Achievements, last time played and hours of play

[Ikagura]

This is probably just me but these are the kind of things that kinda make me anxious each time I play a game (almost triggering my OCD) instead of being just able to enjoy the games.

I don't want to fill the time by idling and I feel like I must note each time it was the last I played before I replay a game after a long time.

Achievements I can ignore them but I cannot act as if they don't exist.

It felt much simpler before when you didn't have to worry about fulfilling the hours of play, not having any "last time played" note nor any achievements, you just enjoy the game you wanna play.

 

[Cris_Agev]

I'm out of the loop since I haven't played with steam for years but why do you need or feel that you need to fulfill a certain amount of playtime?
My reasons at that time were different, I didn't like them because I didn't want people thinking I had no life lol.

 

[Yousef]

Saaaame I panic heavy when I see “last played” and never really liked how a lot of games calculate playtime like cmon man let me PAUSE the time while I PAUSE the game it’s so cruel to count idle time when I’m LITERALLY pausing and not idling cmon game devs they’re not the same thing

 

[VampireLord1024VampireLord1024's icon]

I haven't played any games on consoles where achievements are a thing in a few years.

 

[bjork]

The only time I kept watch of a 'last played' was Stanley Parable because it had that achievement where you got it by not playing for five years. Turns out I forgot about it and it was actually six years when I finally played again, heh. As for time played, I think a couple of 360 games had achievements for that and I got them (iirc there were ones in Game Room and also one for 50 hours in Viva Pinata, which I idled about 30 hours for).

I like achievements if they make sense, but sometimes they're so oddly specific. Powerwash Simulator has some that are like "clean this object first" but you'd never normally play that way. Or if there's a ton of online ones, I generally don't like that. I have two remaining in fallout 76 but don't play with anyone, so I'm trying to recruit a buddy to do it with me but it hasn't happened yet.

I liked playing pre-all of that, but I don't mind it so much that this stuff exists now. I just wish it were better implemented universally.

 

[Logi]

i only pay attention to achievements and time played when i'm doing retro achievements stuff and only when i've played the game before and i'm playing just for achievements

 

[DunkeyKong]

I've played with retroachievements but I don't think about it really, because most of the games are worth playing without achievement (they're just that good)

 

[TheGreatExplode]

I like seeing the time played for each game and just how many hours of my life that have been wasted on a game lol. I don't care about achievements though because most of the time, getting all of them is too much effort than what it's worth.

 

[RageBurner]

I really hate these kinds of tracking mechanisms and tend to disable them where I can (emulators) and ignore them where I cannot (digital storefronts).

 

[SkunkyBeaumont]

I tend to live stream my gaming sessions with retroachivements turned on and shit. I find having a audience helps keep me honest, but since I almost exclusively play retro games, and freeware ports and shit, I have to willingly engage with them to get them in the first place. I love retroachivements, and have actually cleared my achievements so they can pop in my live streams on games I tinkered with off stream.

 

[Waffles's iconWaffles]

I haven't touched my Steam account since 2014, so I definitely haven't made much progress there XD

 

[Infasis]

I actually really like that about achievements. It's like a scrapbook of what I played, when, and even what days, and time I beat certain bosses and stuff. I'll often clearly remember playing games with people, and other things that happened that day, or during that time, but without achievements I couldn't even tell you what year it was. I guess, I just use them more like photographs than any real "achievement", but I like that about them.

(I wish trophies or something existed for GameCube. I have so many memories playing that with loved ones, but my memory card with all the Animal Crossing letters we wrote each other, and stuff is long gone.)

 

[SkunkyBeaumont]

I actually really like that about achievements. It's like a scrapbook of what I played, when, and even what days, and time I beat certain bosses and stuff. I'll often clearly remember playing games with people, and other things that happened that day, or during that time, but without achievements I couldn't even tell you what year it was. I guess, I just use them more like photographs than any real "achievement", but I like that about them.

(I wish trophies or something existed for GameCube. I have so many memories playing that with loved ones, but my memory card with all the Animal Crossing letters we wrote each other, and stuff is long gone.)

https://retroachievements.org/

 

[Ikagura]

Saaaame I panic heavy when I see “last played” and never really liked how a lot of games calculate playtime like cmon man let me PAUSE the time while I PAUSE the game it’s so cruel to count idle time when I’m LITERALLY pausing and not idling cmon game devs they’re not the same thing

Yes, aside from speedrunning I don't see the need to have the timer in the menu.

Even game saves should only count the actual in-game timer.

That's why I go back in the home menu on the Switch or quit the game asap if I need to do something like going outside or have dinner.