10,000 Gamerpoints, the hard way..

So a year later, after playing pretty much every arcade game, and getting a majority of them, I officially crossed the line of "Sigh" - 10,002 gamerpoints for the Xbox360. The "Sigh," meaning one of two things:

Either 1) I could have concentrated on full retail copies and not been sucked by my temptress, the XBLA, or B), think of everything else I could have been doing- artwork, photography, making (more) love, volunteering, working, questing for the meaning of life and finding the answers to be too hard a pill to swallow (and realizing- DAMN, this is a long Mister Falcon sentence.) I could have even climbed a clocktower and started... nah, that's not a proper thing to share.

I realize this is a self-serving post/thread/thing, but it makes you think.. like the great thinkers... Aristotle.. Plato... Lincoln... Lennon (take your pick) .. and MaxShrek/Mills/Mills of the Serengeti..

I don't think I've broken 200 yet.

IMAGE(http://card.mygamercard.net/Sinatar.jpg)

Wow, congrats on crossing that threshold! Sometimes, when I'm not playing I get a little depressed because I realize that I'm literally wasting countless hours pushing pixels around on a screen and it does very little to better myself in the big scheme of things. This usually trigger to have mini-crises where I start to dwell on the time wasted and what I could have been doing instead. Then, I go play a game and I feel all better again. It's like crack!

Anyway, I recently heard that a gamertag reached the threshold of 1 million points (even though it's speculated that multiple users accessed the same tag). I don't have the link but it has some interesting stats about how many gamers were completed, the number of achievements, etc.

Sinatar wrote:

IMAGE(http://card.mygamercard.net/Sinatar.jpg)

I think you and Swat both have almost 15,000 points. I look at my friend's list and go "man, why am I in my own private section of numbers? do I play too much?"

IMAGE(http://card.mygamercard.net/Swat%20R2.jpg)

IMAGE(http://card.mygamercard.net/iNei.png)

I've got like 1637...guess that equates to having a small e-penis.

I have the game journalist standard of sub-5000 points. I just don't really care about them, although I DO like the occasional affirmation of my awesomeness.

"You mean that was the 100th time I jumped off a wall? I AM awesome!"

I don't care about my score, it is what it is because I play so many damn games and I at the very least finish them all.

Last time I checked, my gamerscore was "5". I played Hexic enough to unlock one of the achievements.

That 360 sure does make a great DVD player, though!

Does it strike anyone else as funny that Swat is a "Pro" gamer but Sinatar considers himself "Recreational"?

I think I'm getting close to 2000 but the only Arcade game I own is Doom. Oh and Hexic. I attribute the low points mostly to COD2 having so few opportunities to get points and games like Dead Rising and Oblivion having lots of opportunities but crashing horribly on me all the time. The only game that felt fair to me in the points department was GRAW.

My Gamerscore..... a big fat zero. Someday I will get a 360, hook it in my office where the kids won't see the gore and work towards my lifelong goal of taking it to 11. Because, it's 11.

MaxShrek wrote:

think of everything else I could have been doing- artwork, photography, making (more) love, volunteering, working, questing for the meaning of life and finding the answers to be too hard a pill to swallow

But my real point is, yeah, I hear you. I've spent a lot of hours on games and the penchant for mdoern games to include a timer makes it all the easier to know how much time that is. But, if we weren't gaming, would we really be writing novels, developing new antibiotics or saving the world from killer bees? Or is it more likely we'd just watch more TV and movies?

That said, I need to get back into some sort of creative pursuit.

The overall Gamer Score really only means you play the 360 more than other platforms. I game primarily on the 360 so the number's higher than people who give all their consoles equal lovin.

Sure, it's cool to see it grow over time, and who's at the top of your list with you (Sinitar and Nei!), but for me, individual achievements are where it's at. Anyone can complete a game, but there are some achievements which are damn tough to come by, and anyone on my list who gets them makes me go "damn, I can't believe they f*ckin did that!"

One of the biggest things I like about them has absolutely nothing to do with competition. I like how after a year, the Xbox is compiling my gaming history. I can see a visual representation of what games I was playing at a certain snapshot of time. It's pretty cool to wax nostalgic and even think about going back to "wrap em up" or replay them again on a lazy Sunday.

Plus I just love the sound of that "puuhlunk!" sound whenever I get one.

Swat wrote:

Plus I just love the sound of that "puuhlunk!" sound whenever I get one.

