Microsoft’s ever-impressive gaming platform, the Xbox 360, has brought countless hours of joy and entertainment to gamers the world over. Xbox LIVE has connected those gamers over the Internet so that they can play together and interact online in a way never before possible. The games produced for the console are constantly improving and pushing back the barriers of gaming with more and more realistic physics engines, smoother, sharper and more impressive graphics, and game-play which is more akin to a Hollywood blockbuster than mindless, simple, button-smashing fun. Microsoft has created all of this but there is a downside. With good there is evil, with matter anti-matter, with Clapton the Spice Girls. The Xbox has released a plague upon the gaming world: Point Whoring.
Point whoring is the practice of needlessly accruing vast amounts of Achievement Points simply for the sake of having a higher gamer score. Every Xbox user has a Gamer Tag, which displays their chosen name, a picture and details on the gamer’s reputation, as well as a gamer score. Unlocking achievements within Xbox games increases these scores. The achievements vary in their worth and difficulty to obtain and points range from simple things, such as successfully completing a level, to the plain ridiculous, such as hitting a flag 4 times with a golf ball or kicking a chicken.
Many (if not most) gamers now use these whore points to compare themselves to others and see a high gamer score as a symbol of gaming virility. Some are forced to continue playing games, even once complete, to squeeze out every last achievement and bolster their gamer score in the process. Gamers can become obsessed with that familiar “Blop-ping” noise that indicates your most recent triumph. Certain games are purchased purely because it is easy to get points by playing them for a short period of time. These points have no value. They cannot be exchanged for anything
Despite what I have said here I have to admit, like an addict confronted with his problem, that I have been points whoring. I noticed recently I was doing ridiculous things in the gaming world to get another achievement point. From spending time at Liberty City’s golf range trying to hit a flag with a golf ball four times instead of completing one of the story missions, to replaying games through to choose different paths and receive different awards. I once mocked my friends for chasing the Xbox achievement dragon, but I now find myself counted amongst their number. That said, and shame aside, hunting for achievement points in games can often lead to some of the most fun and amusing game-play, for example the occasion when I received an achievement point for placing a grenade in someone’s pocket in Fallout 3, just to watch their trousers explode. I resolve to continue my gaming, but to limit my point whoring to occasions when I am bored so as that the practice does not become the main driving force of my gaming, but a tiny sideline treat every now-and-then.
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