Why do people play video games? For some, it’s escapism; for others, it’s about competition; and for others it’s challenge.
Often, for me, it’s the latter.
Achievement hunting is the goal-oriented practice of playing video games in order to collect achievements and “100% complete” games by collecting every achievement in them.
The appeal of video game completion is similar to that of finishing a book series or TV show. I find myself comparing it to the concepts of ill and well structured problems.
An ill-structured problem is one that has no clear boundaries, you often don’t know if the solution that you’ve come to is the best one – and crucially for the comparison I’m making, you don’t know when you’ve ‘finished’ the problem. University students will be all too familiar with this, essays could always have wording refined, sources double checked, and for Computer Science students like me, we’re all too familiar with courseworks with no clear end in sight.
In comparison, a well-structured problem is one with a clear order of tasks, that once completed mean that the problem is ‘finished.’ Much like a list of achievements in a video game, once you get that last achievement or platinum trophy, you’ve “100% completed” that game.
My own achievement hunting journey began after I watched a video by an enthusiast who had reached over one hundred 100% completed games on Steam. Since then I have sought out short, rewarding experiences that could increase that number for me. Today, I’m at 70 perfected games – and would like to share some of my recommendations for games that you can complete in a reasonable amount of time!
1 – Turnip Boy Commits Tax Evasion
Turnip boy is a top-down adventure game where you play as a Turnip who avoids paying his taxes. If you’re aiming to complete all of its achievements in a single run, a walkthrough will take you down a very specific route, walking between different areas of the maps to collect and gift items between NPCs.
In an environment where so many games opt for massive, open world experiences where two playthroughs could never cross paths – like ‘Skyrim’ or the Switch ‘Legend of Zelda’s – Indie games like Turnip boy aren’t afraid to indulge the linear storytelling reminiscent of an earlier era of gaming. The linear path that turnip boy brought me back to the days of following a walkthrough to complete Pokémon: Emerald on my old Game Boy Advance SP in the back of the car.
The rogue-lite sequel, ‘Turnip Boy Robs a Bank’, is equally as delightful, and another short experience with manageable achievements that you should take a look at.
2 – Pikuniku
‘Pikuniku’ is a charming 2D puzzle platformer with a fun story, it’s also the first game I ever 100% completed on purpose and a good example of a game with a few, very difficult achievements that stand between the player and their blue and yellow Steam badge.
A small, DDR-like rhythm game against a robot, which requires the player to restart the entire game to replay, requires perfect precision to unlock its achievement: ‘Dancing Machine.’ Whilst another minigame inspired by the early mobile game doodle jump requires you to play it for a ridiculous amount of time until you achieve the score ‘999.’
3 – Thank Goodness You’re Here
I talk about a game-long achievement in my full review of ‘Thank Goodness You’re Here’. This achievement is a missable one that takes the entire game to get. Where I’d usually be annoyed that I have to replay long sections of a game in order to complete it, I really enjoyed being able to experience this story again.
4 – Clustertruck
You may recognise this game from the early days of voiced-over YouTube videos. ‘Clustertruck’ is a parkour game where you race to a finish line while riding a horde of stampeding lorries. It’s addictive, it’s simple but most importantly it’s got a good gameplay loop that progresses you through levels that test different movement styles.
Clustertruck’s achievements are progression based – meaning that you are rewarded for completing levels and exploring the entire game and have a completion percentage that directly relates to how much of the game you’ve played.
If you like the idea of completing a progression-based game I can also recommend ‘Earn to Die 2’, my favourite web/ mobile game from when I was younger which is also available on PC. All of its achievements are also tied to its levels, and the upgrading and purchasing of new vehicles is incredibly satisfying.
The concept of satisfying progression is leveraged in a lot of clicker or tycoon games, where your progress is rewarded with the ability to make more or faster amounts of progress. Whilst I lovingly dub these “Number go up” games, I do find a lot of the same completionist joy in coming to the end of one of these. I’d highly recommend ‘Nubby’s number factory’, ‘Digseum’, ‘Nodebuster’, ‘Minutescape’ or ‘Max Manos’ if you’d like this fix.
5 – Buckshot Roulette
‘Buckshot Roulette’ is an addictive, probability based, tabletop horror game. It combines an eerie atmosphere with high stakes problem solving to deliver a visually captivating take on chance.
It’s also an example of a game where the achievements aren’t immediately obvious, a player who hasn’t taken a look at them would never come across the Easter eggs they reward – listening to the music of the club the game is set in for over a minute, deciding to turn the shotgun on yourself after uncovering that the current round is live, uncovering deicide by choosing to name yourself “GOD” on the contract you sign before playing.
6 – Firewatch
‘Firewatch’ is a walking simulator where you play as a man escaping his personal life, confined to a watchtower, whose last human connection can only be reached at the other end of his radio. It’s visually striking, with a mysterious plot at its heart.
‘Firewatch’ is an example of an indie game with a story to tell – a prime candidate for those looking to collect and complete short games. Without achievement hunting, I may never have experienced the wide variety of stories that are out there in the medium of video games.
If you’d like to start achievement hunting in order to experience different styles of games, stories and to widen your gaming horizons, there are plenty of other experiences like ‘Firewatch’. ‘Florence’ is a short puzzle game that puts you in the driver’s seat of a breakup story through clever visuals and interactions. ‘Unpacking’ is another experience guided by storytelling, but it tells it by having you unpack the creator’s belongings as you follow their life journey through each of their living spaces.
Another style of story is the big, PlayStation-style AAA games. Whilst lots of these won’t be short experiences, they will still remain well-structured throughout. I would be remiss not to mention my favourite of these, the Insomniac Spider-Man games, which I played when they came to Steam. ‘Spider-Man’ and ‘Spider-Man: Miles Morales’ guide you through engaging stories with exhilarating gameplay using excellent achievement design that allow an achievement hunter to tick off entire areas of New York City on their quest to “Platinum” the game.
7 – A Game about Digging a Hole
A simple core concept meets an addictive, incremental gameplay loop that will have you happily going back and forth between your shed and what used to be your garden.
What’s unique about the achievement experience in ‘A Game about Digging a Hole’ is that you only start being able to unlock them once you’ve fully completed the game once, meaning that the achievement design forces you to experience the game before you complete challenges based around it.
If you like the idea of fully experiencing a game before starting your completionist journey, I can also recommend ‘Exit 8’. It’s a unique concept horror game where you repeatedly walk the same corridor, playing a creepy game of spot the difference to try and escape the underground station. The only two achievements are for your first completion of the game and for experiencing all of the exit’s anomalies.
Whilst I stand by every single recommendation that I’ve made, and I do still find lots of joy in getting every single achievement in a video game, I’d like to give you a warning before you set out on a quest to up your average game completion % on Steam.
As a side-effect of a perfectionist mindset, achievement hunting defines your experience of games to a single perspective, in the same way that perfectionism restricts your life experience to chasing achievements rather than enjoying the process.
However, good achievement design in a game can lead to a more curated experience from game designers, and I have been able to experience parts of games that I wouldn’t have if there wasn’t a digital badge at the end of the tunnel.
Overall, I think the practice of achievement hunting is less symptomatic of perfectionism, and more a treatment for it. In a world where meaning, achievements, can be so ill-defined, an outlet that allows for structured, earned success with clear goals is hard to come by.
So go finish some games.
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