The Completionist in You

[Jermungandr]

So, I am not much of a "completionist", as the term has come to be known. When it comes to games, outside the main storyline, I usually only do enough until I reach a point where I'm either bored or too frustrated to bother continuing.

However, there are a few exceptional games out there that I will always 100% complete every time I play them. For me, this usually means that I find the games so enjoyable that I always want to get as much as I can out of them, and that I can easily get full completion without having to consult the internet a lot. Two perfect examples that come to mind, for me at least, are Majora's Mask and Okami.

So anyways, the point of this thread is; I am curious about what games bring out the completionist in you. What games do you find yourself doing all the extras to 100% every time you play it?* And what kind of things does the game do that draws you into completing it?

*(Obviously you should only count games that have extra things to do outside the main storyline).

[TomGuycott]

I'm more of a 70-90% completion player. The main draws for me when it comes to game completion are the modes and unlocks after, but if the game had something like a collection that has little bearing on gameplay or interest.

A good example is recent Kirby games. I'll play each legs and find all the necessary collectibles to unlock every hidden level and the after game boss rushes, but things like stickers, key chains and what have you are not as worth it.

The only games I'm absolutely sure I completed entirely are Kirby Superstar and Donkey Kong 64. Everything else is sort of up in the air and I can't vividly remember.

[miyabi95_]

i never complete games. just don't have the time tbh. all i can do is play to my heart's content in one sitting and come back later. also i get frustrated really easily.

[Kosheh]

beating games is for grown-ups B)

completing them is for kids and highschoolers



seriously though, as a Grown Man i just wanna play through a game and enjoy the story, and not worry about 100%ing the whole thing with optimal stats to guarantee a perfect playthrough every time. maybe if i was 14, sure i'd be able to hammer out my homework and drill through a mario game to 100% completion.
not at 30. i got shit to do.
my employer doesnt give a shit how many pokemon ive caught. clearing the DKC games with >100% completion isnt gonna improve my credit score. platinum-ranking the time trials in crash bandicoot 3 wont make me more attractive to real estate agents when i want to buy a home.

getting diamond rank in an online game wont make me a good father but my wife sure as shit will know why there hasnt been any netflix and chill for the past 6 months

*to be fair though, there are "endless" games that if i like 'em enough i'll try to shoot for the other goals, like Animal Crossing New Leaf and trying to get more clothes or the golden set of tools, but other than that, what's the fricken point

[psychospacecow]

The first steam game I 100%'d was DBXenoverse. It wasn't all that hard apart from the rampant RNG.
First one I 100%'d on Xbox was the Battlefield Pacific Theater arcade game, but you don't really unlock anything in that. If it isn't much effort and I really enjoy the game, I'll 100% it. I'm not gonna bother trying to get all of Civ 5's achievements though.

[TomGuycott]

Actually, I also 100% completed all single player aspects of Dark Souls multiple times. It's one of the few games on PSN that I have a Platinum Trophy. Also Symphony of the Night (excluding the Saturn content like Maria and the extra section).

In this day and age, getting 100% on a game is increasingly convoluted, and it also comes down to a question of what qualifies as "completion". Some games are so vast that it isn't even possibly to quantify the game in a percentage. Take No Man's Sky: how many planets do you have to go to before you can consider the game "complete"? A more important question would be how many planets you could go to and still feel like you're having fun.

The only things worth 100% completing are things that feel fun from 1 to 100%. Anything that feels like a chore, whether because of being overly difficult, busy work or just being really boring, just isn't worth the effort. Do an actual chore instead.

[miyabi95_]

i got VERY close to completing Sonic Pocket Adventure and Sonic Rush but their last special stages were completely unfair so i just gave up on it.

Both are great games but special stages in general are just so stressful.

[Koopaul]

Half of the fun of video games to me is collecting and exploring. So ofcourse I'm a completionist. Not because I'm one of those braggarts who wants to prove something but because I genuinely love exploring and collecting things.

@kosheh: If you still have time to beat a game then you certainly have time to eventually 100% a game. You don't have to do it all at once, just little by little when you have the time. And no, 100% won't give you a better credit score or impress your boss, but neither will playing a video game at all! We do it because it's fun. You still play video games right? So when you say "what's the fricken point" I laugh and ask "What's the point in playing video games at all?"

[Jermungandr]

I didn't say they had to be modern games you know. Ideally we're talking about games that you have played through many times before and you find yourself playing to completion every time you do, not "I did it one time" scenarios (although still feel free to discuss those).

