Playing Fallout 4 Anniversary Edition on PC and I hit one of those classic “Bugthesda” moments: last time this level crashed to desktop with no warning, and today my screen randomly auto‑adjusted mid‑game and threw my aim and immersion completely off.
I did the usual ritual: check for updates → Microsoft Store updates → verify game files → repair the library. You know the drill.
But honestly, that’s not the part that’s really stuck in my head.
What’s been gnawing at me is this: in 2026, are achievements still relevant in the way platforms treat them—especially when mods disable them anyway?
A few things bother me:
Mods disable achievements (even on consoles now in some cases), so for a lot of players they’re already meaningless mechanically.
There’s no way to opt out. If I don’t want a permanent public record of what I did or didn’t do in a game, tough luck.
Even if I uninstall or refund a game, the partial achievement list just sits there on my profile forever like a half‑finished diary I never agreed to publish.
What I wish existed is something like:
a “no achievements” mode where I can play purely for the experience, and my achievement list just shows as “inaccessible/opted out” to others
or at least the ability to hide or erase achievements for specific games if I decide I don’t want that history attached to me anymore
I’m not pretending I can change the minds of big companies who still design like it’s 2005, but I am genuinely curious what different types of players think:
Achievement hunters: Do you care if others can opt out, or does that not affect you at all?
Mod users (PC and console): Since mods often disable achievements, do they still matter to you in any way?
Everyone else: Do you ever think about the permanence of your achievement history, or is it just background noise?
Is it time for platforms to give us a real opt‑out or ephemeral play option, or am I overthinking something that most people are fine with?
They’ve always been a waste of time IMO. The only time I’d do them was when i owned very few games and had to squeeze every drop of value out of each one.
There are some cool ones like factorios finish the game in under 8 hours but most are slop. I think theres still a place on steam for them. I can go on peoples profile and see the ones they’ve chosen to display and how rare they are.
If you use mods you can usually get a mod to reenable them if you care about it.
Makes no difference to me. I don’t mind them either way, but considering how they do nothing to effect the game i would say keep them. If anything they serve a purpose of statistics and possibly how far you are into a game. Considering i have never played a game with mods they are never disabled for me either. Ive been there when they started which i think was the year after the PS3 launched so 2007 or 2008 when the update came to introduce them. Its pretty cool seeing almost 20 years worth of that data on what i did and in what year i did it.
I like the different approach some games take, like Minecraft’s “advancements”. They’re per save, so mods don’t disable them (in fact, many mods add their own), and a nice indicator of how much progress you’ve made in a world already.
And people who care about “completing” a game can still do that in a single save and show off the advancement progress window there (although it can be cheated just like in any game).
There’s just no global statistics anymore.
Side note but I really don’t know that drill. I’ve used Linux since 2010 and only begrudgingly dual booted in the years before proton was a thing, but now have used it as my only OS since Valve started developing it.
Highly recommend trying it out if you like to tinker. Modding things like Bethesda games is possible, but it’s been a while since I played one so I can’t remember all the specifics.
Achievements are cool sometimes. I did some challenge runs on Factorio like “there is no spoon” which is launching a rocket in under 8 hours. There is almost always a mod that turns achievements back on for most games fwiw
Idgaf about achievements. It always was a scattered mess and (imo) epeen length comparison. I play for the experience and fun of it.
Ymmv. Have fun however you’re having it!
You can usually reenable achievements with another mod, if they matter to you.
I love achievements to the point I’ve been replaying a ton of old games just cause of retroachievements. As for what I’d think of others not wanting them, I don’t really care what you do. I do see a lot of pushback against achievements, especially whenever the topic of Nintendo adding them comes up since they’re the only platform without it, so a way to just permanently system or game wide disable them would be nice for those people. Something easy to access so you wouldn’t have to dig in menus for it.
Could be an age thing. 20 years ago on the 360, achievements I cared about. By the middle of the PS4 generation, I stopped caring about PS trophies. On Steam, never cared about Steam achievements. 20 years ago being a completionist was an interest of mine which included achievements. Today, I’m fine not finishing games
I think part of the reason I don’t care that much about Steam achievements is that they don’t do anything, plus the fact that they can be scammed via 3rd party tools.
I’ve only used said tool once to grant myself the “Paragon level 200” achievement and “Explore Nahantu” achievement in Diablo IV because I earned those on BNet and the unlocks aren’t retroactive.
