Steam Adds Achievement Sets to Separate Base Games and DLC
Valve is introducing achievement sets on Steam, letting developers split achievements into separate groups for a base game and its DLCs. The Verge
In supported titles, the client sorts unlocked achievements into those developer-defined sets during browsing, like separate folders. Each set gets its own progress bar.
Completing every achievement in a set earns a "set complete" trophy that appears on the player's profile.
Valve is also refreshing the Steam Achievements page. The updated view shows an overall progress summary alongside per-set progress, with detail views for individual achievements.
The system includes support for seasonal sets. Developers can archive a seasonal set, which allows time-limited achievements without leaving expired objectives in the active list.
The features are available in the latest Steam client beta. Valve lists Against the Storm, Age of Wonders 4, American Truck Simulator, Crusader Kings III, DREDGE, Euro Truck Simulator 2, Forza Horizon 5, Left 4 Dead 2, Portal 2, PowerWash Simulator, PowerWash Simulator 2, Team Fortress 2 and Victoria 3 among games already supporting achievement sets.
The broader context here is a metadata problem that grows with expansions. A single flat achievement list gets hard to read once DLC and seasonal content build up. Completion percentage becomes harder to interpret, and late DLC can lower the score of players who had already finished the base game. Splitting by set keeps the original completion record intact while giving new content its own tracking area.
In my view, the archival option is the more interesting part. Time-limited objectives have always been awkward in profile systems built to keep a permanent record. Closing off a set preserves history without suggesting the achievement can still be earned. For teams running live games, that should reduce interface clutter and support questions around expired content. For players who track completion, it clarifies what counts and when.
The broader pattern with profiles is also worth noting. Platform identity now rests more on short, verifiable summaries than on long raw lists. A per-set trophy is compact, travels across game pages and profiles, and is easier to scan than scrolling through hundreds of entries. For studios with multi-year roadmaps, separate sets reduce the work of reworking old lists as new content ships. Over the long arc, that kind of structured progression often finds second uses, from discovery filters to social comparison, because clean data builds on itself.
