Trophy Spam Issue

[NanaCheese94]

22 hours ago, fbdbh said:

The only objective and democratic thing you could do in a new system is remove stacks. Every stack where trophies are the same. Autopop or not, region or rerelease, doesn’t matter. It’s not a judgmental decision. It’s something you could in theory enforce. This doesn’t solve the spam problem, but it’s making things a bit better, even if you have to give up legit second playthroughs.

 

Banning, removing game series, publishers, however… that’s a vile slippery slope and very much not in the spirit of anything good. Even if it’s about profit-hungry low effort games. I don’t think there exist a moral right to obscure any creation just because a competitive feeling is hurt somewhere. It just feels just as wrong as those exploitative games themselves.

 

I'm sorry for necromancing but I'd like to know: if you remove stacks where trophies are the same, how would you solve it if the devs start diversifying the stacks slightly? Just changing the name of the trophy description would work probably. Heck, they could just start plainly numbering the Trophies instead of naming them...

[TheBusToYoker]

How is this website suppose to remove stacks? It can only address features which may or may not encourage people to do such things as stacking. I don't think the practice of game stacking is bad in of it self. If someone likes stacking games on their profile, it is their choice. This shouldn't be a conversation about denying people choice.

 

Spam apps though for those who are seriously competive about leaderboards are denying people any choice, because they've got no other choice but to play them. It's a vicious cycle that won't stop until there is a better and fairer system of competition on leaderboards.

 

The only people who are winning are the ones making these non games. This website, trophy hunters and trophy hunting overall suffers.

Edited October 19, 2022 by AMadScotsGuy

[ViensDanser]

Putting all these no games wihout exceptions in a category that does not earn points for the leaderboard would be a good start.

Deleting the stacks will be useless ,none of these absurd games can count for the leaderboard 

[MMDE]

There's been even more of these trophy spam apps...

 

 

 

 

When they can't tell the difference anymore, we shouldn't either. They are stacks of the same game, and we really should stop counting stacks of games, especially the ones with high percentage.

[AJ_Radio]

Notice how people who have been trophy hunting since the early days are getting all heated and vocal about where trophy hunting is going.
 

Now contrast that with the people who have only started the last two to four years, have hundreds of EZPZs and are fighting against those who just want to see more legitimate games on the PS Store.

 

Do you guys see the pattern by now? 
 

Someone on here got all butthurt to the point where he purposely took his trophy profile off this website. He only started trophy hunting a year or two prior and already amassed tens of thousands of trophies, mostly games that take five to 30 minutes to finish per stack. 
 

And he was mad that people were questioning his trophy habits. 
 

This is why posting on this website has gotten horrible. Every time a thread like this one pops up, the people who compete on the leaderboards come out of the woodwork and try to defend blatant shovelware. 
 

Yeah, they are technically games. Doesn’t mean they are good or that they should even be accepted. 
 

The real culprit is Sony for giving these hack developers a source of income, blocking out authentic indie developers who put time and effort in releasing their product. 
 

There’s already a bunch of games on Steam that may never reach Sony platforms. Which is a real shame, but it is what it is. 
 

You can release a game where it is literally a guy taking a crap in a toilet and that will get accepted by Sony. They then allow the release of multiple region stacks and thus the cycle begins. 
 

Quality control was lost on Sony years ago. I literally wouldn’t of ever found out that Axiom Verge 2 was released were it not for looking it up on a search engine. 
 

The webpage PS Store is an absolute mess. Non-trophy hunters are beginning to point out the crap on their YouTube videos, but that won’t change anything because all Sony cares about is money.

Edited October 20, 2022 by AJ_Radio

[MMDE]

9 hours ago, AJ_Radio said:

Notice how people who have been trophy hunting since the early days are getting all heated and vocal about where trophy hunting is going.
 

Now contrast that with the people who have only started the last two to four years, have hundreds of EZPZs and are fighting against those who just want to see more legitimate games on the PS Store.

 

Do you guys see the pattern by now? 
 

Someone on here got all butthurt to the point where he purposely took his trophy profile off this website. He only started trophy hunting a year or two prior and already amassed tens of thousands of trophies, mostly games that take five to 30 minutes to finish per stack. 
 

