Exponential Growth of Easy & Fast Plats

[Unknown_v2_0]

15 hours ago, LC-Fraggers said:

As I said before, climbing the leaderboards and gaming are two separate hobbies. 

 

Yeah that's a way of looking at it. at a certain point the leaderboard just depends on how much 'non-gaming' you can do. How many 5 min plats you can stack , VNs you can kip through, games you can auto run etc. I think lower on the leaderboard even if you are playing just to climb you will be trying to rush through the games as fast as you can, potentially missing out on the experiences.

 

I certainly felt my Trophy Hunting was just purely separate from 'gaming' so I started calling it on-gaming. was just like how many guides can i copy the movements from, using the vita trick to get additional stacks of games, setting up turbo controllers and just letting the system run etc. 

15 hours ago, LC-Fraggers said:

As I said before, climbing the leaderboards and gaming are two separate hobbies. 

 

Yeah that's a way of looking at it. at a certain point the leaderboard just depends on how much 'non-gaming' you can do. How many 5 min plats you can stack , VNs you can kip through, games you can auto run etc. I think lower on the leaderboard even if you are playing just to climb you will be trying to rush through the games as fast as you can, potentially missing out on the experiences.

 

I certainly felt my Trophy Hunting was just purely separate from 'gaming' so I started calling it on-gaming. was just like how many guides can i copy the movements from, using the vita trick to get additional stacks of games, setting up turbo controllers and just letting the system run etc. 

[Unknown_v2_0]

8 minutes ago, enaysoft said:

 

Playing easy non effort games though, you learn or achieve next to nothing from doing that.

 

Trophy hunting at a top level, is all about low skill, and no time limit.

It is in comparison probably the easiest and most boring race you can ever think of, and one that lasts forever.

 

Is it a really a proud moment to be in 1st place for several years but never actually win?

The more easy trophies that are pumped into the system, the harder it is for people in this race to stop.

 

Unknownv2 on the other hand, he wouldn't have bought a Nintendo Switch and be buying and playing games on that if he was still here collecting trophies.

I wish as many people as possible and more people like him in the top of the leaderboards, they all need to wake up someday and stop this path they are on, as I genuinely believe almost none of them will be happy about it years down the line.

 

 

Once you are up there its just a chore keeping it up really. And I would say not only is it possible to achieve nothing but it can have negative side effects (social media can have this too though and it was a part of why i stopped as well) . When others high up there retired from the leaderboard grind I actually used to think they were foolish of them  to do so. After I stopped I was actually thinking well I can see it and think they were smart to get out then. Plats are just coming faster and faster and so once you stop you will get passed faster and faster and then after a few years no one will even know your name. It was sort of cool at first to be up there but then it was negatively effecting me and it took me 3 years to quit. Very hard to quit due to all the work I put in already, feeling like it was my identity and other factors. It definitely wasn't all bad, I have a lot of good memories and have learned a lot of lessons along the way. Trophies definitely changed the way I gamed. Even in longer games that weren't purely for leaderboard climbing (although me rushing through them was a result of the leaderboards to an extent). PLaying on Switch was very weird initially as there was no trophy list 'telling' me how to play it. I was used to basically playing trophy lists you could say and it even dictated what games I would play.

 

I can't say that quitting the leaderboards and possibly trophies is the right thing for everyone, as everyone is different and for them it may be right. I just know personally for me the negatives were out weighing the positives and hopefully others aren't experiencing what I was...

[AJ_Radio]

22 minutes ago, Unknown_v2_0 said:

 

Once you are up there its just a chore keeping it up really. And I would say not only is it possible to achieve nothing but it can have negative side effects (social media can have this too though and it was a part of why i stopped as well) . When others high up there retired from the leaderboard grind I actually used to think they were foolish of them  to do so. After I stopped I was actually thinking well I can see it and think they were smart to get out then. Plats are just coming faster and faster and so once you stop you will get passed faster and faster and then after a few years no one will even know your name. It was sort of cool at first to be up there but then it was negatively effecting me and it took me 3 years to quit. Very hard to quit due to all the work I put in already, feeling like it was my identity and other factors. It definitely wasn't all bad, I have a lot of good memories and have learned a lot of lessons along the way. Trophies definitely changed the way I gamed. Even in longer games that weren't purely for leaderboard climbing (although me rushing through them was a result of the leaderboards to an extent). PLaying on Switch was very weird initially as there was no trophy list 'telling' me how to play it. I was used to basically playing trophy lists you could say and it even dictated what games I would play.

 

I can't say that quitting the leaderboards and possibly trophies is the right thing for everyone, as everyone is different and for them it may be right. I just know personally for me the negatives were out weighing the positives and hopefully others aren't experiencing what I was...

 

Interesting take.

 

Understandable that people at the top are doing it. What I don't understand is people at my world rank doing it. You can easily get to my world ranking in less than a year without much effort if you play the right games.

 

Roughdawg4 is already forgotten, I don't know how active he is in the trophy hunting community since PSNP removed him from the leaderboards a couple years back. I just know that around 2014 - 2015 it was him and xLukk at #1 and #2 respectively. xLukk in particular has really fallen off the charts, he was consistently at #2 behind Roughdawg4 but is now #88. His status on his profile says "Switching to good games, Ratalaika messed trophy hunting.." When he was #2 you were within the top 5 - 10, you have a different name then before Sony allowed us to change usernames.

 

I recall another guy named Warped_Tonttu who was in the top 20 worldwide, now he isn't even in the top 100. Another trophy hunter by the name of TheNukes was pretty high up there, who quit playing regularly back in 2016. His world ranking? 550 on the leaderboards.

 

I've mentioned this before but back in 2015 - 2016 before My Name is Mayo, your fastest platinums basically came in the form of Japanese visual novels that you have to physically import. I recall Hakoom making a video about this many years back, but that was the fastest way to climb the leaderboards. Today there is absolutely no need at all to do that. With the $30 - 100 you paid to get a few of those novels, that is roughly 20 - 50 platinums you can earn playing ZJ the Ball.

 

If at one point Terminator Salvation and Hannah Montana were the bottom of the barrel and regarded as laughable games on one's trophy list, the bottom has certainly dropped years ago.

 

I'm not telling people they should absolutely stop but if they are feeling miserable doing it then I suggest that they do.

[LC-Fraggers]

4 hours ago, enaysoft said:

 

Certainly by watching the Terminator 100 times I am missing on our other films. That is inevitable, as one human in a world of billions, it is impossible for me to do able to see everything at once.

It is an interesting comment, however you're kinda missing the point on what I am trying to say.

 

I'm having the time of my life watching the Terminator because I am watching the film because I like it. People playing bad games however are deluding themselves, aren't having actual fun, and are instead wasting their time, and as a result of this, they are missing out on playing good games. This behaviour is caused by trophies and it is holding these people back, not only in their leisure time but also in their life too. For sure playing games at any level in most cases is "not useful in life" and is a time to unwind and relax.

Playing easy non effort games though, you learn or achieve next to nothing from doing that.

 

From a challenge point of view, it's also just a low effort task.

 

If you think about something like, the Le Mans. It is a high speed race that lasts 24 hours, not only about driving skill but also about endurance due to the length.

 

Trophy hunting at a top level, is all about low skill, and no time limit.

It is in comparison probably the easiest and most boring race you can ever think of, and one that lasts forever.

 

This is what the leaderboards are in a nut shell. Is it a really a proud moment to be in 1st place for several years but never actually win?

The more easy trophies that are pumped into the system, the harder it is for people in this race to stop.

