The word 'enslaving' is harsh, but I really felt that with Eu4 and its bunch of new impossible achiements every few months or, an another example, with the recent release of goals in Lol. And I guess some developpers, inspired by marketing advisors, use it, not for fun purpose, but for hooking players, enslaving them to their games. I strongly suspect the industry of video game knows its share about the kind of effect these achievements have on the brain of humans (or at least some of us like myself, Im a very goal oriented person, so it works worryingly well on me, but I know people who doesnt care at all). There is even a whole branch of youtubers dedicating themselves to explaining how to realize achievements X or Y. A cold description easily done from a distant point, but your brain can really trick you into believing they are worth more than that. But even for smaller games, I surprised myself entering in a mind habit of performance, crowned by the achievements, these smalls, useless pictures with no other value than boosting your e-ego. Eu4 and hoi4 are probably the main games I did that and for a reason, I absolutely loved them. Very hooked, to the point were I was able to play obsessively a game without experimenting pleasure just to obtain an impossible achievement and to have the short shoot of dopamine we all know. I was one of those players obsessed by achievements.

In the end, why would they ? 'Your game, your rules', says the old gamer proverb and that's what SAM helped me to understand. It doesn't seem to be considered illegal by Steam since they never banned someone for using it. I'm following this sub since years and I felt I had a story to share many of you would appreciate and even relate to.įor those who've never heard of it, SAM is a software allowing you to hijack every steam achievements.

Steam achievement manager