Back in 2005, Xbox introduced Xbox Live Achievements, a metagame in which the cumulative score (Gamerscore) – spanned across games on every Xbox Live platform. Playing games is already fun, of course, but as any gamer knows, achievements add an extra layer of discovery, exploration and accomplishment that reinforces gameplay enjoyment.
With Xbox One, we’re breaking the mold again, and will be offering consumers actual tangible benefits from the Achievements system. What does that mean? Well, in addition to Gamerscore (which can only be earned through games), which will carry forward from Xbox 360 to Xbox One, users can now also get digital artwork, new maps, unlockable characters and temporary stat boosts. And guess what? It’s not limited to games. Achievements can also unlock other Xbox One apps such as video and music so you can get sneak-peek content, early access or subscription extensions.
There are two kinds of Achievements: achievements and challenges. Achievements are probably already familiar to most Xbox Live users. It’s a goal or activity you have to accomplish, and you get a reward once you do. Achievements can be locked at any time, whether it’s on a game’s launch day or three years later. A challenge also comprises a goal and a reward, but they’re time sensitive – you can only unlock them during their eligible time window.
Both are officially considered Xbox Live Achievements, so inherit many of the same benefits, such as winning rewards, saving to your achievement history and getting an icon to commemorate the event. One of the differences, however, is that challenges don’t give Gamerscore. Since they’re intentionally temporary, whereas achievements never expire, we want everyone to have the same opportunity to increase their Gamerscore. However, challenges can cross titles and can be unlocked by the community (community challenges usually exceed what a single player can accomplish in the given period of time).
And the new Achievements system is cloud powered, which makes it easy and consistent to run challenges across all players of a game at the same time. It also makes it possible for developers to add new achievements and challenges after the initial release of the game, which, among other things, means that you can get new achievements without always having to buy new content or download title updates. Developers could even involve the community in the achievement creation process!
For more details on the new Achievements system in Xbox One, check out this blog post.
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Jennifer Chen
Microsoft News Center Staff