And he was mad that people were questioning his trophy habits. 
 

This is why posting on this website has gotten horrible. Every time a thread like this one pops up, the people who compete on the leaderboards come out of the woodwork and try to defend blatant shovelware. 
 

Yeah, they are technically games. Doesn’t mean they are good or that they should even be accepted. 
 

The real culprit is Sony for giving these hack developers a source of income, blocking out authentic indie developers who put time and effort in releasing their product. 
 

There’s already a bunch of games on Steam that may never reach Sony platforms. Which is a real shame, but it is what it is. 
 

You can release a game where it is literally a guy taking a crap in a toilet and that will get accepted by Sony. They then allow the release of multiple region stacks and thus the cycle begins. 
 

Quality control was lost on Sony years ago. I literally wouldn’t of ever found out that Axiom Verge 2 was released were it not for looking it up on a search engine. 
 

The webpage PS Store is an absolute mess. Non-trophy hunters are beginning to point out the crap on their YouTube videos, but that won’t change anything because all Sony cares about is money.

 

Are they technically games? idk tbh

 

You hold a button to watch trophies unlock. That sounds more like an application to me.

 

I honestly don't think there are that many who actually like what is currently happening, no matter if you're new or not, and we can make changes that addresses it.

 

There will always be some easier or quicker games, but we don't need to have 5-20 stacks of trophies for the same exact quick and easy game.

 

I really don't think these new asset swaps are new games or apps, it's the exact same thing with a sprite or background swap or something. There are multiple new lists like this every day now.

 

I can actually afford every single stack, no problem, I just think this is detrimental to the trophy hunting community. We're just letting some few companies exploit us and ruin it for everyone. Sure, we can just stop buying the games, but there will always be some who do regardless. There are already functionality on this site to do most of what I request, and I think it just has to happen at some point.

Edited October 20, 2022 by MMDE

[AJ_Radio]

17 minutes ago, MMDE said:

 

Are they technically games? idk tbh

 

You hold a button to watch trophies unlock. That sounds more like an application to me.

 

I honestly don't think there are that many who actually like what is currently happening, no matter if you're new or not, and we can make changes that addresses it.

 

There will always be some easier or quicker games, but we don't need to have 5-20 stacks of trophies for the same exact quick and easy game.

 

I really don't think these new asset swaps are new games or apps, it's the exact same think with a sprite or background swap or something. There are multiple new lists like this every day now.

 

I can actually afford every single stack, no problem, I just think this is detrimental to the trophy hunting community. We're just letting some few companies exploit us and ruin it for everyone. Sure, we can just stop buying the games, but there will always be some who do regardless. There are already functionality on this site to do most of what I request, and I think it just has to happen at some point.

Aabs Animals was probably the first “application” with trophies, because you’re just watching a poorly rendered cat for five minutes. Linger in Shadows was more of a tech demo than anything else. 
 

Hannah Montana and Megamind were basically what easy platinums used to be. Magus was another really easy one, intended to be more as a joke than an actual game. 
 

Today it’s basically a AI bot cranking out the same lists over and over. There’s no passion, there’s no expression, there’s no art, there’s no beauty. 
 

As long as people continue to buy, these hacks will continue to release the same shovelware. 
 

Every time I hear someone arguing against those who just want the hobby of trophy hunting to get better, I glance at their trophy profile. 9 times out of 10 they are people stacking hundreds of EZPZs on their trophy account and barely any actual game that takes effort. 
 

Then they have to go and defend their shovelware by attacking people who want to see the PS Store get better. 
 

That’s what pisses me off and this is why most threads like this one either wind up dead or get locked in due time because of flame wars. 
 

To a degree, I side with the people who don’t care about the leaderboards. Those who are playing tons of shovelware and getting angry at people like me are part of the problem. 

[steel6burgh]

17 minutes ago, MMDE said:

I can actually afford every single stack, no problem, I just think this is detrimental to the trophy hunting community. We're just letting some few companies exploit us and ruin it for everyone. Sure, we can just stop buying the games, but there will always be some who do regardless.

