Achievement Unlocked
Achievement Unlocked is a 2008 Adobe Flash video game developed in 4 days by John Cooney and published by Armor Games.[1][2][3] While essentially a platform game, it has been referred to as a metagame as well as an "antigame".[4][5][6] The game is a send-up of in-game achievements, still a relatively new concept at the release of the game. While a video game achievement is usually a meta-goal defined outside a game's parameters, in Achievement Unlocked, unlocking numerous achievements is the only goal of the game.[7] It's been described as a "commentary on the proliferation of nearly meaningless rewards in games"[8] and was featured in the book 250 Indie Games You Must Play by Mike Rose and The Game Designer's Playlist: Innovative Games Every Game Designer Needs to Play by Zack Hiwiller.[9][10]
Achievement Unlocked | |
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Developer(s) | John Cooney |
Engine | Adobe Flash |
Platform(s) | |
Release | 2008 |
Genre(s) | Platform |
Mode(s) | Single-player |
References
- McWhertor, Michael (December 19, 2008). "Achievement Unlocked: The Game: You Have To Unlock The Achievement". Kotaku. Retrieved 2012-09-21.
- Cooney, John [@jmtb02] (23 April 2018). "For some background, Achievement Unlocked was a 4 day project built in Flash, fairly low expectations for it (I wasn't SUPER confident in my voice as a creative). Had 5m plays on @ArmorGames alone, ended up in several books and talks about games and game design. Was shocked" (Tweet). Archived from the original on 2 January 2021. Retrieved 26 July 2021 – via Twitter.
- Macgregor, Jody (23 April 2018). "Introducing the Class of 2008". PC Gamer.
- Salter, Anastasia (2014). Flash : building the interactive web. Cambridge, Massachusetts. p. 108. ISBN 9780262028028.
- New literary hybrids in the age of multimedia expression : crossing borders, crossing genres. Amsterdam. 2014. p. 225. ISBN 9789027269331.
- Ensslin, Astrid (2014). Literary gaming. Cambridge, Mass. p. 91. ISBN 9780262027151.
- "Alt+Escape: Achievement Unlocked". The Escapist. 23 January 2009.
- Anthropy, Anna; Clark, Naomi (2014). A game design vocabulary : exploring the foundational principles behind good game design. Upper Saddle River, NJ: Addison-Wesley. p. 192. ISBN 9780321886927.
- Rose, Mike (2019). 250 Indie Games You Must Play. [S.l.]: CRC PRESS. p. 182. ISBN 9781138427853.
- Hiwiller, Zach (2019). The game designer's playlist : innovative games every game designer needs to play. Boston. ISBN 9780134873268.