Lasombra Files Episode 11: Stir the Pot

**Lasombra** · 07-09-2012

After getting hired by the company three months ago I never thought I’d see so much of this foggy island, but here I am again getting off a plane in the jolly ol’UK. What’s this make it? 2, 3 dozen times? I’ve tracked down the king of the pot...ah, wait, will my audience know what pot I’m talking about? Richard, let’s do another take...and...you’re just going to keep rolling aren’t you? Le sigh. I’ve tracked down the Gordon Ramsey of trophy hunting, with a pinch of Jamie Oliver to give him that extra personality. We’re going to get a lesson on how to serve up a delicious platinum wellington tonight in Episode 11: Stir the Pot. Yes chef, I’ll get the risotto done in four minutes. Yes chef, of course I’m a donkey. Yes chef, I know that risotto looks like it came out of the digestive tracks of a dehydrated camel that was left rotting on the floor...

Disclaimer: This interview is reproduced as written by the interviewee with the exception of spelling and some grammar corrections. Picture copyright of its artist/photographer.

Name: Stu (Stupot00)
Age: 27
Gender: Male
Occupation: Hydraulic service engineer
Country: UK

Lasombra: When did you start gaming?

Stupot: My first memories of gaming are playing the Sega Megadrive. The love for Sonic was unreal; I remember having some sort of mod on the Megadrive that allowed it to play import games so I always had games before everyone else. Had to be about 20 years ago and have never looked back.

Lasombra: How did you choose your PSN name?

Stupot: With my name being Stu I seemed to have gained the nickname Stupot for as long as I can remember. Someone already had it when I signed up for PSN so I just added the 00 and Stupot00 was born.

Lasombra: What motivated you to become a trophy hunter? What was your initial spark?

Stupot: This site motivated me. I had never really been bothered by that little *PING* but had somehow managed to pick up a few platinums. It wasn’t until I was trying to platinum Heavy Rain I finally decided I needed help and came across this site. With the great guides I soon had the platinum and followed it up with Fallout NV shortly after and have been trophy hunting ever since.

Lasombra: Are you a trophy hunter, platinum hunter, or a specific hunter? (Example: All GoW game hunter)

Stupot: I like to think of myself as a platinum hunter. I started late so I do have a lot of unfinished games on my trophy list that will never be touched again. As for being a specific hunter I will definitely be trying for the next PES plat which will make 4.

Lasombra: How many hours do you dedicate to trophy hunting?

Stupot: On a good week I can do around 40+ hours but then I get bad weeks where I will be lucky to get 5 hours. All depends on work and family life, which always come first.

Lasombra: What motivates you to go for that next trophy? How do you stay motivated after a long gaming session, particularly with grinding trophies?

Stupot: Seeing how well people are doing on this site always motivates me to push harder and trying to get more platinums than DragonWolfVII helps. I try to plan a lot of breaks when I know I’m going to be gaming for a long period of time and always come prepared with lots of snacks and Monster drinks. Grinding trophies are my Kryptonite but I find the way that helps me is to pace them out over a week and try to grind a certain amount of levels/matches a day so it doesn’t feel as much of a chore.

Lasombra: Have you ever gone through any burnout from your sessions?

Stupot: I used to all the time, it would cause me to not want to play anything for days even weeks but now I’ve started taking more breaks and having better planning for trophies it doesn’t seem to happen as much. I think this is one of the worst things to happen to a trophy hunter as you never know when it will go away.

Lasombra: What is your proudest platinum? Why? Was it your hardest?

Stupot: Unreal Tournament 3 is my proudest and I would say hardest platinum to date. Nearly all of the trophies are for grinding kills and game modes. Insane mode is exactly what it says and I dread to think of the hours I put into the game. I'm also the worst FPS player you will ever meet so that makes it that little bit more special. Demon's Soul's also gets an honourable mention.

Lasombra: Do you have a trophy goal for the year? If so, how far are you along in it?

Stupot: I set myself a few goals for the year, one was to hit trophy level 23 which I managed to do last month so my next target is 80 platinums. Currently I’m on 67 with two games sitting a trophy away from platinum. I’m still a bit unsure if I will make it, may have to sneak in a few short easy games

Lasombra: Do you believe gamers should be allowed to make trophy hunting teams? Why or why not?

