What if M$ sold achievements for MSP?

**Sully** · Joined: 12 Nov 2006 Posts: 4570 Location: Tampa, FL

Please don't turn this into a achievement debate. Some people go crazy for 'em, some people pursue them with mild fervor, and some people don't really care at all about them at all (which is where my interests fall).

I'm intrigued by how seriously some people take achievements- particularly people who are willing to have other people complete them or are willing to exploit a glitch/exploit to get an achievement they didn't actually earn. This got me wondering- would people pay MSP for achievements? I think they would and M$ might stand to make a ton of $$. I'm thinking 1 MSP per gamerscore, so a 50 point achievement would cost 50 MSP. Would this "cheapen" the achievement experience for you? Would this program be a success?

**snowyporpoise** · Joined: 17 Jul 2008 Posts: 1655 Location: Burlington, ON

Why the fuck would anyone do that? Achievements honestly mean nothing. Sure they are cool to show skill, but if you bought them, that just takes away any form of significance they have.
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**Maygs** · Joined: 23 Mar 2009 Posts: 62 Location: Australia

Isn't this illegal? Anyway, some guy gave me 3000 MSP for getting some tough GH3 achievements for him.

**CleverTangent** · Posted: Sat May 02, 2009 2:12 pm Post subject:

**Archang3L** · Posted: Sat May 02, 2009 2:22 pm Post subject:

It kind of goes against the whole principle of "achievement" points if you can purchase them at will.

Only one kind of gamer would ever bother to buy them - the gamerscore whore who rents easy games just for a quick +1000GS
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**DPooch** · Joined: 05 Feb 2008 Posts: 1651 Location: Pittsburgh, PA

The only possible benefits are glitched achievements or like online achievements that can't be obtained anymore from an online issue or a server being shut down.
And even this isn't a reason for doing it.
I see no usefulness at all in this. I might put down a couple bucks for like "survive all L4D campaigns on Expert" or something, and very difficult ones, but it just seems unworth it, and I didn't really get it myself.
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**THABEAST721** · Joined: 26 Dec 2007 Posts: 2000

People actually already do this. I get messages all the time saying they will pay me points to get the 750k achievement for them.
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**OnionPowder** · Posted: Sat May 02, 2009 3:20 pm Post subject:

To me, achievements have the thrill of trying to get them. Just getting achievements is taking away all the fun. So if people wanna waste their money and just buy the skill they don't have, fine with me. Good thing M$ hates that.
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**stubbscroll** · Joined: 19 Jul 2006 Posts: 532 Location: Norway

I'm afraid this would be a success if it happened, seeing how crazy some people can be with achievements. Also, as THABEAST says, it's already happening via direct member contact.

Also, there already exists DLC where this happens indirectly: extras that can be obtained in-game by playing the game and earning it (money, weapons etc), but that can be bought outright with DLC, and thus get closer to achievements with less work.

Some companies (especially EA) typically offer such DLC. For instance, in Need for Speed Underground, it's possible to buy cars with MSP instead of in-game money. In Godfather 1, in-game money (which is even increadibly easy to earn) can be bought with MSP. I've seen more examples of this, but I don't remember them right now.

However, 1 MSP = 1 GS would be a bad pricing scheme for MS. Difficult ones like certain "reach #1 at the leaderboard" achievements could probably be sold for a higher price.
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**Qarx** · Posted: Sat May 02, 2009 4:08 pm Post subject:

What about paying in order to unlock an achievement? You know, like paying to make one availible. It could range from easy to really, really hard. I think M$ would make loads with that idea.
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**inv4der** · Joined: 16 Sep 2007 Posts: 9662 Location: Meridian, ID

**diddin** · Joined: 08 Mar 2008 Posts: 1688 Location: Evanston, IL

Gamerscore sells, but who's buyin?
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**9001** · Joined: 03 Sep 2008 Posts: 3690 Location: North New Jersey

I actually thought about this but in reverse; I was thinking of an idea where you sell gamerscore for Microsoft points. But that would end up being bad.

**killzonedout** · Joined: 12 Jul 2008 Posts: 3061

I dunno. I've gotten offers of 1600 points for the SCC metallica achievement. It's nuts, and I don't approve.
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**stubbscroll** · Joined: 19 Jul 2006 Posts: 532 Location: Norway