That nagging little icon..

What is it that makes it so satisfying to get 100%, 10/10, or just to remove that annoying little tag on the minimap?
 
I've noticed in a lot of games lately much of the non-crucial gameplay focuses on some big ugly 28/100 or 58% hanging over your head somewhere on screen.
 
Why is it so important to climb that ladder? I think it's mostly because games are very expensive to purchase, and to make. All this fluff is easy, fast, and cheap to produce. Use available assets, available mechanics, make them easily repeatable for what the player will perceive as added value for their $60. Nothing wrong with that, as long as it starts with something that's fun. But it usually doesn't. It starts with something that's easy and cheap to create.
 
Benefit number two being that lengthening the amount of time the player can play the game makes it less likely for that copy to show up in the resale market.  If it gets a player to hold onto their copy for even 2 weeks longer, it probably keeps one more used copy from stealing a new copy from the developer, and I'm all for that.

The need to generate this cheap, recyclable side content for a game is what I see as one of the biggest problems to the industry truly hitting the mainstream outside of Nintendo's children and family oriented efforts. If a game could just be a fun experience or a memorable story for 3-7 hours and cost $20-30, brand new, I think a lot more people would give more games a chance. Save the padding for DLC or "limited editions" that target the hardcore market that's asking for that stuff.  
 
Right now buying a game is more like buying a season of TV than a Movie. $40-60 for around 15-20 hours of content, on average, maybe more. Who goes into the store looking to buy an entire season of a TV show, not having watched or being able to watch even one episode of it? This gets even worse when you think about how reliant on sequels games are and what kind of barrier that presents.
 
I have a lot of fun with certain games' side content, but when you think of some of the lesser examples (Prototype, Assassin's Creed 1 flags, GTA4 friends/dating, Brutal Legend, No More Heroes, Far Cry 2's endless checkpoint battles) you think that these games would have been much better with a leaner, more focused development that wasn't so clearly focused on hitting some arbitrary or mandated content amount or game length. Most players don't finish enough games anyway - make them shorter, and cheaper!

We've gotten away from the obligatory multiplayer that hurt games like The Darkness, Metroid Prime 2, and Condemned 2 - I think this is the next step. I don't see a lot of people complaining about this, but the main point is that developers need to identify early on and cut content that doesn't work, doesn't fit with their game,or isn't fun. It's how some of the best games ever made happened.

What is it that makes it so satisfying to get 100%, 10/10, or just to remove that annoying little tag on the minimap?
 
I've noticed in a lot of games lately much of the non-crucial gameplay focuses on some big ugly 28/100 or 58% hanging over your head somewhere on screen.
 
Why is it so important to climb that ladder? I think it's mostly because games are very expensive to purchase, and to make. All this fluff is easy, fast, and cheap to produce. Use available assets, available mechanics, make them easily repeatable for what the player will perceive as added value for their $60. Nothing wrong with that, as long as it starts with something that's fun. But it usually doesn't. It starts with something that's easy and cheap to create.
 
Benefit number two being that lengthening the amount of time the player can play the game makes it less likely for that copy to show up in the resale market.  If it gets a player to hold onto their copy for even 2 weeks longer, it probably keeps one more used copy from stealing a new copy from the developer, and I'm all for that.

The need to generate this cheap, recyclable side content for a game is what I see as one of the biggest problems to the industry truly hitting the mainstream outside of Nintendo's children and family oriented efforts. If a game could just be a fun experience or a memorable story for 3-7 hours and cost $20-30, brand new, I think a lot more people would give more games a chance. Save the padding for DLC or "limited editions" that target the hardcore market that's asking for that stuff.  
 
Right now buying a game is more like buying a season of TV than a Movie. $40-60 for around 15-20 hours of content, on average, maybe more. Who goes into the store looking to buy an entire season of a TV show, not having watched or being able to watch even one episode of it? This gets even worse when you think about how reliant on sequels games are and what kind of barrier that presents.
 
I have a lot of fun with certain games' side content, but when you think of some of the lesser examples (Prototype, Assassin's Creed 1 flags, GTA4 friends/dating, Brutal Legend, No More Heroes, Far Cry 2's endless checkpoint battles) you think that these games would have been much better with a leaner, more focused development that wasn't so clearly focused on hitting some arbitrary or mandated content amount or game length. Most players don't finish enough games anyway - make them shorter, and cheaper!

We've gotten away from the obligatory multiplayer that hurt games like The Darkness, Metroid Prime 2, and Condemned 2 - I think this is the next step. I don't see a lot of people complaining about this, but the main point is that developers need to identify early on and cut content that doesn't work, doesn't fit with their game,or isn't fun. It's how some of the best games ever made happened.