2501072

The new year 2025 hit me with a surprise on logging into SFI. I had finally achieved Grand Master status in SFI Badge Quest!

What is Badge Quest? There is one for SFI and another one for TripleClicks mostly for games exploits. It is one of the side attractions—being awarded badges for certain activities and accomplishments. Most badges have points attached to them. People get placed on a Leaderboard, ranked based on their total points, and so it could be seen as a “contest among players.” There are 5 different levels of SFI Badge Quest, from Rising Star to Grand Master Elite, each with its own requirements and rewards. Level 1 or Rising Star requires just 12 badges, and in return you get 150 Rewardicals and 1 entry in the Badge Bounty drawing each month. On the other hand, the highest Level 5, Grand Master Elite, requires your total points to be among the top 20, and in return, you get 5,000 Rewardicals and 5 entries in the drawing each month. The Badge Bounty drawing shares a certain number of Rewardicals among those that get picked.

The realization that I had become SFI Grand Master on New Year Day dawned on me while playing HIDDEN. When I opened the Rewardicals Ledger to copy out my winnings at the end of a game, this was what I saw.

When I saw the huge 2,000 Rewardicals, with “BQ: sfi grand_master” against it, I first hoped it wasn’t a software glitch error. I checked TripleClicks and my Badge Quest level there was still Master as I had 9,850 points and needed to hit 11,110 to make Grand Master. It was later that I checked the SFI home page where the SFI badges were and saw that even though my “current level” for SFI Badge Quest was saying Master, my total points was 8,600 which was more than the 8,300 required to make SFI Grand Master. Meaning they would be updating my level shortly. In the email that SFI sent me, which I later saw, it was stated that the prizes, the 2,000 Rewardicals and 4 Badge Bounty drawing entries, would be awarded every month the status was maintained, every month I scored among the top 200. (The level did get updated the next day as shown here.)

The interesting thing about the development was that I was not really actively chasing the badges all the time, not always doing things for the sake of the badges. They mostly got earned along with my cumulative activities and staying power. Earlier in the morning, my auto-delivery order for the new EZ-Premium+ subscription had just been processed. Requalifying my rank like this on the first day of the month, used to earn me the Executive Speedster badge with gold trim. The 565-Day Transformation Streak badge with the highest point value of 1,500 below is a testament to my attendance record, logging in and spending at least one TCredit or ZCredit every single day for 565 days nonstop.

What a grand way to start 2025!