achievements have been a monumentally bad thing for gaming and culture

LOL, I’m sorry, what? :D

Please elaborate!

I like achievements. Outside the feeling of completion, they allow me:

• to try some challenges I would never have the idea to try (e.g. the great Trine 2 achievements)
• to decide when I am done with a game and can start up another.
• to feel a bit proud when you achieve something only 5% or other players did.

Thankfully achievements can typically be ignored, at least in single-player games that I play. So not sure what’s so radically bad about them.

But, the funniest achievements system that I’ve seen was in the original ‘Assetto Corsa’, the racing simulator. It goes like ‘win with this car on this track against these other cars’, and then seven hundred of these, vaguely mirroring the pseudo-career mode that the game has. I had a chuckle seeing that, and paid no attention to the achievements again. The cherry on top is that basically no one plays the original ‘career’, driving mod cars on mod tracks instead.

Can’t say that you’re wrong …