So I read about GameGround on GamesRadar last night. It claims to be a social networking site for gamers. As one of the GamesRadar commenters asked: like Raptr?

Yes and No. With GameGround, at least as it currently exists in beta, you create a profile and then proceed to earn points, levels, badges, and achievements for almost everything you do, all with various ways to brag about it. The experience starts off pretty intensely nuts, and it brings to mind all of the articles I've read recently about ways that MMOs and achievement systems try to get you hooked. This site is trying hard!

What I found strange is you don't import the games you own or play into GameGround. There's an already populated list of fully and partly supported games. Fully-supported games include GameGround's own set of achievements (called Missions) and leaderboards. Partly-supported games just have basic activity tracking. At the moment, you kind of hope your games are supported, and you try not to get distracted by the dozens of games that don't interest you in the least but beckon to you all the same with their missions for points and levels and rankings and so on.

After you create your (free) profile (and get an award for doing so), you download the (free) GameGround client, called GG1, which tracks your PC, Facebook, and web-based gameplay (Xbox tracking is apparently in the works, PS3 tracking is apparently a more remote possibility). I'm not quite sure how the client works, but you're supposed to maximize your browser when you play browser games, and make sure that nothing is obstructing the game, to ensure the client can "see" your gameplay and score. Weird, eh? Like it's watching over your shoulder.

As a beta, it's expectedly buggy at this stage. At least it was for me. It registered my very first round of Canabalt, which, of course, I blew on the first jump. But then it didn't pick up any of the next 20 times I played it, even with restarts of the client, browser, and computer. Even when I ran over 7000m! So, right now I have a registered high score of like 325m. Embarrassing.

Then it picked up some of my PC-based Bejeweled 2 play, but not my web-based Bejeweled 2 play. That's what I find a bit off-putting though. GameGround's design makes me feel like it's suggesting what games I should be playing, like web-based Bejeweled 2, rather than asking me what games I like and enhancing my experience of those.

Ultimately, GameGround's bugs and current design led me to remove the client a few hours after installing it. As it stands, it's not for me. It might be for you, though, if you're the kind of person whose hunger for points and status and rewards can never be sated and your taste in games undiscerning. Remember, all this insanity is free after all. I will give it a few months and then try it again because it does show promise of new and fun things, but at the moment, this is not the social networking site for me.

So, yes, it's kind of like Raptr, but also, no, it's kind of not. After last night's experience with GameGround, I have come to appreciate what Raptr offers me much much more than I did before (and I already thought it was awesome). Raptr lets me play the games I want to play in peace, quietly keeping reliable track of game time and achievements and friends' activity, without trying to throw other games with their uncompleted missions at me in obtrusive ways.