MS states rules for gamerpoints

By Tom Bramwell Published 2 February, 2007

Inc. downloads, max is now 1250.

What with all the whoring of gamerpoints lately (Kristan "840 from Open Season" Reed), Microsoft has decided to clarify the guidelines it issues to developers - revealing that downloadable content could account for as many as 250 additional points in future.

All disc-based games must offer 1000 as the base amount, Microsoft says, although a publisher is allowed to deliver a portion of this (it doesn't specify) via free add-on content. Note the "free" bit. Meanwhile, Xbox Live Arcade games have to offer 200 points.

Downloadable content - whether it's premium or free add-ons - may then account for up to 250 additional points in the case of boxed games, while Live Arcade titles are allowed to offer another 50.

Microsoft hopes that by clarifying the borders, so to speak, we will see a bit more consistency across future releases. "A perfect example of this is the recent release of Crackdown, which has delivered 900 Gamerscore today on the retail game disc," a spokesperson said. "The remaining Gamerscore in Crackdown will be made available, for free, via a future content update."

Fair enough then, but surely the problem with gamerpoints isn't that the amounts are inconsistent, but rather that developers are inconsistent about the feats involved in obtaining them? Compare the lengths one has to go to get 1000 points in King Kong to the equivalent feat in Ridge Racer 6, for example.

What do you reckon, readers? What should Microsoft be doing with gamerpoints?

Picture of Tom.

About Tom Bramwell

Tom is Operations director of Eurogamer Network and Editor-at-Large of Eurogamer.net. He joined the company in February 2000.

Read more articles from Tom by visiting the Tom Bramwell archive page.

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Comments (46) Latest comment 5 years ago

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  • Wash #1 5 years ago

    Simple, every other publisher should be allowed 1000, whereas EA the dumb bastards that they are should be limited to 100.

  • MrFlintBlackman #2 5 years ago

    Points for online play is getting out of hand.............simply because either the points are too hard or the game isn't really that good online.

    More single player points, that you earn by doing FUN things! cannot stress this enough it must be FUN!!!!

  • ZuluHero #3 5 years ago

    Agreed, some of the gamerpoints in Dead Rising were a blast to get :)

  • spidermanalf #4 5 years ago

    I hate the online gamerpoints, why put up with a load of plebs, just to get a few points, does my head in!

  • mattigan #5 5 years ago

    Probably less than 200 of my gamerscore is from online stuff, I just can't be arsed with it, online for me is the bit I have a go on after I've completed the single player campaigns, and by that time I've usually had enough of the game and whack it on Ebay.

    Gamerpoints should be much more focused on the offline portion of the game IMO, THP8 is a good example of this, although some of P8's achievements are rediculously hard to get.

  • kaosridder #6 5 years ago

    YES. Hopefully they will add some to lumines. Right know they are useless. I want an achievement for doing patterns, damnit :(
    Edited by 1 at 02/02/07 @ 09:14

  • mkreku #7 5 years ago

    Gamerpoints is a stupid idea to begin with. The only thing it does is make people buy crappy games they don't even like just to be able to harvest points.. that doesn't actually DO anything. People are f-cking sheep, being led by Microsoft to wherever they want you to go.

    I LOVE online leaderboards (for each individual game). I HATE gamerpoints.

  • Scimarad #8 5 years ago

    Why the hell do people care about gamerpoints? Surely you play a game because you enjoy it, not becaues you want to extract the maximum amount of points from it - It's not as if you get anything for them...

  • Rambaldi #9 5 years ago

    @mkreku

    "The only thing it does is make people buy crappy games they don't even like just to be able to harvest points"

    I think that's a rather narrow minded view of what Gamerpoints are for. Sure, some pople get obsessed wheras others just have a bit of fun. I don't play ANY game I think is crap and won't play ANY game once I tire of it, whether that's at 50 points or 950 points. I set my own targets: 31k by my 31st birthday - 4 months and 1500 points to go:)

    I agree about the online vibe. I've gone off playing online and some of the online achievements require a stupid amount of time and effort to unlock. What if you buy a game that's getting on a bit and no-one's playing it anymore?

