Top 10 dumbest Xbox Live Gamerscore Achievements

by Ward Knippling

Posted: 05-08-2009

In Soviet Russia, achievements unlock YOU: The Doc takes a look at the lamest and most excruciating Xbox Achievements.

Hello Jiggafans, and welcome back to the Jiggawatt! For those of you who know and understand the concept of Gamerscore and Achievements, please scroll down to the third paragraph. These aren’t the droids you are looking for. When Xbox Live updated with the launch of the 360 back in 2005, it brought with it a new system, called the Gamerscore. The Gamerscore is a symbol of dedication. If you are an excellent gamer, it will reflect on the Gamerscore, which is comprised of the total points you get from unlocking achievements in your games.

Achievements are most often certain challenges in the game that, when the criteria have been met, can be unlocked to award points to your Gamerscore. Achievements can range anywhere between ironic, bizarre, frustrating, and hilarious. They can be little jokes that the developers threw in for a laugh, such as finding the Rat Man’s Dens in Portal, to difficult challenges that make you happy to earn them, such as killing the population of the city of Willamette Colorado in Dead Rising.

Many gamers have turned Achievement earning into a metagame (a game within the game), which has turned into a more or less unspoken contest between those on Xbox Live to have the highest Gamerscore. This has led to a few unfortunate habits. The first being the idea that having the highest Gamerscore will make you the God of Gamers. I think Mythbusters cracked this one: it won’t. The other unfortunate side effect is that many companies input easy achievements into their shoddy games in order to amp the sales with the achievement farmers.

On the other end of the spectrum, there are some achievements that are nearly impossible to get. Many games ask you to accomplish the gaming equivalent of moving a mountain with dental floss and scotch tape. They require not dedication, but addiction to attain.

That being said, I thought it would be fun to take a look at some of the worst, “Achievements,” out there and explain why they suck. Each one on the list will be labeled, “Excruciating” or “Lame.” This should be interesting.

#10. F.E.A.R.: “Realtime” -- Excructiating

There were a lot of Achievements in F.E.A.R. that would be noteworthy for this list, but the one that takes it for me is Realtime. Beat the game in any difficulty without Slow-Mo. 65G. You will have about as much luck doing that as you would eating real beef in McDonalds. The game is already difficult to play with the slow-mo (which will not stop you from screaming like a girl when the more frightening parts come up). Take that one little security blanket away and you don’t have a Video Game anymore. You have a rollercoaster ride through hell with a stop in Detroit along the way.

#9. Bullet Witch: “Hell Difficulty Cleared” -- Lame

Bullet Witch can be described in many different ways, none of them particularly flattering. It is the achievement farmer’s game, for sure. Need more proof on that, check this out.

A sizable gamerscore can be attained by playing through this game once... but a lot of the points come from playing through it on the harder modes. That is until you get to the Hell Difficulty. Though I sincerely doubt that there is anyone, even among the achievers, who have stooped this low; you get a whole point for beating the Hell mode. Way to go.

#8. Dead Rising: “Clothing Horse” -- Excruciatingly Lame

Sometimes I think that the government uses video games as a habitual monitoring system. This paranoia is helped along by the Clothing Horse achievement in Dead Rising. If anyone is willing to try on every single possible outfit in the Willamette Mall to earn 20 gamerpoints... they are probably flagged as possibly being a terrorist (or a male of questionable sexual orientation).

#7. Kameo: Elements of Power: “Various 0 pointers” -- Lame

When your game isn’t fun enough to attract the mainstream hardcore gamer, you should include elements to get the achievers and the casual audience involved. Somebody forgot to tell the folks at Rare this tidbit before they made Kameo. It was also not mentioned that it was unwise to name your game after a short guest appearance. Beating the harder time trials and difficulty settings nets you 0 gamerscore. There are achievements for them… but 0 points? It’s as if the game was subliminally telling us, “I’m an old turd in a new brown paper bag!”

#6. Final Fantasy XI: “Reach Level 75 with each character class” -- Excruciating

I haven’t actually played this game. This one was submitted by a friend, who describes leveling ONE character to seventy-five as being, “Like trying to shove a corn cob in a part of your anatomy that you should never shove a corn cob up. Sure it’s possible... but in the end you’re going to feel like a whore and probably have an STD.”

#5. King Kong: “Pyromaniac” -- Lame

Achievements are sometimes very easy to get. Take the Simpsons Game, for example. You get points for hitting the start button at the title screen. Though that is meant to satire gaming and achievements, this one is not. In order to achieve the status of Pyro, you simply need to grab a torch and set someone ablaze. This nets you a hundred points...which seems a little overzealous for such an easy feat. It’s like giving your waiter a 100 dollar bill. It’s a nice gesture... but a little more than was absolutely necessary.

#4. Game Master: “Finish the Game Without Using Continues” -- Excruc... hell with it, “Almost Completely Impossible”

Have you ever been tasked with taking a gold ring to the heart of Mordor in order to stop the evil deity, Sauron? You’d probably have more luck doing that than you would getting this achievement. Heck, you’d be better off in Mordor than trying to beat this game WITH continues. And for a whole 50 points? A waste of time does not begin to describe this one.

#3. Guitar Hero III: “Blowing It” -- Lame

This achievement was designed to humiliate you, whether or not you tried to get it. All you need to do for this 5 pointer is fail any song ten times. If you do this by accident... that’s a sad one to have show up on your gamertag. If you do it on purpose, just to get the five points...well that’s even sadder.

#2. Blue Dragon: “Defeat King Poo” -- Excruciating

It’s hard to take this one seriously at all. “Yeah, I’m wandering around aimlessly looking for a giant turd monster. If I beat it I get 30 gamerpoints. Although... there’s a really good chance that this thing is going to beat the living shit out of me (pun intended).” I mean, the thing actually looks like a giant turd. Truly the greatest artistic achievement from the man who brought us Dragonball.

#1. Ghost Recon: Advanced Warfare: “World Champion” -- Excruciating... as in, “Not gonna happen”

This one’s a fun topic. Because I know that I’m probably going to get SOME emails saying, “Hey, you’re wrong! I’ve gotten this achievement!” If you do send me this email (whether or not it’s worded exactly this way -- I’m expecting some colorful profanity here), then you are a liar. This 40 point achievement requires you to be the top of the leaderboard -- cream of the crop, so to speak. Which means that 99 percent of 360 owners... hell around 95 percent of GRAW owners, will never attain it. Oh, and back to those emails for a second, folks... pics or it didn’t happen.

So there you have it. Ten of the worst Xbox Achievements ever. Please do not feel the need to beat them now that you know about them. This article was designed to help you SAVE your time, not throw it away.

“Thanks Doc, now we know!”

“And knowing is half the battle!”

“G.I. JOOOOOOE!”

Doc out!

You can read more of Ward Knippling’s blogs here.

The opinions expressed in this article are solely those of the author.