Have you ever looked at a game in your Steam library that you had every achievement for the base game, but notice the DLC achievements have ruined your completion record?
Soon that will be a thing of the past because Steam has started rolling out a new Achievement Sets feature out in beta, allowing game developers to categorize their achievements. This way, you can track your achievements based on what category they belong to.
Some might have a category specific for online achievements. Achievements that are tied to DLC may also have their own specific section. This gets better as achievements tied to DLC are not included in your progress unless you have the DLC in question.
Developers also have the ability to archive achievement sets for seasonal-based events, presumably intended to allow limited-time achievements without ruining the progress counter for people who don't get to the event in time (like how online achievements are. Do we finally have a solution to this problem that has persisted for over 20 years now?)
Global stats on achievements will also be viewable as a separate toggle rather than a new page.
PlayStation Trophies has the same type of system, where only base game trophies are required to get a Platinum trophy (even if you already have all of the associated DLC and other content to access the other achievement sets). If this works the same way, you'll be awarded with full completion (and the associated blue ribbon) for getting all of the base game achievements.
Quote From Steam We're starting a beta for Steam Achievement Sets, a new feature aimed at improving the achievement experience on Steam.
Games today live longer than ever, continuing to receive updates through new DLC, expansions, and seasons. But achievements added with new game content can be hard to discover and can accidentally break the completion status of players who have already finished the game.
We have designed Achievement Sets to help address these types of issues. You can try them out in today's Steam Client beta and in a growing set of games that have already added support.
Introducing Achievement Sets
This beta enables developers to group their game's related achievements together in collections we are calling Achievement Sets. Devs can specify the number of sets and the purpose of each to match their game's specific needs. You can imagine one game grouping its achievements into single-player and multiplayer sets, or another into 8 class-based sets.
In games that support sets, you still unlock achievements by playing the game as usual. But when you browse what you have unlocked afterward, Steam will break the long list of game achievements into the developer-created sets, making it easier to see what you have completed and to find other related achievements you can unlock next.
Each Achievement Set also has its own progress bar showing how far along you are in that area. Once you have unlocked every achievement in a set, Steam will commemorate the moment and add a "set complete" trophy to your profile. If new achievements are later added to the set, your completion is preserved.
As a game grows, developers can create new sets to hold achievements for the added content. These new sets make it easy for returning players to see what new things they can unlock, while also preserving their prior completion status until they play again.
There are two types of Achievement Sets.
Base Game Achievement Sets
Base Game sets contain achievements that can be earned by all players who play a game. Their progress and trophies are displayed in blue on your achievements page.
DLC Achievement Sets
Some games contain achievements that can only be earned once you have purchased additional content (DLC) for that game. These achievements can now be grouped into new DLC sets, allowing you to separately track what you have unlocked in the new content.
DLC achievements are not included in your overall game progress until you have access to the content. Once acquired, they will be displayed as purple progress and trophies on your achievements page.
All possible achievements for a game can be explored from the new achievements page, so if you are curious, give the page a skim to see what the game's DLC has added.
Seasonal Achievements
We are also introducing the ability for game developers to archive individual achievements or entire Achievement Sets. We think there are a lot of fun ways games can take advantage of the temporary nature this can add, such as adding achievements to season-based games or enabling time-limited holiday achievements.
Once archived, users who had already unlocked the achievement or set will still see it on their profile. However, archived achievements won't show up on the profile pages of users who missed the unlock nor block their progress toward completing a set or game. Anytime an achievement can no longer be unlocked by users, it should be archived.
A New Achievements Page
Bringing this all together is an updated achievements page, accessible from your Games List on the web and from games in your Steam Library. The new page gives you a summary of your overall progress, progress in each achievement set, and details on individual achievements.
Global Stats, or the per-achievement completion rates, are now available as a toggle here rather than on a separate page.
Search has also been expanded with filters for specific achievement sets and for locked or unlocked achievements. Plus, there's a little extra joy when you complete all your achievement sets.
You can now compare your game progress with up to three friends, including rare achievements, completed sets, and progress in DLC sets. You'll see both the number of achievement sets you've completed and a new, more accurate total achievement count, making it easier to compare your progress with friends. This total is based on achievements each player can actually earn, which may vary depending on the add-on content they have and whether certain achievements are time-limited or archived. As a result, the total can differ from friend to friend.
And More
We've rebuilt a few areas where achievements are displayed, to show off your overall achievement and set progress throughout Steam. You'll see your completed sets on your profile in the Recently Played section, your Games List, your Library, and more.
The Perfect Games tab is now called Completed and expands to show both completed games and games with completed achievement sets.
Games with completed achievement sets can now be added to the Completionist Showcase, in addition to completed games.
Games played via Family Sharing are now displayed in the Games List.
Friends with playtime in a game through Family Sharing are now eligible for friend comparison.
Store and Library game pages will now show if a game has achievement sets.
Try It Out Now
These updates are now available as a beta for both players and game developers. Here's how to join the Steam Client Beta. We'll continue making improvements during the beta, so make sure to let us know what you think.
As developers begin using the new tools, you'll start seeing these changes appear for supported games.
The following games have already added achievement sets:
Are you a game developer interested in seeing how easy it is to add achievement sets? Read the Steamworks blog post here.
What do you think about Steam Achievement sets? Let us know in the comments below.
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