Avatar: The World's Oldest Profession

 

For achievement/trophy hunters, it's been said that "Every Point Matters".... It's also been said that if you're looking for quick and easy gamerscore, the unequivocal, axiomatic go-to game is 2007's Avatar: The Last Airbender - The Burning Earth. What's discussed far less often, however, is what the psychological effects of this caliber of achievement whoring can have on the human psyche. Thus far I've successfully avoided the temptation of this shameful 1000gs gimme, but journalistic duty commands that I compartmentalize my pride, swallow my dignity, and finally descend into the belly of the beast in an effort to see if holds up to the hype.

First things first, I have no plans to review the entire game; I'd frankly be surprised if anyone over the age of twelve played it for any reason other than the achievements. Secondly, my primary goal is to discern whether or not you can truly achieve all one thousand points in less than five minutes with minimal effort, as has been advertised. With that in mind, I'm going to utilize a stopwatch and detail exactly what is entailed in maximizing this title's achievements. A few things to note: I am playing this on a slim 360 model, I am not installing the game to my hard drive, and I'll start the clock right as I hit "Play Game" from the dashboard. Aaaaaaaaaannnnnnnnnd GO.

I'm opting to skip creating a save file when prompted at the loading screen, and all the cut scenes prior to the game starting are skippable, so I'm skipping them. All five achievements are hit-combo based, split up in multiples of ten all the way up to fifty. What essentially needs to happen is as follows: You run to the left of where you start, while enemies appear to your right. Once up against the wall, you repeatedly tap B in the direction of the enemies, without stopping. With 2/5 achievements (a 20 hit combo) under my belt, a mid-action cut scene is now taking place. Unfortunately, this one cannot be skipped, and if it's any indicator of how the rest of the game plays out, it's a damn good thing I'm not trying to review it. The dialogue is terrible, truly truly awful, and the characters aren't even moving their mouths while they speak!

Back to action, I'm following the same formula as the first time around by running to the left and spamming B, with only minor aiming tweaks to the left analogue stick to ensure I stay pointed at the relevant enemies. All five achievements have popped, and although the highest one is for a combo of 50 hits, I got my combo meter up to 91 before the battle ended and I powered down the stop watch. Even better than I had seen it described, I had the entire 1000 gamerscore in 2 minutes, 49 seconds. In my experience, this is hands down the quickest and easiest game to max out that I've ever played, but it has already come at an emotional cost.

Hey baby.... how much for a platinum trophy?

Here's the thing: the gamerscore mechanic was manufactured to represent something. While some games will be more difficult than others, and some players will be inherently better at some titles than others, the entire concept of achievements/trophies was to illustrate that a player had accomplished something. A full 1000 gamerscore in one particular game was supposed illustrate that a player has accomplished everything in that game. In this particular case, I accomplished nothing. Maxing out the gamerscore in Avatar was less challenging than putting away my sock laundry, and frankly the amount of effort I put in shouldn't warrant a single 5 point achievement, let alone a full set of 1k.

I suppose it stands to reason that if there are incredibly tough, long, and difficult games to complete, that there be short, simple, and easy games to complete as well, but this is so simple that it really doesn't mean anything. If you're under 10,000gs and you're looking to pad your gamerscore, completing this game is not an accomplishment... if anything it just shows your desperation to have a higher score than you do. And if you're over 25,000gs, what good is another trite thousand at the expense of your gaming integrity?

This game is now on my profile. For good. It will now be clear to every other gamer I encounter, whether it be friend or foe, that I, your humble Scoundrel, have whored myself out to the easiest gamerscore ever made available. Sure, it was under the guise of an editorial experiment, but if I'm being honest, I've always secretly wanted that 1000 points. Until today the rectitude of my judgement has thankfully kept me from them.

But now I feel dirty. So... so dirty. And I fear there isn't a shower hot enough to wash this clean.