The official Fable 2 Achievements have been unveiled, and it appears the previous rumor from August was pretty accurate. Even The Swinger (i.e. "Take part in a debauched bedroom party with several participants.") is still in there. However, there's an added note in about 30 of the Achievements, specifying the ability to earn them simply by watching someone else (i.e. another hero in a world you visit via online co-op) fulfill the requirement. Despite the lack of surprise, we are genuinely excited to being rather vice-full in our quest to obtain all 1000 Gamerscore points.

[Via X3F]

A rumor in Game Informer (full text from GI after the break) states that Gamerscores and achievements will be transferable to Microsoft's next console. As far a rumors go, this is one many Xbox 360 owners might pray Microsoft wouldn't prevent from becoming a reality.

Achievements and Gamerscores are two features of the Xbox 360 that have developed a strong following, particularly among "ch33vo-holics." We can already imagine the internet hissy-fit temper-tantrum freak out we'll see if the Xbox faithful can't transfer their data. Although the next console is still years away, it would be unfortunate to envision Microsoft not allowing gamers to transfer their data effortlessly to the next system.

[Via X3F]

For the thorough achievement hunter, there are an elite series of Gamerscore garnering goals that the softcore gamer is not likely to possess, such as Dead Rising's Zombie Genocider achievement, or, well, most of the achievements from Chromehounds. One stands out above the rest, though, requiring a great deal of time and skill to earn -- the "Seriously" achievement from Gears of War. Getting 10,000 kills in ranked multiplayer earns you 50 Gamerpoints, and hopefully, a concerned intervention from a few of your closest loved ones.

Bizarre Creations' latest project The Club gives a hearty nod towards the life-consuming achievement with one of their own -- the cleverly titled "No, Seriously" requires you to kill 10,001 opponents in ranked online matches. Oh, we see what you did there. We'll have to wait until Feb. 19 to see if the game is good enough to merit that kind of time investment, and if Bizarre ripped anything else off of Gears -- such as a steroid-infused protagonist that speaks with the eloquence of Tourette's suffering sailor.

GameStrata, a new game statistic tracking and social site, has just launched into a (semi-)public status. Players can use the free service to keep track of a range of quantifiable game performance details. We're not quite sure what to make of the service, since an Xbox Live Gamertag does nearly the same thing on a platform basis, albeit Xbox only. (We see overlap with Steam too, for another heavy competitor.)

We'll give the site some hope, however, since it's signed a wide roster of EA, Activision, Capcom, and Sega for launch titles. Those games are Battlefield 2 (PC), Guitar Hero III (Wii, 360, PS3), Lost Planet (360), and Universe at War (PC, 360). The site combines stats from all of those games into a single user profile. It'll also strip Gamertag data into its service.

GameStrata aims to bathe geeks in delicious data to keep them away from in-game -- and community-based -- competitors. Co-founder Barry Dorf takes exception to our classification, saying via email, "We do not see the space as having competitors, only partners.There are publishers that track stats and some that do not. We do not believe the publishers that are tracking stats are at the granular level we want them to be, or they want to be. Where do I rank in the first chorus during Sabotage in GH3 on Medium, or how many headshots did I make last week in Battlefield 2, and where did it rank amongst those stats?"

Those details run deep, letting gamers graph performance over time -- say, kills with a certain weapon -- and compare it to friends. Players can also broadcast a syndicated news feed to update competitors with their latest achievements.

After reviewing concerns about its Xbox achievement choices, Propaganda games says it'll consider removing the "team kill" award after the Turok launch early next year. Although CVG reports in its headline "Turok dev to scrap team kill achievement," the quote from Propaganda VP Josh Holmes is actually, "We are currently looking at readying a patch or solution for it if it does become an issue when the game releases" (um, looks like somebody forgot to read the story before writing the headline). That's not a definitive statement that Propaganda will nix the controversial achievement, but merely acknowledgment that the developer will consider doing so after the game releases.

Actually, a few statements made by Holmes in the interview are a little frightening. For example, he says that the team kill achievement -- which gives ten points for killing one creature, enemy, teammate and yourself in a single round -- was originally created as a joke because they found that players in their first Turok match met all the criteria. That's not exactly a confidence builder.

David Dreger, better known to the Xbox community by his gamertag "Knuckles Dawson," finally saw the end to his 681-day Xbox achievement streak on Oct. 4. Dreger tells why it happened in his latest Achievement 101 feature on sister-site X3F. After receiving MVP status from Microsoft on Oct. 1., he finally made the decision to stop -- but it took another few days for it to actually happen. Dreger received at least one achievement on his Xbox 360 gamertag every day from Nov. 22, 2005 until Oct. 4, 2007.

