Why is trophy hunting/achievement hunting still niche and not mainstream?

[usapro2017]

I have often heard that trophy hunting is fairly niche and only a small percentage of gamers care about trophy hunting/achievement hunting..  but why do you think this is? Why did it never become hugely mainstream?

 

In the PS5 generation, do you think the amount of people that trophy/achievement hunt will increase? decrease? or stay about the same?

[Juzota]

My gamer friends who doesn't trophy hunt just says it's meaningless and not worth their time. I do agree with them.

[Long-Ryde]

My friends who don't trophy hunt think it's pointless and don't care. I do it because I'm OCD about how my time is spent gaming and finishing games.

[Orphioon]

Like anything, its a time investment and people are more strapped for time then ever.

[djb5f]

It will definitely still stay niche.  See no reason why it would change.

[Caesar Clown]

To do something extra, people often require motivation of some sort. It just means your average person doesn't get any form of motivation from earning trophies. For more people to get into it, you'd really need prizes of some kind.

[damon8r351]

Yeah, what the fuck is collecting a bunch of jpg's gonna do for me?

[Evil_Joker88]

I agree that it's time restrains and motivation that most people don't care about trophies/achievements. And if you have no clue how to unlock some trophies, some just leave the game instead of looking at trophy guides.

 

I say it'll stay the same

[GTA_Darren]

No actual reward, few years ago when Sony gave reward points when people unlock trophies, I feel it is a great program to attract more players to hunt trophies. Unfortunately they kill it. Right know Microsoft gave some reward points when players unlock achievements daily. It is not much, but it is a good start. Before that I only turned on my Xbox One once in a while. Now I will spend at least an hour per day to unlock an achievement in order to earn reward points. In conclusion, you need to have certain rewards to attract players.

[DarthTerrorize]

I'm a sucker for collectables, I love collecting. I love gaming. 2 loves rolled into one ?.

[Bonzi Buddy]

36 minutes ago, usapro2017 said:

In the PS5 generation, do you think the amount of people that trophy/achievement hunt will increase? decrease? or stay about the same?

I think it will be the same regardless of what system.

[PatinumNumemon]

Lol my real life friends sometimes shame me for the lengths I go to with trophy hunting. What I find funny is that they also try using trophies as a way to get me to play a certain game with them. For example my real life friends have recently gotten into For Honor, and are telling me that the trophy list doesn't seem too hard and that I should give it a shot. If you see me playing For Honor sometime soon, now you will know why ? honestly there should be a larger incentive for getting trophies in order to make it more mainstream. That, or some popular YouTuber or streamer needs to really show interest in it for it to blow up.

[DavySuicide]

Fuck mainstream,  it's good imo that it's something not everybody is doing. Same with music, art, movies whatsoever. Mainstream kills the fun ^^ it's a hobby like everything else. I mean some people collect stones or build a miniature railway. Whatever floats the boat and kills time. It's a beautiful hobby for me. I hate online gaming and competition so it's something one can do on his own without time pressure.It would be awesome if PS5 times would add some new nuances to trophy hunting.

 

I always laugh when people say it's meaningless, because by the moment you switch on your console or your tv or open your book it's meaningless as well, like everything else is meaningless in the pure sense of nihilism. Rick and Morty style ^^

 

 

Cheers guys  = ) 

[El Duderino]

47 minutes ago, usapro2017 said:

I have often heard that trophy hunting is fairly niche and only a small percentage of gamers care about trophy hunting/achievement hunting..  but why do you think this is? Why did it never become hugely mainstream?

What the hell? Are you aware that certain companies built their entire business model around exploiting achievement hunters? The Spanish publisher Ratalaika Games S.L. is the first name that should come to mind.

Every gaming distribution platform has an achievement system. Nintendo being the only exception by now. No matter if you're playing on Steam, gog.com, UPlay, Origin or other more specialized platforms: You can collect achievements. It is mainstream. It has always been. Achievements are a highly calculated thing. When Microsoft introduced them on a large scale in 2005, they didn't do it because they're nice. They did it as a loyalty business model. That's what it has always been.

I'm once again shocked and baffled about how naive many people are.

[pinkrobot_pb]

It was meant to be main stream, but just like the way Sony tried to set up PSN as some new sort of social network and push Vita as the next uber game console, it didn't exactly work out like that. Pretty much every platinum is an ultra rare on PSN, which means that at best 1 in 20 gamers will be actively hunting for trophies. How is that not a niche? It is, and it always will be. The other 19 out of those 20 players only care about playing online or playing the story to completion.

 

And that's fine by me as I have never aspired to be part of the majority, so as long as trophies stay around I don't care how few people go out and look for them.

[Sir_Bee]

27 minutes ago, Santa said:

What the hell? Are you aware that certain companies built their entire business model around exploiting achievement hunters? The Spanish publisher Ratalaika Games S.L. is the first name that should come to mind.

Every gaming distribution platform has an achievement system. Nintendo being the only exception by now. No matter if you're playing on Steam, gog.com, UPlay, Origin or other more specialized platforms: You can collect achievements. It is mainstream. It has always been. Achievements are a highly calculated thing. When Microsoft introduced them on a large scale in 2005, they didn't do it because they're nice. They did it as a loyalty business model. That's what it has always been.

I'm once again shocked and baffled about how naive many people are.

Aggressive much?

 

But to your point, I could not disagree more. The casual gaming market vastly outnumbered the hardcore, which would translate to the vast majority of gamers, on any platform you can name, don't care about trophies much at all. 

 

Yes, certain developers can tap into the hardcore market by creating games designed for trophy hunters, but they will never be anything more than a small slice of the gaming ecosystem. 

