I agree that achievements are largely arbitrary and seem to encourage doing something not because you enjoy it but just so you can get that artificial sense of accomplishment of having checked off an item on a to-do list. Achievements create an artificial sense of something that you "should" do in order to get the full experience of a game. It's not the same as getting a high score on a scoreboard because that's a genuine achievement, you've done better at a game than a number of other people have.
But, frankly, I'm not as strangely attached to the notion of cheat codes or cheating to win a game. Now I admit there is a sense of sneaky, mischevious glee from it; a feeling of "hee hee! I'm putting one past these suckers!" But really, is doing that as impressive as actually beating a game straight-up? Would it be as impressive to make a three-pointer in basket ball if people found out you taped a magnet to the ball and another one to the hoop to make sure it went in? I don't think so. Now there's no doubt finding special secret stuff in a game is a hoot. But I don't think you have to CHEAT to get it.
Game developers should try including stuff that is a secret, like, say, a collectible item that isn't in the manual and isn't explained in the game, but if the players go out of their way enough to get enough of these items, they get a special weapon or a secret, alternate ending. Stuff like that would make the game fun to play and give the players a sense of real achievement, having gone out of their way to meet a special challenge and get rewarded for it, not just give them a check list of things to do it get a meaningless achievement.
I don't think cheating at a video game needs to be the way to get special abilities or see special content in a game. But giving people unspecified, secret challenges that aren't blatantly pointed out to them and rewarding them with some small token of recognition would be a lot better than arbitrary achievements.