Stupot: I have no problem with gamers that decide to do this as leaderboards do not bother me. It does however ruin the leaderboards for those epic solo gamers that work so hard on their accounts and deserve recognition.

Lasombra: Do you think Sony should create a world database with every user’s PSN trophy info for all to see? Why or why not?

Stupot: I don’t think Sony should do this, I mean just think of the amount of spam messages everyone would get. Also I’m guessing not everyone would want people seeing their usernames and if users can see what trophies you have they may try to add you for boosting/trophy sharing etc. It would get annoying.
Lasombra: What tips do you have for someone trying to reach the next level and going after a difficult platinum?

Stupot: Never surrender, but most importantly take a break, always try to read the guide or find as much info on the trophies as you can. Planning is your best friend and just remember take it easy, there is no rush.

Lasombra: Regardless of the system, what pre-trophy game would you auto-buy if it was released on the PS3 with trophy support?

Stupot: Well that’s a hard question. If they kept the game the same and didn’t mess with it I would go for Goldeneye N64. I spent so long playing this game and loved it to bits. Other than that any Final Fantasy or Kingdom Hearts would go down well.

Lasombra: Being from the UK, there is a huge UK base on the site. Does that help you with boosting trophies?

Stupot: It is great that there are so many UK gamers here but to be honest I don’t think I have had the chance to boost with many of them. The only recent one was some help from Chambers with Demon's Soul's. Most of the bigger boosting sessions I have joined seem to have happened around midnight here in the UK, which I don’t mind when it’s a weekend but they can go on for a few hours.

Lasombra: Having over 50 plats, has any game broke you or came close to breaking you and make you want to break something?

Stupot: Resident Evil 5 trying to beat Ndesu on professional. This drove me crazy. I dread to think how many restarts I had to do. I even gave up on the game for a year. Also PES2010 online trophies actually made me break my old laptop screen. The lag was so horrible it made the game unplayable but playing with a friend made it a lot easier in the end.

Lasombra: How much do you subscribe to gaming culture? Do you like to hang out and chat about games at the local gaming shop, or do you take a hands-off approach and just buy your games and get out?

Stupot: I tend not to talk to the staff in my local game store as they don’t have a clue what they are doing. I went in this Friday to pick up R&C HD collection and asked the member of staff behind the counter why they didn’t have any on the shelves. He said that the game was not out for another 2 weeks. So after a 5 minute argument of which most of it was me telling him it was out today and to go look for it he gave in and went out the back, to return 2 minutes later with the game. I mean come on!! What game shop doesn’t put new releases on the shelves before opening?

Lasombra: Where do you buy your games?

Stupot: I'm very stingy when it comes to buying games, I will always look in my local shops and online until I can find the cheapest price. I will normally end up getting them from Game.co.uk or Shopto.net as they both offer reward points so I can save money on the next game. When my backlog gets down I will be looking into renting games as it seems to work out cheaper and I’m a member of Lovefilm already.

Lasombra: I’ve been in talks with BadWolf and he’s mentioned he’ll be hosting a new trophy competition soon. Will you be entering it? Have you entered any competitions in the past?

Stupot: I always seem to miss the competition sign-ups so I have never managed to enter one. Now I’m a bit more active on the site, I hope to not miss out and I’m sure I will be entering one soon. They always look fun and everyone pushes really hard so hopefully I won’t get destroyed in the first round.

Lasombra: What are your favourite types of trophies to get? Collectables, story-related, something wacky only seen in a couple games?

Stupot: I like the more random trophies, something you wouldn't normally do in a game. Things like killing gang members with "fart in a jar" in SR3 or peeping under Juliet's skirt in Lollipop Chainsaw. I think trophies should be fun and should push game developers to add more fun and adventurous things into the game other then fill it with collectables all the time

Lasombra: If you could ban any type of trophy what would it be and why? A kind of trophy that made you say WTF, why are the programmers sadists?