 

Trophy hunting has never, and will never be "mainstream". There are far too few so called hard core gamers who would even care.

Edited May 3, 2020 by Sir_Bee

[Xenoblast91]

Interesting that you posted such a brave thread in a platform where around 80% of their user base is an actual trophy hunter. And seeing responses struck really hard to me. You'll never now what people could say about certian topics. But anyways... 

 

Because gaming at it's core right now is focused in selling "funny times". The companies know that beyond your money, your attention (your conciousness, self-awareness about your inmediate reality) is way more valuable. And truly it is. Therefore they makes games in order to appeal the "normal guy" from everyday life. People don't care about trophies because some are daunting, and the task more require you a huge amount of skills, patience, learning and self-appreciation. Many people, honestly, lack those traits, and prefer to waste their time just casually gaming or otherwise, socializing and stuff. 

 

Of course, many would have their motivations towards why trophy/achieve hunt, but it's a personal matter, as everything in life is. By "niche" you can mean underground. But well, trophies in my perspective, is a way to tell yourself that your money is worth every penny. I know many people don't care, but it's a way to truly leech all the potential of your games. Many games we're desing for that exact purpose. Open-world games with deep RPG mechanics are often the mainstream AAA games you see around now. Why? Because as gaming industry evolved as we did through years, the consumer from 10 years ago now probably works at an office/industry for 8 hours and if by somehow wants to spent their afternoon/night playing, they can use a fantasy world to do it. While trophies being secondary for them, they still be there for people who will care. 

 

But as underground the thing could be, there is at least someone who really has put their soul into it. You want to know how to beat a certain boss? Somebody did it. And not only that. S/He tape it. And edited it so well that people like you and me could take advantage from his/her anonymous contribution to the world. Whatever game you can imagine, there's someone out ther who actually beat it. And probably twice. Maybe even has done a speedrun of that game. When you put and reconsider all this, trophy hunting becomes a matter of passion, taste and personal effort to do it with your time. There are really cazy people, and even more crazy and cool people that would willingly help you in this same quest many of us are in. 

Edited May 3, 2020 by Xenoblast91
Typos

[Quink666]

Friends of mine only plat games they really enjoy like Spiderman, GoW. Easy AAA plats. They can't be bothered getting plats in games they don't really enjoy. Unlike trophy hunters who would suck a dick for bronze trophy casuals only trophy hunt when it's a game worth it.

[Cassylvania]

Too many people play games casually for it to ever become mainstream. It's always been like that, though. Pokemon pushed the whole "Gotta catch 'em all!" thing back in the 90's, but I was the only person I know who actually did that. And for every hardcore competitive Pokemon player today, there are a hundred more who only know Pikachu from Pokemon GO.

 

Personally, I wish trophies in general were more approachable. I think too many developers put trophies in their games that no one outside of a trophy hunter would even consider or try. Stuff like beating Kingdom Come: Deliverance without killing anyone or speedrunning a game that isn't intended to be rushed. What's the point? I want to see more trophy lists that reflect the nature of the game. If the morality of killing people is a major part of the story or if you're already required to beat each level in a certain amount of time, then it makes sense to have a reward for those things in the game, but sometimes it feels trophies are just there because the developers couldn't be arsed to think.

[thefourfoldroot]

Some people say it’s meaningless, but that isn’t a good reason as finishing all in game tasks are meaningless.

However, because they are a meta task, and devs rarely take time to visually display them in game, they do have (stupidly) a reputation for not being a game task that the developers devise.

I also think it’s because most gamers just aren’t completionists for a start, and because another large section of gamers only care about playing and hanging out with their mates online, many wouldn’t even start the single player aspect of a game.

 

[TrophyChief]

1 hour ago, Quink666 said:

Unlike trophy hunters who would suck a dick for bronze trophy...

Um, no. Gold? Maybe ?

Mainstream, probably not. However, I do believe that trophy hunters and trophy hunting will increase over time. Some hunters fall off over time while others climb on board later, but the net result will increase as long as the community doesn't ruin it for those newcomers.

[ZoutjeNL]

The majority of the players just want to play games and move on. The patient that you require for the grinds or difficult trophies such as not dieing, speedrunning a game etc is too much for the majority. Most players find trophies a waste of time and pointless. 

[Arcesius]

I've been told once on this site that I'm not a trophy hunter because, and I quote:

 

Quote

Trophy Hunting, for the majority of people, is getting as many trophies as they could (and that's why they do the stacks) and climb the leaderboards to be in the Big Leagues (the first 5-10 places). The thing that you do it's not trophy hunting.

 

If that is your definition of trophy hunting, then it is not and will never be mainstream because I'm pretty sure that most players will agree that it is a huge waste of money and time (no offense, just my personal opinion). 

 

Now, if you allow for a broader definition, then while still not mainstream, I think there are more trophy hunters than only the people on this page. Most just don't go out of their way to get all trophies / achievements in every single game they play, but they might in games they've truly enjoyed. I know people in real life that are this way, but even well-known twitch streamers will get all achievements in certain games they play. You also very often find comments on trophy-unrelated youtube videos of people talking about the plat of the game in question. 

 

However, trophy hunting is not necessarily very entertaining to watch, so it's difficult to sell. It doesn't generate a huge audience, so it ain't lucrative for individuals or companies either (unless you are selling trophies on Ebay... seriously, people use those services...), so it will never become truly mainstream. 

 

 

[SeekNirvana]

Most people don't have the time to play games the conventional way; let alone completing extra, grindy ass goals.

[CrimsonMercury]

On 5/3/2020 at 10:44 AM, SeekNirvana said:

Most people don't have the time to play games the conventional way; let alone completing extra, grindy ass goals.

.

Edited January 18, 2021 by CrimsonMercury