But I agree with you that acheivements like “Test of Faith” are the kinds of achievements needed to drive replayability. When you are forced to approach the gameplay from a brand new angle the game remains engaging.

An example of a game that accomplished that for me without having achievments was Psi-Ops on the PS2 (one of my favorite games ever). The way the levels were laid out and the variety of powers at your command meant that you could approach the game completely differently each playthrough if you wanted.

Great post!

unlocking difficulties and then having achievements linked to completing it on that difficulty. Star ocean is guilty of this as i believe it has 2 difficulties that require unlocking and an achiievement for completeing it on all of them.

grind achievements/awards. prototype is majorly guilty of this adding in the ‘kill 53,000+’ achievement to get on the dead rising/left 4 dead train. I played through the game on normal and killed 8,000 – i am not playing through prototype 7 times for 20gs

specific event achievements with no chapter selection option – darksiders seems to be guilty of this as 2 or 3 achievements (such as kill 150 enemies riding the angelic beast) reference single points in the game you don’t replay.

make your game worth replaying don’t try and use my completionist nature agianst me

I feel like there has been a divergence away from games that are in fact, replayable simply because we have entered a time where a larger demographic of ‘gamer’ is in the market place. This means that a similar number of developers are forced to work on projects that are meant to satisfy a large and finicky audience. This has pushed developers to produce content for multiple tastes through the diversified (PS3 and 360 vs Wii) console market. This is really the first generation of consoles that clearly set up visible line in the sand for (lack of better terms) the hardcore and casual gamer. In my opinion this is really what’s caused a lack of replayable content in many of the next gen titles. Casual gamers don’t have a lot of time to play games (or don’t take a lot of time) and therefore they require much less content to be content with a purchase. I feel like this has not only hurt a game’s replay value, but a game’s actual time/content as well. Most of us here are in our 20′s it seems, and have jobs, families, school, etc going on, and probably don’t really have time to spend 8 hours a day playing through an 80 hour game. Companies know this and have assumed that they can produce products that a requires less of a time commitment to complete, and thus, feel justified to some extent with a purchase.

I still play old school games because they are fun. Mario is fun, Sonic is fun, etc (which was a point in the original discussion above). The fun factor has also seemed to take a back seat to graphics and narrative (which is not exactly a bad thing 100% of the time). As the casual gaming community continues to grow, I fear that companies are going to continue down the road of a quick gaming fix for casual gamers and less on the “hardcore” (sorry, again).

Also, good old school games were fairly few and far between. Blockbuster titles are a once a month thing these days. This simply adds to the lack of replayability simply because gamers are looking forward to the newest thing and they, in turn, quickly tire of what they have. Advertising and hype are a huge sales driver, and we are bombarded with it everyday. Our options are driving us away from any type of sustained replay.

I hope at least some of this makes sense. I’m working off of caffeine only at this point in my day.

But in terms of games that usually bring me back for more and offer actual replayability, Capcom and BioWare usually get me for at least a second playthrough on most of their games.

The Resident Evil games are a great example of awesome replay value. You have multiple different ways to play the game, with different characters, all on top of different campaign scenarios.

I have played my fair share of games over and over:
Earthbound
Grandia
Castlevania: Symphony of the Night
Legend of Zelda: Link’s Awakening

But, these games all share a common interest…they are some of my favorite games of all time. Chris’s comment rings true here. That dude LOVES action games, hence he has played – what is considered one of the greatest ones of all time – over and over.

The big push now is going to be for a strong single player component that will have replay value based on it’s relationship with the gamer. Developers can deliver incentives with achievements and difficulty levels, but that targets a small percentage of gamers. Real replay value is coming to fruition in the multiplayer market. Uncharted 2 did it, Demon’s Souls did it, and the upcoming Assassin’s Creed 3 is – rumored – to be doing it.

Great Article.

Amen to Capcom. I like what they did with Resident Evil 1 & 2. You play as one character and then go back and play as the other. While the experiences are similar, it’s cool seeing the game from two different player’s perspectives. Not to mention, in resident evil 2, once you beat the game with both characters, you’d unlock the 4th survivor mission, (Hunk and Tofu) which was a lot of fun in of itself.

Great piece!