so, i've mentioned RetroAchievments a few times on this site before, specifically when reviewing some games i've played with them enabled. well, each year RA has an event where each week, a random achievement is selected for "achievement of the week." if you complete it, you get a point towards that year's AOTW badge. complete all 52 of them, and you get a gold badge. (there's also achievement of the month, but i generally don't bother with those, as they're a lot more committal...) i love this concept, and last year in 2025 i tried to keep up with it for a while. in the end, i started doing them in late january, got four of them, and gave up around mid february.

well this year, things are gonna be different!! every three months, i'll be posting a set of mini reviews of each game i played for Achievement of the Week this year, and hopefully by the time we get to the end of December i'll have written 52 of them. we'll start with each week from January to March for this first batch, then the next set will be from April to June, then July to September, then October to December. so, let's get this show rolling!

week 1
Game: Final Fantasy Origins (PS1)
Achievement: Troll Face
Goal: Beat Astos in FF1
Game finished? Yes

I think you know that i like final fantasy 1. That said, the PS1 remake can be a little challenging to get into because of the spell system, and with the lack of the quality of life changes such as being able to save without the use of an inn. Plus, this cheevo requires you to beat the Marsh Cave, which sucks and is ass. Still, this one gets bonus points for being FF1.

week 2
Game: Metroid Fusion (GBA)
Achievement: Leg Day Paid Off
Goal: Get the Speed Booster
Game finished?: Yes

This got me into Metroid, after years of being on the fence about whether i liked the series or not. Fusion is a pretty great game, and a really good entry level game for the Metroid series. I ended up liking it so much that I 100%ed it, which should say something.

week 3
Game: Dark Cloud (PS2)
Achievement: Cringe
Goal: Get Xiao as an ally
Game finished? No

not really sure what's going on with the name of this cheevo, it feels very much like the set creator just hates Xiao for some reason. She's not THAT bad, i've certainly seen worse catgirl characters. Dark Cloud is cool though, it's something i'd been meaning to play since 2018 and this finally got me to do so. You're welcome, Vincent. The presentation feels very much like they were excited to FINALLY be working with the PS2, because they went all out. The dungeon crawling is fine, it can feel a little... BIG sometimes, and your character is slow, and you run out of your thirst meter or whatever its called very quickly. Also early on, you don't get a lot of poison healing items, so if you get poisoned you're kinda just Fucked. Damn, do I even really like the dungeon crawling in this game, now that I think about it? I'm not sure. I mean, i think getting the pieces for your town is pretty fun and rewarding, and it's always exciting to get a new part to go with one of your buildings you've placed. In an alternate timeline, I think i would have gotten addicted to Dark Cloud as a kid, but for now I thought it was just okay.

week 4
Game: Sonic & Sega All-Stars Racing (DS)
Achievement: Amber de Amigo
Goal: earn 500,000 lifetime miles
Game finished?: No

Man, fuck this one. This game made me depressed the whole time i was playing it. I heard in a video a long time ago that this game is actually pretty good, and for the hardware i suppose it is, but something about it feels kinda... lifeless? I dunno, i did not feel any joy playing it. The cheevo itself is a grind too, i was doing this one up until the last day because i REALLY was not into the gameplay, and it takes so many races to get to 500k. The only joy i got out of this game was seeing Ryo Hazuki riding a motorcycle and doing flippy tricks while exclaiming in his autism voice. I love Ryo. He doesn't fit in with the goofy ass cast this game but that makes it funnier to me.

week 5
Game: Kaizou Choujin Shubibinman Zero (SFC)
Achievement: Spaceship
Goal: Defeat Galko (or the 5 pillars)
Game finished?: Yes

I was a little apprehensive about this game at first, but it started to click as i played it more. It's like if a beat-em-up was actually fun! it focuses more on platforming, so that might be why. The arcade structure of only having a certain number of continues made things a little hard though, and i'll admit... i cheated a bit. I used a glitch to give myself infinite continues, and the set didn't stop me, so... win? I like how the two characters (p1 and p2) play differently, and you're able to play as either in single player. All you have to do is switch your controller to the second port, and you can play as the girl! When i first came out as transgender I was always VERY adamant about being the girl if given an option, and while i've mostly gotten over that tick now, this game reignited that desire within me. sometimes you just want to be a pink frilly dress magical girl, nothin wrong with that. Plus, i like her playstyle more. the male character gets a really powerful DP, which is cool, but the female character gets an AIRDASH. come on, that's sick.

week 6
Game: Rayman 3 (PS2)
Achievement: Clearleaf Forest
Goal: Complete Clearleaf Forest
Game finished?: No

i had rayman 2 as a kid and i love rayman 1, so ive always wondered what rayman 3 is like. now i know! its just okay. idk, the humor is very hit or miss for me, and that's kind of all this game has. well, except the combat. nitrorad will always bring up the combat as a highlight of this game, and he's right, it's pretty cool. the combo system is neat, and its fun curving your punches n stuff.

week 7
Game: Drawn to Life: Spongebob Squarepants Edition (DS)
Achievement: A Crazy Circus!
Goal: Complete Lagoon Circus
Game finished?: No

wow! who's surprised that i didn't get much enjoyment out of the licensed spongebob ds game? drawn to life is one of those games i knew about as a kid, but it always felt kinda. hollow to me? i knew i wanted to make games as a kid, no doubt, and people were always like "yeah it gives you a little taste of that!" but even as a kid, i could see that it was really hollow. i didn't want to just draw platforms and characters, i wanted to MAKE GAMES. (thats probably why i fucking loved warioware diy, they let you program shit there!) it just felt like being put in a playpen, compared to a nature trail. sure, they're both places for you to walk around in, but one definitely feels less belittling than the other. on top of that, i do like what people would consider "bad games" most of the time, but licensed games like this certainly don't make me feel "cool" playing them. i never really had cable to watch spongebob on as a kid, so i don't really have that big of a connection to it. all of this adds up to a game that just DID NOT click with me.