So is some sort of action on the issue forthcoming?  Should we hold our breath?  Is there anything we can do as a community to help persuade the powers in charge of implementing these changes?

[AJ_Radio]

16 minutes ago, steel6burgh said:

So is some sort of action on the issue forthcoming?  Should we hold our breath?  Is there anything we can do as a community to help persuade the powers in charge of implementing these changes?

Nothing will change until either Sky Ripper comes back and addresses things or PSNP gets a proper competitor. 
 

I don’t see either happening, and those of us who want to avoid EZPZs are becoming a niche within a niche.

[Jerry_Appleby]

I haven't read through this entire thread because I don't have time, but yes I agree with MMDE that trophy hunting has gone so downhill that the original hunters can't enjoy their hobby anymore.

 

There used to be a time when I was top 10 in Canada and top 400 in the world, then all these trash games released and I dropped way down the LBs because I refuse to support a company profiting off of addicted gamers. Most of the old PS3 friends I made don't hunt trophies anymore because these types of games erased that hobby.

Hell, even my best friend was addicted to these types of games and he would be earning like a dozen plats a day even though he knew the games were trash, he just couldn't pass up a quick plat. He wouldn't even talk to his real friends anymore because he was too busy doing stacks of games for his friends while they did his other region stacks. It took a while, but I eventually managed to convince him not to waste his savings on those games, and he eventually stopped buying them.

 

And this problem isn't going away because there are too many addicted gamers out there that are willing to spend whatever it takes to get all those trash plats earned. Anything that can combat these types of games is a welcome addition to the site! I would probably say to only exclude stacks of games with platinums above 90%.

[Ashande]

47 minutes ago, MMDE said:

[…]

I really don't think these new asset swaps are new games or apps, it's the exact same think with a sprite or background swap or something. There are multiple new lists like this every day now.

[…]

 

Given the recent situation where one of them claims to be The Basketball Quiz but still has the game icon of The Taco Quiz, they’re not even too keen on the swapping, in some instances…

[steel6burgh]

3 minutes ago, Jerry_Appleby said:

addicted gamers

That is the key phrase.  Might as well just give up the hobby because that is going to get the hobby shut down.  Mark my word!  Addicted gamers will become a liability for Sony.  People don't get it.  Of course Sony wants people to buy more games as a result of accumulating trophies.  I don't think they realized it would get this crazy.

[You]

31 minutes ago, steel6burgh said:

That is the key phrase.  Might as well just give up the hobby because that is going to get the hobby shut down.  Mark my word!  Addicted gamers will become a liability for Sony.  People don't get it.  Of course Sony wants people to buy more games as a result of accumulating trophies.  I don't think they realized it would get this crazy.

 

Indeed. In my comments yesterday about how shit the Playstation Stars program is and how it's encouraging NFT behaviour and a meta eco system. (Or the gradual introductions of it)

 

There are already a lot of people going against me saying it's just a bit of fun, just ignore it and why bother worrying? It's a bit of free money to some people by playing some games. Which I agree with actually.

This is how it starts though, and you only have to look at what trophies have become to people over the years. It's become an addiction to a surprising amount and getting those trophies as fast as possible and the rewards mainly, some numbers on a website that is only valid for the moment you loading the website...

 

Same thing has happened with everything else shitty up till this point, Day 1 DLC, fucking buggy mess games released and patched later, loot boxes, cosmetics you have to pay (oh it doesn't affect the game so it's fine), gambling, Hard difficulty DLC release, disk locked content that you have but has DRM so you can't access it, cheats that cost money and aren't unlocked/ hidden in the game etc.

 

Sure initially there is pushback, but then people start whining telling you to shut up because we've heard the complaints a million times. Then the latest shit thing is just "normal". I suspect in a few years time there'll be all sorts of things on this eco system that people are starting to get addicted too. Isn't there already some sort of other trophies you can get, like when you get up to lvl 999? Which also has encouraged people to buy EZPZ games.

 

This?

