Achievement Unlocked - You've kicked the habit

I was never a person who cared about high scores, collectibles, or seeing every ending to my games. One play through to see the ending and maybe a few side quests and I was ready to move on. So you could imagine my surprise when I found myself chugging through hour 15 of Army of Two's horrendous multiplayer to unlock my "Retirement Savings Plan" achievement. Something about seeing the little achievement unlocked bubble or the filled in achievement icon page for the game makes me so happy. I'll admit it, I was a full fledged achievement whore. That was until I played through Too Human.

I finished the single player campaign for Too Human with a big frown on my face. I couldn't stand the game from beginning to end. My complaints are pretty much the same as everyone else's, so I'll skip that bitch fest for now. After seeing the mediocre ending, I checked out what achievements I missed on my first run through and guessed I would be playing this game for another 2-3 weeks if I was to reach the full 1000/1000. With Dead Space, Fable 2, and Fallout 3 on the shelf and Gears 2 in the mail, I was faced with a tough decision. Move on to another game that I would probably enjoy immensely or suffer through several more weeks of pain with Too Human to satisfy my addiction. Typically I would have chosen the latter. For proof, check my gamer card for Army of Two, Conan, and Shadowrun. But this time, I chose to eject Too Human from my disc drive and my life. Maybe it was my realization that I'm now an adult and don't have as much free time, maybe it was knowing that I'll never get through my backlog if I don't move on, or maybe it was a deep understanding that having a full 1000 in Too Human isn't anything to brag about (no offense to those that do). Thanks to Goozex, I will never even be tempted to return to that game.

Now, I'm still a recovering achievement junkie/whore - I'm playing Dead Space a third time for the final achievement and I would like to get the full 1000 in Gears 2 - but at least these are games that I enjoy.

Are any of you guys hopelessly addicted to achievements? What is that appeal that draws us in? If you kicked the habit, what was your method (or game) that helped you walk away from an incomplete game?


And - anyone wanna get some gears 2 achievements (Tag: Mindzeye82)? (I said I was recovering!)