Steam Achievement Sets Protect Your 100 Percent From DLCs

If you have ever unlocked every achievement in a game only to watch your 100 percent badge crumble when a DLC dropped, Valve has finally heard you. Steam Achievement Sets launched in beta this week, and the headline feature is simple: your base game completion stays intact no matter what extra content developers add later.

What Are Achievement Sets?

Achievement Sets let developers organize a game's achievements into separate groups, each with its own progress bar. Instead of one long list that mixes everything together, players now see achievements broken into categories—base game, each DLC, and even seasonal or character-based collections if the developer chooses to set them up.

According to Valve's announcement, you still unlock achievements by playing the game as usual. The change is how Steam displays and tracks them afterward. When you browse your achievements page, you will see each set with its own progress. Finish every achievement in a set, and you earn a "set complete" trophy that appears on your profile.

The key improvement is that DLC achievements no longer appear in your overall game progress until you actually own the DLC. As Engadget reports, base game achievements and their progress bars show up in blue, while DLC achievements display in purple. If you never buy a particular expansion, those achievements stay out of your way entirely.

Why This Matters for Completionists

Anyone who has chased a perfect record knows the frustration. You spend dozens of hours hunting down every hidden collectible, mastering every challenge, and finally hit 100 percent. Then the developer releases a $15 expansion, and suddenly your profile shows 87 percent because the new achievements diluted your total.

Some players stopped caring about completion percentages because of this pattern. Others avoided games with active DLC support altogether, worried their effort would be undone by future updates. Achievement Sets address the problem directly: your base game completion is its own category, and it stays complete even if the developer adds more content down the line.

Valve also mentions that developers can archive seasonal achievement sets. That opens the door for limited-time challenges—think Halloween events or anniversary celebrations—that disappear when the season ends without permanently cluttering the achievement list. If you earned those achievements, you keep them; if you missed the window, they do not drag down your completion forever.

Games That Already Support Sets

The feature is in beta, so it requires opting into the Steam Client beta on your end. On the developer side, games need to be updated in Steamworks to define their sets. No code changes or SDK updates are required—just configuration through Valve's tools.

A number of games already support achievement sets:

• Portal 2 and Left 4 Dead 2 — classic Valve titles leading the way
• Crusader Kings III and Victoria 3 — strategy games with substantial DLC catalogs
• Euro Truck Simulator 2 and American Truck Simulator — known for years of expansions
• Forza Horizon 5 — a racing giant with seasonal content
• PowerWash Simulator and its sequel — cozy games with steady post-launch support
• DREDGE — an indie hit with a recent expansion
• Age of Wonders 4 and Against the Storm — strategy favorites with growing content

Games like Crusader Kings III, which have released multiple expansions over the years, are perfect candidates. Players who mastered the base game years ago can finally show that off without their profile being cluttered by achievements for DLCs they may not own.

A Redesigned Achievements Page

Along with sets, Valve redesigned the Steam achievements page. The new layout shows a summary of your overall progress, progress in each achievement set, and details on individual achievements. You can also compare your progress with up to three friends, making it easier to see who has the rare unlocks and who still has work to do.

For players who enjoy hunting achievements together—calling out tips on stream, racing to see who finishes a set first, or just comparing notes after a play session—the comparison feature adds a social layer that was missing before. Achievements have always been partly about bragging rights, and now the bragging is easier.

The Satisfaction of Chasing Milestones Together

Completion milestones hit different when you are not alone. Watching a streamer finally nail a tough achievement after hours of attempts is part of what makes live gaming content fun. Chat erupts, the host celebrates, and everyone shares the moment. The same energy shows up in any multiplayer session where everyone is pushing toward a goal—whether that is clearing a raid, winning a tournament bracket, or simply surviving one more round.

Achievement Sets protect those moments from being retroactively devalued. When you see someone's 100 percent badge on a game with five DLCs, you know they actually finished the base game—not that they just happened to buy every expansion and got lucky with a few extra unlocks. The badge means something again.

That sense of earned progress is at the heart of why milestones matter in community play. Whether it is a Steam achievement, a win streak on stream, or a personal best in a quick browser match, the feeling of "I did it" is stronger when the rules stay consistent.

How to Try It

If you want to test Achievement Sets now, you will need to join the Steam Client beta. Open Steam, go to Settings, then Interface, and select "Steam Beta Update" from the Client Beta Participation dropdown. Restart Steam, and you should see the updated achievements page for games that support sets.

Not every game has sets yet, and developers will add them at their own pace. Valve says the list is growing, so expect more titles to adopt the feature in the coming months—especially games with active DLC plans.

Takeaway

Steam Achievement Sets solve a long-standing frustration for anyone who cares about completion. Your 100 percent badge finally stays yours, DLCs get their own space, and seasonal achievements can come and go without messing up your record. It is a small change in the grand scheme of gaming, but for completionists, it is a big deal.

If achievement hunting is your thing, this beta is worth checking out. And if you want to chase milestones with a live community, catch a Late Night Vision stream sometime—there is always another round to win.