 

https://img.playstationtrophies.org/images/monthly_2020_10/news/trophy_levels_83596e12-7eef-4a6c-912d-b64d204bb989.jpg

 

Eventually I can see goals in the Playstation Stars program whereby you have a month to get 50 gold trophies and you get 200 star points, and then people need to start buying a few 11 gold platinums to finish the challenge because they ran out of time playing regular games.

 

No idea what's going to happen next but I dare say in a few years time, there'll be more issues alongside the ones we have now.

Edited October 20, 2022 by enaysoft

[AJ_Radio]

57 minutes ago, Jerry_Appleby said:

I haven't read through this entire thread because I don't have time, but yes I agree with MMDE that trophy hunting has gone so downhill that the original hunters can't enjoy their hobby anymore.

 

There used to be a time when I was top 10 in Canada and top 400 in the world, then all these trash games released and I dropped way down the LBs because I refuse to support a company profiting off of addicted gamers. Most of the old PS3 friends I made don't hunt trophies anymore because these types of games erased that hobby.

Hell, even my best friend was addicted to these types of games and he would be earning like a dozen plats a day even though he knew the games were trash, he just couldn't pass up a quick plat. He wouldn't even talk to his real friends anymore because he was too busy doing stacks of games for his friends while they did his other region stacks. It took a while, but I eventually managed to convince him not to waste his savings on those games, and he eventually stopped buying them.

 

And this problem isn't going away because there are too many addicted gamers out there that are willing to spend whatever it takes to get all those trash plats earned. Anything that can combat these types of games is a welcome addition to the site! I would probably say to only exclude stacks of games with platinums above 90%.

Short attention spans. 
 

AAA games still require your attention, but many have been streamlined to the point where you can multitask without issue. 
 

It’s why it’s always hard to go back to old games because the old standards were still in place. 
 

The stuff that @Stay-Pationt covered back in 2016 - 2017 doesn’t even get a few active players anymore. And all those games he covered like Her Majesty’s Spiffing were considered very easy. 
 

Trophy hunting has changed drastically, and not for the better. There’s a gap in the community now, and unfortunately like your friend, more people are becoming addicted while being overly aggressive to anyone suggesting they should stop playing those games. 

[jaehyun1009]

I used to be against the likes of rarity leaderboards as it came across as a bit elitist.

 

But it's certainly a different story nowadays. I'm sure I don't need to explain why as this topic has been discussed to death by now.

[steel6burgh]

33 minutes ago, jaehyun1009 said:

 

I used to be against the likes of rarity leaderboards as it came across as a bit elitist.

 

Well we don't have to call it the rarity leaderboard.  We could just refer to it as, "Spam games don't count board."  I think in a nutshell that is the point in a rarity leaderboard more than trying to be an elitist.

[dmland12]

Well, it would be great to see Sly take some control over the leaderboard, whatever form that ultimately takes.  Do we know if he's seen this thread or what his thoughts are on it?

[Vulpine9Tails]

It's gotten so bad that even my bf, who doesn't really care about trophies or even browses the store that often, has noticed all these trash games. It is most definitely an issue. I have no good solution, but I will say I have been trophy hunting since the early PS3 days (old accounts) and this has been an insane change from those days. I love movie tie in games (ie those games that were frowned upon back then) and now I'm seeing them as top tier compared to the shite that's put out on a daily - no, hourly probably - basis. 

[Knave21]

How feasible would it be to just exclude points from games made by the trophy spam developers. We know who they are, how hard will it be? If those games stopped rewarding points people will stop buying them and they will stop making them. 

[AJ_Radio]

1 hour ago, Knave21 said:

How feasible would it be to just exclude points from games made by the trophy spam developers. We know who they are, how hard will it be? If those games stopped rewarding points people will stop buying them and they will stop making them. 

I’m sure some of them have come on these forums and tried to defend their shite.

[JAK-KRIEG]

19 minutes ago, AJ_Radio said:

I’m sure some of them have come on these forums and tried to defend their shite.

Oh yeah we have several moles on the loose defending their companies. I'm sure of it. A full stop awarding points for these atrocities will be a death sentence for them, no one will buy them, problem solved.

