wartech.jpgIn the immortal words of Thomas Falsetta “Sleep's for babies, gamers play all night,” and, in my journey to 10,000 achievement points before “Super Smash Bros. Brawl” comes out, it seems to be more of a reality week after week.

I think I’m actually forming an addiction to getting achievement points. The symptoms are becoming more and more obvious. For example, if, for some crazy reason I don’t get any points on a given day, I actually lay awake in bed at night, and, in some cases actually have to get out of bed and play, or else I can’t fall asleep.

Nighttime gaming has generally been my preference for many years now, and I’ve learned the hard way not to pick up a game in the morning if I actually have to be somewhere before noon (like school, or, more importantly, work). However, it has only been a rare case that I’ve actually been kept awake by a game, much less by something as unimportant as achievement points. This week that's what happened.

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dirt.jpgThe quest to 10,000 continues, and as I press on I am learning not only about the games, but about myself as well. As much as I love getting achievement points, there are some that just aren’t going to happen. I don’t have the time, energy, and in some cases mental capacity to handle getting some of these points. It’s just not going to happen.

Overall, this has been my best week so far, finally scoring 1,000 points in seven days, over the course of just two games, bringing my total since the challenge began to 2,250. “Halo 3” was completed (on normal mode for minimal points) and “DiRT” was pushed to 97% for a whole mess of points. The thing is, neither game (much like last week’s focus “BioShock”) will ever reach the full 1,000, it’s just impossible for the type of player I am. With the majority of my missing points in “Halo 3” falling into the multiplayer category, and one of “DiRT”’s achievements being “Drive 1,000 miles” it’s just impossible for me to complete them.

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mt_bioshock_ecoshock281×211.jpgTwo weeks in and things are not going as well as I had expected.

I completely understand that 10,000 achievement points in twelve weeks is a bit of a lofty goal, but I figured I’d be able to squeak out about 1,000 points a week for the first 10 weeks, and then be done with a fortnight to spare. It’s not looking like that’s going to happen. But, really, what difference does that make? You’re playing "Halo 3."

I’ve spent the last two weeks working my way through "BioShock." While it is easily one of the best games that I’ve played this year, it took me about a week longer than I expected to finish, and I didn’t even get the full 1,000 points, finishing with a respectable 950. I also chalked up a small handful of extra points from the Genesis classic, "Sonic the Hedgehog 2," and I ended the week with a meagerly fruitful hour or so of "Halo 3."

My total for the week clocks in at 690, and over the past two weeks I have a total of 1,250 points, which is clearly under my 2,000 point expectation, and which is resulting in me being forced reexamine my gameplay plan for the next 10 weeks.

These are the strategies I used:

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achievements1.jpgWhen one video game addiction gets in the way of another, things can really get ugly.

At the beginning of every game the player is presented with a challenge, a way to overcome it and an end goal. It’s a pretty tried-and-true formula that has been used for thousands of years now, in all different kinds of games. Sometimes, when people get bored (or a little ambitious) some people like to come up with their own challenges.

Here’s the thing:  I really like achievement points (I’m currently at 21,515) and I also really like "Smash Brothers" (so much so, that I’m considering going pro). I realized that these two passions of mine are about to go head to head, and I know in my heart, which one is going to win out. As much as I would like to go on collecting achievement points… cessation, thy name is Smash Bros. It will all come to an end on December 4th, the day "Super Smash Brothers Brawl" for the Wii is released. Before that day arrives, I would really like to increase my GamerScore to a point where I feel comfortable leaving it alone for a couple months while I begin my "Smash Brothers" training. So, I’ve come up with the following challenge: I won’t allow myself to play "Super Smash Brothers Brawl" until I have gotten 10,000 more achievement points. "SSBB" is the princess in my quest.

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