http://www.ripten.com/2008/01/07/xbox-live-server-problems-cause-achievements-to-disappear/
As if the recent Xbox Live issues hadn’t caused enough problems, it now appears that you can actually lose an unlocked achievement as well. I’ve had a recent run-in with this disturbing occurrence, and as always, 1-800-4my-xbox’s Max was there to help me out — and of course by help me out, I mean annoy me while I try to connect to a real person.
It all started with a 400-mile trip home for the holidays. I met up with one of my friends to play some co-op Guitar Hero II, something that requires both people to be in the same room (no online play, which is why we didn’t do it before).
We decided we would try to get all of the co-op achievements while I was home because it would be a long time before we would get another chance.
To make a long story short, we got all of the co-op achievements except for 800k pair and millionaire pair (800,000 and 1 million points in a co-op song, respectively).
We had done pretty well on Free Bird so we decided we would try to get the 800k - it seemed doable if we rocked out hard enough. We played quite a few times, getting close but not quite breaking the 800k mark. We decided to rest for the night and try again the next day.
After a nap and some cereal, we were primed and ready to melt faces. After two or three attempts, we blew the doors off - 840,996 points. I was so excited that we finally unlocked the achievement that I immediately hit the guide button and stared at it for about 2 minutes.
We were so proud of ourselves that we actually took a picture of the newspaper score screen so we could remember this moment always.
This picture is not doctored - we really are that sexy
Fast-forward about a week to today. Out of curiosity, I looked at my Guitar Hero II achievements to see what I had left, and to my surprise - no 800k pair. What the hell?
I checked my friends achievement list, and he still had the achievement. I know it wasn’t just a dream. So why the fudge don’t I have it? I thought maybe this was yet another problem with Xbox Live, so I gave them a call.
Once I connect to a real person, I tell him this whole story. After I finish he asks:
“Is this related to Halo 3?”
What? Are you fucking serious? I keep my composure (because I’m asking him for help, after all) and simply say “No, Guitar Hero II”.
He puts me on hold for 10 minutes and when he comes back, much to my surprise, he says that this is actually a known issue with Halo 3 and that I’m not the only one. I repeat again that it’s not Halo 3 I’m having trouble with, it’s Guitar Hero II.
“Oh, right. I thought you said Halo 3, but it applies to all games anyways”.
Basically, while attempting to “fix” Xbox Live, they’ve systematically been rolling back and recovering portions of their servers to weed out the bugs. Again, this is not the “official” word from Microsoft, but the guy on 1-800-4my-xbox said that’s what was going on. He seemed to know what I was talking about when I told him my issue, so that leads me to believe he’s not just making stuff up.
Now, for my problem, what I need to do is get another achievement on Guitar Hero II in order to update my account. Unlocking a new achievement should re-register my previous achievements, and re-unlock the one I’m missing.
Simple, right? No. Absolutely not simple at all. The only achievements I have left to get require 5-starring Hard and Expert (not gonna happen), getting a million points in co-op (doing that would get me 800k anyways, and I can’t do any co-op by myself), and getting 500,000 points on a song in single player (again, not gonna happen).
What if this missing achievement was the last one I could possibly get on the game? What would they do then?
I do have to give the “agent” credit, though. Most tech support blows smoke up my ass because they really have no idea how to help me. This guy at least found out about the problem and how to solve it. While I don’t know (and might never know) if it will work, it’s nice that it at least seems to make sense. On top of that, he didn’t treat me like I’m the idiot, even though he did try to make me think I was playing Halo 3. They never stop advertising that game, do they?
