Giving up the gamerscore whoring.

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For the last few months, I have been looking at people on the 360 gamerscore whoring sites, and they gave me delusions of grandiour. I was looking at attempting to add 100,000 more to my gamerscore by this time next year. I was looking to have a perfect scoring streak that would last for quite some time.

Then I decided it was a lot more stress than what it was worth. And I decided I did not want to be one of those hardcore gamerscore whores that play Avatar - The Burning Earth, Hannah Montana - The Game, and My Horse & Me 2 just to add more points to their gamertags.

I am going to focus on the quality of my gaming instead of the quantity.

It helps that every time I scheduled an achievement whoring session over the last three months, one of my RL friends ended up calling and I did some face-to-face socializing instead.

I also do not want to be verbally abused by 12yos who think that boosting 100,000 kills of Gears of War makes them more manly. That happened to me a few times about three or four years ago; my having a speech impediment gave them the appearance that I was an easy target, and I got an endless barrage of Forrest Gump references hurled in my direction. I would rather not be around those people if I can avoid it. Besides, I'll prove my worth as a gamer when I finally get all the BTs in Star Ocean - TLH, which takes a LOT more effort than Seriously 3.0.

In any case, I want to enjoy my games instead of looking for the fastest ways to get 1,000 gamerscore out of them.

Definitely a good thing, I'd say. Frankly, I'd always wondered why anyone gave a damn about the stupid gamerscore. If achievements were actually anything resembling difficult to get, then I could sorta understand it, but..... no, they're not, in almost every case. Very few of them really ARE true achievements, or difficult whatsoever, and it ends up being not about who can be the most awesome, but instead about who can grab the most games. Simply spending money..... or spending time..... or grinding..... are not difficulty.

And with the money bit, hmmm, another bloody stupid marketing ploy, in that manner.

I'd rather find a REAL challenge, than try to get points from games that hand out points because you selected a character, or other bloody stupid "achievements" *cough*.

An achievement that actually is worth something.

If I ever get this achievement, legitimately (I don't hack or cheat on any of my games), I will consider myself to be a true gaming god. Until then, I'll just be comfortable with being a casual gamer.

Hmm, the thing about that one is.... well.... would you believe that Deathsmiles.... including it's Black Label version.... is one of the easier bullet-hell shmups out there? I finished it quite a long while ago myself (I had the import version way before the release of the translated one), and was able to defeat Jitterbug without bombing even once when I ran into him for the very first time; he just didnt compare to other bosses I'd already dealt with. Dont get me wrong, it's still a nice achievement to beat that one, particularly if someone is relatively new to the genre, but I can definitely top that one.

I'll give a few quick examples here. These are all much shorter videos than that one, only about 5 minutes long for each. They're all me playing these, and I tend to chop up gameplay videos of these into small segments, because I'm very impatient about video uploading and processing. ALL of these are dramatically more difficult than anything in Deathsmiles, Black Label or original version.

Let's start with Mushihime-sama Futari, by far the most difficult in the entire genre without exception. Here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C57SiHlmrVE

As the title says, that's an early attempt for me at this stage, and I could have done that with waaaaayyyyyyy less bombing/dying than I did there. As a rule, I play these for score, not just for survival and, well, I often tend to try a little too hard to get big points, which often causes me to crash into things that I should have otherwise dodged. Played purely for survival, I can handle that level and defeat the boss. That boss is actually the easiest in the game, at least by my account. And that mode I'm in specifically is Ultra mode, which is downright impossible for most. But we'll get to the REALLY nasty bit later here....


Next is this: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7uON3zty3-Q

That's stage 1 of the same game and mode. I did that video for the very specific reason of the fact that I LOATHE that stage, probably more than any level in any other game ever, and I *finally* managed to do pretty much the entire stage without even bombing. I did have one death, and it was a really STUPID one. Managed to crash into a bullet when there were hardly any on the screen, something I do at times.


And then: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vuOQBL1T2o8

As a comparison, this is Ultra mode in the first game in the series (Futari is the second). Much less batshit insane than the second game's Ultra mode, but still very insane nonetheless. This video is noteworthy in particular for the first attack that the boss uses. I can handle most of this mode without too much trouble at this point. But it took me a year of constant practice to get good enough to do it.


