Sony answers PS3 firmware 2.4 questions News

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"Trophies will make a noise when you earn them"

Cool, my heart does lift a little when I hear that lovely sound coming from my 360!

Good thing trophies aren't retroactive... would ruin the trophy system from day one if people could download saves from the net and get the trophies that way.

"Trophies will make a noise when you earn them"

Very innovative and a true next-gen feature ;)

Fair enough, making them retroactive would be a PITA and open to abuse.

But they should be compulsory in all forthcoming games IMO.

I know it's unlikely, but I'd love to have the trophy noise user-assignable, as I'd be straight on Major Nelsons blog for the 360 achievement noise! Like I say, ain't going to happen, but it is a great noise. Say what you like about Microsoft, they know their noises!

This "trophy" story that sony even talks about is the cheapest copy from the xbox patern they could ever do... I mean not only I dont care about the achievements personally but the fact that Sony is doing this is just plain stupid... Is this going to make me think that NOW PS3 is worth buying? Why dont they stop fucking wasting their time with shit and try to pay some companies for some real great games so i wont be feeling so lucky to only have my xbox? Wtf is wrong with them? Im a fucking gamer.... You cant sell me shit for pathetic attemptsreally. The Marketing stuff should have been all fired a couple of years ago as well. Known Sony issue.

Hasn't Three Speech cleared out, yet? That'll be the next thing that Sony can fix.

To be honest I see no reason as to why future multiplatform titles shouldnt feature trophies seeing as the 360 versions will have their achievements. All they need to do is transfer the awards over to give both games the same list.

And if M$ want to be a bunch of bitches and lock down certain achievements on certain games so they cant be duplicated on PS3 then the developer can still come out and create completely different rewards for both versions of the game. that was people with both consoles and therefore too much money can buy both versions of the game and get 2 lots of unique awards

I think Sony are right in not making the trophies mandatory because as we know from the Xbox 360 some games are better suited to Achievements than others.

Am I the only person in the world who thinks trophies and achievements are a total waste of time?

Hehe I hated it when I was on my Xbox trying to get an achievement and someone came online. It makes the same noise and you think you have finally unlocked it, only for your dreams to be shattered.

"Very innovative and a true next-gen feature ;) "

sucks to be you :(

What's the point of an achievement system if it's not mandatory?

@davisorle

Wow, you are really cheesed off considering you don't even have a PS3. Hardware and software companies have been copying each other for years.

I'm delighted we are finally getting these features on PS3.

What features though? In-game text messaging and a half arsed achievements system? Don't get me wrong, its a step in the right direction but its more of a shuffle than a step. I was expecting more.

el_pollo_diablo - Achievements are both a good and a bad thing. They're good in sense that they can motivate you to get more out of a game than you might do otherwise but at the same time they can ruin games, say, where they're tied in to the online modes. In my opinion, Achievements and Trophies should only be awarded for playing games offline. I'm less bothered by Achievements now anyway but it used to annoy me initially when games used to weigh the Achievements in favour of the online modes, something which I'm not really interested in playing, e.g. Tiger Woods 06.

So no chat or cross game invites. Still your trophies will make a noise so well worth the hype.

*Ping*

Trophy unlocked! :)

@Benno

What is half arsed about the achievements system? Only thing it lacks is PC access , which they are looking into. Other than that, it seems more or less a straight copy, with 'level' replacing 'gamerscore'.

And in-game messaging is a pretty important feature to me.

I'm just glad they weren't affected by the latest Home delay.

"I think Sony are right in not making the trophies mandatory because as we know from the Xbox 360 some games are better suited to Achievements than others."

And legally I belive they can't just change their requirements to publishers/developers now (1½ years after launch) and try to force trophy support into all new games. But they are propably trying to motivate developers to support trophies by making it as easy to implement as possible.
I'm sure most future PS3+360 multi-platform games will have it - no reason why not.

lol the PS3 doesnt have achievements so the xbots bash it...then they get it for free and everyone says "what's the point?"

looks more like ppl are bashing sony because they want too, rather than looking at what they are getting for free.

Its entirely optional, if you like it, play the games and aim for the trophies, if you dont like it dont bother with it!

"but at the same time they can ruin games"

No, they really cannot ruin any game. Achievements dont unlock anything except a few meaningless points on your gamertag, so you lose NOTHING of the game if you dont hit achievements.

Anybody know if trophies can be hidden from other users - a privacy setting like 360 has?

Personally I prefer to hide my achievements/trophies...

@Gaol

Yeah your right, I meant half-assed as in its not enforced or mandatory to be put into games.

But yea its pretty much a straight copy. In-game messaging, unless voiced, is a bit pants. Unless I have a keyboard I am much better off phoning my friends up or sending them a text message. All they need to add is a private chat system like Xbox Live, then everything falls into place.

@Benno: I wouldnt call it "half-assed" but I would also really like voice-messages like 360 has... faster than typing with a controller.

The problem I have with Achievements and now this Trophy business is that they encourage gamers to engage with each other competitively. That's all well and good for a hardcore market which granted MS have targeted from day one, but does it have to be a feature in all games? And does it have to be a mandatory feature on the gamer profile. Shouldn't gamers be given the choice to be involved in such a set up. Not everybody wants to be judged on their playing habits competitively.

