A few weeks back, the PlayStation 3 got a much-anticipated firmware update, that finally added in-game Xross Media Bar (XMB) access, a few minor tweaks, and trophy support.

What are trophies, you ask? Put simply, they’re the PS3′s answer to the Xbox 360′s achievements. The latter are the gold standard of Xbox Live, with a majority of Xbox gamers whiling away countless hours in the pursuit of the pointless awards. You earn gamerpoints for them, and Xbox fanatics worldwide try to outdo each other by having a higher gamerscore. It’s the equivalent of a digital pissing contest, with these toolbags measuring each others’ e-penises. Of course, few of them realize that gamerscore is absolutely worthless; it adds nothing to gameplay, and there are no rewards.

The PS3′s trophies are equally pointless. Instead of having numbers assigned to random tasks completed in a game, you’ll instead earn bronze, silver, gold, or platinum trophies. These can be compared with other users collections, but like achievements and gamerscore, they’re ultimately worthless. They don’t affect anything in-game, and you reap no benefits for earning them. Furthermore, the whole thing’s kind of a half-assed effort at the moment; only a handful of games currently support them, and most older games won’t be patched. (Which, to be honest, can’t be all that difficult; it’s just another case of developer laziness.) I’m sure that a majority of future games will support trophies, but the PS3 didn’t need this bullshit; it’s got enough extra features as it is. Just let the games stand on their own merit without bells and whistles.

I should also mention that trophies and achievements can be downright distracting. If you’re really caught up in a game’s world, nothing takes you out of it faster than a banner appearing that says “Achievement unlocked.” Hell, I was playing Super Stardust HD the other night (finally got around to buying the add-on pack, as I hadn’t played the game in ages), I somehow unlocked a trophy in Survival mode…and the banner distracted me, causing me to fuck up and die. How annoying. I don’t see any reason why the notifications can’t be smaller or otherwise less obtrusive.

I can understand that people just want to have fun acquiring trophies and achievements, and that’s fine. The problem is that too many fans and developers are using them to overshadow everything else. Like I’ve stated countless times before, they add nothing to the game. This obsession with pointless trinkets has got to stop. It’s one thing if killing a thousand enemies in a row will earn your character a new weapon. It’s another if killing a thousand enemies in a row earns you a worthless number sitting on the Internet. Seriously, those obsessed with these things need to get outside more; your “bragging rights” only show that you spend way too much time playing video games.