 

To become a trophy addict you first have to be a gamer, which is why I say it's highly likely these people would be buying and playing good games, if the trophy rush wasn't on their mind. My mum, who isn't an active gamer, she's not going to just suddenly be playing awful games all day every day since in her life she isn't invested as a gamer.

 

Unknownv2 on the other hand, he wouldn't have bought a Nintendo Switch and be buying and playing games on that if he was still here collecting trophies.

I wish as many people as possible and more people like him in the top of the leaderboards, they all need to wake up someday and stop this path they are on, as I genuinely believe almost none of them will be happy about it years down the line.

 

I do understand what you're getting at but I think that the flaw in the argument here is that you're telling people what they do and don't find "fun" based on your own experience. I offer you myself as an example. I've certainly had more fun playing a wide variety of shorter games- low quality or not- than I did grinding out the last hours of Marvel's Avengers or Tomb Raider's multiplayer... and yet achieving 100% in either of these games would be looked at with far less scorn than these quick and easy platinums. What's the difference there? By definition, you're not having fun. Grinding, by its name and concept, isn't fun but it's widely accepted as a far more respectable method of earning trophies than capping off a bunch of Ratalaika games. 

The "fun" in trophy hunting is up to the individual and at what level they want to pursue it. For me, the grind is worth the sense of achievement at the end of it all. For you, it might not be and that's fine but I wouldn't presume to tell you the right and the wrong way to enjoy yourself so long as it wasn't hurting anybody. A minority of people have this "problem" that you're referring to where the addiction controls their lives and they're miserable because of it but that's the same with any past time. You wouldn't ban alcohol or demand that people buy the highest quality beer just because at some point they might become alcoholics. 

Is it a really a proud moment to be in first place for years and never win? I mean, that's essentially how every professional sports league in the world operates. They're on top for a season or two and then have to try and fight back to reclaim their titles or "first place". Nobody is ever truly crowned the all-time greatest. Why attempt anything if the only point of it is to be the best of all time? It is, by definition, a fleeting achievement but an achievement nonetheless and, again, it's simply not up to you to tell people what they should and shouldn't be enjoying. To bring your own example up one last time, I couldn't fathom watching The Terminator literally hundreds of times and I think it's a fantastic film. The idea that I'd be doing that instead of discovering some of the other tens of thousands of interesting movies and TV shows out there is painful to me... but I'm not you and I can't dictate to you what you should be finding fun. 

This debate doesn't really seem to be about cheap and easy plats. It sounds like you have a problem with competitive trophy hunting in general, of which cheap and easy plats have become a far more central element over the past few years. You may not improve your skills as a gamer by playing lower effort games but you do improve your leaderboard rank and, for a lot of people, that's really the point of being a trophy hunter.  

[AJ_Radio]

27 minutes ago, LC-Fraggers said:

I do understand what you're getting at but I think that the flaw in the argument here is that you're telling people what they do and don't find "fun" based on your own experience. I offer you myself as an example. I've certainly had more fun playing a wide variety of shorter games- low quality or not- than I did grinding out the last hours of Marvel's Avengers or Tomb Raider's multiplayer... and yet achieving 100% in either of these games would be looked at with far less scorn than these quick and easy platinums. What's the difference there? By definition, you're not having fun. Grinding, by its name and concept, isn't fun but it's widely accepted as a far more respectable method of earning trophies than capping off a bunch of Ratalaika games.

 

You can throw MMOs in here as well. Most of all MMOs revolve around grinding. Grinding to get a set piece or armor. Back in Cataclysm when I played World of Warcraft there would be daily quests available. You finish these quests and you earned yourself some points. Using the LFD (look for dungeon) tool I usually did dungeons and raids with a lot of randoms. Some of them were fun, others were not, usually because one person would aggro an enemy and then the whole team would wipe out. At times I didn't have fun, other times I did. Most of my time was spent grinding, that was how the old MMO model worked.

 

I understand Tomb Raider's multiplayer being boring. Max Payne 3 took around 40 hours to get all the multiplayer trophies. DriveClub took me an entire month to get done. I think the argument enaysoft is trying to get at is one takes effort, the other doesn't. Platinums that take five minutes or less in my view I consider 'participation awards'. You are free to dispute with me over this, but I honestly think it's no different than getting +100 likes on a Reddit post, or making a tweet about a controversial event and having 10,000 people share that tweet. It's basically instant gratification.

 

Unknown made a video about Mein Leben. I don't necessarily agree with all of it, but he raised some good points regarding a trophy that people tried to petition to make easier. Like you said it's up to the individual on whether or not trophy hunting is "fun", especially when they often challenge themselves. Most people don't bother with it because they either don't have the time or they feel they will get too stressed out doing it. That's fine, I respect their decision. But I respect that far more than capping off a bunch of throwaway games. I cannot help but feel that anybody can do that, provided they sit down and actually do them.

 

27 minutes ago, LC-Fraggers said:

Is it a really a proud moment to be in first place for years and never win? I mean, that's essentially how every professional sports league in the world operates. They're on top for a season or two and then have to try and fight back to reclaim their titles or "first place". Nobody is ever truly crowned the all-time greatest. Why attempt anything if the only point of it is to be the best of all time? It is, by definition, a fleeting achievement but an achievement nonetheless and, again, it's simply not up to you to tell people what they should and shouldn't be enjoying. To bring your own example up one last time, I couldn't fathom watching The Terminator literally hundreds of times and I think it's a fantastic film. The idea that I'd be doing that instead of discovering some of the other tens of thousands of interesting movies and TV shows out there is painful to me... but I'm not you and I can't dictate to you what you should be finding fun.

 

I don't know enaysoft but I imagine anybody who has watched The Terminator that many times has probably done it over the course of a lifetime. Still, that's a bit of an exaggeration.

 

The way I see it is you have to make the most of what you got with the time you got available. Hulk Hogan was regarded as one of the wrestling greats of the 1980s, but today, he is nothing more than a washed up has been. Historically, he truly was on top, but that was the past.

 

I cannot see Hakoom ever reclaiming first place on the leaderboards. He was on top for a very long time, and in a couple ways I sort of respect him for sticking around that long to begin with. But nothing lasts forever. The newer players are doing it quicker and faster, which generally means the older players either have to play the same types of games, or just give up on the leaderboards.

 

This reminds me of the old gaming competitions when I used to watch the Street Fighter and League of Legend online tournaments. The players of old and in the past would more than likely get wiped out by the newer generation of players. It's the same with professional sports. The male and female swimmers of today who are Olympic worthy would more than likely run circles around the swimmers of old from 30 - 40 years ago. Technology has improved and so has peoples awareness of diets. Eating just the right foods and participating in modern exercises can greatly improve your hand-eye coordination and speed. Boxing in my eyes has changed a great deal. UFC has changed a lot too. There's no doubt that an old timer in his prime couldn't compete with the UFC fighters of today.

 

I never had a leg in the trophy hunting race. The main effort is how much you're willing to keep up with it. People have come and gone to be replaced by a newer player who knows all the tricks to unlock trophies as fast as possible without resorting to outright cheating.

Edited October 21, 2021 by AJ_Radio

[You]

4 hours ago, Unknown_v2_0 said:

 

Once you are up there its just a chore keeping it up really. And I would say not only is it possible to achieve nothing but it can have negative side effects (social media can have this too though and it was a part of why i stopped as well) . When others high up there retired from the leaderboard grind I actually used to think they were foolish of them  to do so. After I stopped I was actually thinking well I can see it and think they were smart to get out then. Plats are just coming faster and faster and so once you stop you will get passed faster and faster and then after a few years no one will even know your name. It was sort of cool at first to be up there but then it was negatively effecting me and it took me 3 years to quit. Very hard to quit due to all the work I put in already, feeling like it was my identity and other factors. It definitely wasn't all bad, I have a lot of good memories and have learned a lot of lessons along the way. Trophies definitely changed the way I gamed. Even in longer games that weren't purely for leaderboard climbing (although me rushing through them was a result of the leaderboards to an extent). PLaying on Switch was very weird initially as there was no trophy list 'telling' me how to play it. I was used to basically playing trophy lists you could say and it even dictated what games I would play.

