Dusting off the Cobwebs

Earlier this week I decided it was time. Time to come back to the Achievement Game.

This decision did not come easily. As much as I enjoy playing video games, a lot has changed for me over the last year. I recently had another child, work is still as demanding as ever, and I also am still committed to raiding on the weekends with Wiping with Style.

The first question I asked myself was if I had the time to play my beloved 360. The answer is I do, just not as much time as I would like. With my gaming time being limited I told myself I would have to make the most of it. I cant allow myself to get distracted or to sit idly on the dashboard for extended periods of time. I have to constantly be aware of that next achievement, so to ensure I stay focused and on track I have gone back to the trusted site of www.x360a.org. The Road Maps will help me be as efficient as possible and increase my achievement to time played ratio.

The second question I had to answer was how I was planning to tackle the task of reaching 100k. That was pretty easy for me to figure out as right now I have a pretty large backlog of video games I own. Some still need to be played for the first time(in the wrapper), and others that I need to complete. So my personal stash of games will get me started but I will eventually reactivate my GameFly account.

The third question I asked myself is probably the most important. How was I going to avoid burning out and quitting again? Well for starters, no more shit games. I know that will be harder said then done but I am going to try to avoid the garbage games, even if that means passing up an easy 1k. My thought process on this is that playing quality games will keep me coming back but will also allow me to build a list of games I can burn through should I ever enter another GSL (HOTBA Reunion!). I have decided to juggle no more then 3 games at a time as well. Like I said above I want to play as efficiently as possible. However, I plan on trying to have at least one game that has some sort of co-op available that way I can also use the time to game with my 6 year old. Today we started on Toy Story 3 and the four achievements I unlocked mean even more to me because they were completed with my son.

So that is my plan and I am going to do my best to stick to it. This week I have been working on Bulletstorm and managed to complete the Anarchy Master achievement with a friend. I finished the campaign, now I just need to go back and clean it up a bit. As mentioned Toy Story 3 is being worked on and I am going to flip a coin to decide on my next game to play. The candidates are COD:Black Ops and Bioshock 1. All in all this week was a good reintroduction back in to the achievement scene. As of this posting I have unlocked 21 achievements for 405 points. 100k will be mine......

March

The month has gotten off to a slow start due to some real life issues but its time to get energized and start scoring.

I should stay scoring at a decent pace this month and will hopefully make up some ground on my push to 100k. My plan of playing 4 games will keep me from getting bored but I have to be careful and remember to say hello to my Wife every once in a while. I just paid for her to get her hair done so that should earn me at least 3 weeks of game time right?

First up will be Boderlands. I heard a ton of great things about this game and Im really looking forward to playing this. My first play through will be strictly co-op. I will be playing with a good buddy of mine, eMoander, so party chat will be entertaining as well. Hopefully the game will live up to the high expectations I have in my mind about it.

HOTBA is back at it again with another horrible game. This month we will suffer through Fracture together. Im not sure if we will go for the 1500 multi-player games played acheevo but it would be a nice one to have and brag about....well maybe not. Im not sure if I will play the rest of the campaign yet. Im not really worried about my completion percentage right now so this will probably look horrible on my gamercard when I send it back to Gamefly.

When Im not making fun of Moander or knee deep in mindless boosting with HOTBA I will be playing Darksiders. Sadly this game kind of got pushed to the back burner last month, but I will make amends and finish at least one play through...

Now the game that will drive me nuts this month is Gears of War 2. I have made up my mind to finish up two more achievements in the game, which means I need to hit level 50. As of this posting Im at level 44. 50 is as far as I go then Im never touching this game again....or should I say until Cliffy B releases more dlc. So if anyone is down for some Guardian boosting holla at your boy!

Attack Plan In Place

With my 2009 goal already met I needed something new to keep me motivated to continue scoring for the remainder of the year. Actually, to keep me scoring until Modern Warfare 2 comes out.

My plan is somewhat of a ripoff of Thrawn's plan that he used during the summer, after the GSL had ended, but only slightly different. I am only going to focus on 3 games (2 retail, 1 arcade) from 3 different genres to keep it fresh and prevent burnout/boredom.

1. Dead Space (FPS/Horror): I have had this game from Gamefly for far to long and I need to finish this up. Im almost half way finished with my first play through and Im currently sitting at 205/1000. The game is fantastic and if you have not played it you need to take your ass over to your nearest Blockbuster and rent it now! This game came highly recomended to me from BL4CK SiLv4 (who has a new blog by the way http://silv4.blogspot.com/ ) and it has not disappointed.

2. Grand Theft Auto 4 (Sand Box): This game is sitting at an embarrassing 15/1000 (not counting DLC). For some reason I never got into this game, I guess Nico just wasnt my kind of guy so the game sat collecting dust. I don't know if Ill get the full 1k in this but any progress in this will be good progress for my completion percentage.

3. Feeding Frenzy (Arcade): 150/200. Only 3 achievements left in this game but they are time consuming. Still needing 40 thousand in the Food Bank, 1000 Sharks eaten, and 10 hours played. Ill work on this for a few minutes a day until completed. As of this posting my Food Bank is at 21k but unfortunately there is no way to track how many Sharks you eat or how many hours you play. Ill be glad to have this game completed.

Now I dont expect to stick to this plan 100% of the time but having this in place will keep me focused. I do plan on doing some multiplayer with friends and boosting when the opportunity presents itself.