@farticusmaximus - So you've never played an online game where people aren't playing the game properly because they're more interested in getting the Achievements then, either on their own or as part of a group? That's the ruining part I'm referring to. Of course, without the Achievements they'd have no reason to do it. OK so 'ruin' is perhaps too strong a word but they certainly can *spoil* games for others. I know because I've come across it several times myself. ;)

@farticusmaximus
"No, they really cannot ruin any game. Achievements dont unlock anything except a few meaningless points on your gamertag, so you lose NOTHING of the game if you dont hit achievements."

Are you kidding me? You've obviously never played Gears online...

EDIT: 15 seconds too late...

Thank you, zuljin! :)

@Rash..

Why? What possible impact does it have on you or anyone else in the universe if you DON'T go for achievements.

If you accidentally hit an achievement during play does a man in a grey suit stab a bunny in the eye? No, you get some points.

There is no 'problem' with trophies or achievements.

@ Rash'

I don't think so. To most normal people it's not willy waving "look at my score" it's ACHIEVEMENTS. Even my girlfriend feels proud when she unlocks them and feels she's accomplished something in the game. She cares not about getting (or who has) the bigger score and neither do I to be honest.

Only the hardest of the hardcore (and maybe children) truly give a crap about the actual score.

Oh, so some kid isnt playing the way you like online? Welcome to the internet.

There are people doing their own thing in every online game. Saying that achievements are bad because of some tard dicking about in gears online is complaining for the sake of complaining, plain and simple.

farticusmaximus & bad09: Darren illustrated the point perfectly, and what if the style of the game doesn't suit the feature? Flow for example wouldn't sit well IMO.

@ Rash'

To be honest I've never thought about, or noticed it. If people are playing for achievements online it hasn't ruined any online games I've played, even Gears.

farticusmaximus, I guess ultimately as the consoles go more mainstream I'm not convinced it's implementation is well suited for a such a broad demographic.

At least i'm not alone thinking trophies (like achievements) are totally useless and bring nothing interesting to gameing.

Call of Duty 4 had the achievements idea down perfectly, and Infinity Ward came out and said that they don't put online achievements in their games because (as said above) people change their game for the achievements thus ruining the experience.

I imagine that developers will put the Tophy system in their games going forward, I think the idea that Sony have of "levelling up" means that "trophy whores" (obviously the equivalent of the 360 "achievement whores") will want to play games with trophies. not necessarily saying they'll play it if its a shit game....actually if they're a trophy whore they will!

I hope they add trophies for Metal Gear Solid 4...

Would a Team ICO game suit such a competitive framework when the work is artistically driven?

Cool, an excuse to play all my games again. : )

I like many couldn't give a monkeys how many achievement points I have though but sometimes it gives you an excuse to vary what you play. If it wasn't for people hunting for achievements, many online games would now be as dead as a dodo now.

Just a bunch of bronze trophies for fl0w, I guess that would be appropriate.

In any case, small-scale games are never going to contribute to your level as much as large-scale ones. This is still better than the Gamerscore approach.

@farticusmaximus - I never said Achievements were bad though... I said that they have their pros and cons but, in my opinion, they do have a tendency to spoil online games whereas they wouldn't if they didn't have them at all. I don't expect you to agree with that, I'm just expressing what *I* think based on my own experiences. :P

No mandatory=fail

@farticusmaximus
No its not complaining for complainings sake. If a reward causes people to go solo in what is essentially a team game, then yes it ruins the game because I like playing in teams! In fact, its why I tend to buy team-oriented games.

Not to mention as soon as you attach a reward to something people will be much more inclined to cheat to get to it. I'm looking at Warhawk in this instance, with good people getting kicked, or even flag carriers getting kicked.

EDIT: And ditto, I didn't say achievements were bad, but they can detract from a game.

Referring to the Acheivements ruin online games discussion, I must say it does annoy me in Halo 3, especially in Rumble Pit games, where you get American teenagers(usually) constantly asking people to help them get their 'Overkill' achievement or some such. It's probably more prolific in Halo 3 as when you get all 1000 gamerpoints for the game you get a samurai sword on your back. It is an unusually strong incentive to get all the achievements, especially if you're a Ninja Gaiden fan - it is Ryu Hayabusa's Dragon sword no less! It's hardly an achievement though really when you have to go begging people in every game to help you get them...

I've never noticed it in Gears, but it would annoy me all the same. I wouldn't go as far as saying it ruins, or even spoils the game, for me it just gets on my nerves. As farticusmaximus says though, kids will always piss you off on Live, or PSN for that matter, there's no getting away from that really. Let's just hope this doesn't make them more vocal and annoying on PSN.

If a reward causes people to go solo iin what is essentially a team game, then yes it ruins the game because I like playing in teams!

If a developer makes a game that should played as a team game reward individualist behavior, then something must have gone wrong with the game design, isn't it?

This isn't a fundamental flaw in achievement schemes on it's own. It's more of a case of misdirection of developers when choosing what to reward.

"Would a Team ICO game suit such a competitive framework when the work is artistically driven?"

What is so competitive about 'Ding! Congratulations you completed the first level, have a trophy'?

Come to think of it, I did used to work with a guy who used to play with just friends online just to get achievements and rankings, but they were in there own games so it didn't affect anyone else. He asked me to play online with DOA4 and let each other pummel one another to get our ratings up (for the S rank etc) but I said no thanks, How could I judge my ranking with other players if I cheated and ranked up without earning it?

Achievements on 360 are dead good! hopefully this will add life to some ps3 games

lol the PS3 doesnt have achievements so the xbots bash it...then they get it for free and everyone says "what's the point?"

I'm pretty sure that Xbox achievements are free as well.