Nintendo does not want achievements, except for the situation

This is not a surprise, but it was worth confirming: Nintendo Switch 2 will not have achievements. When Polygon asked the Vice President of Nintendo for the player and the experience of the product Bill Trinen, if Nintendo intended to change his ways and introduce ubiquitous tracking of progress, he returned a basic, single -syllable answer: “No”.

At this slow stage – 20 years after Microsoft debuted in his Gamerscore achievement system at Xbox 360 – it seems safe and sound to conclude that Nintendo is usually slow for the implementation of this function. This is a conscientious opposition. Nintendo never gave reasons that avoid achievements, but it seems to be against the basic and even philosophical level.

Why? It is true that Nintendo has always liked to do things differently and boasts the originality of its projects. But the company does not copy the systems of others when it suits its needs or when it simply becomes inevitable. Nintendo has been taking place in multi -person online mode for decades, offering perfect and constrained services, perhaps out of concern for children’s safety. But the online gaming market is now inevitable – and subscription revenues for Nintendo Switch Online enough critical enough – that on Switch 2 we have a gamechat, which again discovers disagreement and enlargement of Nintendo recipients, in Nintendo. If the main designers of Nintendo felt that they really need achievements, pride would not stop them to jump into fashion.

I guess – along with the achievements of many other observers – it is that achievements are simply not with Nintendo ideas about what the experience of the video should be. In this purist argument, a amusing game factor should be sufficient motivation to play, without breadcrumbs of grated meta-fiddle traces and prizes that will lead you through this experience. It can even be fear, not groundless, that achievements can diminish and divert attention from the pure pleasure of the game, govering players on the checklist of things to do and focusing more on boasting of laws than playing at the moment.

There is no need to repeat the arguments regarding the value of achievements that have been hit in this and back for 20 years. Well -designed achievements can be inventive and enriching and lead to the areas of the game and styles of gameplay, which he did not discover otherwise. It is also true that achievement systems appeal to some of our worst instincts as people, and can transform something that should be a jovial form of art into bloody bothersome duties. Personally, I’m on the fence. But I respect the purism of the Nintendo approach, which seems truthful in focusing on self -placement of games, and in the first place.

Everything makes the system in the style of achievement The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild AND Tears of the kingdom Even more fascinating.

This system, called my Play data, looks quite basic. It will be available in the Zelda Notes function in the Nintendo Switch application. It follows statistics such as defeated enemies, treasure chests or collected rupees have been opened, and awards medals in the application for hitting specific purposes. In global data you can compare your progress with players around the world.

It sounds quite inspiring and maybe just as well. When I heard for the first time that Nintendo was adding meta-gole to these two games, I was afraid of their spirit. I love it, despite the fact that they are so busy and extensive, these games are almost attentive. They are designed to encourage unplanned, organic exploration, life and fun at the moment. Although they are heavily loaded with things to do, they do not depend on the dense network of goals that spray so many games with an open world.

Fortunately, for me, the achievement design in my Play data is so uninteresting and abstract that it is unlikely that this slight balance is unlikely. I have to believe it is intentionally. If Nintendo wanted Breath of the Wild AND Tears of the kingdom To have good achievements, they would already have them. Medals of my Play data seem to be a half -baked function containing the Switch 2 Editions offer.

Perhaps it does not bode well in the case of Nintendo approach to raise the value to its editing Switch 2. But it indicates that when it comes to achievements, Nintendo’s heart really is not really in it and it will probably never be.