 

I can't say that quitting the leaderboards and possibly trophies is the right thing for everyone, as everyone is different and for them it may be right. I just know personally for me the negatives were out weighing the positives and hopefully others aren't experiencing what I was...

 

Yeah I can imagine it being a chore, all the stuff you have mentioned is pretty much a similar to everyone else I have talked to about the matter, including other people who have stopped.

Just because I haven't done it myself, I can easily see how or why people start, people continue and people quit with trophy hunting as I have mild feelings though, due to being a bit OCD about certain things.

 

I do miss just playing a game, and thinking I can just stop or start whenever. Now for me personally even before trophies I would at least want to complete the game and get the ending. I would not feel like I had "completed" the game until I had at least seen one ending. I look back at my trophy list and I like looking at it as since it is in order of last played, you get a nice order and memory lane of the stuff you have been doing. If I had to scroll past through 8 stacks of a game that lasted 10 minutes, I probably wouldn't even have any memories of the game years down the line, all it would be is a reminder of "Erm what was I doing playing games that way"

 

I think you quitting the leaderboards is a good thing and it is very humble you not only talk about it but also made a video about it detailing the issues. I mean, if you had continued, nobody here would probably know who you are. For me it's always about having fun, and trying to aim for 100% where possible, due to my OCD, but for me as long as it's over 80% or so, I am fine with moving onto the next game. You can't expect to have 100% on everything ever, that doesn't work in life so it shouldn't work in games either, if you are at 100% then you probably aren't challenging yourself. Of course 100% lists completion lists, that's a whole different conversation.

 

33 minutes ago, LC-Fraggers said:

I do understand what you're getting at but I think that the flaw in the argument here is that you're telling people what they do and don't find "fun" based on your own experience. I offer you myself as an example. I've certainly had more fun playing a wide variety of shorter games- low quality or not- than I did grinding out the last hours of Marvel's Avengers or Tomb Raider's multiplayer... and yet achieving 100% in either of these games would be looked at with far less scorn than these quick and easy platinums. What's the difference there? By definition, you're not having fun. Grinding, by its name and concept, isn't fun but it's widely accepted as a far more respectable method of earning trophies than capping off a bunch of Ratalaika games. 

The "fun" in trophy hunting is up to the individual and at what level they want to pursue it. For me, the grind is worth the sense of achievement at the end of it all. For you, it might not be and that's fine but I wouldn't presume to tell you the right and the wrong way to enjoy yourself so long as it wasn't hurting anybody. A minority of people have this "problem" that you're referring to where the addiction controls their lives and they're miserable because of it but that's the same with any past time. You wouldn't ban alcohol or demand that people buy the highest quality beer just because at some point they might become alcoholics. 

Is it a really a proud moment to be in first place for years and never win? I mean, that's essentially how every professional sports league in the world operates. They're on top for a season or two and then have to try and fight back to reclaim their titles or "first place". Nobody is ever truly crowned the all-time greatest. Why attempt anything if the only point of it is to be the best of all time? It is, by definition, a fleeting achievement but an achievement nonetheless and, again, it's simply not up to you to tell people what they should and shouldn't be enjoying. To bring your own example up one last time, I couldn't fathom watching The Terminator literally hundreds of times and I think it's a fantastic film. The idea that I'd be doing that instead of discovering some of the other tens of thousands of interesting movies and TV shows out there is painful to me... but I'm not you and I can't dictate to you what you should be finding fun. 

This debate doesn't really seem to be about cheap and easy plats. It sounds like you have a problem with competitive trophy hunting in general, of which cheap and easy plats have become a far more central element over the past few years. You may not improve your skills as a gamer by playing lower effort games but you do improve your leaderboard rank and, for a lot of people, that's really the point of being a trophy hunter.  

 

You're talking about grinding here, that's quite different. I guess it depends if you enjoy the grinding, I do on many games, such as Dynasty Warriors games, I will happily grind forever.

Grinding 1000 online kills though, that's something I hate. It does however also prove that trophies are a bad influence in many ways.

Would anyway be grinding 1000 online kills if the trophy existed? Of course they wouldn't.

 

I do think this "addiction" is controlling people's lives, it's just that it affects people who way more who are really addicted to collecting trophies. You and your Tomb Raider and me and my Dynasty Warriors, it's certainly affecting people in different ways. For me and you though either way you look at it, I enjoy it and you got a "sense of achievement at the end of it all"

 

I never thought to count how many times I watched The Terminator, it isn't a particular long film and for it being my favourite film of all time and over 20 years since I first watched it, 100 times isn't a super high amount. Certainly most films I will watch only once or twice at most.

 

Some of my favourite tunes I might have listened to them 10000-20000 times or more since I encoded the mp3s in 1997 or so, of course those are maybe 4 minutes long each. Again I have no data. But yeah, if I had to watch The Terminator 100 times in a year let's say. No way I am doing that. That's like twice a day

 

This debate is certainly about cheap and easy plats. Since 2008 we've all been infected by the draw of these imaginary things in some way or another. Once upon a time paying 30 dollars for a second hand copy of Hannah Montana probably wasn't much of a draw back then, but as UnknownV2 says in his video, he is completely correct that easy trophies are getting out of control. Many people are playing one or two good games while stacking easy plats everyday in the meantime. At some point, there will be people who play nothing but easy games, because like i mentioned in my previous post, the rate in which you can start climbing is faster than ever.

 

It's true when you maybe it is a really a proud moment to be in first place for a few weeks or so. In Sports however, you often have a medal, or a trophy, photos, records etc.

Winner 2018 or something, there is an actual record of your achievement, the content ended and someone how.

 

On Dec 31st 2017 at the stroke of midnight, did the person 3rd place in the entire world get a bronze medal for their achievement? Of course they didn't.

Is it even possible to find out who was 3rd at the end of 2018. I don't know. Does anyone know, does anyone care?

 

Right now I know Ikemenzi is in 1st and Hakoom is in 3rd, but I forgot who is in 2nd, I could check right now and remember the name for a few minutes, but then forget again.

 

The leaderboard isn't a good indication of achievement, if anything, years later down the line. It will simply become a postmortem of who was the best person at being to stop playing huge amounts of awful games. The ultimate race to the bottom.

[DaivRules]

8 hours ago, enaysoft said:

It is an interesting comment, however you're kinda missing the point on what I am trying to say.

 

I'm having the time of my life watching the Terminator because I am watching the film because I like it. People playing bad games however are deluding themselves, aren't having actual fun, and are instead wasting their time, and as a result of this, they are missing out on playing good games. This behaviour is caused by trophies and it is holding these people back, not only in their leisure time but also in their life too. For sure playing games at any level in most cases is "not useful in life" and is a time to unwind and relax.

As has been said before, you keep missing the point and only try to fit others in the mold you want them to be in. 
 

For some people, climbing the leaderboard is the game. They’re not interested in how you’re evaluating your measurement of your hobby because that’s not what they’re trying to do.

 

It’s fine that you can’t seem to understand it, but at least acknowledge that their goals aren’t your goals and so measuring them with values that don’t apply is a bit ignorant. 
 

