games I would've quit a lot earlier, a lot longer. Yeah, sure, it means "nothing". But still, it's kinda fun to see that little notice on your screen. A cool and harmless addition to gaming, in my opinion. People who complain about it are the ones who take it too seriously.

And my gamerscore is only like 5000, so it's not like I'm one of the hardcores.

Thank God. About damn time. This should have been in place from the start. It's also awesome news because it now means that Shiving Isles can offer additional achievements. YEAH!

I don't care to have the highest gamerscore or the highest of ones on my friends list but I find myself wanting to get as much of the achievements out of a game I can for the accomplishment. I normally play a game once but have played through a lot of the 360 games more then once in different ways as needed to get the achievements. Plus, some of the achievements test your skills in other ways like survive so long with out firing or getting a certain amount of kills without dying and on and on. It has made it so we can get more out of the game then we normally would have so I am for it. I am definitely for games able to offer even more achievements on top of the 200 or 1000 if they have more content you can download and have to pay for. Like Oblivion, they have added a few side quests that I have never bought and downloaded because they didn’t offer any achievements with them. I never did all the small side quest on the original game either, I only did what got me the achievements and maybe a little more but there is so much more to the game I will never see because there is no achievement awarded if done any of the smaller side quest and frankly got burnt out after 300 hours or more playing it. Now Oblivion has a huge expansion pack coming out soon, “Shivering Isles” and I probably won't get that unless they have achievements for it as well just because I want that achievement for accomplishing it now, where before with the original Xbox I would never have worried about it and might not have ever bought it unless it was a whole new game to buy like an Oblivion 2 or something like that.

Some of the achievements give you a satisfaction as well like on defender, I have a friend trying to get all the achievements I have gotten but can’t so you feel good you’re better at something then others (and he has just over 30,000 gamerscore where I only have 10,000) and what’s funny, he is jealous of me over two small achievement I have on Defender.

That T-Shirt so fits me. I want one. And yes I am an acheivment whore. I can't get enough of 'em.

Crackdown is not a Microsoft game , is a Real Time World game published by Microsoft , same way Gears Of War is.

The only thing worse than an achievement whore, is the anti-achievement whore. Achievements are fun, and they are here to stay! My only request for achievements is that they allow for them in non-ranked games. They are taken too seriously in multi player.

Hasn't this always been the policy, aside from a few few rare exceptions? It's not like this is a "new standardization," just a blog entry explaning the system to the few people that haven't figured out yet.

gamerscore and achievement points are great. It's the one thing that I find myself missing on the Wii. It's nice to be able to look up a friend and know whether or not they've played a game and get a general idea of how long they've played.

The Phil = nard sack

My friends and I are always competing over something so the Gamerscore is a great feature for us. My 360 bit the dust last night (1st time) so they'll have some time to catch up. All I gotta say is I better have it back before Crackdown releases.

I believe Microsoft is using Crackdown as an example to how these new policies will work. Hence why it only has 900 points. Its not Microsoft not following their new rules.


As I mentioned on gamerscoreblog, this is a dangerous move. They're basically saying they are aware there's the hardcore achievement fanbase and they're willing to exploit them.

BIGVIP can claim that the additional 250 gamerscore points could come from free downloads, but how many are actually going to do so? What about games that require multiple content downloads to achieve that extra 250 points? Any bets Halo 3 will have an extra-cheivement of "Play all multiplayer game types on all maps"? But what they won't say is you're going to have to buy three different map packs.

Phil, you are looking at gamerscore the wrong way. If you look at it as "nerd cred", then it's value is truly meaningless.

Achievements offer replay value that the PS3 and the Wii are not offering. Or the PS2/Xbox/Gamecube/Virtual Console/PSN for that matter. It's actually less fun to those in this household because there's nothing to shoot for aside from simply beating the game.

You don't have to care if anyone else cares about your gamerscore. For me, many achievements set goals on games that I wouldn't normally go for. The achievement then becomes personal. Would I have normally tried to save all 50 survivors in Dead Rising? Hell no. But the achievement gave me something to shoot for. Say Pacman for example...I would normally never have tried to eat all the ghosts four times...or get to level 21. But the little mark that says you did it provides some self-satisfaction.

