Our biweekly Achievements column explores everything about Gamerscore: why we want it, how to get it, and tips for enjoying the process. If you like nabbing those points, keep reading! (And if you want to catch up on our previous columns, you'll find them here.)

On its face, it’s a great concept: paying nothing for a game or app, then mining it for quick Gamerscore. Well, the first part of that equation isn’t so hard: Xbox Live Marketplace has a few freebies lurking here and there. But how are they for Achievements? We’ve rated several of them below — not on quality, but PURELY on how easy they are to milk for points. Read up, then decide for yourself if they’re worth downloading.

Aegis Wing

RATING: HARD

Created by three Microsoft interns, this game’s a fun little scrolling shoot-’em-up, but for points, it’s surprisingly tricky — and worse yet, you need co-op partners to get a couple of the Achievements. You’ll nab between 5 and 50 points in an hourlong solo session, but almost none of the Achievements are easy gimmes — though if you can find three local or Live co-op partners, you can very quickly link your four ships for the 10G “Epic Warrior” Achievement.

Doritos Crash Course

RATING: MEDIUM

For all its goofy charm, this Avatar game isn’t easy points, either, unfortunately. The 10G “That’s Gotta Hurt” Achievement (for getting smashed by three hammers in a row…ouch!) is about the only one that’s simple — unless you can quickly “beat” a willing friend over Live for another 10G — as the others involve passing various levels or performing feats of skill. We enjoyed what we played, but after a short session, we’d nabbed only 30 Gamerscore.

Harm’s Way

RATING: EASY

Like now-delisted Doritos freebie Dash of Destruction, Harm’s Way serves up points with wild abandon. Several are straight-up cake (watching the credits, joining a multiplayer game, hosting a multiplayer game), but all of them are doable in an hour  total — especially if you use a second controller to create an inactive split-screen partner (or have a real-life buddy help you, if that feels less weaselly).

Hexic HD

RATING: HARD

Oh, how we love this classic Arcade puzzler. As with its forefather, Tetris, though, you really need to put in the time to learn the game: you won’t snag the Achievements for building sunflowers or black pearls or black-pearl clusters (!) in your first hour of play. About the only easy Achievements here are “Cluster Buster” (25 total combos) and “Star Gazer” (for forming a bonus-star cluster), which grant you a mere 5G apiece. Sob.

Kinect Fun Labs

RATING: MEDIUM

We admit it: Kinect Fun Labs is what gave us the idea for this column in the first place — we figured this collection of 10 downloadable apps (8 of which are free; because Musical Feet and Kinect Sparkler each cost $3, we’ll ignore them for the purposes of this column) might be a gift of Gamerscore. After all, these apps are essentially tech demos; why not throw us points for trying ’em out? 

 Well, the apps are generous…somewhat. Each one offers a total of 50 Gamerscore, and in most cases, between 10 and 30 of those points are fairly easy to get in 20 minutes of play. Usually, these easy Achievements involve two things: (1) Scanning in and building an object (like your own likeness in Avatar Kinect or a sticky-eyed puppet in Googly Eyes) or sampling the basic activity (like trying all three instruments in Air Guitar); and then (2) Sharing photos and videos of your object/activity with friends, as well as posting them to KinectShare.com.

The rest of the Achievements usually aren’t hard so much as time-consuming — e.g., creating a large number of objects (like 25 fighters in Battle Stuff), sampling every single feature in the app, or sharing a dozen or two photos/videos. And that’s where farming these apps becomes a dicey time investment. In the 2 to 2.5 hours that I spent playing Kinect Fun Labs, I came away with about 200 points. Not a bad haul, certainly, but I’ve earned easily as many Gs (or more) from playing games like Guitar Hero: Aerosmith, Spider-Man: Friend or Foe, the first two Scene It? games, Eat Lead, X-Men Destiny, Saw, and Sesame Street: Once Upon a Monster for less time — and for less hassle than downloading, updating, and loading eight separate apps.

Moreover, I liked all of those games more than I enjoyed Kinect Fun Labs. I hate to criticize freeware — it seems tacky, I admit — but most of these apps just aren’t very fun. They’re tech demos, as I said before, and you get the feeling many of their concepts could never fuel a full-fledged Kinect game…though we give their creators huge props for experimenting. I should add, too, that I did get a kick out of a few of the apps. It’s amusing seeing your Avatar stretched, shrunk, and fattened-up in Mutation Station (shown below, though not with OXMers), and I owe Battle Stuff sincere thanks for letting my copy of Arkham City slug it out with a Marcus Fenix statue. Plus, Build a Buddy’s design is incredibly cute, with your scanned-in doodad ordering you around and a “Toot Toot!” Achievement for holding a five-second crouch.

Nevertheless, for the modest points payoff and its general lack of fun, Kinect Fun Labs is decidedly so-so for Achievements.

BOTTOM LINE: Of the games/apps listed here, the only one we can really recommend downloading solely for points-farming is Harm’s Way. Everything else is either too difficult or too time-consuming overall. It’s a shame — but then again, you’re not paying for any of these freebies, so if any of them intrigue you gameplay-wise, you may as well as download ’em and give ’em a go!