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盘点五款最佳社交游戏及其成功的原因

发布时间:2011-05-13 17:46:28 Tags:,

作者:Jason Schreier

社交游戏开发系列由Level 3 Communications提供支持,后者是家光纤交流服务的国际供应商。Level 3致力于以任何需要的形式来传播数字媒体。据分析公司eMarketer资料所述,到2012年有将近6870万美国人玩社交游戏。虽然这个数字看起来可能不太真实,但确实很有意义。游戏将让Facebook或智能手机更具吸引力。

但是为何那些主流社交游戏会这么流行呢?它们如何用十年前未曾想到的方式将我们联系起来?让我们观察以下五款最流行的社交游戏,尝试找出它们风靡市场的原因。

1、FarmVille

Farmville

Farmville

《FarmVille》确实在许多事情上做得很多,这也是为何将近10%的Facebook用户玩这款游戏的原因。但这款出自Zynga之手的模拟农场游戏设计最精巧的机制在于其邻居系统。独自建设农场和收获庄稼已是足够简单,但如果你与Facebook好友一起做这件事,农场产量将呈指数般急速飞升。《FarmVille》的更新速度也让其深受玩家喜爱。

这既是个模拟显示农场的游戏,在这里工人需要配合以维持生存,也让玩家召集朋友前来体验,使得Zynga收获颇丰。去年,公司将从《FarmVille》中学到的社交推销方式运用到《CityVille》中,后者凭借1亿左右的用户(游戏邦注:此数目是《FarmVille》的两倍)成为Facebook上最流行的游戏。

2、Zuma Blitz

zuma-blitz-board

Zuma Blitz

无论玩的时间是长还是短,PopCap这款令人着迷的球类消除游戏都十分有趣,其真正强大之处在于其得分榜。当你在祖玛印加寺庙的场景中玩游戏时,你会在屏幕右侧看到排行榜。这些排行榜根据你朋友的最高得分实时更新,让你可以清晰明了地与他人比赛争夺榜首之位。这个闪光点简单而有效,让玩家因很简单的理由沉迷其中,那便是玩家的炫耀心理。

3、Words With Friends

words with friendsWords With Friends

想象下如果《Scrabble》可以出现在你的手机下会怎样,再想象下不是与计算机对手而是随时与朋友竞争的情景,这就是游戏《Words With Friends》。《Scrabble》已经取得了巨大的成功,因而《Scrabble》网络版广受称赞也就不足为奇了。《Words With Friends》成功之处在于模拟人人均已熟知的传统游戏,玩家无需担心学习复杂的新规则或设计精巧的战略,这只是《Scrabble》而已!

4、Mafia Wars

MafiaWars

Mafia Wars

数年来,《教父》、《黑道家族》、《好家伙》和许多黑帮故事尽管广受批判,但均在商业上获得成功。看到此类情形,也就不难理解为何《Mafia Wars》如此受玩家欢迎。尽管Facebook上这款黑帮模拟游戏(游戏邦注:玩家可以召集朋友组成自己的犯罪组织)无法与那些传统黑帮文化巨作相比,但确实是款令人印象深刻的游戏,可吸引玩家花上大量的时间。与朋友组队来和犯罪集团人员作战,执行任务和扮演犯罪人员确实很有趣。

5、魔兽世界

魔兽世界:大灾变

当你想到《魔兽世界》时,可能会勾勒出如下画面:有些玩家可能不顾及休息和卫生状况,只为了获得更多经验值来升级。但事实是《魔兽世界》的玩家有着各种不同的背景,从乡村家庭主妇到NFL赌博人员。这款游戏目前有超过1200万的订阅用户,绝大多数的原因在于其在社交方面的才能。游戏中不仅要独自击败怪物或升级,你有时还需要和其他玩家以许多不同方式配合和互动,这些方式包括个人邮件和公开网络交谈等。

特别令人瞩目的是,《魔兽世界》让你可以有真正的第二人生。女性可以装成男玩家,男性也可以假装是女玩家,人类玩家可以在游戏中扮演精灵角色。你可以在交朋友或树立敌人,组织人际关系甚至拥有全新的人格特性。无论是好还是坏,某些人在《魔兽世界》中的社交行为超过现实生活,这可能是让其成为最强大社交游戏的原因。(本文为游戏邦/gamerboom.com编译,转载请注明来源:游戏邦)