Gamescore can also be used to track how much more you can get out of a game. Once you've topped out the gamerscore for a particular game...it's a good time to trade it in because it's essentially been "mastered" on a personal level.

I don't care too much about the gamerscore but I do remember trying for a week to get that Geometry wars 1 mil. achievement so i think is a good system.

hmm... well, i understand that achievements and their associated gamerscore are irrelevant to some 360 gamers, but not to most of us. and no, Mike, this hasn't always been the policy. there was a 1000/200 point *guideline* for disk/xbla games, but this is the first *policy* to be put in place.

one part of this new policy that was definitely needed was the extra 250 for downloadable expansions. i'm not only a gamerscore whore, but also an elder scrolls whore. when i heard that there was going to be an full on expansion to oblivion i was stoked, but the "no new achievements" part of the announcement kind of dampened it a bit for me. i hope bethesda can put this in place for shivering isles.

All I have to say is the Shivering Isles expansion better have achievements.

What the policy should REALLY include is that your gamerscore shouldn't count the game you downloaded a TRIAL version of on XBLA as a game played and a 0 achievement score for that.

I also love the sound and feeling you get when "Achievement unlocked" pops up on your screen!

Nice to see it standardized. Condemned only gave 970 gamerpoints. Kind of random?

Hey Kid Pyrrhic

What part of "No part of the gamerscore can come from purchased XBLM content" do you not understand? They CANNOT have achievements come from xblm content that you purchase. If you can get gamerscore from it, it's free.

How confusing. There's this game here Joystiq was just reporting about that has half the points from paid downloads:
http://www.joystiq.com/2007/02/01/aquazone-publisher-fishing-for-ms-points-5000-ms-points/

And then this other article on Joystiq now saying that games can have more than 1000 points and can be through paid downloads:
http://www.joystiq.com/2007/02/02/xbox-360-achievements-policy-amended/

I agree with Silver R Wolf that yes, achievements should stay but ratings for how many you get should go. This way you could indeed check your friends and see what achievements they have unlocked. I just keep thinking all the peeps go crazy getting points for what? So they can be looked at as l33t? I'm sorry but the world of gaming doesn't work that way.

Like someone said earlier it gamerscore does make you play more of the games we already have, I personally love them. Also when games have achievements it also lets us know alittle bit about what the developers would like us to get out of the game.

I think the thing that matters most of not how high a score you have overall but rather what achievements you obtained. I compare my achievements to my friends only because I want to know if they've had some of the same experiences I've had while playing.

Also when the achievement pops up it does give me that warm fuzzy feeling :-)

i figured this was just accepted. i can't say i've ever seen anything differ from these (well, crackdown of course). i like the additional points from dlc.

personally, i think they should form a comitee to decide achievements and to properly calculate gamerpoints. give all achievevments equal weight ("taking a picture" in nfs will get equitable points compared to "win the game on insane" in gow). granted, no one wants to take the time out to actually figure this out, and it's not even that big of a deal. think about it though...

I just post to tell you 360 sucks dick and PS3 is way better!! You can't prove me wrong

OK, the achievement system on the 360 is a pointless gimmick with no "real" reward. I've read some of your comments and I can't believe how ignorently you all are buying into this garbage. "It makes me feel so good when I see those words on the bottom of the screen." Give me a friggin break. It gives you nothing, Hey Microsoft, how about a few online points that we can spend later. It doesn't have to be much. Jeez, each point is worth only $0.0125 anyway. I remember the good ole days of gaming when you accomplished tasks and unlocked additional game content. Such as extra characters, new weapons, maps, etc. That would be great too. This gamerscore nonesense may fool young adolescents, but not me. I own a 360 and wish MS would actually give us something rather than tricking us into thinking we are getting extra "replay" value. Achievements are a lost cause. What happens when you jack up your precious gamerscore to 5,000? Then what...cool, I have a giant number next to my name. Nothing of actual value in sight though. This bores me. Too bad I wasted all that time completing random tasks overplaying a game that I now hate. I am neither wowed nor amused with this gimmick. I see through the facade. "Achievement Unlocked" ...yea, let me know when you find that achievement.