[LC-Fraggers]

4 hours ago, AJ_Radio said:

 

Unknown made a video about Mein Leben. I don't necessarily agree with all of it, but he raised some good points regarding a trophy that people tried to petition to make easier. Like you said it's up to the individual on whether or not trophy hunting is "fun", especially when they often challenge themselves. Most people don't bother with it because they either don't have the time or they feel they will get too stressed out doing it. That's fine, I respect their decision. But I respect that far more than capping off a bunch of throwaway games. I cannot help but feel that anybody can do that, provided they sit down and actually do them.

 

 

3 hours ago, enaysoft said:

 

The leaderboard isn't a good indication of achievement, if anything, years later down the line. It will simply become a postmortem of who was the best person at being to stop playing huge amounts of awful games. The ultimate race to the bottom.

I think achieving something like Mein Leben is a lot different to straight grinding. I would argue that for the majority of people in the majority of games, grinding is unenjoyable and requires even less effort than platting a ton of easy games. More willpower perhaps but not effort, not a test of skill in any respect. Nine times out of ten, you are simply repeating the same process over and over- one that has basically become muscle memory to you by the midpoint of the grind. Am I a more respectable gamer because I spent a long time doing an easy thing for a reward vs. a short time doing an easy thing for a better reward?

I think that's the flaw in enyasoft's argument. It's pitting time required to achieve a platinum against effort required, both of which are irrelevant in a hobby where the goal is to get as many platinums as quickly as possible to climb the leaderboard. As I've said, gaming is not the same as top-level trophy hunting; it's merely an element of it. It has always been this way and bemoaning its inevitable evolution is not a criticism of quick and easy plats. It's a criticism of the hobby itself.

Edited October 21, 2021 by LC-Fraggers

[AJ_Radio]

On 10/21/2021 at 5:40 AM, LC-Fraggers said:

I think achieving something like Mein Leben is a lot different to straight grinding. I would argue that for the majority of people in the majority of games, grinding is unenjoyable and requires even less effort than platting a ton of easy games. More willpower perhaps but not effort, not a test of skill in any respect. Nine times out of ten, you are simply repeating the same process over and over- one that has basically become muscle memory to you by the midpoint of the grind. Am I a more respectable gamer because I spent a long time doing an easy thing for a reward vs. a short time doing an easy thing for a better reward?

 

I wasn't comparing Mein Leben to grinding. The concept of grinding is repetition. Anybody can do it. Mein Leben on the other hard, a trophy in Wolfenstein II for beating the hardest difficulty which is essentially a permadeath mode, not everyone can do that.

 

By your logic, grinding and hard trophies like Mein Leben don't mean much of anything in the grand scheme of things. You are free to dispute with me over this, but I can't simply agree with your viewpoint here.

 

On 10/21/2021 at 5:40 AM, LC-Fraggers said:

I think that's the flaw in enyasoft's argument. It's pitting time required to achieve a platinum against effort required, both of which are irrelevant in a hobby where the goal is to get as many platinums as quickly as possible to climb the leaderboard. As I've said, gaming is not the same as top-level trophy hunting; it's merely an element of it. It has always been this way and bemoaning its inevitable evolution is not a criticism of quick and easy plats. It's a criticism of the hobby itself.

 

This is wrong, because that doesn't apply to everyone. For people like Unknown_V2, they played to maintain a high rank on the leaderboards. For most others, while they care about trophies to an extent, they don't simply play games to climb the leaderboards in the sense that they have to play throwaway games for a ranking that is utterly meaningless. Nobody cares if I'm in the top 6000 worldwide, and because of that I stopped caring a long time ago.

 

Yes, I do care about trophies to an extent, but I couldn't care less about my ranking or where I'm at on the leaderboards.

 

And for the record, trophy hunting is a part of gaming. Speedrunning is a part of gaming. Some people partake in them. A majority of people don't, since this place is after all a niche community serving a small minority of gamers who enjoy going after trophies.

 

So essentially, there is something wrong with criticizing the influx of games that offer no real value other than the virtual trophies they give you, am I not right?

Edited October 22, 2021 by AJ_Radio

[Baranov_925]

Easy way out - platinum is platinum. 100 hours in Dragon Age? lol, 10 seconds in Slyde and we're done.

[starcrunch061]

On 10/21/2021 at 7:40 AM, LC-Fraggers said:

 As I've said, gaming is not the same as top-level trophy hunting; it's merely an element of it. It has always been this way and bemoaning its inevitable evolution is not a criticism of quick and easy plats. It's a criticism of the hobby itself.

 

Just to build on this, I would argue that this effect can be seen elsewhere.

 

Take the Olympic games, e.g. Large countries (the US, China, etc.) lobby for more events simply so they can gain more gold medals. The events aren't even watched by a small minority of people. They're rarely televised. But they generate gold medals, and in a medal count, a gold medal for, say, men's soccer is exactly the same as a gold medal for women's wrestling.

 

China doesn't even pretend to do otherwise. Their medal initiative was clear: sacrifice medals in team sports which require lots of resource and manpower for a single medal, and focus instead on events with many different sub-events, and gain gold medals there.

[LC-Fraggers]

2 hours ago, AJ_Radio said:

 

I wasn't comparing Mein Leben to grinding. The concept of grinding is repetition. Anybody can do it. Mein Leben on the other hard, a trophy in Wolfenstein II for beating the hardest difficulty which is essentially a permadeath mode, not everyone can do that.

 

By your logic, grinding and hard trophies like Mein Leben don't mean much of anything in the grand scheme of things. You are free to dispute with me over this, but I can't simply agree with your viewpoint here.

A trophy like Mein Leben means exactly what you want it to mean. One player could fly it through it on their first try, another would never be able to achieve it. That same player who got it in one run might have found the experience miserable while the one who never achieves it may relish the repeated runs. Much like the example of watching The Terminator a hundred times, different things bring different people joy. The overarching point here is that a trophy like Mein Leben can mean absolutely nothing or absolutely everything depending on what metric you measure it against. As a trophy hunter who looks for sheer volume, it's essentially worthless. As a trophy hunter who collects only the rarest and most skill-based trophies, it's one of the very finest you can get.

 

 

2 hours ago, AJ_Radio said:

 

This is wrong, because that doesn't apply to everyone. For people like Unknown_V2, they played to maintain a high rank on the leaderboards. For most others, while they care about trophies to an extent, they don't simply play games to climb the leaderboards in the sense that they have to play throwaway games for a ranking that is utterly meaningless. Nobody cares if I'm in the top 6000 worldwide, and because of that I stopped caring a long time ago.

 

Yes, I do care about trophies to an extent, but I couldn't care less about my ranking or where I'm at on the leaderboards.

 

And for the record, trophy hunting is a part of gaming. Speedrunning is a part of gaming. Some people partake in them. A majority of people don't, since this place is after all a niche community serving a small minority of gamers who enjoy going after trophies.

 

So essentially, there is something wrong with criticizing the influx of games that offer no real value other than the virtual trophies they give you, am I not right?

Again, the flaw here is that you assume that you know the enjoyment that other people get out of their hobby. You don't care if you're in the top 6000. Other people do. Not everybody measures their successes and attainments in their hobbies by what other people think. Trophy hunting may well be a part of gaming but the insinuation here is that there is only one way to trophy hunt and this influx of easy games somehow invalidates the efforts of the "true" trophy hunter who strives to keep his tag pure and free from said easy games. That is his or her personal choice. It doesn't make them a better or less effective trophy hunter than anybody else. It just means that they are pursuing their hobby inside their own parameters with their own goals. The easy platinums need not bother you if you value rarity over volume... but you can't have it all and a lot of these arguments against easy platinums seem to smack of that sort of resentment.

This is why I believe that there's nothing wrong with somebody buying a game just for virtual trophies if their hobby is collecting virtual trophies. Again, what is the harm? 