Here's some of mine:

1) Every Kirby Game
Not really surprising coming from me. I adore the Kirby games and any excuse to play more of any game the better. In fact, after completing every possible objective in a game I will often make up my own challenges just for the heck of it. Literally the only thing I've never 100% completed in a Kirby game is the enemy card collectables in Kirby 64; and the only reason behind that is because they are randomly selected and that's bullshit. I don't like attempting to complete things that are completely luck based.

2) Every Donkey Kong Country Game
... with the exception of DKC1. You know, I've actually never found the DKC games to be all that difficult, I don't know why people complain about how hard they are. Finding and completing all the bonuses is not all that daunting of a task, and they generally feel very rewarding. The only reason I've never done it for the first title, as much as I love it just as much as the others, is just because the game doesn't really promote finding all the hidden bonuses at all, nor does it really reward you. I do try to find as many as I can each time, but there's little reason to try harder than that.

3) Super Mario World (SNES)
I mean, I guess I technically fullly complete every sidescrolling Mario game I play every time, but Super Mario World stands out the most to me due to the abundance of secrets and how not-obvious a lot of them are. And by 100% completion, I mean finding every single exit even if it's completely redundant.

4) Legend of Zelda: Majora's Mask
With most Zelda games, I'll usually end the game missing a couple heartpieces or a single upgrade or something like the Gold Skultula collectathon incomplete. This is either because I just couldn't find anything on my own and I hate having to resort to using the internet or the task is just to asinine. Majora's Mask, however, I have never had any trouble finding every single heartpiece, upgrade, and mask all on my own. It's a perfect balance of nothing being too much for you to handle figuring out on your own while still being just hidden enough to make you feel like you've really accomplished something when you do complete something. This is one of the reasons why Majora's Mask is one of my all time favorite games, because it does such a good job of making everything feel really satisfying.

5) Okami
Same situation as Majora's Mask, honestly, although satisfying to a bit of a lesser degree, as some of the things you have to do do feel a bit more like a chore.

6) Wario Land II
The second Wario Land game may possibly be my favorite in the Wario series. Finding every secret exit and finding every treasure is fun and exploring every possible storyline is goofy and enjoyable. There's not really much else to say.

[Koopaul]

I don't like attempting to complete things that are completely luck based.

I 100% agree with you. Have the fun of 100% something is completing a certain challenge or exploring a secret place. When it's just random luck well... Why even bother? There's no fun. No sense of adventure to it.

[Kriven]

I try to 100% games, but the vast majority of the time I don't. RPGs become hundreds of times more grindy when you have to New Game+ multiple times to see everything, and they're alreacy forty hours long (or more).

Games in general are longer than I'm comfortable with them being. Ten hours is just about perfect.

[Koh]

If the game is enjoyable to play, and doesn't feel too grindy, or the grind can be multitasked to, then I don't mind going for a complete record. If I have to baby sit the game the for the entire grind, then I'm less likely to do it, because I hate grinding. I'm all about skill-based gameplay, rather than luck-based gameplay. So while I do enjoy the simple gameplay of the 2D Final Fantasies, or the Dragon Quest series, I also hate having to grind on them to progress. But of course, I do it anyway, because I'm a total geek.

Also, this sort of ties into one of the game design conundrums I've thought about before, where it's like, what sort of things can you add to both increase replayability of the game, and also be engaging? So here's one of the solutions I came up with for our planned RPG series: Character perspectives. At the start of a file, you'd choose which main character to play as through the story, the whole way through, and experience the story from their perspective (with their unique play style and abilities). So if they weren't present in the party at some point in the game before, you'll get to see what they were up to, as well as control them through it. So while there would be an "intended viewpoint" of the story, in that the first time you play the game you only have one character to choose from, all of their perspectives would add up to the entirety of the events that took place over the course of the story. Of course when they are part of the party, things would play out the same cutscene wise, but you'd be controlling a different character gameplay wise. So the incentive to play through the game again comes through two main focal points: A change in playstyle, and additional story bits.

[Ton]

In RPGs I tend to do this, but only in ones I know really well.

In FF4 I make sure to never sell anything that is unique. Including rare drops. (usually done mindlessly while I'm watching a movie or something)
In FF6, I make sure to get one of every item and learn all the spells for everyone, get all characters to level 99 with 999 mp and 9999 hp, I learn all the lores and rages.
In Chrono Trigger I grab every item, charm unique items, and do the Black Omen 3 times even though you never have to.

I'm a crazy person.

[Koh]

Aren't the rare drops in Final Fantasy 4 something like a 1/4096 chance of dropping or something like that? I remember how obnoxious it was just to get a single Gorgon Blade/Stoneblade near Eblan, lol.

[Ton]

Yep. To be fair, I don't think I've gotten them all in a single playthrough, but in my current one I have all the summons and many of the rare items. The Crystal Ring still taunts me, though.