So, I’m still in the process of trying to refocus my world but in the meantime, I’m still making time for my hobbies (and I’m also not banging on about ‘what to do with my life’ week on week)! So, this week I’m writing about how an offhand comment can escalate into ‘healthy’ competition and end with me sinking over 200 hours into playing the same game through twice. I won the bet though, that’s what counts!
I love gaming, I always have done, but I especially get a kick out of completing games 100%. All the main storyline, all side quests, all collectables – you get the idea. It might not look like it from my profiles on True Achievements or PSN Profiles as I’ve not got an outstanding completion ratio (especially on XBOX). It’s a love of completion that’s grown over time though and it is something I strive to work towards now!
**I just wanted to add at this point my post is spoiler free**
Back at the end of December I fully completed Assassin’s Creed Valhalla on the Xbox. I earned all of the achievements but I also completed every quest I had available to me too, including the time limited Winter Festival. I thoroughly enjoyed the game, the buggy achievements did take a bit of the shine off of it initially to be honest. However, the depth of the storyline meant I got the feels a few times and felt faced with what for me, felt like some tough choices. I’m not an emotional person and I usually make quite rational decisions/choices in real life, but some deaths gutted me, some choices made me sit and think for more than a few minutes. I engaged with it so much and felt a little bit sad when my time with Eivor came to an end. I think my save game clocked in at about 160 hours so I’d definitely got my money’s worth. I think it was more like 120-130 hours though as I do have a bad habit of walking away and leaving the game running.
My husband JC is not like me in the slightest when it comes to gaming. Firstly, we’re into different genres, I went off first person shooters a while ago, where as he loves Call of Duty: Warzone and Counter-Strike. Unlike me, he’s not massively into RPGs, stabbing things with swords or firing off magic spells. JC also seems to have an innate inability to complete games that have a storyline, especially RPGs – so I was surprised when he declared his intention to give Valhalla a go. We both got a copy of the game and I can’t remember why but he actually got a head start on me and was ‘in front’ for a while (this wasn’t actually a competition at this point). However, a lack of wanting to go off and do side missions or go to points of interest meant I quickly out-levelled him and my progression became quicker. Fast forward to 27th December and if I had to estimate his completion, I’d say he was under half way through the main storyline when I completed the game.
There wasn’t any banter about me completing before him – it’s fair to say I’m obsessively good at RPGs compared to JC (he’d kick my butt at Warzone, I know my weaknesses!). However, I did utter the words “I bet I could complete it again before you complete it once”. We had a bit of a laugh about this and how it might encourage him to complete it rather than put up with the ‘shame’ and the bragging. But the next thing I knew the Playstation was being switched on and I started the install for a second playthrough on a different console. We set the terms, he only had to complete it by finishing the main storyline; whereas ‘complete’ to me meant everything – the full Playstation platinum trophy.
So to cut through a few week’s worth of playing and banter that wouldn’t be that interesting to write about – I’m sat here typing this with the platinum trophy under my belt and JC still hasn’t finished the main storyline 🤣! For reference, I think my save game for my Playstation playthrough was about 100-110 hours.
The most interesting thing that I wasn’t expecting about a second playthrough so soon after the first; was even though I knew what was coming, it still affected me in the same way. I still felt the twinges of heartache and anger when innocents were lost. I felt the same hurt and betrayals and I was still left wondering if the decisions I made were the ‘right’ ones. I completed side quests and storylines that I knew I didn’t need to do, I went off on tangents like weddings and the Winter Festival that weren’t essential. Such was my engagement and enjoyment of the game I relived it and lived it as much the second time around as the first.
I mentioned above that I don’t really get emotional or ‘the feels’ about much. I can’t honestly think when a TV show or a movie reached me in the same way as some points in Valhalla did. I mean, I was upset about the ending of Game of Thrones, but who wasn’t!
So when is a game not just a game… well I’d say when it’s a journey and an experience. Kudos to the writers of Valhalla, they certainly made it that for me. I started off by saying I’m a gamer and that I love games. But I’ve been a bit lost with gaming for a while and I think I fell out of love without realising it somewhere along the way. Completing this made me reflect and I remembered the elation I felt when I completed the original Assassin’s Creed back in the day. Before that when I was a kid, I remember completing Sonic the Hedgehog on the Mega Drive with all the chaos emeralds. I remember how I felt when I first immersed myself in World of Warcraft (I played vanilla onwards) and I opened myself to a whole new genre – MMORPGs, that I’d never experienced before.
It also made me think about why I might have lost the love. Life definitely got in the way, as did my health and my family commitments. I also for a long while got to some extent belittled and not supported for what I chose to play. Would you want to play something that every time you loaded it you got told how crap it was and a constant commentary about why ‘xyz’ is better? It’s just easier not to play or to boot something up that causes less friction. It made for a perfect storm of a long period of not gaming or feeling uncomfortable with what I chose to load up or put into a console when I did have the time or energy. I’ve been asked to clarify that this is not JC!
I’m out of the other side though and I think it’s safe to say my passion has been renewed. Maybe gaming is the ‘thing’ I’ve been searching for to build around. Whatever happens, it’s safe to say that the bar for my gaming in 2021 has been set very high. I’m not sure what I’m playing next but if it’s half the game that Assassin’s Creed Valhalla was for me then I can’t wait to get started.
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