Achievement Hunter
 | This article needs additional citations for verification. (April 2013) |
| Achievement Hunter logo | |
Type of site | Video games, web series |
|---|---|
| Available in | English |
| Owner | Rooster Teeth Productions |
| Created by | Geoff Ramsey Jack Pattillo |
| URL | achievementhunter.com |
Achievement Hunter is a gaming website created by Geoff Ramsey and Jack Pattillo of Rooster Teeth Productions. The website is largely based on the achievement mechanic, found in seventh generation video game consoles after being made popular with Microsoft's release of the Xbox 360. The website was launched 2008, along with Rooster Teeth's YouTube channel. Achievement Hunter has since gone on to become the core of Rooster Teeth's YouTube channel.
History
During 2008, Geoff Ramsey's interest in gaming achievements led to the realization that there wasn't a community-based achievements website, and in turn Achievement Hunter was created, which shares the design, user profiles and forums of the main Rooster Teeth website. The site is run by two full-time Rooster Teeth staff Geoff Ramsey and Jack Pattillo, who regularly release achievement guides, easter egg videos and other game-related videos, and select volunteers from the Rooster Teeth community help moderate the website. The most frequent videos come from employees and some of the said community members. The current main hosts are Geoff Ramsey, Jack Pattillo, Gavin Free, Ray Narvaez Jr., Michael Jones, Ryan Haywood and Caleb Denecour. Unlike many other achievement-dedicated websites, Achievement Hunter is highly dependent on public contributions and so has guides across many different games and platforms, allowing the site to expand its focus from Xbox 360 games to those on PC, PS3, Steam, and Windows Phone.
In 2010, Geoff Ramsey and Jack Pattillo created a new series called AH Predicts. This involved Patillo and Ramsey simulating and watching an AI played sporting game that was happening, or would happen. They would make predictions about winners before the game, and then see who the winner was after the AI had finished. They covered many important sporting events like Alabama College's playoff games (Ramsey's home-state school), and even the Super Bowl. It has since been suspended.
In early 2010, Ramsey and Pattillo started a weekly series called Achievement Hunter Weekly Update, commonly abbreviated to AHWU. In it, Ramsey talks about upcoming games while Pattillo talks about gaming news. In line with the community-focus of the Rooster Teeth and Achievement Hunter websites, and similarly to The Rooster Teeth Podcast, each episode's title sequence is created by members of the community. Late 2010 saw the introduction of two more regular series, Fails of the Weak and Achievement HORSE. The former is a compilation of mistakes and glitches in Halo: Reach and later Halo 4 with commentary from Geoff and Jack. Reach mistakes have been replaced by Halo 4 on the series 117th episode on December 14, 2012. The latter has Geoff, Jack, and other Rooster Teeth staff members play H-O-R-S-E using obstacle courses built with the Forge mode of Halo 4 (initially Halo: Reach) and the level editor in the motorbike platform racing game, Trials Evolution. They further published their videos both on their website, and on other media-sharing sites such as YouTube. Another series is Rage Quit in which Michael Jones plays very difficult or very annoying games until he, as Ramsey puts it, "eventually has an aneurysm and we have to rush him to the emergency room." In August 2011, Jones became a full-time staff member at Achievement Hunter.
In 2011, Achievement Hunter debuted three new series for its audience. The first, titled This is..., in which featured members of the staff introducing an upcoming gaming title (either retail or XBLA) and premiered in early March for the game, Dynasty Warriors 7. It comes out a day or two after the game comes out. The second series, titled Things to do in: was created in November 2011 and presented viewers and gamers with fun and interesting things to do in games like Saints Row: The Third and Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3. The final series, Let's Play, began airing in early December. In this series, Rooster Teeth staff members play different games every week, with weekly episodes focusing on Minecraft: Xbox 360 Edition having become a popular sub-series. Currently, most of their Minecraft videos take place in a world called Achievement City. Sometime the maps are created by a special guest. Things to do in: comes out every Wednesday and Let's Play comes out every Monday, Wednesday and Friday. This is... eventually formed a spin-off series known as A Look Back At..., in which members of the Achievement Hunter crew re-introduced old Xbox 360 games that may have been overlooked in their release but are now a classic game. This series is no longer done weekly, and has been replaced by Achievement Hunter's "Retro-Active". This series shows classic games such as Blood, TimeSplitters, and Mega Man X. It is presented by Achievement Hunter employees Ray Navarez Jr. and Fragger.
In September 2012, Achievement Hunter launched a new series called Five Facts. In this series, Patillo and Ramsey discuss little known facts about various video games such as BioShock, The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim, and Resident Evil 4. The series is sometimes presented by its creator, Franco, along with another Rooster Teeth employee.
