Epic Games Store testing out achievements, with mod support still brewing
Sweet cheevos
The Epic Games Store has started testing out achievements, which is nice. I like it when I do something ridiculous in Slay The Spire and a little picture comes up acknowledging how awesome I am (and ideally just how small a percentage of people are awesome in the same way). I would like this for Epic-only games too.
They've shown off some for Ark: Survival Evolved, but beyond that it's not clear which games currently have them.
Here's Epic's tweet, which includes pretty much all the information we have so far:
Certain games on the Epic Games Store may begin to display achievements as you unlock them.
This is an early version of the feature and you can expect to see changes & adjustments.
We'll have more info to share on achievements in the future, so stay tuned! pic.twitter.com/80dnoLYegV
— Epic Games Store (@EpicGames) July 29, 2020
I'm glad that Epic is (gradually, oh so gradually) expanding its features to match Steam's. In 99% of games I find achievements are either of no or mere cursory interest, but very occasionally they're transformative. I wouldn't have spent 300 hours in Spelunky if I didn't have achievements pushing me forwards, encouraging me to play in different ways. I spent months practicing speed runs, chasing a 7-minute victory (and restarting if I didn't nab an early jetpack). Then I spent many more months treating every speck of gold as instant death, in a game already renowned for inflicting instant death, because I wanted that last cheevo. The entire concept of "achievements" corrodes the meaning of the word, but if I can't be proud of that then videogames mean nothing.
Achievements have been lurking on Epic's public development Trello board since March, along with other promising bits and bobs. Back in April Epic said they'd "made great progress towards" mod integration, and that they were "doing quality assurance testing and polishing the experience." They said they'd be "releasing support for mods slowly starting with one Store partner and ramping up from there".
There are also Trello cards for enabling different payment methods, adding gifting, overhauling social features, and introducing a shopping cart so you don't need to buy one game at a time.
I don't see anything about making it easier to download games to different hard drives, which is a problem that specifically impacts me significantly, so I will whinge about it. G'waaan Epic, at least pop it in the Trello.
