Achievement (video games)
Unlike secrets, which traditionally provided some kind of direct benefit to the player in the form of easier gameplay (such as the warp pipe in Super Mario Bros.) or additional gameplay features (such as hidden weapons or levels in first-person shooters like Doom) even though they might have criteria similar to achievements in order to unlock, the narrative-independent nature of achievements allows them to be fulfilled without needing to provide the player with any direct, in-game benefit or additional feature.
The motivation for the player to gain achievements lies in maximizing their own general cross-title score (known as Gamerscore on Live, Trophy Level on PSN, and the Achievement Showcase for Steam User Profiles) and obtaining recognition for their performance due to the publication of their achievement/trophy profiles.
Challenges here may include a certain number of headshots or kills and are rewarded not only with the completion of the achievement but also a bonus item that can be equipped.
[10] Patches would be sent with a letter from the company, often written as if from a fictional character, like Pitfall Harry, congratulating the player on the achievement.
In 2007, Valve became the second large publisher to release a platform-based, multi-game achievement system for their Steam platform, eventually capturing a wide number of Windows, Mac OS X, Linux, and SteamOS based games.
[15] Apple added achievements to Game Center on October 12, 2011, with the release of the iOS 4, for mobile platform for iPhone, iPad, and iPod Touch.
[18] Kongregate, a browser games hosting site, features Badges, which earn the user points, similar to Xbox Live's Gamerscore and PlayStation Network's Trophy system.
It has no clearly defined victory condition aside from earning all 100 achievements, from the trivial ("move left", "click the play field") to the complex ("touch every square", "find and travel to three particular locations in order").
NSA information-gathering program XKeyscore uses achievements awarding "skilz" points to assist in training new analysts as a form of gamification of learning.
