Opinion: Firewatch's Paltry Five Trophies Prove That the System Needs Fixing

Couldn't agree more, and I don't even care about trophies to begin with.

Im sure I got a few trophies for Aabs Animals on the Vita, for basically looking at and poking a few kittens. Win win.

I really don't care tbh, but If they put a platinum on all games, it will just boost the sales. A lot of times especially at the EU blog, I have read many comments from people that skip games, becuase they lack a Platinum...
Also if TWD season one ( Vita ) has a platinum, then everything else should have too!

I'm not fussed, even if I am a part time trophy whore, I've been looking forward to this game ever since I saw it at E3.

Trophies hold no appeal to me at all. If I enjoy a game I play it as much as I feel it needs to be played then move onto something new. As for Firewatch think I will give it a miss.

I'm not to fussed about trophy's. When I see people with alot of platinum's I do think "wow that guy/lass has spent alot of time on their ps4 and must be dedicated" but I can't help but think "wow that guy/lass has also spent alot of time on youtube" as well Some company's could be guilty of releasing a rubbish game but putting alot of trophy's in there almost as if they consider it content as well I suppose, I don't think it should be enforced really.

Not fussed. No one on my friends list can keep up with me, so I'm indifferent.

I think games should be put into tiers based on length and difficulty. Only the top percentile should be able to include a platinum. Doesn't bother me too much, but if we are discussing it, that's my two cents. If people are bragging about how many platinums they have, for them to come from short indies and Telltale games cheapens the achievement somewhat.

Good point, there are a lot of games that are very much deserving of a platinum trophy that don't get one. Sony has gone on record as saying it's purely down to how much content is in the game as to wether it will get one, but that's clearly not true in some cases.

Some games are so immensly fun that with a decent trophy collection, it can really add something to the experience to be able to hunt down that plat. So it's a shame when they block seemingly random developers from having that included for no obvious reason.

I really don't care about this. I hate a game like Cannoli where each and every trophy, no matter how hard is worth a bronze trophy. But then again, no one is forcing me to go to such lengths.

I rebought Scram Kitty on PS4 for the trophies, and they ended up being lackluster, making me feel more proud of my Miiverse pic where I got every single cat in the game. In the version with no trophies.

I would rather have games with less trophies than with tacked on, annoying trophies just to fill an arbitrary quota imposed by Sony. Give devs the freedom to add as many trophies as they want or even ditch them if they see fit.

The childishness of "I want trophies" is ridiculous... I dive no damn about "your first shot target", "10th shot", "100th shot", etc. I just don't care. It's distracting and detrimental to immersion.

@LieutenantFatman I think a 5-30 minute Japanese game had a Plat.
@KomrathDE You can turn the notifications off if you want.

@JoeBlogs Hanna Montanna I believe is a very popular and easy Planimum amongst Plat hunter's, and probably cheap as chip's as well to buy.

The people going for platinum only are just a small and weird minority vocal on the internet...

Yeah I'm the same. Not massively bothered about Trophies but this inconsistency does bug me!

The reason why some games get a platinum or not depends on how big the game is & replay value, I can link you to an article where someone at Sony explains it. I collect trophies as they add replay value to my games, I love being able to replay my games & trophies add another reason. But I don't put trophies before games as unbelievably some do, I like the way the trophy system is.

@xMEADx - depends on the hunters; just as many would mock you for it.

There needs to be more consistency in how the plats are applied. I admit, I go for the platinum whenever I can, but I won't persist with a game I'm not enjoying for the sake of getting one.

On Sony's criteria for allowing a game to have a plat, there is this: http://gearnuke.com/former-sony-dev-comments-outlasts-missing-platinum-trophy-explains-trophy-allocation-works/#

It raises as many questions as it answers though. Why is Everybody's Gone to the Rapture "large scope" whereas SOMA is "small scope"?

@get2sammyb I read that somewhere, that all XB games get 1000GS now.

In a way, that's no better though, because you could end up with smaller titles which are ridiculously rewarding from a time-investment/effort point of view.

I think the answer would be for them to just be transparent about the process and criteria behind the decision-making process alluded to in the gearnuke article above.

