Achievement Unlocked 03.28.08: Dude, Where's Your Gamerscore?

Posted by Rod Oracheski on 03.28.2008

Microsoft dropped the hammer on gamers who, through a variety of exploits, cheated their way to grossly inflated Gamerscores. That includes several of the most 'high profile' Gamerscore holders, like... Well that would be telling, wouldn't it?




I'm not sure if I used this header in a previous column or not, but hey, it fits too, so let's fire it out there as well:



My apologies to the developers who got in their responses to my questions about Achievements and their implementation - I swear I'll put that together for next week. This week, however, is all about cheaters, cheating, and consequences.

As mentioned in the teaser, Microsoft leveled both judgment and punishment against gamers who've used save game exploits, and other means, to inflate their Gamerscore artificially. Those gamers found themselves on the receiving end of punishment that's both effective and a bit cruel.

I suppose the question then...why do I find it so funny? I'll be honest - it's the nature of the punishment, and the impact it has on their precious ePeen.


According to Major Nelson's blog, the cheaters identified have had the following things done to them:

• The Gamerscore for the identified account is reset to zero.


• Any account hit by a reset will be unable to regain all previously obtained Achievements and Gamerscore, though it doesn't remove the ability to gain future Achievements through normal play.





• The account will be clearly labeled as a cheater.

What does it mean, being "labeled" as a cheater? Check the image to the right, the new-look version of the infamous StripClubDJ.

StripClubDJ is back to 0. A few days ago he was over 280,000 Gamerscore. He was interviewed back when he had 'only' 102,170 points.

I find this part particularly funny:

GR: What's next? Are you hanging up your hat now, or are you going to keep working your way up?

StripClubDJ: Hell no. I'm not retiring. Why? So someone else can take the number one spot? I had to work for it. So for all you "Gamerscore whores" come and get me. At this point I have around a 5k lead. I will slow up and clean up my games–like spend 14 hours finishing Dead Rising.

Well I guess you're retired now, huh? And really...you had to "work" for it? I think I'm starting to question the whole 'I'm a strip club dj' thing too.

The StripClubDJ Gamertag was actually banned from playing on Xbox Live some time ago, though that didn't stop Dudley, the name behind the 'legend' from still inflating his score offline, nor from trying to sell his Gamertag to anyone who wanted to be on the top of the charts.

The offer to sell the Gamertag was floated around the Internet in January of this year. I wonder if anyone actually bought it...

SupposedStripClubDJ isn't the only cheater caught, of course. There's also Sufoor, ColdRaccoon, and im78yrsold. Whatever happened to seniors being nice people?

They also get the Scarlet Letter - emblazoned forever with CHEATER. I figure it's likely that most cheaters will simply get a new Gamertag, dumping their old account for good. Most of them seem to be Silver accounts, though that could be because they shared StripClubDJ's fate and were banned from Xbox Live play as well.

Whether they make a new Gamertag or not, I kind of doubt they'll be going for the top of the Gamerscore leaderboards any time soon.

Getting caught seems to be nothing more than careless behavior on the part of these cheaters, as a warning was issued back in October about it. Maybe they didn't believe it was real? I would bet they do now.

Unfortunately the system isn't perfect, and there are still some pretty widely known - or at least suspected - cheaters who've managed to stick around. Could that guy be any more blatant? Check out his 360voice page, where he's gaining score without playing games.

21 games played, with 273,819 Gamerscore? OK....

So obviously the system isn't perfect, and everyone hasn't been caught yet - but how many do you think will be willing to exploit to get Gamerscore in the future? I'm willing to bet, even when they're only gambling a Silver account, that it's a far lesser number today than it was at the start of the week.

And let's face it - that's a positive for the rest of us. No, those among us who actually care about Gamerscore will probably never get to the top of the charts doing it in a legit manner - but maybe this opens the door to having more Gamerscore-related contests. Maybe locking the system down in this way lets Microsoft open it up a bit more in other ways, eventually having a 'real' reward system out of the currently good-for-ego-only points?

In the end it doesn't really matter - some chumps who thought the number attached to their Xbox Live account actually mattered got slapped down, and that's good enough for me. I think it's hilarious that they can never get an Achievement out of any of the games they cheated their way through. Gamerscore aside, that would really take away a part of Xbox 360 games that I enjoy - the thrill of Achieving.

Of course these guys probably didn't really care about Achievements anyway. They were all about the ePeen, and that's taken a pretty severe beating this week, so maybe they'll just back away from gaming altogether.

No great loss.



I've hammered through the single-player mode in Rainbow Six Vegas 2 (satisfying gameplay, interesting character customization, lackluster storytelling, and some odd bugs) and am giving the multiplayer a decent go before finishing up the review. While the game itself is decent, a slight step up from the original, the Achievements are really disappointing for those gamers stuck offline, with a huge focus on the online aspect and a great deal of Gamerscore tied up there.

I also played through Rocketmen: Axis of Evil, and for another dual-stick XBLA shooter, it's not bad. There's a lot of customization available, and the four-player co-op makes up for some of the issues with the gameplay. Worth a look, and a good assortment of Achievements to grab.

The Achievement King of this week's releases is, without a doubt, Universe At War. While Dark Sector and Viking: Battle for Asgard both offer up decent Achievement lists, though maybe a little too dependent on the 'complete a level, get an Achievement' formula, Universe At War has a fantastic list that offers good naming, combined with a good assortment of tasks to complete. They up the ante with Achievements granting medals that affect gameplay.