Nice look at Xbox 360 “achievements points” over at the Hollywood Reporter and the egoboo-style effects it’s having on gamer/gaming behavior.

I can personally attest to the “points farming” that the Gamerscore inspires. There’s no other excuse I can give for playing my son’s copy of Cars all the way through than to bump my profile.

Like was noted in the article, I’m quite surprised that Sony and Nintendo did not try to set up similar style schemes. Would be interesting to see some more in depth academic exploration on the effect of achievement points.

Now, I just need to connect with the guys from Gastronaut so I can score a level-2 “Six Degrees of Small Arms” achievement!

(BTW, for those with access to Edge, they have a great lengthy article on achievements in the January/171 issue.)