Finally, staggered originally but currently weekly on Fridays, is Community Game Night. During Community Game Night crew members Caleb Denecour and Geoff Ramsey play a game or specific game type (often in Halo games) with Achievement Hunter and Rooster Teeth fans. They record the games and present the game types for viewers to attempt as well. On Monday April 15th 2013. Achievement Hunter launched their own Let's Play YouTube channel that will be the home of future episodes of Let's Play and VS.[1]
Hosts
Main hosts
- Geoff Ramsey (since 2008)
- Jack Pattillo (since 2008)
- Gavin Free (since 2008)
- Michael Jones (since 2011)
- Ray Narvaez, Jr. (since 2011)
Recurring hosts
- Brandon "Fragger" Light (since 2011)
- Caleb Denecour (since 2012)
- Ryan Haywood (since 2012)
- Kdin Jenzen (since 2013)
Series
In addition to daily video game guides, Achievement Hunter produces several weekly series as well.
References
External links
| Series | Years | |
|---|---|---|
| "Forced Enjoyment" | 2008 | |
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Jack Pattillo must play poorly received games. The series was filmed in a documentary format, with several segments per episode. | ||
| "Pajamachievements" | 2008-2009 | |
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Geoff Ramsey played games with his wife Griffon and a variety of her friends. | ||
| "Achievement Hunter Weekly Update" | 2010-Present | |
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Geoff Ramsey and Jack Pattillo go over recent video game news and releases, as well as their achievement of the week. | ||
| "AH Predicts" | 2010-2012 | |
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Geoff Ramsey and Jack Pattillo use simulation in sports video games to "predict" an upcoming real-life match. | ||
| "Fails of the Weak" | 2010-Present | |
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Geoff Ramsey and Jack Pattillo go through fan submitted Halo "Game Fails" and give them commentary. | ||
| "Achievement Horse" | 2010-Present | |
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Two hosts go through fan submitted "HORSE" maps in Halo and Trials Evolution. These maps include obstacle courses, shooting challenges, and other types of skill challenges. | ||
| "Rage Quit" | 2011-Present | |
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Michael Jones plays annoying or difficult games, until he inevitably quits out of anger. This series initially began on Jones' personal YouTube channel, but was added to the Achievement Hunter lineup when he was hired in 2011. | ||
| "This Is..." | 2011-Present | |
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This series goes through a recently released game, and explains the game's achievements. Pattillo has called this "the closest they'll ever get to reviewing games". | ||
| "A Look Back At..." | 2011-2012 | |
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Similar to "This Is...", this series included older games that may have been overlooked. It was hosted by Ray Narvaez, Jr. | ||
| "Things To Do In" | 2011-Present | |
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Typically hosted by Geoff Ramsey and Gavin Free, this series showcases unusual or cool things the audience can do in a recently released game. Much like their Let's Play series, many of these videos focus on Minecraft. | ||
| "Let's Play" | 2011-Present | |
|
All (or a selection of) the main hosts play a video game, with their live commentary dubbed over the events. New episodes are released three days a week with their flagship episodes being their weekly Minecraft episodes on Fridays. Let's Build is a series released on Tuesday's showing the creation of the Minecraft challenges that are used for Minecraft Let's Plays. | ||
| "Game Fails" | 2011-Present | |
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A series that contains several videos a day of fan submitted "fails" in a vast selection of games. Not to be confused with "Fails of the Weak". | ||
| "Trials Files" | 2012-Present | |
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Jack Pattillo and Geoff Ramsey highlight and provide commentary on a variety of user-created maps in Trials Evolution. | ||
| "Game Night" | 2012-Present | |
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Caleb Denecour and Geoff Ramsey play a Halo custom game with the Achievement Hunter community, recording footage of gameplay and later posting a compilation of the best parts that typically averages about five-minutes long. | ||
| "Retro-Active" | 2012-Present | |
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Hosted by Achievement Hunter community member Fragger, this series features games from the past generations of consoles and how they can be implemented into the current generation. | ||
| "Quick Bits" | 2012 | |
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This series featured several clips from of Let's Play episodes. | ||
| "Five Facts" | 2012-Present | |
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This series features five little known facts about a very well known game or game series. The series was created by community member Franco for the Community Hunter channel and was recently added to the main channel line up. | ||
| "Coming Soon" | 2013-Present | |
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An in-depth look at what games are coming up in the following month, with gameplay footage, developer comments, and intensive details on what to expect from the game itself. Created and hosted by Kdin Jenzen. | ||
| "VS" | 2013-Present | |
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A weekly one on one competition where two of the staff members compete against each other in a video game of the challengers choosing. The winner of the game is declared champion of the office for one week and gets ownership of a pretend WWE Championship belt for that time. The winner is then challenged by another Achievement Hunter member the next week. | ||
| "Let's Build" | 2012-Present | |
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A now weekly episode on their Let's Play Channel, Geoff and Gavin show you how to build some of the Let's Plays in Achievement City. | ||
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