5 Top Social Games and Why They’re So Successful

Jason Schreier

The Social Gaming Development Series is supported by Level 3 Communications, an international provider of fiber-based communications services. Level 3 is committed to carrying digital media from anywhere to anywhere, in whatever format needed. Around 68.7 million Americans will be playing social games by 2012, according to analysis firm eMarketer. A number like that might seem unreal, but it makes perfect sense. There’s something extraordinarily appealing about logging into Facebook or picking up your smartphone and instantly playing a game alongside countless other people across the world.

But why do the best social games work so well? How do they manage to connect us in ways we wouldn’t have thought possible just ten years ago? Let’s look at five of the most popular social games and try to figure out why they’re hits.

1. FarmVille

FarmVille is doing a lot of things right, really — that’s why close to 10% of all Facebook users play FarmVille. But one of the most ingenious mechanics in Zynga’s farm simulation game is the neighbor system. It’s easy enough to harvest crops and build up your farm alone, but when you do it with your Facebook friends, your productivity skyrockets exponentially. And if you’ve ever hopped onto your news feed only to be subjected to a deluge of FarmVille updates, you know just how tempting it can be to click around and see what the fuss is all about.

Either this is a metaphor for real farms, where workers have to cooperate to stay alive, or it’s just a ploy to get people to recruit one another so Zynga can harvest all of your money. The gaming company has used the social promotion lessons it learned from FarmVille to launch CityVille last year, which has already become the most popular game on Facebook with almost 100 million users (twice that of FarmVille).

2. Zuma Blitz

PopCap’s addictive ball matching game is fun to play in both short and long doses, but its real strength lies in its scoreboard. As you go about your business in Zuma’s Incan temple, you’ll see a set of rankings on the right side of your screen. Those rankings are constantly updated with your friends’ high scores, allowing you to talk smack as you compete with one another for slot number one. It’s a brilliant, simple, and effective technique that keeps players hooked for one simple reason: Bragging rights.
3. Words With Friends

Imagine if Scrabble was available on your phone 24/7. Now imagine that instead of playing against a computerized opponent, you could compete with any of your friends whenever you wanted, picking when to play each word at your own personal discretion. That’s Words With Friends. Scrabble has always been immensely popular, so it’s easy to see why online Scrabble is just as lauded. Words With Friends works because it successfully emulates a classic game that everybody already understands — no need to worry about learning complicated new rules or devising intricate strategies. It’s just Scrabble!

4. Mafia Wars

Between The Godfather, The Sopranos, Goodfellas, and the countless other mob stories that have been both critically and commercially acclaimed over the years, it’s not hard to see why a game like Mafia Wars works. Though this Facebook mob simulator — which lets you recruit friends and form your own criminal organization — can’t be fairly compared to any of those classic pieces of pop culture, it’s certainly an impressive game that you can sink way too much time into. Teaming up with your buddies in order to fight mobsters, perform “jobs,” and pretend to be criminals is way more fun than it should be.

5. World of Warcraft

Sure, when you think World of Warcraft, you might picture the nerdier set — those who may have sacrificed hygiene and sleep to reach one more experience level. But the truth is that WoW is populated with players of all sorts of backgrounds, from rural housewives to NFL punters. The game currently boasts over 12 million subscribers, mostly because of its social capabilities. Instead of just fighting monsters or leveling up a character by yourself, you get to do it with thousands of other players and interact with them in many different ways ranging from personal e-mails to public online chats.

Most strikingly, World of Warcraft allows you to live a veritable second life. Girls can pretend to be boys; boys can pretend to be girls; human accountants can pretend to be elven mages. You can make friends and enemies, form relationships and even take on an entirely new persona. For better or worse, some people enjoy socializing on WoW more than real life, which may make it the most powerful social game out there. Oh, and Mila Kunis plays it, which might be a good reason to start. (Source: Mashable)

 


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