Psychology behind Trophies?

[PostalDudeRus]

deeply sorry for bad English

Recently, I began to ask myself how exactly trophies (achievements, badges or etc) are working?

 

Being not very immersed into trophy hunting myself, I do having fun earning trophies, but recently I started to feel like I pushing myself to complete some games I really don't want to complete to 100%.

But what exactly motivates me? Do I really need to spend time on video games that much? For what? For useless icons on gaming network? Possibly, because it's fun. That's where uroboros really begins, let me explain:

 

After analyzing my gaming activity for past few month I has concluded that I did wasted hours and hours of my time playing games that not even little fun for me and all my efforts were just to complete trophy list and see that sacramental 100%/Platinum on my list. But in the end I did earned what I wanted, right? So it's "The time you enjoy wasting is not wasted time" (Bertrand Russell). Where is the line between doing things and having fun and forcing yourself to do something to achieve that "fun"? And that is more like one of the steps of addiction development. It's kinda complicated for me to explain on non-native language, but I hope you got the idea behind this paragraph.

 

But to truly reflect my self analyzes I want you tell me why are you earning trophies? Do you spend time on earning trophies more that you wanted? Did you spend money on video game just to earn trophies from it? Share your every idea about trophy hunting and possible trophies addiction effects, please.

 

I've also tried to find materials like articles on achievements (or trophies) addiction (and not video games addiction), and I did found few good material resources:

- THE USE OF VIDEO GAME ACHIEVEMENTS TO ENHANCE PLAYER PERFORMANCE, SELF-EFFICACY, AND MOTIVATION by LUCAS BLAIR

- Why Do Achievements, Trophies, and Badges Work?

- Wikipedia article on "Overjustification effect"

 

[reiner-]

Wow! Deep.

[DaivRules]

I don’t spend anywhere nearly as much time as I would like experiencing some video games and earning trophies.

 

Although the easy answer to trophy addiction is dopamine. It’s no different than other people who build routines around a reward system and develop a dependence. Like the person who can’t break their bad eating habits because they’ve built a habit of taking a specific route to or from work that takes them right by the place they say they don’t want to go to. It takes effort and a change of habits to break a dependence and many people can’t or won’t do it without outside influence. Recognizing it is difficult enough by oneself. Changing it and sticking with the change can be extremely difficult. 

[Deluziion90]

Because trophies?! I’m addicted and can’t stop earning them because I love gaming and having a site keep track of my progress makes the addiction even worse.

 

The fact that I can scroll all the way to my first game and still have memories from platinum 1,2,3 and so on until now just keeps me motivated to keep getting everything 100%. This is from a completionist mindset and not just earning random trophies. Sometimes I scroll through my list and just think about what a crazy grind something was or just stupid borderline boring. But that’s all part of the fun after getting it done.

[TrophyChief]

A while back I shared my thoughts on why I trophy hunt. The hunt continues and I still enjoy it!

 

[PostalDudeRus]

10 minutes ago, MrTrofyHunter said:

A while back I shared my thoughts on why I trophy hunt. The hunt continues and I still enjoy it!

 

 

After reading your topic I realized I missed one important thing in my post - completionism. When it comes to videogames, I was always completionist myself, even back in a days when I played NES and Genesis games.

[reiner-]

2 hours ago, Deluziion90 said:

The fact that I can scroll all the way to my first game and still have memories from platinum 1,2,3 and so on

 

This is what I love about trophies.

Looking back through your list and being reminded of all the great and rough times had getting a certain trophy.

[Lava_Yuki]

I love the personal satisfaction they give me, it feels like I've "mastered" a game. Before the era of trophies. I was a completionist who would open every chest and get every item, so being rewarded for my efforts just makes me feel good and also serves as proof to others. It gives me boasting rights over my friends and brother who don't play for trophies and hence never 100% a game, they just go with the flow for a few hours before moving onto the next game

[charxsetsuna]

I like completing checklists in games, always have. Like completing the pokedex in the gba games, unlocking supports in fire emblem,  unlocking all the cars in burnout paradise even though there was never a trophy for that. (I couldn't plat the ps3 one anyways because I didnt have a camera) 

 

Trophies are just a extension of a habit I already had.