While many players are still waiting for an overhaul of the Xbox achievement system, Larry Hryb, former director of communications at Microsoft and better known as Major Nelson, has just lifted the veil on one of the sounds that has not been not selected to represent rare successes.
Major Nelson Shares Horrible Audio Rejected by Xbox for Rare Achievements
Since 2016, when an achievement obtained by less than 10% of those who launched the game is unlocked on Xbox, an animation and sound different from classic achievements are produced. If the sound is rather pleasant, Larry Hryb shares one which was not retained by Microsoft.
Listening to it, we can clearly rejoice that it was never integrated. He is particularly strident and aggressive, in other words, not very pleasant!
When I was working on the Xbox Rare Hits sound, we had several iterations. This is one of them that we rejected. I think you will agree that it was the right choice.
In September 2023, journalist Jez Corden confided that Xbox would still work on a revision of achievements and the introduction of a platinum. Well before that, already in 2021, Jason Ronald, one of the engineers who worked on the Xbox Series
In 2022, during Microsoft’s annual Hackathon, a team of Microsoft designers and developers decided to create a new achievement system that would not replace Gamerscore, but would complement it. Xbox Achievements 3.0 was based on bronze, silver and gold achievements (not unlike the PlayStation system) with various achievements per title.
It remains to be seen if Xbox is still looking at an overhaul of the achievements.
