Université de Lausanne

Test Trophy Please Ignore: Achievements as Paratexts in Palimpsestic Readings of Remasters and Remakes

This paper argues that achievements, or trophies, function as paratexts in Genette's sense, offering authorial commentary that reveals the palimpsestic relationship between original video games and their remakes and remasters.

• The paper argues that achievements/trophies act as paratexts in Genette's sense, offering authorial commentary that exposes the palimpsestic relationship between original games and their remakes and remasters.
• Trophy lists persist, change, or are newly created across versions, and these traces of revision can be read as interpretive, navigational, and commercial thresholds, a dimension the authors say previous scholarship on remakes as paratexts has largely omitted.
• A 2007 industry study cited in the paper correlated higher achievement volume with higher Metacritic scores and sales, and achievements became mandatory on Microsoft and Sony platforms after the Xbox 360's 2005 launch.