Beards Gamercard

Xbox Insider Spotlight: Earning Achievements with Beard

We’re excited to announce our second Xbox Insider Community Spotlight! This time around, we’re featuring Beard, an Xbox Insider with a skill for earning achievements.

Last month, Xbox Insider Team Lead Bradley (@WorkWombatman) noticed a Tweet from Beard that we just couldn’t resist learning more about.

Beard's tweet

Pretty cool, huh? Let’s see what else Beard has to say about achievements and his time as an Xbox Insider!

How long have you been an Xbox Insider, and what Xbox One Update Preview ring are you currently a part of?

Hello! I have been part of the Xbox Insider Program for (a little over) four years. I am in the Preview Alpha ring now.

Awesome! And where are you from?

I’m from Indiana.

What do you do for a living?

I was a commercial carpenter for 12 years, but as of 2014, I’m a stay-at-home father.

We already know you’re a dedicated gamer, but what are some of your favorite games on Xbox?

That’s a tough question, as I enjoy so many different games. I really enjoy the ID@Xbox Program, and not necessarily for the easy Gamerscore. There are a lot of great games that I normally wouldn’t of played without this program.

My all-time favorite series is “Tom Clancy’s Splinter Cell” (specifically Chaos Theory) and “Gears of War.” Believe it or not, I can’t wait to dive into any of the Artifex Mundi – it’s my guilty pleasure, I suppose.

We noticed you Tweet last month about achievement hunting. Do you mind telling us a bit about “Frenzied February,” your total Gamerscore and how you got into achievement hunting?

As of today, my Gamerscore is 560,775.

I got my first achievement on November 24, 2005, in Perfect Dark Zero. From that day, I was hooked. In my opinion, achievements are the best thing to happen to gaming. I got my first big milestone in 2008, when I hit 100,000 Gamerscore. Back then it was a different ball game; once I hit 100K, I slowed way down. I still loved achievements. I just no longer pushed to get it done as quickly. 100K back in 2008 was a decent accomplishment.

Alright, so “Beard’s 2nd Annual Frenzied February of Achievement Awesomeness” started February 2017 where my goal was to clean up some of the backlog of games that I had, gain a ton of achievements and do so in the shortest month of the year to see how well I could do. I didn’t really plan ahead, I just played the games I had and moved onto the next one. Last year, I scored 81,376 Gamerscore in that month.

This year was a little different, I had a friend who wanted to take part as well. We both had a goal of 50,000 Gamerscore earned that month. I spent a couple weeks going through games, making a spreadsheet and really putting thought into how to go about it this year. I passed that spreadsheet onto him, and he reached his goal of 50,000 Gamerscore about halfway through the month! He stopped there, but I kept going, my goal constantly kept changing. I figured I was so close to last year’s score, why not try to beat it? Then I beat that score and decided I was so close to 100,000 Gamerscore, why not keep going? I ended with 126,970 Gamerscore earned in February 2018.

Love the idea of choosing the shortest month of the year to complete this! Any tips for other Xbox gamers who are looking to boost their Gamerscore?

Gaining Gamerscore today is easier than it used to be. The ID@Xbox Program has a ton of quick and easy games you can complete in as little as 15 minutes.

As for other suggestions for anyone trying to boost their Gamerscore? I’d definitely sign up at TrueAchievements.com!  I’d also recommend you check out Maka91 and AchievementLand, as they have a ton of game walkthroughs, which will help you get the full completion the quickest. Maka also always puts out “Top Easiest Games of the Year” videos, which will help you in deciding which games are the easiest to play.

Thanks for the information! I imagine this will be tough to answer, but what achievement are you most proud of?

I’ve thought long and hard about this and I decided that I can’t just pick one achievement that I’m most proud of. The overall accomplishment and achievement of getting 126,970 Gamerscore in one month, which happens to be the shortest month of the year with 28 days, makes me far prouder than any one single achievement.

Finally, what do like most about being an Xbox Insider?

I really like trying out the new features that we get early. It’s fun to have something early and explore the updates and help test it out. However, being part of the Xbox community is the most rewarding thing.

I am very honored and excited to be here – thank you for the offering me the chance to be interviewed and for featuring me. This has been a blast!