Edit: Sammy - Dunno if you want to try and bottom this out, but the KennyLinder guy on Neogaf, who made the comments in the gearnuke article I linked, might be willing to talk more about it? Here's a link to the discussion on Neogaf, he's the fist post on this page. http://www.neogaf.com/forum/showthread.php?t=759221&page=3

Honestly, it just shows how little there is to do in this game to begin with. It's not hard to think of things in a game to have a trophy for unless there's not an awful lot to do in the game other than walk from A to B and trigger WAVs to play. There's at least 2057 trophies in World of Warcraft because there's such a ridiculous amount of stuff to do - and the game doesn't even do the usual "Cast 500 spells", "Kill 500 goblins" type stuff either. The game came out well before achievements did. Diablo 3 before Reaper of Souls had well over 400 achievements. Not as part of some kind of MS or Sony initiative, but put in by Blizzard for the PC version.

Yet imagine if films had trophies. What could they possibly be other than "Watch 1 scene", "Watch 2 scenes" etc? That's what I feel the case is with this game. This isn't really about trophies, it's about this particular game and games like it. People talk about achievements and trophies as a modern thing, yet games have really always had them, they just didn't keep a record of them outside of high score tables. Collect all Chaos Emeralds in Sonic. Find the hidden zone in Super Mario World. Getting a true ending is a thing in thousands of games, but for a semi-modern example, Persona 4.

These were meta things that you'd aim for that were separate from completing the game and they're the kind of things that lend themselves immediately to being a trophy or achievement. If a game lacks mechanics, lacks options, lacks player expression, lacks things to achieve other than walking forwards, it's hard for it to have trophies.

For me trophies can (not always) do the following:

• something fun to collect
• encourages me to try out different play styles
• encourages me to experience all the game has to offer
• something to look back on and see your gaming history
• compete/collect with friends

I like to think that if Crash 2 had trophies it would have one for collecting all the coloured gems....which at the time I did anyway but now it would be a trophy too. With regards the topic, I wish there was more consistency but it's not going to stop me buying a game.

I have a weird opinion on trophies. They're not the end all-be all of my gaming experience, far from it, even though I have 9 platinums to my name. Granted, most of those platinums I got because "Ehh, why not?", and I try not to use guides while doing so. Even though I like collecting them from time to time, I get enough of a thrill beating games by itself, and I don't need a pop up to tell me that.

All that said, the issue here is with the inconsistency of trophies, which I can understand. Admittedly, my only gripe is probably what objectives are made for what type of trophy. Assassin's Creed II for example has only one gold trophy, most of the story trophies are silver, and everything else is bronze, including the irritating feather collection.

Don't get how you can say that trophies don't matter then go on a rant about how some games have so few, I'm looking forward to Firewatch trophies aren't something I'm overly concerned about

The devs actual explained thier thinking process behind the trophies for firewatch in the latest playstation blogcast. Its worth a listen it aounds like their choice.

@Neolit lmao, agreed. I got every trophy but that one, it bothered me a lot that I was one off a plat but not enough to actually sink so low as to play the game in such a ridiculous way.

I thought it was due to the length of the game, I'm not expecting fire watch to be very long.
It would be nice if every game got a platinum but short games would be far too easy don't you think? I thought it was a bit cheap how easy Resogun's was to get. and thinking about it that was a really short game : / I vote for consistency.

@Neolit I haven't had any issues playing Grim Fandango with tank controls - didn't know it was a trophy either I generally play with the original models as well it takes me back to a simpler time

I'm no trophy chaser, though I do like them and will go for them when it's fun to do so, but the inconsistency really is baffling. I don't know what criteria Sony uses to determine who gets a plat and who doesn't, but I don't the size/scope argument. I mean, Goat Simulator has a platinum for goodness sake! The last few Telltale games have platinums and literally the only requirement to earn them is to play the whole game to completion. King's Quest meanwhile lacks one (unless one gets added later) despite a comparable number of eventual episodes and having actual puzzles and meaningful choices.

Giving every game a platinum trophy might "diminish the importance" of Sony's top gong, but the current opaque and wildly inconsistent system for allocating them is beyond annoying.

@Neolit I recently finished the game and got the platinum. I always thought tank controls were fine, however after playing Grim Fandango I agree. They are terrible and need to be left in the 20th Century.

@Plateface It really wasn't that hard. I mean, at first I thought I was gonna have to give up on going for it, but when I switched to using the directional pad over the analog stick it suddenly became much easier.