And then: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jiT04G9a9rY

This is from Dodonpachi Dai-ou-jou, the PS2 version specifically. Death Label mode, which takes all of the already horrible bosses in the game and gives them a huge speed boost. It's a boss-rush sort of thing. And if you wonder why I appear to pass right through a bullet occaisionally, it's because activating the Hyper mode gives about a second of invincibility right afterwards. This mode is utterly beyond my skill level to beat. I wasnt able to reach it, but that last boss has THREE forms, not two, and the third makes absolutely everything else in the game look easy. And in THIS mode, not only does it get the same speed boost as the others, but you fight TWO of it at once. I stand no chance against that nightmare.


And lastly:

This is Dodonpachi Daifukkatsu. Of all of these videos, this one is the easiest for me to accomplish. This run through this stage is a pure scoring run. I really love the heck outta this game, and it remains an all-time favorite of mine. Currently I can reach the 4th stage in this, which mostly consists of a long string of f-bombs and various other curses followed by a game over. The third stage midboss is a nightmare in it's own right, I haaaaaaaaaate that thing. I *think* I put up a video that shows me reaching that horror (and promptly getting obliterated by it), but I'm too lazy to look for it.


And the thing about all of these? They arent even CLOSE to the difficulty of what I would call the true ultimate achievement. Not.... even.... close. That would be this: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5ztCxpBmXuA

That one's not me playing. Definitely not. Even so much as REACHING that terror of a boss is an incredibly amazing achievement in and of itself; reaching it with that many lives and bombs is twice that. But even after all of that, this boss makes the rest of the game look easy. It's THAT hard. I consider it by far the single most difficult thing in any game that ever was, while still being TECHNICALLY possible for every one of it's patterns to be fully dodged. The guy playing this one is an absolute master, far, far beyond my level. I fight this boss in the game's training mode every now and then, simply because it's awesome, and starting with 4 lives I can reach the halfway point of this fight (halfway through the second form), but I cannot go further than that. And that's in TRAINING mode, where you select a specific part of the game to practice. Actually reaching it by playing the whole mode? Ye gods, no. That's totally beyond me, I cannot do it. Not even close.



So, yeah.... THOSE are hard. I'm mostly just showing them here because I think these games are just, well, impressive, and it's VERY satisfying to really get somewhere in them. I always try to promote this genre, as I love the hell outta it, and I find that videos of it are fun to watch because of all of the utter chaos going on. I also just like showing off the games themselves.... I wish more people would give these sorts of games a go, really.

Even with all of that though, totally finishing Deathsmiles is still an impressive feat; most other console games simply do not compare to that game's difficulty, even if it's one of the easier ones in this genre. It is indeed, as you say, an achievement worth getting. The entire genre IS made to be very, very difficult, so even the so-called "easier" ones are very hard. With practice though, these are all possible.

And if I come across as braggy here, I apologize for that; I dont actually mean to do that, but I'm aware that I sound that way sometimes. As it is there's PLENTY of genres and such that I'm absolutely horrid at. Like FPS games.... I always say that in those, my aim is so bad that I cannot hit the side of a barn..... from inside the barn. Put me on an actual TEAM, and, well..... that team will lose. Simple as that.

It should also be noted that these games in the videos are all imports; I'm running a Japanese 360 here. If you'd care to try similar games though, I can give recommendations if you want, particularly for those found on PC. There's LOTS of good stuff to be found, and not just of the "bullet-hell" type.

damn i thought exceed was hard, oh well i still have touhou.

Edited: removed overly long quote.

Heh, the only three shmups I've ever played are Deathsmiles, Akai Katana and Raiden IV. I am far from being an expert on that gaming genre.

I did manage to 100% complete both Catherine and Child of Eden, though..... So, I guess I'm not completely worthless as a gamer. (Heh, those games are a LOT easier than any of the shmups mentioned in this topic so far!)

Well, these sorts of games being as crazy as they are certainly doesnt mean that others arent still quite difficult in their own right. Stuff like Catherine is definitely too hard for many players. It's quite a difficult game in it's own right.