    There should be a set balance, say 80:20 between offline and online (unless it's an MMO or something) and someone needs to have a word with Japanese developers about just how much of your life you're supposed to invest in a game to get ANY kind of points. I mean, 40 hours in RR6 for just over 350 points? Come on, really.

  • homerramone #10 5 years ago

    I reckon they should only let you see your friends in online scoreboards - cos then there would be no reason for the people that cheat to get to the top of the scoreboards to cheat - since the only people that will see the result of your handiwork are friends, its means theres no point in doing so.

  • ZuluHero #11 5 years ago

    i like gamerpoints - if only to compare how well im doing against all my friends when we all buy the same game. It adds a bit of replayability to a game, albeit small ;)

  • Kiigan #12 5 years ago

    Achievements for downloadable content is a good idea - I might have been more tempted by the Lumines Live downloads if there'd been some fun or interesting achievements to aim for.

  • udat #13 5 years ago

    Get nothing for Gamerpoints? Surely people with the most points are feted as Gods? Women worship them wherever they walk and men buy them beer in every pub...

    No?

  • DanWhitehead #14 5 years ago

    I like Gamerpoints not because they're an excuse to waggle your games-organ in the face of others, but because when deployed correctly they encourage you to get the most out of your games. So much so that playing games that don't reward exploration or advancement now seems a bit deflating.

    The consistency definitely needs to be addressed with regard to what you need to do to earn them though. F.E.A.R is another tight-fisted bastard - graciously granting you 15 points here and there as you slog through the game, and saving all the big scores for nonsense like "Play 5,000 Xbox Live deathmatches against people from no less than three countries, and score 500 headshots in each, while juggling live puppies".

  • Aretak #15 5 years ago

    "Simple, every other publisher should be allowed 1000, whereas EA the dumb bastards that they are should be limited to 100."

    The 500 points for completing Challenge mode in World Cup '06 were an absoloute bitch to get.

  • EmiliasHorse #16 5 years ago

    I love the gamerpoint system. You get a buzz when you unlock the score you have been striving for, and you get a permanent record should any of your friends care to have a gander at your game records. Brilliant

  • OnlyMe #17 5 years ago

    I don't understand why they don't just let you trade in gamerpoints for MS Points, that you can buy stuff for. It's perfect for business, they'll sell more games, because people will want to play more games to gather gamerpoints - and this time it's an actual motive! I know I would spend money (and time) on games if I could use the gamerpoints for anything. Right now, I just don't give a shit about them. Ok, maybe 13 year old nerds think it's "cool", and gets credits in their "gang" for having a lot of points, but for the mature it's just pointless.

  • LeD #18 5 years ago

    I don't care too much about the points themselves, but I do like my Achievements. As the box keeps a record of what you've done, it's just nice to be able to go back on a game and see that you finished it on hard, that you managed to collect all the secret items, that sort of thing.

  • Tyronne #19 5 years ago

    I could not care less for the points system at the moment,it does nothing whatsoever in my mind and until it actually has a purpose or you can do things with them they will continue to go way under my gaming radar.

    What they should do with them...give them a reason for being.

  • EmiliasHorse #20 5 years ago

    In fact its so good even Sony agree.

  • DanWhitehead #21 5 years ago

    "I don't understand why they don't just let you trade in gamerpoints for MS Points, that you can buy stuff for. It's perfect for business, they'll sell more games, because people will want to play more games to gather gamerpoints - and this time it's an actual motive!"

    That would screw up the Live Arcade business model though. Gamerpoints have no monetary value to Microsoft, so they'd be essentially giving away the content for free. A percentage of people might buy more games to get more Gamerpoints, but there's no guarantee that they'll buy first party games, in which case Microsoft's only gain is a tiny fraction of their cut of the third party sale and a (potential) rise in 360 software sales.

    So in that regard it's far from "perfect" for business, since you're swapping a straightforward transaction (buy MSpoints from Microsoft, use them to purchase downloads from Microsoft) for a more diffuse transaction where the benefits are less obvious, and probably negligible in nature.

    Factor in the numerous ways of cheating to beef up your points, and it really doesn't make sense.