Dreger, who is also a co-host on sister-site X3F's podcast, says he's accomplished all that he wanted to with the achievement streak. What finally made him stop his streak was a good game of Halo 3 with a friend while they were on the level "The Way the World Ends." Dreger says he's still interested in getting achievements as he is a self-proclaimed "achievement whore," but now is focusing on simpler tasks like getting his score to 54,321, to mirror when he had 12,345. Y'know, just for the heck of it.

Blending real life with virtual life is usually reserved for those who think it's wise to incorporate 1337 speak into grade school essays (and shame on you for thinking Shakespeare doesn't r0x0rz j00r b0x0rz). Dueling Analogs, for splicing what makes the Xbox great with what makes ... well, we don't want to go there either way, has been crowned the winner of this week's webcomic wrapup.

Second place goes to still-newbie 2P Start and third place went perennial favorites (and our rocketeering racketeering partners) Penny Arcade. Thanks to everyone who voted and be sure to let us know of any game-related webcomics you stumble upon this week!

A reminder regarding one of the most obnoxious Xbox 360 achievements ever conceived. For the next hour, if you've got a copy of NBA Live '07, turn that puppy on, it may be the best chance to get the "1,000 People Online" achievement. The achievement is worth 100 points. The event was promoted by Achieve360points.com. It is going on right now, and here's the simplest way to lay it out:

• February 10th at 5:00 to 6:00 pm (Pacific)
• February 10th at 6:00 to 7:00 pm (Mountain)
• February 10th at 7:00 to 8:00 pm (Central)
• February 10th at 8:00 to 9:00 pm (Eastern)
• February 11th at 1:00 to 2:00 am (United Kingdom)
• February 11th at 10:00 to 11:00 am (Japan)

Even after you gain the achievement, stay on. Remember, you got 999 people to thank for your easily gained, but ridiculously conceived, achievement.

[Update 1: Apparently the event was a success. Congrats to those who participated.]

We recently sat down with Games for Windows (GFW) Marketing Director Kevin Unangst and PR Manager Michael Wolf for a brief pre-launch tour of gaming on Vista. Admittedly, the implementation hasn't changed much since we first previewed Vista nearly a year ago. Even so, from a GUI-perspective, Vista features a user-friendly central location for cataloging, accessing, and tweaking (settings, parental controls, updating, etc.) GFW-branded games -- non-GFW games won't necessarily be excluded, but they won't feature many of the required functionalities built into the branded titles.

Games for Windows is still very much a vision. The first priority, a retail initiative, is currently underway. By employing marketing strategies used by console makers, namely platform-branding, Microsoft hopes that PC gaming (under the 'Games for Windows' banner) will become less intimidating to mainstream consumers -- no longer will the PC games isle be a cluttered mess of disparate titles. Computer Gaming World was also renamed as Games For Windows to help drive Microsoft's new brand. Aside from retail consolidation, this branding will ensure certain requirements are met by games' publishers. To earn the GFW brand, a title must comply with certain Microsoft-tested specifications, including widescreen support, compatibility with the Xbox 360 controller, parental control features, and simple installation. GFW games will also begin to carry a system rating, based on a 5-point scale. Vista will assess the value of your PC's gaming abilities and assign a rating (or "WinSAT"), say 4.5. You can then weigh that rating against a game's recommended rating (example: 5.0) and its required rating (example: 3.5) before purchasing. Update: The scale will begin at five points, but is designed to grow as newer technologies enter the market.

Speaking with Game|Life, SCEA's executive vp Jack Tretton confirmed that PlayStation 3 user accounts will not feature an aggregate score based on gaming accomplishments, squashing rumors that Sony would counter Microsoft's gamerscore/achievement system with "entitlements."

Tretton did suggest plans to incorporate a "pan-console" scoring system into first-party titles, but admitted that Sony had not decided on a name for this feature and that developers of first-party launch titles would likely pass on it. While excluded from Sony's aforementioned scoring system, third-party publishers will have the option to include their own achievement-like rewards, "on a game-by-game basis."

We've been hearing of a bushel of defects with just-released Xbox 360 title Oblivion IV, most of them relatively harmless. But this one's a real zinger because it allows players to stop leveling altogether and simply play the equivalent of a medieval playboy.

Shall we elaborate? What happens when you couple unlimited gold with a level one character's limited judgement? Wanton carousal, all-night mead keggers, illegitimate NPCs spawning all over the place, and legions of trust fund kids who forego the noble professions of blacksmithing, shoe-mending, and inn-keeping for jobs in architecture, museum curation, and film studies research.

The world of Tamriel is going to look an awful lot like Manhattan island if this defect isn't patched, quick.

[Via Xbox 360 Fanboy.com]

[Update 1: fixed really stupid spelling mistake. It's medieval. medieval. medieval. Got it now!]