Xbox Achievements

Xbox Achievements are a point system found on the Microsoft Xbox 360 and Microsoft Xbox One consoles. Achievements are earned by completing tasks within the game for varying amounts. The point total has no real benefit or advantage in the real world, however amongst us, it is a badge of honor and shows where you are at in your life. 100,000 achievement points signifies retirement. We often refer to them as "cheebits."

Origins
Before the Xbox Achievement system was in place, there was nothing like it. Completing games and extras were done on your own accord with very little to show for it, outside of cosmetic rewards, art, extra levels, etc. Since games were almost exclusively single player offline, almost no one would know of your accomplisments. The Xbox Achievements came into play and changed everything, although not right away. Coming into this new system, we still didn't really care about these "meaningless" points. We played the games, got some achievements, and moved on.

On the night of June 8th, 2011, a group of us were rather bored. We saw that a game called "Harm's Way" was free and that the achievements could be gotten in a short amount of time. The rush we got from this was unlike anything we had experienced before. We rushed out to rent another supposedly easy game called "Rayman Raving Rabbids" that night as well. Our hopes were crushed when we realized that many of the achievements were bugged and it was very difficult. The fire had been lit however, and we pursued it much harder afterwards.

The Lifestyle
Within a week, we vowed that this was our new lifestyle: earning achievements. We began to buy and rent easy completion games to get our scores as high as possible. We would take advantage of rentals, buy 2 get 1 free used games, GameFly, and in some cases, Japanese imports.

It was quickly decided on that 100,000 achievement points would be our end goal. When we first got into this, we were at or around about 10,000 achievement points, so the goal seemed lofty but attainable. If anyone got discouraged by the grind, the phrase "We chose this lifestyle!" could be heard shouted across the room. This meant that there was no turning back and the achievement lifestyle always took first priority.