[You]

12 hours ago, LC-Fraggers said:

A trophy like Mein Leben means exactly what you want it to mean. One player could fly it through it on their first try, another would never be able to achieve it. That same player who got it in one run might have found the experience miserable while the one who never achieves it may relish the repeated runs.

 

Welcome to the world of "contest". You perfectly just described why trophies are often meaingless participation awards. Anyway I think you would find it very hard to find someone who hated getting Mein Leben on their first attempt. They would certainly be jubilant.

 

I think fundamentally some members here don't seem to understand that it's not even about the games at this point.
Remember a few years back there were rumours that Sony was thinking about making it so you would earn trophies for watching movies? Imagine how different things have been if they'd gone through with that crazy idea. In the same style of microtransactions where sometimes you can practically just buy trophies, if trophies could be earned by buying McDonalds or drinking crates of mountain dew, these people would do that on top of their playing habits. The guys at the top will do anything to keep ahead of one another, no matter what it is. It just happens that games are currently the primary way of achieving that goal. That option is still available and I don't want to give developers idea. They could easily make download codes or whatever into their products, codes earned from doing real world activities.

From the accounts of certain people at the top such as UnknownV2 and what we can see right before our eyes. I still don't know why some people can't see that this isn't just a sensible hobby anymore. Playing games for that much time, just isn't healthy.

 

> This is why I believe that there's nothing wrong with somebody buying a game just for virtual trophies

> if their hobby is collecting virtual trophies. Again, what is the harm? 

 

I would agree with this to a point, but is it not obvious now at this point. We're past the point of sensible purchasing and playing habits, it is indeed causing harm, to a lot of people. You can see from time stamps that people are playing almost everyday, all day. You can get all sorts of complications in your body sitting down that long all the time, not to mention with getting on with your actual life, whether you have school/job or literally just doing anything else like personal hygiene, cooking, exercising. Relaxing from your hobby.

This trophy collecing contest if we could call it, it isn't a sport but if it was, it's perhaps the worst kind of contest you can imagine. Maybe they are secretly playing in teams of people and said person is actually living a healthy lifestyle, but even if they are, it's not really about which "trophy hunter" is the best anymore then is it? Unless this is supposed to be a team sports event.

We only really know who Hakoom is since we have seen movies and pics of him, everyone else presumably has no face reveal, but it's a meme at this point to show how tired Hakoom tends to look in all his recent appearances.

 

I watch some esports, such as the Tetris ones and there's lots of fun, people get to meet each other, shake hands, win and lose gracefully. We know the personality of all the guys at the top.

In most sports, especially things like the Olympics. World records are broken every year but as time goes on and the limit to what humans can achieve draws nearer.
It's fair to say that the top 100 or even 1000 of any sport, any of those people in 2021 could beat the winning opponent in say 1980, due to how technology, training and all sorts of things have improved over the years. Trophy hunting on the other hand runs in the opposite direction, you need less and less skill to participate in this contest as time goes on, with people like Hakoom arguably losing out the most.

 

Every time eight stacks of a 10 minute platinum get released, that's another 8 platinums worth of trophy points that gets practically gets cancelled from existence from the early PS3 days.
The fact you could potentially start a new account and earn as many trophy points in 24 hours that it took Hakoom to get in his first few years of trophy hunting should be a stark reminder to how low standards have become. Mathematically Hakoom also needs to play these games as each time he does he cancels out that gain everyone else made on him.

I didn't need to "fit others in the mold you want them to be in.", they're all already in the same mold, as can be seen on this very site.
You can open up a profile of any of them and it's full of all the same easy games and often in a very similar order to how the are released in the "NEW TROPHY LISTS" on this site. Entering this race and getting fairly high requires little effort other than your time and money.

You can seriously open up any profile and just scroll down as fast as you can your mousewheel and try to find a list that isn't just a 97.35% platinum rarity list. They all look the same. There is no diversity at all, it's just all the same crap.

 

This is why Ikemenzi is the best and is probably going to be impossible to overtake, unless he stops playing.

His tactic, he plays every single easy game just like everyone else at the top but he also mass spams every single game available that he can find. He has odd things like 4 stacks of a game all at 22%, or 2 stacks at 5%, he will play a new game, any game, see how far he can get until trophies don't seem to pop anymore, stop, then play that same route again getting the same trophies.
The only way to catch this guy is to do exactly what Ikemenzi does, but more, it's always more. Play more games, play more easy games, spend even less time living your life.

There's a lot of antisocial behaviour and gamesmanship going on too, from the guys at the top and also everyone else around them. There was no need for Ikemenzi to get attacked on twitter for becoming no1, Hakoom subtly changed his "no1 trophy hunter" label to something else. There was no passing of the baton so to speak when Ikemenzi became the leader or when Hakoom dropped to 3rd. Not even the guys at the top are acknowledging each other and the other guys trying to catch up aren't watching either. No greets or congratulations to anybody, rarely anyway. Ikemenzi is proud of "playing more than 10000 games" but in reality it's barely 2000 actual games, taking away stacks and all. If you remove all their common and uncommon trophies, these guys sometimes have less trophies than many of us. 10000 games?! It's all just nonsense, by inflated numbers.

Also, most of the guys at the top have hidden trophies, your goal is wanting you most trophies in the world, isn't hiding just even just 1, breaking the rules or ethics of the whole thing somehow? Everyone is mostly just sat alone, playing all the same easy games and continually playing more everyday, because that's the additive lifestyle they have all become. You have to commit mild fraud too in order to pretend you have an address at several locations in the world. It's getting increasingly more difficult, especially as time goes on to say "Well done" or "Great work!" for what these guys are doing.

 

It's hard to know where we go from here for the guys at the top in the coming years but eventually it will just be a glorified cookie clicker. Watching the numbers going up, and almost everything becoming an automation. At some point gameplaying AI will likely be a thing, to play the game for you.

 

On the other hand, in this very forum there's a whole ton of fun and positive energy in ExistentialSolid's destroy me thread, all talking about gaming tips and keeping up with how the guy is doing. There's none of this with leaderboard chasing. That's the sort of thing we should be trying to move towards and promote.

Edited October 23, 2021 by enaysoft

[You]

(post didn't merge for some reason)

Edited October 23, 2021 by enaysoft

[Wild-Arms-R]

15 hours ago, enaysoft said:

 

Welcome to the world of "contest". You perfectly just described why trophies are often meaingless participation awards. Anyway I think you would find it very hard to find someone who hated getting Mein Leben on their first attempt. They would certainly be jubilant.

 

I think fundamentally some members here don't seem to understand that it's not even about the games at this point.
Remember a few years back there were rumours that Sony was thinking about making it so you would earn trophies for watching movies? Imagine how different things have been if they'd gone through with that crazy idea. In the same style of microtransactions where sometimes you can practically just buy trophies, if trophies could be earned by buying McDonalds or drinking crates of mountain dew, these people would do that on top of their playing habits. The guys at the top will do anything to keep ahead of one another, no matter what it is. It just happens that games are currently the primary way of achieving that goal. That option is still available and I don't want to give developers idea. They could easily make download codes or whatever into their products, codes earned from doing real world activities.

From the accounts of certain people at the top such as UnknownV2 and what we can see right before our eyes. I still don't know why some people can't see that this isn't just a sensible hobby anymore. Playing games for that much time, just isn't healthy.

 

> This is why I believe that there's nothing wrong with somebody buying a game just for virtual trophies

> if their hobby is collecting virtual trophies. Again, what is the harm? 

