For some people, beating the main campaign or collecting a handful of the various collectibles within a game simply isn’t enough. There is a collective of gamers out there who will not rest until they have seen and done everything in a particular video game, and even then, they might play it all over again if there’s an achievement in it for them. Trophy hunters are a rare breed, but you can’t help but admire their work ethic.
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However, if you dig even deeper into this subsection of gamers, you’ll find trophy hunters that seek out exceptionally rare and difficult platinum almost exclusively. These games are a little tricky to source as, for the most part, developers want to make their games challenging but not brutally so.
But believe it or not, there are quite a few games on thePSPlus Catalog that fall into this ‘tough platinum’ category, and being the good egg that I am, I’ve taken the liberty of highlighting a few of them for you.
10Bloodborne
Bloodborne
It may seem odd that we are kicking things off with a Souls game, considering the gaming world reveres these titles as the hardest titles in existence, but while they are hard experiences, they aren’t necessarily hard platinum to achieve if you’re a good Souls player. So, in this very specific case, it balances out.
That being said,Bloodborneis a very tricky game, especially for Souls fans who are used to hiding behind their shield and relying on their stamina bar to dig them out of trouble. As Bloodbornemixes things up and provides a fast-paced, risk-and-reward playstyle that forces players to play on the offensive if they want to get ahead.
It’s a platinum that requires you to beat all the bosses within the game, collect a variety of unique items, and you’ll also have to clear all of the Chalice Dungeons too, which is no small achievement. But, if you’re a Souls veteran, this platinum experience may just be the harsh but fair challenge you’ve been looking for.
9Kayak Mirage
As someone with very flimsy shoulders, this VR title’s platinum trophy gives me the fear, and quite frankly, even those with supple joints should be wary of this one. The PS Plus catalog has started adding VR titles to the line-up lately, and Kayak Mirage, an international Kayaking simulator, is one of them.
It’s a game that is very realistic, mechanically impressive, and can be rather relaxing if you just want to paddle at your leisure and enjoy the scenery. However, due to the races included in this title’s achievements, the soothing nature of this VR experience is chucked overboard as you frantically paddle to the checkered flag.
To earn this platinum, you’ll need to embody the humble duck. By that, I mean calm and composed on the surface, but paddling like a kayaking demon under the water. It’s a platinum that will test your fitness, kayaking skills, and patience, but if you have what it takes, get on the water and make a splash!
Red Dead Redemption 2
There are many factors that can make a platinum trophy elusive. It can be down to one particular rare trophy, it can be down to the need to play online, or, in many cases, it can be down to the sheer amount of time you will need to invest to make that trophy pop, andRed Dead Redemption 2may just be the most time-consuming platinum on the PS Plus Catalog today.
To earn this one, you’ll need to clear the story along with all the Gold Medals associated with these missions. You’ll need to find all the collectibles in this expansive world, clear all the challenges, earn the trophies related to your honor level, clear all the optional Camp Companion and Stranger Missions, do various miscellaneous tasks, hunt and skin the rarest animals in the land, and even if you’ve done all that, you’ll still have a bunch of online trophies to obtain.
This platinum requires a deep knowledge of RDR2’s world and a lot of free time, as it can easily take 200+ hours to do everything needed for the platinum trophy. So, if you’ve got nothing but time on your hands, this may be the ideal challenge for you.
7Hollow Knight
Hollow Knight (Dupe)
Hollow Knightmay be cute as a button, but don’t be fooled; this is a hard game, and one that only gets harder the longer you play. Now, to be fair, a lot of the trophies attached to this game are relatively manageable as you’ll need to explore thoroughly, beat all the bosses dotted around Hallownest, and find all the upgrades for your little knight. However, the trouble comes when you get to the end-game content within Godhome.
This secret end-game area accessed through Godtuner in the Junk Pit plays host to some of the most brutally tough boss gauntlets that you’ll find within the entire medium of gaming. With the Pantheon of Hallownest serving as the hardest of the lot, this challenge will see you take onevery single boss in the game back to back, and if you die even once, it’s curtains.
This gauntlet also features brand-new, insanely tough bosses along the way and very few breaks to catch your breath, making it a kingmaker for anyone who takes on the challenge. The only saving grace is that the Path of Pain isn’t linked to any trophies, but even still, this is a genuinely brutal platinum process.
Games that feel more like art projects tend to be good examples of easy platinum. Walking simulators like Journey and What Remains of Edith Finchare great examples, as are artistic showpieces like The Artful Escape. You would think that, at a glance, the ballet-based platformer Boundwould be firmly within this category. Yet despite being a showstopper in terms of artistic flair and design, it also serves as one of the toughest platinum trophies in existence.
This will require you to beat the game, do various hidden tasks, and find all the Memory Shards dotted around the place, but in truth, that’s the easy part. The difficulty comes through the Speedrun achievements, as players will need to effectively play through the campaign and achieve near-perfection to beat the game in fifty minutes or less.