  • Rambaldi #22 5 years ago

    People who think Gamerpoints are a waste of time either:

    a) Never had a sticker album as a kid
    b) Got old and boring real quick
    c) Have naff all points

    If all of the above apply: hit yourself with a large, blunt instrument
    Edited by 1 at 02/02/07 @ 09:52

  • Zomoniac #23 5 years ago

    Gamerpoints rock, and anyone who says otherwise is wrong. Yes, there are ludicrous examples of bad gamerpointage (you can get 600+ in NBA Live 06 by picking a good team and simulating every match, takes about 20 minutes!), but how many people would've experienced the brilliance of COD2 in veteran, in which it's a better game, tenfold, were it not for the achievements? Then there's PDZ, where 950 of the points are for multiplayer, not unlike FEAR, which gives you about ten points for finishing it. TDU has great achievements too, even though it's an MMO, the bulk are for progressing through single-player, and the Viva Pinata ones are ace. I like achievements with thought, and yes an 80:20 SP/MP split would be ideal (the Lost Planet ones seem good, about 300 for finishing it, 200 for getting all the target markers, 150 for finishing it on easy, 150 for defeating optional bosses and 200 for online). I'm just ranting now. To summarise, achievements rock if they're good.

  • Jabbaa #24 5 years ago

    i like the gamerpoints. Fair enough some of the online achievements are tedious but i have certainly been through most of my games more than I would have to just hoover up those last few points. Dont see any other reason to do the CalofDuty games on veteran difficulty for example as they are ridiculously hard in places. This new extension is surely mainly for the Oblivion expansion pack. Possibly dowloads of the Knights of the Nine pack werent what they expected and so this bigger, more expensive pack gets this extra hook.

  • pinhead #25 5 years ago

    I like the concept of gamerpoints. However it does let you know how much spare time people are spending on their 360's. My gamerscore currently suggests that the girlfriend is encroaching on too much of my spare time!

    /makes note to dump her (not really)

    Secondly, yes online gaming just to collect points is a waste of time. I cannot remember how many times I have switched off the 360 in disgust at some of the antics of the US based compadres with R6. This is why the whole Halo3 beta thing is just not interesting for me. A good co-op online game though is fantastic (gears, R6, GRAW2(?))

    /looks forward to mass effect
    Edited by 1 at 02/02/07 @ 10:07

  • polar #26 5 years ago

    I agree that online gamerpoints just aren't worth the effort at all. 800 points for offline, 200 for online seems fair to me.

  • Vice.Destroyer #27 5 years ago

    Gamerpoints are obviously contentious. Sort of like marmite. I never realised how badly I got drawn into the (pointless) gamerscore race, until I found http://www.mygamercard.ne t and its global leaderboard that you can filter, so that you display only certain countries. (It annoys me no end that I am only 1845th in the UK. Out of 100,000 registeresd users).

    And [link url=http://www.360voice.com,]http://www.360voice.com, [/link] for some reason another really quirky cool site that wouldn't be possible without gamerscore points.

    But in regards to the extra achievements you can get via downloadable content, let's see what happens. Personally, I think that I will just not pay for it. It was the same feeling I had whilst playing The Godfather and finding that if I wanted Level 4 upgrades for my weapons, I had to pay actual money for it. I can get my head around paying money for an extra level. But weapons?

    Hopefully I'll feel the same about paying for the priviledge of earning more achievements.

  • Xerx3s #28 5 years ago

    Meh. My gamerscore is far below the 4k mark but when I compare it to most people, I usually have more than doubled their gs per game.

    I thought the achievements in oblivion where brilliant. You really go out of your way to get them all and you really get the feeling that you earned them.

    Halo 3 + legendary + achievements = win.

  • ralphwolfenstein #29 5 years ago

    How much you care about your gamerscore is how you will be judged come the revolution. The more MS do to regulate them, the more meaningful they will become, and therefore less useful as what they currently are - a barometer for obsessive compulsive disorder

    Please let publisher's continue to offer the full 1000 points for merely booting up a kids title. Let the gamerwhores froth their rage acrosss the internet, and as they do so, let them glimpse their own reflection in the monitor and ask themselves where their lives went so wrong...