 

I would agree with this to a point, but is it not obvious now at this point. We're past the point of sensible purchasing and playing habits, it is indeed causing harm, to a lot of people. You can see from time stamps that people are playing almost everyday, all day. You can get all sorts of complications in your body sitting down that long all the time, not to mention with getting on with your actual life, whether you have school/job or literally just doing anything else like personal hygiene, cooking, exercising. Relaxing from your hobby.

This trophy collecing contest if we could call it, it isn't a sport but if it was, it's perhaps the worst kind of contest you can imagine. Maybe they are secretly playing in teams of people and said person is actually living a healthy lifestyle, but even if they are, it's not really about which "trophy hunter" is the best anymore then is it? Unless this is supposed to be a team sports event.

We only really know who Hakoom is since we have seen movies and pics of him, everyone else presumably has no face reveal, but it's a meme at this point to show how tired Hakoom tends to look in all his recent appearances.

 

I watch some esports, such as the Tetris ones and there's lots of fun, people get to meet each other, shake hands, win and lose gracefully. We know the personality of all the guys at the top.

In most sports, especially things like the Olympics. World records are broken every year but as time goes on and the limit to what humans can achieve draws nearer.
It's fair to say that the top 100 or even 1000 of any sport, any of those people in 2021 could beat the winning opponent in say 1980, due to how technology, training and all sorts of things have improved over the years. Trophy hunting on the other hand runs in the opposite direction, you need less and less skill to participate in this contest as time goes on, with people like Hakoom arguably losing out the most.

 

Every time eight stacks of a 10 minute platinum get released, that's another 8 platinums worth of trophy points that gets practically gets cancelled from existence from the early PS3 days.
The fact you could potentially start a new account and earn as many trophy points in 24 hours that it took Hakoom to get in his first few years of trophy hunting should be a stark reminder to how low standards have become. Mathematically Hakoom also needs to play these games as each time he does he cancels out that gain everyone else made on him.

I didn't need to "fit others in the mold you want them to be in.", they're all already in the same mold, as can be seen on this very site.
You can open up a profile of any of them and it's full of all the same easy games and often in a very similar order to how the are released in the "NEW TROPHY LISTS" on this site. Entering this race and getting fairly high requires little effort other than your time and money.

You can seriously open up any profile and just scroll down as fast as you can your mousewheel and try to find a list that isn't just a 97.35% platinum rarity list. They all look the same. There is no diversity at all, it's just all the same crap.

 

This is why Ikemenzi is the best and is probably going to be impossible to overtake, unless he stops playing.

His tactic, he plays every single easy game just like everyone else at the top but he also mass spams every single game available that he can find. He has odd things like 4 stacks of a game all at 22%, or 2 stacks at 5%, he will play a new game, any game, see how far he can get until trophies don't seem to pop anymore, stop, then play that same route again getting the same trophies.
The only way to catch this guy is to do exactly what Ikemenzi does, but more, it's always more. Play more games, play more easy games, spend even less time living your life.

There's a lot of antisocial behaviour and gamesmanship going on too, from the guys at the top and also everyone else around them. There was no need for Ikemenzi to get attacked on twitter for becoming no1, Hakoom subtly changed his "no1 trophy hunter" label to something else. There was no passing of the baton so to speak when Ikemenzi became the leader or when Hakoom dropped to 3rd. Not even the guys at the top are acknowledging each other and the other guys trying to catch up aren't watching either. No greets or congratulations to anybody, rarely anyway. Ikemenzi is proud of "playing more than 10000 games" but in reality it's barely 2000 actual games, taking away stacks and all. If you remove all their common and uncommon trophies, these guys sometimes have less trophies than many of us. 10000 games?! It's all just nonsense, by inflated numbers.

Also, most of the guys at the top have hidden trophies, your goal is wanting you most trophies in the world, isn't hiding just even just 1, breaking the rules or ethics of the whole thing somehow? Everyone is mostly just sat alone, playing all the same easy games and continually playing more everyday, because that's the additive lifestyle they have all become. You have to commit mild fraud too in order to pretend you have an address at several locations in the world. It's getting increasingly more difficult, especially as time goes on to say "Well done" or "Great work!" for what these guys are doing.

 

It's hard to know where we go from here for the guys at the top in the coming years but eventually it will just be a glorified cookie clicker. Watching the numbers going up, and almost everything becoming an automation. At some point gameplaying AI will likely be a thing, to play the game for you.

 

On the other hand, in this very forum there's a whole ton of fun and positive energy in ExistentialSolid's destroy me thread, all talking about gaming tips and keeping up with how the guy is doing. There's none of this with leaderboard chasing. That's the sort of thing we should be trying to move towards and promote.

Damn this guy went hard.

[AJ_Radio]

On 10/22/2021 at 4:58 PM, enaysoft said:

Also, most of the guys at the top have hidden trophies, your goal is wanting you most trophies in the world, isn't hiding just even just 1, breaking the rules or ethics of the whole thing somehow? Everyone is mostly just sat alone, playing all the same easy games and continually playing more everyday, because that's the additive lifestyle they have all become. You have to commit mild fraud too in order to pretend you have an address at several locations in the world. It's getting increasingly more difficult, especially as time goes on to say "Well done" or "Great work!" for what these guys are doing.

 

It's hard to know where we go from here for the guys at the top in the coming years but eventually it will just be a glorified cookie clicker. Watching the numbers going up, and almost everything becoming an automation. At some point gameplaying AI will likely be a thing, to play the game for you.

 

On the other hand, in this very forum there's a whole ton of fun and positive energy in ExistentialSolid's destroy me thread, all talking about gaming tips and keeping up with how the guy is doing. There's none of this with leaderboard chasing. That's the sort of thing we should be trying to move towards and promote.

 

It already is turning to automation. You barely have to do any work at all on your end to get a platinum these days. Contrast that with the early Xbox 360, PS3 days when even an easy game would take you a number of hours to get full gamerscore, or get the platinum trophy.

 

There's no problem with playing a number of easy games. I myself have done it. But when most of your profile is nothing but games that took no real effort or skill to obtain, it becomes more difficult for me to congratulate these guys.

 

They treat this like a contest, but unlike the Olympics or most sporting events, nobody is going to remember you or care by next year.

[You]

25 minutes ago, AJ_Radio said:

 

It already is turning to automation. You barely have to do any work at all on your end to get a platinum these days. Contrast that with the early Xbox 360, PS3 days when even an easy game would take you a number of hours to get full gamerscore, or get the platinum trophy.

 

There's no problem with playing a number of easy games. I myself have done it. But when most of your profile is nothing but games that took no real effort or skill to obtain, it becomes more difficult for me to congratulate these guys.

 

They treat this like a contest, but unlike the Olympics or most sporting events, nobody is going to remember you or care by next year.

 

We are already there, nobody even cares about who is in the lead right now.

I just did a quick google search for ViensDanser, tusman and ferryjan. Pretty much zero results, who are these people?

No idea, I dare say none of them will be wasting 5 minutes of their time on a forum, when they could be spending that valuable time (in their eyes) playing a 5 minutes platinum. So they probably have no footprint anywhere on the Internet.

 

A guy on another discussion on this site a few months ago said something very interesting. He said he plays quite a lot of these games just to keep up fairly high in the leaderboards.

He said they were a blessing and a curse, at first it's great to play a ton of these games, the thrill of your rank jumping up so quickly is a huge, but then once you easily overtake all the regular game playing users, you hit a wall.

 

And this wall is a huge hurdle, because now you need to play EVERY SINGLE easy game you can think of just to break with the dedicated trophy hunters at the top, because the top 1000 guys in the leaders already have a head start and have most of these games already.