I think my problem with the whole thing is just how many games, usually on console, have become REALLY easy these days; all the regenerating health and infinite lives and easy bosses and often no such thing as an actual game-over screen. Infinite continues, too, usually. Stuff like that.

And Raiden 4 is another good one as the shmups go. Feh, I need to get another copy of that; I have the version that released in the US, but it doesnt run on a JP 360 unit, and I dont have a US unit anymore.

Which reminds me, there's two very specific games I can suggest for this genre that are easy to get and do not need to be imported, if you should have the interest: There's Under Defeat on the PS3, a personal favorite of mine and one that can be bought on PSN now (I dont think the physical release ever left Japan, but it's the same thing). Bloody excellent game, that, very unique mechanics for a shmup.

And also, Raiden Fighters Aces, which is a compilation of the 3 games that make up the Raiden Fighters trilogy. They're on the 360, and they're also on the PC under the name Raiden Legacy, found on Desura.

I never understood the gamerscore stuff anyway. Either something is fun to me, then I do it anyway, or it does not make fun to me, then I dont do it. Never understood, why I should get motivated to so something, that I wouldnt do otherwise, only because of some digital numbers increasing.

Yeah, this.

I could understand doing it if the achievements were ACTUALLY achievements, as in, something that takes some real skill and effort to accomplish; then the score would make more sense, showing "look, I did this much difficult stuff successfully!". But when games give you achievements for doing things like selecting a character or finishing .0005 of a tutorial, then.... yeah, it falls apart totally.

Click here for the MOST DIFFICULT ACHIEVEMENT on the 360 ever!

Hehehe.

yeah, I recently gave up on trying for every last achievement possible myself. I was never an actual achievement whore... I have played "achievement whoring games" though, but only because I was either curious about the game itself or because I'm a fan of the license. I have played every LEGO game ( LOTR & Batman 2 on PS3 as I was sans 360 for a while ), TMNT, Legend of the Guardians, Ben 10, Avatar TLA: Burning Earth and maybe a few others but as I said I'm either a fan ( LEGO, Ben 10, Avatar , TMNT ) or curious ( Guardians ). In fact, my proudest 100% games are Saints Row 3 ( soon 4 as well! ), Skyrim ( working on DLC to regain 100% status ), Band Hero and both Dragon Age games. If I can't get every achievement, oh well ( hell, some games I can't even earn 1 achievement like Rumble Roses XX, Aegis Wing and Max Payne 3 )...I'd rather have fun that want to kill myself because I can't do shtako in some frustrating game.

And as I saw Deathsmiles mentioned, I freaking LOVE those games! I couldn't do much in the 1st game but I have all but 2 achievements in Deathsmiles II X ( one is the highest score one, 6 billion iirc and the other has to do with 1 minute at max magic or something )

Yeah but getting all of the hats in tf2 is an achievement (or money drain depending on how you see it).

I liked the metagaming (what it's called), but it has it's downers.

1. Too many games give points for ONLINE gaming components...which I can't do.

2. Too many games give points for insanely difficult (not just "challenging") goals to meet.

It's really bad when it's a game you love, but can't play online, or a game you can play but is so horrible you don't want to invest the time into it just to get the stupid points.

don't forget the ones for pure dumb luck like the gambling one in Final Fantasy XIII-2....and why the hell do they put random things as secret achievements/trophies? How am I supposed to know to do things like stand still for 5 minutes unless I look it up first when the only achievements that should be hidden are story progression?

Rumble Roses XX is notorious for its achievements. Primarily because it takes around 500 hours to get all 1,000 gamerscore. Most of that is spent on repetitive grinding. That is one game I have no interest in playing.

I did purchase Max Payne 3 a few months ago, but I still haven't started it yet.

I have had a Xbox 360 for 4 years now and my gamerscore is around 30,000g and like many others I bought games like Avatar: TLA, Cloudy with a chance of meatballs for the easy 1000G, but for the past 2 years, my score went up alot slower because I just didn't feel like continuing.

I guess it was just to catch up with my friends mostly in terms of score.