Then players also need to beat the game without dying once, sequence break, beat various other chapter-based speedrun challenges, and play the game at least 6 times over. It’s a grueling challenge, but if you want to prove you’re a mercurial dancing extraordinaire, then be our guest.
5Session: Skate Sim
Session: Skate Sim
Here’s one that I’m proud to say I have in my trophy cabinet. Session: Skate Simis a game that prides itself on being a skating game far removed from the Tony Hawk’s Pro Skater andEA Skatefranchises. This game focuses on realism above all else and provides a true-to-life simulation of skating where, in the beginning, you’ll struggle to even put together a basic line, but before long, you’ll be doing noseblunts and Laser Flips.
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However, even when you do become accustomed to the precise and demanding controls, the game will still ask a lot of players wanting to achieve 100% completion, as players will need to grind and manual for literal miles, do specific tricks at volume, complete the game with the manual catch feature enabled, and to top it all off, you’ll need to complete all the historical challenges within the game, which are hard to find, and deadly to pull off.
I can personally attest to the fact that this one is a grueling slog, but one that will prove without a shadow of a doubt that you are a natural-born ripper, so drop in and tear up the streets!
Before we talk about this one, I just need to make one thing clear. When I list this as a hard platinum, I do so with the solo experience in mind. I’m very aware that, if you have friends who help you boost certain things, you may pop each of these trophies with little to no fuss. However, if you’re taking this on as a solo venture and playing legitimately, this is a very hard challenge indeed.
This is becauseTerrariais a game with so much content, depth of systems, and things to learn that you need to fully immerse yourself to stand a chance of checking everything off your list. Which includes finding all the pets, beating all the bosses, achieving certain world states, and grinding to a degree that it would make your head spin.
It’s time-consuming and all-consuming, but if you’re someone that really loves Terrariaand wants to see if you have what it takes to 100% the game solo, this serves as a challenge that separates the noobs from the pros.
3Slay The Spire
Slay the Spire
Speaking of games that require knowledge and mastery to 100%, that couldn’t be more true ofSlay The Spire, anaddictive card-based roguelikethat only awards its platinum to those who are willing to work insanely hard to earn it. It’s estimated that players will need to play a minimum of 46 times to earn this platinum and invest well over 100 hours in the process, and that’s only the best-case scenario, as chances are the RNG might not be on your side.
You’ll need to beat the game with all the characters present, earn their secret endings, and also reach level 20 Ascension, which is an insanely difficult thing to do. But in truth, it’s the hyper-specific miscellaneous trophies that kill you in the end. You’ll need to beat the game with all Relics, beat the game with a deck of five cards or less, beat the game in under 20 minutes, and beat various bosses in super-specific ways.
It’s a platinum that has no respect for your time and will push you to your very limit. But, if you can handle the pain of RNG screwing you over time and time again, you may just manage to come out the other side with one of the rarest platinum trophies ever to grace any PlayStation.
2I Am Bread
I Am Bread
Slay The Spire, along with a handful of other games on this list, are brutally hard, but you have to say that, by and large, they are fair challenges. Well, the same cannot be said of I Am Bread,a game that is the spiritual successor to Surgeon Simulator, as you control a slice of bread and will need to navigate various levels in a bid to get your slice of bread into the toaster is as close to perfect condition as possible.
It sounds relatively straightforward, but due to the hazardous terrain you need to cross and the internationally cumbersome and flimsy controls you’ll need to wrestle with, each minor movement or decision you make has the potential to spoil your run and leave you pulling your hair out.
Then, when you add in the different level variants like zero-gravity, rampage, and cheese hunt, the potential for frustration shoots through the roof. I love toast as much as the next guy, but if I had to play this game and finish it 100%, I reckon that would be enough to put me off for life.
1The Elder Scrolls Online
Elder Scrolls Online
Then, lastly, we have an incredibly rare PS trophy which is reserved for only the most prolific and successful ESO players to ever roam Tamriel. In truth, a lot of the trophies on this list are admittedly time-consuming, but very few of them are inherently hard to obtain. You’ll need to beat all the story quests and faction-related quests, clear all the caves in the various controlled regions, and do a number of various miscellaneous tasks and grinds.
However, the tricky part that will exclude the vast majority of ESO players from entering the platinum trophy inner circle is that one trophy on the list requires you to become the Emperor, which, in case you don’t know, means you need to be on top of the entire Alliance Board leaderboard at the time a new Emperor is elected.
This essentially means that unless you can work hard enough to become the most successful and influential player in the game and do so at the right time to align with an Alliance, taking all six keeps, you’ll never be able to platinum ESO. However, I can’t think of a trophy that would warrant bigger bragging rights than this one, so if you really want it, you better start your imperial election campaign today!
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