    If unbalanced gamerscore thresholds make people buy crappy games just so they can harvest points, I'd say those people deserved to be robbed of every last little penny

  • jonsaan #30 5 years ago

    Well it's not always easy to get points in 'kids' games. Lego Star Wars 2 is tough to get em. And Sonic the Hedgehog has yet to give me and my son a single achievement point after about 10 hours play.

  • trousers #31 5 years ago

    "THP8 is a good example of this, although some of P8's achievements are rediculously hard to get."

    http://www .rediculous.co.uk/carpenters.htm

  • Peew971 #32 5 years ago

    To people who actually own a 360 and a PS3: Does it fill weird to play a PS3 game with no achievements? I remember playing SC Double Agent and one of the objectives was to collect informations on JBA members all along the game only to realise at the end that the only purpose of that mission was to get an achievement. I thought that was ace and it wasn't an easy job. On PS3, there would be no point in doing this, unless Ubisoft add some unlockable. I'm not having a go at PS3 there, just asking people who own it, out of curiosity

  • trevd72 #33 5 years ago

    i have actually used the gamepoints to get a little extra out of my games before i get shot of them but like others have said they are far from consistent. I think i have close to 900 for COD3 but only 395 for R6:V. Fear gaveeven less, you got something like 5 points for finishing long levels and most of its points are in the multiplayer which is not too hot and not too popular. battlefields achievments were fun. How can it be fixed though to that its even and rewarding across the board.

    I think when they are attached to the mulitplayer side of stuff it devalues the whole purpose, not all games are worth playing online when compared to R6:V or Halo. i am sure there is an achievement in R6:V about hosting a full 16 play game, what is that all about.

    I think they should set a ratio for the points based on progression, skill, moments where you are in the zone/luck (in fps 5 kills in 20 seconds.) and secret stuff. 50% should be set for progression though.

  • jamesbee #34 5 years ago

    @Truk

    What is no less of an achievement? Thats one of the great things, the developer breaks the game down into objectives that would never exisit in your head without the influance to do them via the points system.

    Why should we care you might ask? Because it encourages you to get more fun and play out of the game and play it in ways you never would have considered. I think they are brilliant and anyone who doesn't agree has never heard that sound, you know the sound I mean!

    I would argue they are worth more to the advancement of gameplay than any single feature from the other consoles.

  • Skooch #35 5 years ago

    Whatever your viewpoint on GP's, they have spawned a community of gamers striving to achieve them, for whatever reasons. On this basis, they are a fantastic idea by MS.

    People complain that they don't mean anything, that they aren't worth anything - but these people are missing the point. To Gamer score whores any game is worth rinsing for points, and they are 'competing' against people who feel the same way. GP's provide irrefutable evidence of a gamers achievement in a certain game - it is a way of proving that yes, you have completed Gears on Insane etc. Before GP's gamers could boast about what they have done, without being able to PROVE it. Yes, there are cheats who exploit game saves etc. but from what I can tell this is pretty limited to hard core geeks, and is not symptomatic of the vast majority of the 360 user base.

    For me personally, it doesn't matter that EA games can be whored for points. I pride myself on specific achievements and specific titles. My total gamerscore is average, but I have some specific achievements that are great for bragging rights.

    If you don't care about GP's, then there's no need to slag them off. If you do, then they are a great tool for some fun competitiveness with mates.

  • Rambaldi #36 5 years ago

    I have to say that a factor in my decision over a Wii or PS3 is: "but I won't get any gamerscore for my time...:("

    Either I'm sad or MS are very, very clever.

  • kangarootoo #37 5 years ago

    @MrFlintBlackman

    Absolutely. The number of achoevements in RB6:V that I can only obtain if I step into the hideous realm of ranked matches is pretty poor. If I wanted to be shouted at by crazy people I'd go and start a fire in an asylum.

    To clarify however, I don't give a rats ass about the points. I'm with LeD, achievements per game interest me but the points that result therefrom are about as valuable in my life as an itchy bum.

