World of Warcraft Achievements - What's the point?
Posted: Saturday, March 07, 2009
by Bill Kelly
I'm going to go on record here to state that I really like the Achievements System in the World of Warcraft. I know they basically don't do anything for you. I get it that they are an attempt to wring more playing time per character out of existing content. But I like the darn things.
If you are new to WoW, or at least new to the Wrath of the Lich King expansion set, then you may not be familiar with the Achievements. At first these are often confused with quests however they are completely different. Quests are a series of assigned tasks that, once completed, reward the player with experience, gold, reputation, items or a combination. For example, a quest might involve killing 20 Murlocs, and returning to the quest giver to get your reward. Basically when you successfully complete a quest you get stuff.
There are hundreds and hundreds of these things. For example on is called To All the Squirrels Ive Loved Before where you need to hug over 20 animals like sheep, frogs, deer and skunks. One of the very best I've seen so far is "Make love not Warcraft"where you need to hug the corpse of a dead enemybefore they release their spirit. How sick is that? As soon as I saw that one I instantly set out toget it. I actually got killed on a few occasions trying to /hug a corpse in the middle of a raging battle. I finally got it with my level 18 alt Tauren Druid. Stupid? Yes. Really fun? Yes. Does it make me smile? Every time.
When that little noise pops off and the big flashy bar thing pops up at the bottom of the screen I just can't help but grin. Especially, like mentioned in the post above, when they are not expected. It's like getting a small free cookie. "Hey, you just caught 25 fish. Good job! Here's a cookie." And even though that cookie is very small you still take it and eat it and like it. Who can have bad feelings about a cookie?
My hope is that at some point players will be able to make and implement their own Achievements. It would be completely out of control of course. I can imagine an achievement for getting drunk in every bar in the land, while naked and with a pet chicken at your side called "So this Chicken walks into a Bar..." Or set up a cross continental race with check points that must be done on foot while walking called "The Cannonball Walk." The possibilities are endless. The whole game, once you've maxed out your levels, can turn into a giant treasure hunt with millions of players scrambling for Achievements!
Bill spends way too much time running Druids around the World of Warcraft. If you don't find him in the Battlegrounds he's adding tips and tricks to his website at WoWDruid.com.
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Top-level comments on this article: (1 total)There's this really funny flash game online called 'Achievement Unlocked'. It's nothing but a string of achievements, you're bound to like that ;)
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