Gamerpoints
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New Avatar game awards 1K gamerpoints in 2 minutes
Gamerpoint addiction is a serious problem, people. Did you know that 1.2 million Americans buy awful games every day, just to harvest the sweet gamerpoint nectar that lies within? That's close to 60 million dollars a day that could be donated to charity, or, at the very least, spent on good games. We've got good news and bad news for these people. The bad news? You're going to be buying another bad game soon. The good news? You'll only need to play it for two minutes.Apparently, the creators of Avatar: The Last Airbender - The Burning Earth (Avatar: The Legend of Aang - The Burning Earth for our European readers) thought it would be much, much harder to rack up a 50 hit combo than it actually was. We wonder when someone will start up a Gamerpoint Regulation Council that will make the distribution of points between games like Avatar and games like Guitar Hero III a tad more uniform.[Thanks, jstroh]
xBot dictates Xbox 360 controller, racks up gamer points
We've heard of using a Wiimote to handle home automation tasks, but building a device in order to create an automated Xbox 360 controller is another animal entirely. An intrigued and efficiency-minded individual set out to to achieve an additional 60 Xbox Live gamer points by trudging through 1,000 Death Matches and 1,000 Dark Ops rounds, all without him actually being there. Thus the xBot automator was born -- a robotic dictator that was programmed to simply hit the start and B buttons on a timed interval in order to progress through all the matches needed in order to snag the oh-so-coveted points. Essentially, the completely non-intrusive machine utilizes two rotational solenoids driven by a TTL (Transistor to Transistor Logic) controller, and while the actual programming steps were indeed a bit more in-depth, the creator isn't divulging all of his secrets just yet. So if you think you've got the DIY skills necessary to concoct one of these yourself, and would rather spend "around 10 hours" piecing together an automating machine rather than 40 (or more) hours in Perfect Dark: Zero, be sure to hit the read link for a few more deets on the whole process, and click on through for a live demonstration.[Via Digg]
Stuttering start for Microsoft Rewards program
The Xbox Rewards program remains deadlocked today, following yesterday's launch, which apparently drew more prospective registrants than anticipated. If you've yet to register -- perhaps planning to leisurely earn your 'rewards' during the allotted month -- you've likely already missed out. 'Cause guess what? All those rewards are limited to finite numbers; paltry numbers when compared to Xbox Live's user base.This isn't an 'Old Spice Challenge,' it's a Competition -- and no doubt there are enough registered players teens already racing to gobble up those prizes. If you're lucky, you might score (possibly another) copy of Contra, since 70,000 download codes will be handed out. But even the '100 Microsoft Points' prize (limited to 6,000 winners) could be gone by week's end. Bah, who wanted Fusion Frenzy 2 anyway?Hint: Try this link.
Xbox 360 Achievements policy amended
Microsoft has revised its Xbox 360 Achievements rule book, agreeing to allow publishers to add an additional 250 Gamerscore points to disc-based games through add-on content. The content could be either free or paid. Xbox Live Arcade games can also receive a boost, as publishers are now allowed to add 50 additional points (to the required 200) via downloadable content, which could be similarly free or paid.Each disc-based game must include 1,000 points that are accessible for free (excluding price paid to obtain game), but not necessarily included on the game disc; Crackdown, for example, will only ship with 900 unlockable points, while the remaining 100 will arrive built into a free content update. Microsoft admits that there have been "inconsistencies" in the past, but hopes that the new, supposedly clear policy will regulate publisher's Achievements.
Wack Xbox 360 achievements, Top 10 style
GamersReports has posted a list of some of the more questionable Xbox 360 achievements. But points whores (a.k.a. those of us who pad our gamerscores) will quietly disagree with the claim that the Madden and King Kong achievements are among the "worst" -- heck, who wouldn't take 100 points for lighting a brush fire?And we're gonna argue that GRAW's 'World Champion' is one of the better achievements, in theory. After all, "achievements" implies hard work and a goal that isn't accessible to everyone. But we do agree that Ubisoft should have considered those who were able to play the game before its release -- we're looking at you Major Nelson -- ineligible to receive the achievement.But the other seven achievements on the list are downright tedious and offensive. 40,000 points in Feeding Frenzy? Do we look like we got a case of the OCD?