I like that too but wouldn't it be cool to have the Zelda "just found a secret" chime instead!

Chiggie Von Richthofen wrote:

Does it strike anyone else as funny that Swat is a "Pro" gamer but Sinatar considers himself "Recreational"?

I think I put myself at Pro because I was playing a lot of Halo 2 at the time, and I wanted some really intense matches. Instead of playing with people who wanted to play a game of "get high and crash the Warthogs together", I was looking for a bit more teamwork. In the end, I was still stuck with the same 13 year old boys who sounded like girls, but cursed like Navy Seals

Swat wrote:

One of the biggest things I like about them has absolutely nothing to do with competition. I like how after a year, the Xbox is compiling my gaming history. I can see a visual representation of what games I was playing at a certain snapshot of time. It's pretty cool to wax nostalgic and even think about going back to "wrap em up" or replay them again on a lazy Sunday.

I agree. I feel like Microsoft is writing a little gaming diary for me, and I can look back over it as time goes by.

Funny, I was just thinking about this stuff today. GET OUT OF MY HEAD!

93_confirmed wrote:

Anyway, I recently heard that a gamertag reached the threshold of 1 million points

Given that games give a max of 1000 points, unless I've missed a lot of releases I don't see how that's possible. I do remember a long time ago, shortly after release I think, that there was some bug and someone had an insane number of points. It was patched and fixed though.

Me, I just broke 2000 the other day.

I finally broke 2000 but it's only because of Viva Pinata. I'm an achievement whore.

I like to think that the achievement sound is that of the last nazi in a level's body hitting the ground.

LiquidMantis wrote:
93_confirmed wrote:

Anyway, I recently heard that a gamertag reached the threshold of 1 million points

Given that games give a max of 1000 points, unless I've missed a lot of releases I don't see how that's possible. I do remember a long time ago, shortly after release I think, that there was some bug and someone had an insane number of points. It was patched and fixed though.

Yeah, actually only this week someone was able to brake 100,000gp mark.

I broke the 10,000 mark a week ago. Rainbow Six, Gears, and Call of Duty gave me the push I needed.

I like how Microsoft is compiling a record of my every gaming move, correlating it with other gamers, plotting their next move to get their hooks into my wallet.

The overachiever in me now wants an XBox360 thanks to this thread...

I used to think the points were what you used to buy arcade games. I was sad to find out that wasn't the case.

I am at 635 points right now, only had the Xbox a month.

I broke 5k a couple weeks ago but it's been pretty much stationary since then.

I find that I have far higher points in the games I own and have played than most people on my list but that I don't play nearly as many games in total.

It's a fun thing to look at but really pretty worthless.

Thin_J wrote:

It's a fun thing to look at but really pretty worthless.

I don't think it's worthless. I love comparing my game Achievement scores to everyone else's.

A game where I have a higher score than someone else?

That's a win.

A game where someone else has a higher score than me?

That's a game I'm not finished playing yet.

IMAGE(http://card.mygamercard.net/Legion%20SB.jpg)

On my list, only Sinatar, Swat, and Nei have a higher overall score. Just wait until final projects are over, fools!

Thin_J wrote:

It's a fun thing to look at but really pretty worthless.

I think the points are worthless, but the achievements themselves are quite cool. They often times will have me do something in a game I wouldn't have even thought of.

Exactly, like playing Call of Duty 2 on Veteran. If it wasn't for achievements I probably would have gone the typical "medium" route, but I would have missed out on one of the most intense gaming experiences ever. It's a nice way of letting the devs say "you know, you could just plow through this, but have you noticed this cool thing we also have you can try out?"

Try Quake IV on the highest difficulty. I traded it in because it frustrated me so damn much. I think when it's under $20 I'll pick it up and finish the thing.

Swat wrote:

Exactly, like playing Call of Duty 2 on Veteran. If it wasn't for achievements I probably would have gone the typical "medium" route, but I would have missed out on one of the most intense gaming experiences ever. It's a nice way of letting the devs say "you know, you could just plow through this, but have you noticed this cool thing we also have you can try out?"

Same here. After seeing how many points were locked away in Veteran I gave it a shot to see just how hard it was. A few levels in and the points are nothing, it has become a personal mission to route out every Nazi from Moscow to El Alamein. That's still probably the coolest experience on the 360 so far. Too bad, Fritz, we thaw you out in the Spring!

I only have 875. Oh well. One day I will get past 1000.