I play to have fun not to get trophies.... Who cares if the game doesnt have a platinum trophies.

@AyanamiReign Resogun is more difficult than a lot of platinums so surprised that's your example. Almost all of my 12 plats were easier than Resogun lol

No, I can't say that I agree. Platinums should be reserved for the more difficult games, or those that require a fair amount of time put in.
However...aren't trophies/achievements/steam achievements, the same across all different versions of the title? I'm not sure how this is solely a trophy problem.

I agree, but disagree.

The amount of trophies for a game and their associated value (Platinum, Gold, Silver, and Bronze) is one part developer and one part Sony.

Games like Taco Master get a Platinum, but MGS: Ground Zeroes isn't allowed to have one even though Kojima wanted it (http://www.ign.com/articles/2014/03/17/why-metal-gear-solid-5-ground-zeroes-has-no-platinum-trophy). Other games like Outlast don't qualify for a Platinum due to the (mostly) linear experience and smaller scope of the game (http://gearnuke.com/former-sony-dev-comments-outlasts-missing-platinum-trophy-explains-trophy-allocation-works/#).That being said, they've loosened the "Platinum" rule through the years because it's been statistically proven that games with trophies/achievements sell more (http://www.gamespot.com/articles/study-achievement-rich-games-sell-better/1100-6198361/).

However, it's worth noting that many developers like Campo Santo (Firewatch), Fullbright (Gone Home), and Frictional Games (SOMA) care more about the overall story. To them, trophies are an arbitrary system that detract from the experience. The second that trophy "pops" (with the associated sound), you're pulled "Out of the moment" and are reminded that you're playing game. Developers like Quantic Dream avoided this by having delayed trophy pops--but that's not an option that every game is allowed to have. So, in order to get a Playstation release, developers still have to add 'em in there.

As much fun as they are, Trophies/Achievements forever broke gaming. While, yes, they do add replay value for the OCD-gamer (like myself--I have 68 Platinums!), people end up spending hours upon hours playing games they'd normally return. People judge a game--and decide whether they'll play it or not, it's overall value, etc.--purely based off it's trophy set! It's disappointing.

However, with this article, it's just a gamer blaming Sony for Firewatch's trophies. He doesn't take into account that this is what the developer actually wanted. While I fully realize that this is supposed to be an "opinion" piece, it's really just a unwarranted rant.

Never once have I intentionally looked at a trophy list and went about trophy hunting in a game. That being said I do have some platinum to my name, but I honestly can't even remember which ones. I am not sure why the he'll it even matters, seems like extra fodder thrown in for the obsessed.

Of course not every game should have a platinum! What are you guys are smoking? Now, maybe every dev should care about trophies not about the game!???

I don't play games for trophies so I couldn't care less. All I want is a damn good entertaining experience.

Don't care trophies have no meaning outside of use as motivational goals for individuals, no value; little meaning; fart.

In this day and age of broken a$$ releases and constant patches to 'fix' games, the last thing I'm concerned about when I hand over my hard-earned $60 is whether a game has 50 trophies, including a platinum, or zero.

idc
>_>

I should get a participation platinum just for playing.

@ChasInterjection I do agree for me it takes the fun away. On the PS one I had great fun and I never had the idea I was missing something without trophies. Sometimes trophies take away the fun and get you annoyed.

@Neolit that's fair, I don't think it's a game I'll play again any time soon. Have fun

@Donald_M it may well be easy, but it's just beyond tedious. The game has very little replay value either so I'm not inclined to even attempt it just for a trophy.

@LieutenantFatman it really makes no sense, resident evil 4 was ported with 1000 gamerscore and no platinum to compare. This made and makes no sense at all, especially if you're arguing the amount of content. This is a full game!

@get2sammyb I know this is an opinion piece, but Trophies are the single most important aspect to me when considering a game. Before price, before genre, before review score. Unless its a game that I already know I want (based on previous games in a series) I won't even consider it until I see a trophy list. If they just hand you the trophies, thats a no buy. If they have a insane requirements (like being in the top 10 leaderboards), thats a no buy, and if they have multiplayer trophies beyond participation, thats a no buy. I have exceptions to this for party games (like Rockband) but otherwise this is my first step in buying a new game.