While I might limit myself from “unlocking” achievements I haven’t earned, there’s nothing stopping someone else from “platting” a game they have played for 20 minutes, other than a lack of profile feed posts for these cheated achievements. As much as I would like Valve to make achievements matter, they can’t be allowed to matter while that tool exists.
Definitely an age thing, I remember a time video games didn’t have achievements, you played the game 'cause you liked the game, game companies kept track by virtue of their sails, now these days it’s how long a player plays, what achievements have been unlocked etc. I keep thinking that it’s OCD, the permanence of the thing, something I can’t change, but maybe you’re right, maybe it’s old age.
Achievements are background noise for me, I only chase them if they sound fun to chase. I have done all the achievements for a few games intentionally, but only if there are like a dozen or less that don’t just happen naturally by playing.
I save scummed for elden ring to get all endings because I don’t like replaying games and wanted to see all endings with my playerc think I got all acheivements but 1 without trying to get them all. I was trying to get every piece of equipment and every spell/incantation/summon in the game.
I think they’re relevant for people who like them. Most games I don’t care, but for games I really like it’s nice I’ll use achievements to see of there are things I haven’t yet discovered.
Sometimes it’s fun to compare to friends.
I don’t really know why they disable them with mods installed. If a person cheats and gets them all, who cares? It’s not like there’s actual value. If it makes them happy, let them be happy.
And yea, an opt out feature for people who don’t want them would be good, too.
Sometimes it’s fun to compare to friends.
Unless…
a person cheats and gets them all
If I’m actually friends with them, it’s a trait I’ve accepted, and at worst roll my eyes at. If you somehow feel less because a friend of yours has more achievements, that seems like a different issue altogether.
I really like seeing the breakdown of what percentage of players have done X, Y, or Z compared to me. When achievements were first implemented, it was the first time developers had real data about how people played their games, and it influenced how games would change after that. I don’t think many people are circumventing them via mods percentage-wise, so they’re mostly a good representation of the sample size’s behavior. I rarely go for all of them, averaging about 35% of achievements per game, but I did just 100% Escape from Ever After not long ago, and part of that was getting all of the achievements in it, which was a fun little extra activity to do in a game I really enjoyed.
If you really don’t want that record attached to you, you could prioritize playing games from GOG via offline installer, I suppose.
In some games they so provide an extra challenge that can be fun to go for. It of course depends on the game and the achievement. I’ve had games where I enjoyed going for achievements and some where I never even looked at them
They are marketing shenanigans, they always have been. Those who care about them is the people who are sensible to such marketing tactics.
They used to have value for single player games like Final Fantasy series.
Hate to break it to you but 100%ing a game means jack shit in every context.
It’s called personal satisfaction my dude.
As you can see, I care about achievements: https://sh.itjust.works/post/56525516
As others have said, it’s a great incentive to go deeper in a game. It should just not become a grind and that’s why I don’t 100% a lot of games.
It can also make you remember what branch of a story you went for in a story driven game.
If it gives data to developer about how a game is played, it ain’t something I mind as the way I play isn’t a important privacy wise as other data.
What’s stupid is when people buy a game just because it has easy achievements though…
I’d say you’re definitely overthinking it. I’ll look at the high end achievements if I’ve finished a game I like, as that could point me towards things I may have missed during my initial playthrough, but other than that, I don’t think about them at all.
If I actually do 100% a major game (Like I did for Fallout New Vegas) I’m proud to have accomplished it, but I’m not losing sleep over the other 3000 unfinished titles I’ve played.
I like achievements. I don’t compare them to anybody else, they just give me a goal and personal sense of accomplishment. The Binding of Isaac: Rebirth would have been a lot less satisfying to complete if I didn’t get to see 641/641 achievements on my profile.
In 99% of games I’ve played that disable achievements with mods, there’s a way around that on PC. In the aforementioned The Binding of Isaac: Rebirth, as long as you beat the first “final” boss a single time, you can use mods freely. In Fallout 4 as you’ve mentioned… there’s a mod that re-enables achievements. So this is an irrelevant issue to me.
As far as your other question goes, I’d be more than happy to see achievements be opt-out. On Steam you can always hide your library or use SAM to get rid of them all when you’re done playing, but that’s obviously not ideal.
