Beating a Game

            “I beat the game!” This is an oft heard thing around gamers. “Have you played <insert latest game>?” “Yeah, I beat it three days ago.” Typically, “I beat the game” means “I completed the story.” But, what does it really mean to “beat the game”? Let’s take a look at a few of the meanings of “I beat the game.”

            First, as we said before, many people have come to the conclusion that completing the storyline in a game is beating the game. For these people, it’s more about getting the end rather than the journey itself. But that is how a majority of gamers play. For many, it’s no longer about how amazing the journey is. Rather, it’s how many notches they have on their gamer belt. If this is what you prefer, then by all means play that way. After all, it’s all about doing what you enjoy. However, can one really make the claim that they beat a game if they played it on casual/easy mode? Doesn’t there need to be a certain challenge in order to beat something? If I were to say, “I beat this bottle of water. I drank the whole thing over the course of a day”, people would look at me like I was stupid. If there’s no challenge, then there’s no victory.

            This brings us to another question. What about cheat codes? “I couldn’t beat this part, so I turned on invincibility so I could beat it.” Did you really beat it? In my opinion, using cheat codes is not beating the game. In fact, in my opinion, it is just the opposite; it is admitting defeat to the game. In essence, you are saying, “The game was too hard. I gave up and cheated.” So, if you used cheat codes at any time, you did not beat the game.

            Another meaning of “I beat the game” is “I played through the story on the hardest difficulty setting.” I am almost completely in this camp. For a long time, I was one of those players who played games on the default setting. After all, isn’t that what the game was tuned to? However, just recently, my roommate got me to try any and all games on the hardest difficulty. I am now addicted (I use this term loosely. See the last section) to playing all games on the hardest setting. When I complete a playthrough, I feel a sense of accomplishment again. It’s not just another notch in the gamer belt. It’s a victory. It is a moment to savor. It is a moment when you are standing on the proverbial mountaintop screaming (again, proverbially) “I did it! They threw everything they could at me and yet I accomplished the improbable task against impossible odds in the face of unlikely adversarial conditions!”

            For some, playing on anything harder than the default setting is too much work. Others see it as an addition to playing on the default difficulty to add more replay value. For me, it’s the meat and potatoes of the game. It especially makes me feel great when I beat a game on the hardest whose hardest setting is legen…wait for it…dary!

            Still, for others, “I beat the game” means that they got the highest award in every level. Take my recent post about Twisted Metal, for instance. A friend and I beat it on Hard difficulty. Not good enough for me. I had to beat it on Twisted difficulty. Once we were done with that, we realized that we had gotten Gold in every level except 3. So we felt compelled to get gold in every level. To some, this is beating the game. Achieving the highest standard in each level. Any part of me that is not in the last camp is in this camp. While I don’t feel compelled to beat every level at the highest standard, sometimes I do just for the extra sense of accomplishment.

            Others considered it beating the game if you complete all the achievements. After all, the developer made the game, and decided what achievements to include. So, if you get all the achievements, then you’ve done everything the developers want you to do, right? The neat thing about this thinking is that it includes all of the aforementioned ideas concerning beating the game. About half, if not more, of the achievements in video games are pretty much standard now. Beat a level? Get an achievement. Beat the same level on the hardest difficulty? Get another achievement. Beat the level at the highest standard? Get another achievement.

            Whether you think that getting all the achievements is necessary to truly beat a game or not, no one can argue with the fact that the person with all the achievement did beat the game. He accomplished everything in every camp, plus went back to do little odd jobs to get more. Too much for me, but kudos to the guy who does it.

            Another thing that comes to mind when someone says, “I beat the game” is, “Wow, you beat Triple H?” For those of you who are completely lost right now, that was funny. Triple H is a WWE wrestler, who at one point went by the handle “The Game”. So, when someone says, “I beat the game”…. Ok, hopefully you get it now.

            Lastly, I’ve heard someone say “I beat the game”, and mean that they got over their addiction to video gaming. (World of Warcraft specifically.) Video game addiction isn’t as common as some people would have you believe, but is more common than most people realize. If you are struggling with video game addiction, call somebody. I don’t know who to call, as I don’t think that there is a video game addiction hotline. (I just googled “Video Game Addiction Hotline”. The only things that came up were parodies of addiction hotlines. So, if you’re addicted, you’re out of luck. Cold Turkey, anyone?)

            So, whatever your definition of beating the game is, it really doesn’t matter what others think. As long as you are having fun, that’s what counts. So get out there and play games!

   - Woody