Your appraisal of it as a meta-game is unfair. To say this, is to say that the big-list-of-optional-quests in Fallout, or Witcher, etc... is just a "meta game". They are both a list of tasks to accomplish. Many games even offer in game rewards when a trophy is awarded. With this in mind, the only real difference between a list of tasks in a game, and a list of tasks outside of the game, is that the ones outside of the game will be forever linked to your profile, which makes them much more important, because its forever.

@Name_already_tkn Good point, Resident Evil 4 is an excellent example, huge game with a lot of replay potential. But no platinum trophy. Would have really enjoyed going for a plat on that game as well.

@Neolit Nobody is being forced to do anything. For all that I support the idea that allocation of platinum trophies should be more consistent, they're still just meaningless digital trinkets of no real value.

@thedevilsjester You assume anyone but you cares what trophies you have earned. For the most part, they don't.

And yes, trophies are a metagame. It's because they are a list of tasks outside the game and are not just confined to a single game that makes them so. Not sure why you'd object to such a label. There's nothing wrong with them being a metagame.

@Matroska You're making a lot of assumptions about a game that isn't even out yet. Beyond Sony's base requirements being fulfilled, it's up to the developer how many trophies and for what make it into the game. Maybe the developer just doesn't like trophies. There are plenty of games out there with fewer trophies than they could potentially have, and a few with more than they probably should.

@Donald_M I assume no such thing. You assume that I assume that. To be clear, other than my wife and kids, I have no people on my friends list, I do not play online with other people and I do not care what other people think of my profile. I don't need others approval to make me happy.

They are not a list of tasks outside of the game, far from it, which is why they are not meta-game. They are inside of the game (not separate from it), but built into the code, they often give you direct in game rewards, and many games directly show your progress/status for individual trophies (in game), just like any quest list. Thats as "inside" of the game as you can get. The fact that there is also an external representation, does not diminish their in game (non meta) presence.

Even games that don't show you progress, don't give you rewards, still have the conditions to unlock the trophy (and the unlock itself) built into the game. To be a meta game, it would have to be outside of the game completely. A side game that fans decided they would play (like drinking games) based on some arbitrary set of rules. Trophies are part of the game in the same way any of the games content or systems are part of the game, not meta.

Comparing trophies with friends, the competition that may arise from that, and your "gamerscore", etc..., those are all meta games.

@thedevilsjester Fair enough. That was a personal assumption. I apologize.

At any rate, you are correct that trophy tasks are done within the game, but it is up to the developer whether or not trophies are linked to significant in-game tasks or of earning some results in tangible in-game rewards. Many games have trophies like jump 500 times or beat a certain level without dying. Entirely optional stuff separate from either the narrative of the game or the specific mechanics of beating it. Furthermore, involvement in the whole trophy thing is involuntary and linking trophies to tasks players will already be doing in the game is pretty much the simplest and least intrusive way of implementing them.

At any rate, it's not the in-game completion of tasks that make trophies a meta-game, but the linking together of lists of tasks from every game into a scored list linked to your profile.

And, again, I'm not sure why you even object to the meta-game label beyond an apparent personal prejudice linked to the level of importance you personally grant to the whole trophy thing. Trophies are a meta-game, but that doesn't diminish their importance. They aren't that important to begin with.

@kyleforrester87
If you replaced the word "trophies" with "content" in your statement, it would be easier to understand my position. There are a few exceptions I would make, if I could disable trophies for a game (my list is massive already, having a bunch of games on it that I am not even going to "finish" just bloats and pollutes my list).

@Donald_M
I object to the meta game label because it diminishes the importance of trophies as I see them. They are content as much as anything else in a game is. The gamer level/gamer score thing is pointless to me (and I would happily support removing that aspect of it)

@thedevilsjester

I see. To me, trophies are not content. Content is content, trophies are digital trinkets linked to in-game tasks, some of which may constitute actual content and some of which are pointless busy work. I see there'll be no agreement between us on this issue. Fair enough. We all enjoy games in our own way.

I love trophies, look at my PSN Profile it's true. But, I believe it should be 100% up to the developer how they want to dole out Trophies. I've played games that require 3+ playthroughs to get everything while games such as SOMA lay them out in the simplest of ways. End of the day, it should be more important to preserve artistic integrity by allowing the creator to dictate the rules rather than following some overarching guideline that may not jive with how the developer wants their gaming experience to play out.