[AJ_Radio]

1 hour ago, JAK-KRIEG said:

Oh yeah we have several moles on the loose defending their companies. I'm sure of it. A full stop awarding points for these atrocities will be a death sentence for them, no one will buy them, problem solved.

That one dude earlier joined up in February this year. Sounds appropriate right? It was pretty much when these shovelware titles started getting out of hand.

[You]

3 minutes ago, AJ_Radio said:

That one dude earlier joined up in February this year. Sounds appropriate right? It was pretty much when these shovelware titles started getting out of hand.

 

What I still think is a bit surreal are when people (usually the same people) keep jumping into threads and saying "Oh we've had a million of these threads already" and then start trying to get the threads shut down.

 

Sure these threads keep appearing but that's only because the problem hasn't gone away, and has got way worse and even more people are talking about it.

Considering those people are sick of these threads, and hate us talking about it, clearly they seem to have an unhealthy habit of coming to each of them and being antagonist and ironically bumping the topics and ensuring that it stays around longer.

 

Not sure if shilling, or just out to troll.

 

6 hours ago, Jerry_Appleby said:

Hell, even my best friend was addicted to these types of games and he would be earning like a dozen plats a day even though he knew the games were trash, he just couldn't pass up a quick plat. He wouldn't even talk to his real friends anymore because he was too busy doing stacks of games for his friends while they did his other region stacks.

 

This has happened to 3 people I know as well. One of whom I had a fun and healthy rivaly with for about a year, trying to overtake each other. But then I just admitted defeat when he was earning plats every day, and then watched him quintuple his lead over me in a matter of months even though our rivalry had finished.

[fbdbh]

On 18/10/2022 at 3:37 PM, Ashande said:

 

Not shooting the idea down; just questioning in attempts to understand and refine; putting that first.

 

When you speak of stacks, and trimming things down to one, what sort of mechanics would be involved? For example, with a PS5 autopop; which list would you advocate stays in the calculations? The first one? The more recent one? Whichever one has the better rarity stats? What about situations where one does a partial autopop, then continues/finishes the game? As an example: I did autopop several trophies in the Nioh games, as well as Marvel’s Spider-Man and Maneater, then continued playing from where I was; again, which list is kept? The original, the newer, or the one that is most “complete?” (This gets particularly sticky with Nioh, as some of the trophies earned in one version don’t - or at least, didn’t for me -  carry over and have to be done again.)

 

As related to non-autopop games - or games that cross generations/consoles other than PS4-> PS5 - how would you handle that? As an example, Devil May Cry 2; I owned the PS3 collection when it came out, and happily bought it again when they were reissued for PS4 (partly because I no longer had access to the PS3 disc, partly because I like the games that much), so which stack says? Both, since they’re technically separate entities? The older? The newer? The more rare or the more complete? With my case as an example, would I keep the Platinum for DMC2, or would I have to hunt down a PS3 disc to earn it over there, since that was the original version? What about remakes that are distinct entities but still basically share a list (Yakuza 3 vs. Yakuza 3 Remastered, for example), or GOTY/Special Editions (such as Witcher 3) or GOTY/Special Editions/Remakes that have different lists (usually because they compress DLC trophies into the main list and adjust points/rarity/specific trophies as they see fit) such as Devil May Cry 5 or DmC: Devil May Cry?

 

I’m not deliberately trying to stack my examples with DMC games, I swear; just going from my own Profile to pick from. ?

 

Again, not trying to shoot the idea down, not being defensive - whatever happens, happens, though I will point out for the umpteenth time that I am personally against data manipulation to get the result a given individual wants, rather than objective facts - but merely curious for more specifics on how you would picture such a change working.

 

No stack is preferred, if the trophies are the same, there would be some kind of unified title - if one trophy is earned, then that one is earned.

 

In this system you’d not see the PS4/PS5 tag, but this is something you’d have to develop for a new profile system.

[JAK-KRIEG]

40 minutes ago, AJ_Radio said:

That one dude earlier joined up in February this year. Sounds appropriate right? It was pretty much when these shovelware titles started getting out of hand.

You see the same people being VERY defensive about these "games" to the point where you think there must be a vested interest ?