week 8
Game: Super Bomberman 5: Gold Cartridge (SFC)
Achievement: Have Muscle, But Don't Have Strategy
Goal: Defeat Muscle Bomber
Game finished?: No

so uh, this cheevo was what got me to interact with the flikki system for the first time on RA. ive always kinda sucked at bomberman, i think its a cool series, but you really have to think like 5 steps ahead of the enemies to be any good at it. i was able to manage most of the early game levels, i was a little bored, but i was at least making progress. and then i got to the first boss, Dog Bomber. this shit felt impossible, hes fast, hes smart, he places landmines that can gib you in an instant, and if you get a game over you lose ALL of your upgrades, meaning unless youre godly enough to beat him without items, your ass is going to the earlier levels to grind. i think most other people agreed with me on this one, because when i went to the RA discord server EVERYONE else was complaining about the same shit as me. on top of that, muscle bomber is the 3rd world boss, and i couldnt even beat the first world. so i gave up. i used a flikki to trade this one out for Gran Turismo 2002. beautiful game, by the way! GT2002 looks phenomenal for the hardware, it even supports native widescreen! i think Gran Turismo is known for being a visual showcase for the consoles it's on, and this is no exception.

week 9
Game: Donald Duck: Goin' Quackers (PS1)
Achievement: Magica's Evil Dome
Goal: Complete World 3
Game finished?: No

i'd heard of this game before, but it took until this week for me to finally play it. i knew it was a crash bandicoot clone, i knew it was on EVERY fucking console, and that was it. after playing it, it's honestly not too bad? certainly more enjoyable than something like drawn to life or sonic all stars racing. the presentation is a little... dumpy, but the platforming is respectable, and i like how the collectible toys work, where you have to hit a book, then reach a collectible it spawns within a time limit. sorta like with spongebob drawn to life, i certainly didn't feel COOL playing this, but i still enjoyed it! in the past i never heard anything all that negative about it, and i think i understand that now.

week 10
Game: Castlevania: Dracula X Chronicles (PSP)
Achievement: Headless Knight
Goal: Defeat Dullahan
Game finished?: No

i'd never played a Castlevania game for more than 10 minutes before this, and i gotta say, i really enjoyed it! shit was hard, yeah, but i found the process of learning how each obstacle works and how to get around it using the tools provided in a certain amount of lives to be a really fun challenge. i often hear people say that lives are an outdated mechanic, and depending on the game that they're in they definitely feel unnecessary and antiquated, but sometimes it can really add to the tension of something and really force you to learn how to deal with something effectively. i felt this a lot with Star Fox when i played that game recently, it took me several days to beat that game without save states because of the lives system, as opposed to the 30 minutes it would have taken me otherwise, and it really forced me to get good at it. it was awesome! anyways, back to castlevania, the only issue i really had was that if i lost the axe before the room with the floating eyes in level 4, that attempt was more or less a lost cause, because that room feels so impossible without it, at least with my knowledge. other than that though, the game was cool! i kept seeing people saying "oh you NEED to get Maria to deal with the boss of level 4" but honestly the boss wasnt so bad without it.

week 11
Game: Goldeneye 007 (N64)
Achievement: Arkangelsk Runway [A]
Goal: Complete the Runway mission on Agent difficulty
Game finished?: No

Goldeneye's one of those games i'd heard sooooo much about in my time about how its a landmark title in first person shooters, but i'd never really taken that much interest in it. AOTW is always forcing me to play stuff i wouldn't otherwise though, and after playing it, i can definitely see what people see in it. it's such a crazy game for the hardware, and really has so much love and care put into every aspect of it. i haven't watched goldeneye (the movie) but i did watch a couple of Bond movies a while ago, namely From Russia with Love and Dr. No, and after playing GoldenEye it does make me wanna actually watch the movie. Rare was always just making shit work with what they were given, and i think that's so cool.

week 12
Game: Fire Emblem: The Blazing Blade (GBA)
Achievement: I See Lycia
Goal: Complete Chapter 5
Game finished?: No

Femblem is a series i've been kind of wanting to get into for a while now, i could totally see myself getting obsessed with it and playing every single game in the series over the course of like a couple months like i did with Final Fantasy. This AOTW finally got me to try it out for a bit, and i like it! i really loved the battle animations, they're so satisfying to watch and are full of so much flair. that shit is Awesome, i gotta say. i also liked Lyn, she's pretty cool, i'm surprised that with all the femblem sword fighters we have in smash, Lyn isn't one of them. other than that though, i had a hard time getting into the gameplay of this. i dunno man, i always feel stupid playing these kinds of strategy games. i played Advance Wars a while ago which is essentially Fire Emblem without the RPG elements, and i couldn't get past one of the levels. that being said, i was able to handle everything Blazing Blade threw at me. now, that's probably just because this cheevo required me to play through all of the easy baby tutorial levels where they just tell you what to do, but... hey, give a girl some small victories, okay? also, for the record, this is the cheevo that got me the bronze badge! wahoo!