 

This is the curse of easy trophies, you need to own them to cancel out all the easy trophies that everyone else. Until they all simultaneously have every single easy trophy known to man ONLY THEN can they play perhaps the real games they want to play. Unfortunately like I keep mentioning, easy games are coming out thick and fast so that goal in itself is harder and harder to achieve.

 

I also remember another guy in another topic getting really angry at easy games with everyone mocking him because his trophy list is full of them, but it's true though. When you have so many easy games, each time a new one comes out, you're forced to buy and play it, and so do all your rivals and it reduces the value of all the other easy games you already have.

 

It's fascinating to watch, everyone having to play all the easy games because the fear of missing out on everyone else playing them too. They are all their own worst enemies, if only they all made a pact with each other to all stop playing easy games then the contest would not only be fair again, but may also bring all the fun.

 

I remember the moment when Ikemenzi overtook Hakoom as I was watching and he did a sneak attack. He didn't seem to sync some of his systems, for quite a few days and then suddenly boom, all of a sudden he had about 40-50 platinums sync all at once but pushed him ahead of Hakoom.

 

I mean that's also a weird things about the leaderboards, it's just an approximate. Who knows if people are yet to sync, as there's no reason why somebody can't say get some platinums on Vita and then just leave their system off for a few months. There may even be a person who has double trophies what Ikemenzi has, except just doesn't exist on this site.

 

As it is Sunday, I see that

 

"Zippy the Circle (Level 11, Level 12, and Level 13)"

 

just got released. (What a crazy "name" for a released Playstation title...)

 

So I guess we can look forward to seeing it on "Popular Games This Week"

 

(From last week "Zippy the Circle: Levels 8, 9, & 10" is still in "Popular Games This Week" and that's just ONE of the stacks...)

 

Edited October 24, 2021 by enaysoft

[AJ_Radio]

1 hour ago, enaysoft said:

 

We are already there, nobody even cares about who is in the lead right now.

I just did a quick google search for ViensDanser, tusman and ferryjan. Pretty much zero results, who are these people?

No idea, I dare say none of them will be wasting 5 minutes of their time on a forum, when they could be spending that valuable time (in their eyes) playing a 5 minutes platinum. So they probably have no footprint anywhere on the Internet.

 

A guy on another discussion on this site a few months ago said something very interesting. He said he plays quite a lot of these games just to keep up fairly high in the leaderboards.

He said they were a blessing and a curse, at first it's great to play a ton of these games, the thrill of your rank jumping up so quickly is a huge, but then once you easily overtake all the regular game playing users, you hit a wall.

 

And this wall is a huge hurdle, because now you need to play EVERY SINGLE easy game you can think of just to break with the dedicated trophy hunters at the top, because the top 1000 guys in the leaders already have a head start and have most of these games already.

 

This is the curse of easy trophies, you need to own them to cancel out all the easy trophies that everyone else. Until they all simultaneously have every single easy trophy known to man ONLY THEN can they play perhaps the real games they want to play. Unfortunately like I keep mentioning, easy games are coming out thick and fast so that goal in itself is harder and harder to achieve.

 

I also remember another guy in another topic getting really angry at easy games with everyone mocking him because his trophy list is full of them, but it's true though. When you have so many easy games, each time a new one comes out, you're forced to buy and play it, and so do all your rivals and it reduces the value of all the other easy games you already have.

 

It's fascinating to watch, everyone having to play all the easy games because the fear of missing out on everyone else playing them too. They are all their own worst enemies, if only they all made a pact with each other to all stop playing easy games then the contest would not only be fair again, but may also bring all the fun.

 

I remember the moment when Ikemenzi overtook Hakoom as I was watching and he did a sneak attack. He didn't seem to sync some of his systems, for quite a few days and then suddenly boom, all of a sudden he had about 40-50 platinums sync all at once but pushed him ahead of Hakoom.

 

I mean that's also a weird things about the leaderboards, it's just an approximate. Who knows if people are yet to sync, as there's no reason why somebody can't say get some platinums on Vita and then just leave their system off for a few months. There may even be a person who has double trophies what Ikemenzi has, except just doesn't exist on this site.

 

As it is Sunday, I see that

 

"Zippy the Circle (Level 11, Level 12, and Level 13)"

 

just got released. (What a crazy "name" for a released Playstation title...)

 

So I guess we can look forward to seeing it on "Popular Games This Week"

 

(From last week "Zippy the Circle: Levels 8, 9, & 10" is still in "Popular Games This Week" and that's just ONE of the stacks...)

 

 

I'm not going to make a giant textbook response as I've done so numerous times already on this thread. But I just want to say that I think it's bad when someone like Ikemenzi was ridiculed on Twitter for being #1 on the leaderboards. I don't care about fame in the slightest and I have no intention of ever trying to get it, but in that position I would certainly be embarrassed.

 

WIth a PS4, PS5 and Vita you are basically set. You can no longer get new stuff on the Vita which means you go back to older games, but the stacks are still there and readily available.

 

For a time, when I first joined PSNP, this website had a section of "cheaters" who were permanently removed from the leaderboards. A fair number of those accounts had a higher trophy count than Hakoom, but virtually most every game they had finished had a 10 second platinum timeframe. They were using a hacked console with custom firmware and/or had a program installed on their system that automatically gave them trophies.

 

It's never been fair play. The person with the most time and money is going to come out ahead, doesn't matter how good or talented you are with games. This along with so many other reasons that I don't care to mention, is why I stopped caring about the leaderboards years ago. It's why I stopped playing Runescape, being playing for rankings will just make you feel more miserable.

[LC-Fraggers]

11 hours ago, enaysoft said:

 

...

 

 

10 hours ago, AJ_Radio said:

 

...

 

I feel like we're largely arguing semantics from our positions now so I'll try and wrap it up from my end. I do respect the points you've both made. You've both lived the leaderboard chase and both grown tired and seen the futility of it. I understand that. ikemenzi has essentially perfected the formula to rule the leaderboards and I don't see anybody catching him by doing anything different. His brand of trophy hunting is practically the antithesis of gaming for pleasure. My only argument is that it's a valid hobby, even if it appears to be an essentially pointless one, and easy plats are the economy that it runs on. It has always been this way, even as those easy plats become easier and easier. That is simply evolution of the craft. 

 

I'd love to see this site include multiple leaderboards like TrueTrophies so that gamers could compete in different categories. Who has the most ultra rare trophies? Who has completed the most horror games? Who has the most 100% completions? I think more options would free people from feeling that the only way to achieve anything is to be locked into a cycle of playing the same titles as everybody else.  

[kinnyman]

13 hours ago, enaysoft said:

As it is Sunday, I see that

"Zippy the Circle (Level 11, Level 12, and Level 13)"

just got released. (What a crazy "name" for a released Playstation title...)

So I guess we can look forward to seeing it on "Popular Games This Week"

 

Just a heads up...Lady in a leotard with a gun just came out.  You've probably been dying to play that one too lol

 

I agree with your points, but the leaderboard hunt is what it is.  It's always gonna be about the highest value trophies in the shortest amount of time or the most trophy value in the shortest amount of time.  Trophies in "push the X button 500 times" are worth the same as trophies in The Witcher 3.  Sony and these developers have found a way to capitalize on this niche gaming community. 

 

Say all of us here developed our own system of trophy value and it was a hit with the majority of the community, I'd imagine Sony would sink the idea via copyright if it hurt their pockets.  It'll take people to stop buying these games and/or Sony to regulate these types of developers.  Don't see it happening.

 

[You]

18 hours ago, LC-Fraggers said:

You've both lived the leaderboard chase and both grown tired and seen the futility of it.