    Rambaldi, you missed "d) have a sense of reality and context" off your list.

    As for complaining about the consistency of how different developers award points... shame on you Tom. Surely you can see that trying to balance something so very subjective is akin (if not more futile) than the arguments about review scores on wholly different games that keep popping up on here. Your comparison of KK and RR6 is in fact a perfect example of exactly that (what if someone rocks at driving games but can't control an FPS to save their life, or vice versa). Difficulty and effort are not SI units.

  • kangarootoo #38 5 years ago

    @Rambaldi

    Both

    ;)

  • Mr_Brown #39 5 years ago

    I like the idea of gamerpoints. Without gamerpoints would Dead Rising be half as good? P1robably. I'm not too bothered about my overall gamerscore but its fun and motivating to have acheivements to chase, with varying degrees of difficulties.

    Saying that, the achievment for being number one on the online ranking for GRAW is feats I'd like to avoid in future, theres no way 99% of people are going to be able to acheive that. So why do it?

  • Rambaldi #40 5 years ago

    @kangarootoo

    "Rambaldi, you missed "d) have a sense of reality and context" off your list."

    Nope, that was carefuly worded as b) Got old and boring real quick ;)

  • kangarootoo #41 5 years ago

    Doh!

  • RexRunti #42 5 years ago

    I think there is a big difference between acheivements and gamerpoints. The achievements are aimed at doing specific things within the game, some good (survive for 60s without firing a shot) some bad (become the best online player in the world). Whereas the points you receive for each acheivement are meant to allow for a comparison across games. However this doesn't always work as getting 1000 points in say Hitman is a lot harder then King Kong. That said when someone on your friends list has 10 more points than you, you do start looking for an easy 20pointer or download something from XBLA.

    In short achievements add to the replayability of a game, may even make you play in a different way and add to bragging rights or humiliation (think 0point acheivemnts in DOA). Gamerpoints do not add anything to the game but add to your overall live experience by increasing competion and allowing you to get a (very broad) ballpark figure of how good/hardcore someone you never met is.

  • miiiguel #43 5 years ago

    I don't understand what's the problem of some gamerpoints beeing (much) more easy than others.
    We (gamers) all know which ones are cooler than others. It's not much a numeric value (although it's kinda nice to have > 20k ;) ), but more a quality "thing".

  • BlondOwl #44 5 years ago

    Screw gamerpoints it's silly go grab some XP in WoW instead...

  • sanctusmortis #45 5 years ago

    They do say the extra 100 points HAVE to be available through a FREE add-on, though.

    The difference between the Achievement/Gamerscore system and before is now you have evidence. Before, you could say "I finished x, it was easy" and someone would say "prove it". And on some games, you simply can't; FF games you can, for example (it keeps a time log, etc), and Halo too (tracks what levels are completed on what difficulty) - but what about your brag as to your headshot percentage? Pretty easy to prove when you have a 100 Headshots achievement, earned after x time on day x and time x.

    I certainly would never have tried for Genocide in Dead Rising if it wasn't an achievement. Who would go out of their way to kill that many? Why would you level up to level 9 with all the characters in Ninety Nine Nights if it wasn't an achievement? And why the Hell else would you buy a movie tie-in game or EA Sports title?!?

  • Machetazo #46 5 years ago

    re: MrFlintBlackman - I agree with your point about online-only points. Particularly because that implies that an online following needs to exist for that title, for you to be able to get those points...

    Ta, mattigan, for reminding me about Mr. Hawk and his not-so MTV'd project, too. :)

    re: ZuluHero - I was just surprised that I got an achievement (which I display with pride) for THAT! I just wanted to try it, didn't think our roving reporter friend would even clear the rail, but my goodness, what'd you know...scant seconds of FLIGHT, lol! For this endeavour, I got an achievement. and a smile. :)

    I thought that achievements were meant to be awarded for achievements in the game, milestones and so, yes; but also for exploring the game and spending time playing it the way you like? Rewarding fairly innovative play styles and such (that from the maker's perspective delivers the added win, of keeping their disc in the console longer.) Crackdown should be good for the latter category.