Raising Your Gamerscore By PowerLeveling

Joystiq is reporting on a new outfit claiming they'll powerlevel your gamerscore for cash. For $300, they say, they'll raise your Xbox Live gamerscore by 3000 points. Ozymandias, a member of the 360 Launch Team, has commentary on the situation. From his post: "The thing that struck me as most interesting about this is that Achievements (and the Gamerscore associated with them) have become a currency... one just as valuable as virtual currency in MMOs, and one some people might be willing to pay real dollars for. I certainly don't condone it, but it does support my belief that competitors will need to have their own Achievements/Gamerscore system in the future as it's definitely a tipping aspect for some folks. (For the record, I now believe the rumor of PS3 'Entitlements' to be false; however, I fully expect a similar solution within the next year or so once the online service has launched.)"

Comments

So... uh...

[Ant P.]

You buy a $400 system and games, then pay someone else $300 to play it for you?

WTF is wrong with people these days, seriously?

Re:So... uh...

[orasio]

For that amount of money, you could buy a PS3, and you get to play yourself!
Sony RoX0R

this is what turns me off online gaming

[cliffski]

It's this attitude that totally wrecked MMORPG games. there is fuck all role playing, there is fuck all exploring, fuck all entertainment, fuck all GAME. All we have are endless parades of people doing *whatever it takes* to score the points to get to the next level, and then the next level, and so on. Every MMO i've played has been like this. Its weird. Its even polluted FPS games with high scores like BF2. Ever played a BF2 game where everyone is a medic?

"I need to get my next medic badge dude".
"yeah fine, how about we play in a way that we all have fun, and play as a team huh"?
"shut up n00b"

I hope one day someone will make an online game that doesn't rack scores, or give a fuck about them. they can count me in.

Re:this is what turns me off online gaming

[aiken_d]

Defcon is for you. Online play, but scores just disappear after each game. No ladders, no high scores, no score history, no levels, nothing. Plus, the whole point is to blow everyone up, so there's not a lot of room for griefers (what are they going to do, *not* launch their nukes?). It's not an RPG or anything, but it's the first online game I've ever been able to enjoy *every* game, not just when I happen to fall in with decent people.

So..?

[kirun]

If you're paying somebody to play the games for you, perhaps the games in question aren't actually fun and you should buy some different ones? Or, is there a market for games where you start off with all powers and infinite ammo, then just go around destroying stuff with absolutely no challenge? Should developers release a £200 ultimate box set winners edition of the game that consists of one DVD that plays the end credits?

Junk...

[sinner0423]

Gold farmer: Okay!!! We powerlevel your character to level 60! Buku gold & epix! Only $100 American dorra!

(Powerleveling ensues)

Gold farmer: Okay joe! Powerlevel done! Enjoy gold and ninja'd epix!

(3 months later...)

Joe Schmoe: What the fuck? Someone logged on my account and stole EVERYTHING in my bank, including my 10,000 gold pieces and epic blow up doll collection!

Typical scenario, and no, I don't make this shit up. Although, the stolen items & currency are usually refunded, it's just asking for trouble if you sign up for something like this. Don't give your password(s) out to complete strangers, and you'll be better off for it.

Re:Does not compute

[SScorpio]

Each 360 game has achievements which you complete by doing things in a game, (beating the game, kill a boss, doing this side quest, etc). Some of them are hard, some are easy. By completing an achievement you get points added to your gamer score which show are l33t you are. The achievement system is a good way to get people to keep playing games and unlocking things they normally won't bother with a 2nd or 3rd play through. But the whole gamer score thing is really just an e-penis.

I have a 360 but...

[Travoltus]

what in the world can you do with gamerscore points?

Buy things?

I thought that was what the for-pay Gold membership was for... which is why I never got onto Xbox Live AT ALL. (I'll get my updates via download&burn, thank you.)

Anyways, this gamer score crap is why things like Game Shark hasn't come out (and why 360 games are so brutally hard to play); alas, the ban on cheat code generators has been rendered moot by this run-around with the gamer score. So now we have neither cheat codes for single player games nor any integrity for the gamerscore system. Joy.

Tell me why again I bought a console??

Re:I have a 360 but...

[Miriku chan]

... because, being simple minded, you're easily swayed by hype and didnt bother reading up on it first?

am i close?

That's just sad.

[Endo13]

Levels and unlocks in MMORPGS or BF2 actually give you some advantages or more options in games, however pathetic these might be. (In the end they're still mostly about boosting your e-peen, but at least they have a pretense of being more...) Since 'Gamerscore' is merely a way for you to keep score of what you've done so far (and make your e-peen bigger than your friends') it becomes worth exactly nothing when you have someone 'powerlevel' it, because it doesn't even show your score then. All it shows is that you have enough of an inferiority complex to pay someone to raise your score.

Maybe I should hire Tiger to play a few rounds of golf for me while I get a massage... that'll help the ol' scorecard.