 

Actually, aside from observing the people at the top once upon a time I have never been interested in chasing the leaderboards myself. I used to have a friendly rivalry with one of my friends, which was fun for a few years, until he got addicted at Ratalaika games and I just said "Yep, you win mate, no way I can catch you now" and then he became a trophy addict for about a year before finally stopping.

 

It's worse now of course, I just hate all of the truly awful games that are being released and so many people buying them, and then a surprisingly high number of people defending this practice as if it's normal. It's sad to see over the years how the standards have been going down and reading/listening to people like UnknownV2 what kind of effect it is having on people at the top even if they aren't aware of it yet.

 

I used to use this site to see what games had been released and what were about to be released due to new trophy lists becoming available often on this site first.

Unfortunately as can be seen by looking at the front end right now, it's just filled with "games" and you have to search for the actual games.

 

Trophies and achievements are already having an unhealthy affect on all of us in some way. I just hate seeing what it is doing to all the people at the top, I worry about what this is doing to people. I did notice what Kinnyman said about "Lady in a leotard with a gun" and everyone shitting on it. These kinds of topics aren't going to go away anytime soon. It gets old seeing everyone talking about it, I mean, the people dissing the game, they're not wrong are they? It's going to be a popular game this week though of course, because it has easy platinums, yes with an S.

 

This is fast becoming an alternate form of "Whales" which is guaranteed recurrent spending but on console instead of mobile. A dollar may seem cheap but that's why the dev releases up to eight stacks of it. Now you've paid budget price for it. These games rarely get one stack anymore and for the obvious reasons I just mentioned.

 

Multiple leaderboards, rarity etc, is certainly a great idea, but unfortunately that doesn't change to what is happening to the current people at the top.

 

Way back in ye old days of 2001 I had to witness a friend get addicted to Ultima Online, that was all his did with his time, 3 years sat in the University labs just playing this one game, despite warning him constantly he still failed even after taking the second year twice. You can get addicted to anything, and be unable to stop, even before trophies were a thing.

 

I guess it's too late to try and help some of these people now, I just wish them all the best and hope they don't have regrets later. Like many people seem to suggest, I should probably just stop caring and let these people get on with it which of course they will obviously do anyway, despite what most of us here say.

Edited October 25, 2021 by enaysoft

[AJ_Radio]

21 hours ago, LC-Fraggers said:

 

I feel like we're largely arguing semantics from our positions now so I'll try and wrap it up from my end. I do respect the points you've both made. You've both lived the leaderboard chase and both grown tired and seen the futility of it. I understand that. ikemenzi has essentially perfected the formula to rule the leaderboards and I don't see anybody catching him by doing anything different. His brand of trophy hunting is practically the antithesis of gaming for pleasure. My only argument is that it's a valid hobby, even if it appears to be an essentially pointless one, and easy plats are the economy that it runs on. It has always been this way, even as those easy plats become easier and easier. That is simply evolution of the craft. 

 

I'd love to see this site include multiple leaderboards like TrueTrophies so that gamers could compete in different categories. Who has the most ultra rare trophies? Who has completed the most horror games? Who has the most 100% completions? I think more options would free people from feeling that the only way to achieve anything is to be locked into a cycle of playing the same titles as everybody else.  

 

I did the leaderboard chase on a MMO, but the comparisons are so similar in style that I felt I just had to bring it up.

 

The standards have definitely gone down. That's our entire point really. Five years ago you had My Name is Mayo and Orc Slayer. Today, those games are considered slow by 2021 standards.

 

I was watching MTV the other night with kids within my circle of friends and family. I knew 20 years ago the channel meant something. It meant music videos, shows based on genres of music (Yo MTV Raps, Headbangers Ball, etc), interviews with up and coming musicians who represented Generation X. Then the 'Me' Generation (Millennials) came along and the influx of reality shows started sweeping the network. By around 2008 - 2010 MTV was nothing more than a shadow of its former self, showcasing such shit as 16 and Pregnant, Jersey Shore, and other puke inducing garbage. The other night, they were airing some crap that was basically the 'oohs' and 'aahs' to try to get some shock value. Nothing has changed at MTV.

 

MTV is a valid cable station through and through, plenty of content of theirs you can watch on the internet. But it is absolute junk. If easy platinums are getting easier and easier, television shows on stations like MTV continue to get dumber and dumber. It's not just television anymore either, YouTube has also catered to the lowest common denominator by having their most popular YouTubers post trendy shit to keep the kids hooked. That's really what it's all about in the end, the kids. The stuff I see today catered to the kids and the masses makes iJustine and Shane Dawson from 2008 - 2009 look good in comparison.

 

These overly easy games I would compare with stuff my little nephew plays on my sisters iPad. Junk. Dumbed down. At his age I was playing Super Mario Bros 3 on the NES, which required a lot more skill and commitment to properly play it. The game my nephew is playing basically has most everything handed to them, he just sits there and collects stuff in his game. Whereas I had to struggle to figure how just how to get past the fourth and fifth worlds in Super Mario Bros 3. But I did it. So the standards have definitely gone down over time.

[Unknown_v2_0]

14 hours ago, AJ_Radio said:

 

 

These overly easy games I would compare with stuff my little nephew plays on my sisters iPad. Junk. Dumbed down. At his age I was playing Super Mario Bros 3 on the NES, which required a lot more skill and commitment to properly play it. The game my nephew is playing basically has most everything handed to them, he just sits there and collects stuff in his game. Whereas I had to struggle to figure how just how to get past the fourth and fifth worlds in Super Mario Bros 3. But I did it. So the standards have definitely gone down over time.

 

Unfortunately I think all games are getting easier and easier.... Like I LOVED Kirby as a kid, recently played All Star Allies and stopped after 3 levels cause it  was so mind numbingly easy. Then we got these save states and rewinds added to games, check points every few rooms etc. Then all social media now is falling into what you are describing... I have noticed a lowered attention span and  concentration from dealing with stuff like that and trying to 'bounce back' I guess you could say lol. I remember those early years of MTV... yeah things very different now  I guess. Although I do think back to how our parents and grandparents saw what we watched at the time ( maybe felt very similar thinking 'what is this garbage' what will the youth of today's youth think and what will the state of things be like then..... lol)

[AJ_Radio]

On 10/25/2021 at 8:01 PM, Unknown_v2_0 said:

 

Unfortunately I think all games are getting easier and easier.... Like I LOVED Kirby as a kid, recently played All Star Allies and stopped after 3 levels cause it  was so mind numbingly easy. Then we got these save states and rewinds added to games, check points every few rooms etc. Then all social media now is falling into what you are describing... I have noticed a lowered attention span and  concentration from dealing with stuff like that and trying to 'bounce back' I guess you could say lol. I remember those early years of MTV... yeah things very different now  I guess. Although I do think back to how our parents and grandparents saw what we watched at the time ( maybe felt very similar thinking 'what is this garbage' what will the youth of today's youth think and what will the state of things be like then..... lol)

 

This is what happened to real time and turned based strategy. I purposely play on harder difficulties now for these games because of how easy they make them on normal.

 

Social media is a different issue, it has the MTV mentality where eyecandy and crap are promoted over stuff that carries substance. That's what YouTube mostly is, catering to the youth who in turn subscribe to the biggest YouTubers who all post trendy bullshit to get the money rolling.

 

Of course, your parents probably felt Darkwing Duck, Family Matters, Kenan & Kel, The Famous Jett Jackson and That's So Raven were all stupid for the same reasons.

[JAK-KRIEG]

I was playing bouncy bullets on the vita and did some soul-searching while I was hating my way through getting the plat. I realized why the hell am I doing this I'm not having fun so I decided to pack it in. This was back in 2018 so I have had around 2 years "sobriety" and I'm back enjoying getting trophies and plats.