@kyleforrester87 I understand. As I see it though if there is a game that I am only going to play 50% of, it's not worth my time, since there are literally hundreds of other games that I could play that I would play completely.

Does it really matter? I don't even know how you get trophies or how to view them. I don't think I ever felt I missed something in any of the games I've played, so I'm sure they're not all that important.

The Telltale Games Walking Dead series has been one that puzzles me. Why is it that season 1 is worthy of a Plat, but season 2 isn't. That's the kind of crap that needs to be sorted out.

i would prefer extra game content for completing certain parts of a game

I love trophies and have been frustrated more than once that a game didn't have a platinum.

@get2sammyb
With an actual score it's much easier for devs: they could grant someone 1000 "gamerpoints" just for seeing the end so the gameplay doesn't get interrupted by these awful messages. With the trophy system every Platinum is made up out of 4 Gold trophies, at least that's the way most of them work.

A game like Firewatch shouldn't be interrupted for every little "accomplishment" and they sure as hell shouldn't be forced to put in collectables just for Thropies' sake. On a game like CoD or PES for instance it's pretty neat to have trophies pop up, especially when you didn't knew you were about to get one, but in a game like Until Dawn, TWD, Alien Isolation or even Dark Souls it's such a buzz killer. I think devs should be able to just give people a platinum for finishing their game, whatever that means, and that all games should be able to get a Platinum trophy. They could make the distinction elsewhere with giving them less gold, silver and bronze ones, which in Firewatch's case would be a good thing.

Trophies for me are really the gaming equivalent of having all these meaningless belts in Martial Arts: they give you a white belt just for showing up and after 3 classes they offer you to try out for a yellow one, for money obviously. Why can't people just train because they like it and want to be good and do the black belt exam when their trainer thinks they're ready? The same with games: we used to make our own challenges within the games we finished and we used to have a blast. We never knew speed runs were an actual thing, yet we wanted to beat levels, courses or entire games as fast as we could if it suited the game. We explored every nook and cranny of adventure games and RPGs because we wanted it, not because of some trophies. The real trophies were getting a special weapon because you walked the extra mile or discovering hidden areas.

The real value of trophies or gamerscore is lost anyway because of YouTube; you can have 50 platinum trophies yet suck at every genre, whereas Justin Wong or Daigo U. probably have 2 or 3 Platinum trophies.

The less trophies the better - I get sidetracked looking at the lists sometimes and instantly forget what trophy im going for whilst I'm playing. Hidden collectible trophies (ie collect 30 feathers / trinkets / notes) need to stop, they were important last gen - but completely immersion breaking going backwards and forwards over youtube.

20 or less trophies per game please.

@themcnoisy Assassins Creed Syndicate wreck 5000 things with horse and wagon complete torture Slow and boring. And real ones not the ones that are a terrible to do.

My question is how many people here actually play or buy games for the sake of trophies?

Personally, I'll usually only try to Platinum a game if one if I like the game and two if its not too difficult. The type of achievement I hate most are collectible trophies cause I find them to be tedious and most of the time they don't contribute anything to the game.

I also feel that simple games that only take a couple hours to complete, for example Telltale Games don't deserve Platinums.

I enjoy trophies but I have never felt the need to try and platinum a game because, given the time I get to spend gaming, I tend to finish a game and move on.

I think the quality of the achievements is more important. If a game doesn't lend itself to a trophy system I am not sure it needs them. Almost through Uncharted Collection and some of the trophies, like no. of headshots scored are quite fun to try and collect. In Everybody's Gone to the Rapture, I think one of the trophies was to walk in and out of the Doctors surgery (forgive me if I am wrong on this one). These kind of trophies I just never bother with. Purely personal but I do think trophies increase the value of the game.

My only problem with trophies are the online ones. I hate that sometimes i have to play online modes to get platinums. Overall i like them. Gives me an added reason to play the game after i've finished the main story.

After completely finishing a game. I replay the game with the enjoyment of earning trophies. There are a few games in my collection that I have completed but did not have a Platinum trophy. Having a platinum trophy really is a trophy of satisfaction that you have completed the game at 100%.