I'm not a big fan of Rare. For anyone who skewered me for last year's The Developer's New Clothes and its follow-up piece, this should come as little surprise. I withstood a fanboy bombardment � and all I said was that, GoldenEye and Blast Corps aside, much of Rare's output over the last decade has been dirge. On reflection, I thought perhaps I had been too harsh. Until I read this BBC News article.

Rise of the Robots

According to the report, American car mechanic David Harr faced the dilemma of playing Perfect Dark Zero for 40 hours to earn the final set of reward points, or build a gadget to do the hard work for him.

Naturally, he made the robot play Rare's corridor shooter.

Mr. Harr spent $60 building a small device that presses two buttons on the Xbox 360 pad to start and restart 2,000 offline matches, thus giving him the points needed to complete the game while liberating him to go about his "daily life". Apparently, gamers in forums have even accused Mr. Harr of cheating. But I myself am wondering � Is Perfect Dark Zero really that tedious?

Complete-'em-up

Seriously though, the article highlights the lengths to which one gamer went in order to complete a game . Isn't this sort of absurd? Not really, when you consider how games are built. They're built like treasure hunts. And treasure hunts are dull, dull, dull. What's more, many gamers resort to maps and guides for those unreachable final items � ironically, taking away any sense of discovery.

There is no excuse for this. Unlockables, time attack modes, 100% completion targets � usually achieved by collecting 100 stars/rings/packages of cocaine (delete as appropriate) � frankly, these are the hallmarks of lazy design. Programmers are trying to swindle you into thinking you got more than your money's worth. You didn't. The game was finished over 40 hours ago � you've just been playing the same levels over and over since then. My Fire Flower-writing colleague Iun nailed it with his recent column� he said that "These secondary objectives are a red herring: they actually add no further value if you incorporate them into the first play." Indeed. Busting a gut to slay a lumbering giant within 5 minutes in Shadow of the Colossus to obtain� an arrow that whistles! No, really! Come on. I love this game inside out, but if I keep playing the time attack mode I'll end up loathing it. This is like being made to eat the same meal again and again until you're pig-sick of it.

This is only one example. You can pick a hundred others. Some people actually enjoy playing games to death, until they have wrung every drop of enjoyment from them � these are the power gamers, the completionists, the completionistas. They must achieve 100%. And they are no fun.

Final Cutscene

What's worse about treasure hunts is that they rarely add anything to the endgame. There are notable exceptions � the 100% complete ending of Metroid Prime ominously sets up the "Echoes" of Metroid Prime 2. And the Metroid series succeeds in creating alien worlds that are broad and deep, perfect for exploration and discoveries. But these are the exceptions. I like games that are most like movies or novels, that can carry a narrative. I like a beginning, a middle and an end. I don't want to have to replay the same set piece again and again to attain an extra weapon or a different coloured tunic. Once I've seen the final cutscene, the story is over.

Building little robots to repeatedly hit "start" reveals how wearisome unlockables have become. Unlockables are a grind.

Still, this all stems from Perfect Dark 'Nil', the latest in a long line of Rare collect-'em-ups (hate mail can be sent to the usual address). But in the meantime, let's all stop being completionistas. Maybe then developers will make games a bit more epic, rather than forcing us to play the same 10 hours over and over again.

Nick Bennett
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