Stupot: I will have to say collectable trophies; they seem to be getting worse. I don’t mind the one collectable trophy but it’s when you have to play though a game and be on the lookout for 4 or more different types of collectables. It’s like they can’t think of any other trophies so they believe adding more collectables will be a good idea. It makes me like MP trophies a little more.

Lasombra: Any tips for the viewers on how to bake a delicious cake to give them lots of energy during their next gaming session?

Stupot: I don’t know about getting energy from a cake but my favourite thing to make and eat while gaming is chocolate chip brownies. They are just like normal brownies but with added chocolate chips which makes the inside of the brownie even gooier. Serve it warm with a scoop of ice-cream and get gaming. All this talk of cake has made me hungry.

Oh gah. I’m not feeling too well. Is there a bucket anywhere? Burp! Ohhhh, that platinum was not a good choice of metal to use in the wellington dough. Richard, get me a bucket...this is not...going to...stay...pukes on the floor...Burp! What the hell man, why are you filming this? Tune in next time viewers. You can all meet me at the emergency room as I get my stomach pumped of this...ewwww, whatever this pile of puke on the floor is supposed to be, in Episode 12: No Time for Love, Dr. Jones. Is that my lung? I feel light headed. Why is it starring back at me, and why is the room starting to spin?

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**Chambers35** · 07-09-2012

I knew it would be Stu

I win!

Great read buddy, and my name's in there too

Keep up the trophy hunt.

Dr.Mayus next? He's the only doctor I know of

**Luckay** · 07-09-2012

Originally Posted by Chambers35

I knew it would be Stu

I win!

Great read buddy, and my name's in there too

Keep up the trophy hunt.

Dr.Mayus next? He's the only doctor I know of

Has to be dr_mayus

I don't know any other doctors

Great read guys

I'm loving these interviews Lasombra.

**gyrocop** · 07-09-2012

Great read Lasombra.

It may not be Mayus. It's a Indiana Jones reference. It's a Short Round quote, from the second movie. Hmm... This one is tricky.

**Coug** · 07-09-2012

Another great interview. Keep up the

work!

**wandarer** · 07-09-2012

Mmmmmm love chocolate chip brownies!

Another great interview! Keep it up!

**DaRe_xLw** · 07-09-2012

Cake? I love cake!

Nice interview Lasombra, it's nice to learn about our PS3T cake!

**Smashguy** · 07-09-2012

Great interview! Dr. Mayus should be next interview for sure!

**D1mech** · 07-09-2012

You deserve the interview Stu, you're a nice guy

Hope to see more sigs from you in the future as well

**DragonWolfVII** · 07-09-2012

I was right! Another great interview Lasombra, and great to read and find out more about Stu.

And woohoo, I got a mention!

As for next weeks interview I'm stumped to be honest, got no idea who it could be.

**Artemis** · 07-09-2012

You make chocolate chip brownies yourself? Yummy, but all those callories aren't good.

I have no clue (only Dr. Mayus) who the next one will be. Way too hard to guess. >_<

**Frost425** · 07-09-2012

Another great read Lasombra!!

Can't wait for next week's episode with Dr.Mayus

**Achilles_XLII** · 07-09-2012

Fantastic interview fellas, always a choice read. And yeah, the next one has to be our good doctor.

**Denaratuck** · 07-09-2012

Excellent interview and I think almost everyone knew who it was going to be. As for next weeks interview, I'm guessing its going to be Doctor_Doom seeing as the quote at the end is from Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom.

**dr_mayus** · 07-09-2012

Originally Posted by Denaratuck

Excellent interview and I think almost everyone knew who it was going to be. As for next weeks interview, I'm guessing its going to be Doctor_Doom seeing as the quote at the end is from Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom.

I was thinking the same thing...but thanks everyone for the vote of confidence

**Timeless-Enigma** · 07-09-2012

Great imagination you have Lasombra. Great read and i am looking forward to the next awesome installment

**kidson2004** · 07-09-2012

Damn good read!!

Great work guys

**SplatterScoggs** · 07-09-2012

Awesome read. I feel your pain Stu on sucking at FPS. but I played the shit out of Goldeneye, and got killed probably a million times... but had tons of fun doing it. I think its Dr. Mayus next, or maybe the doctor of Doom.... either will be a great read for sure.