作者：Jon Jordan

美国开发商NimbleBit工作室的Marsh兄弟迄今为止已经发布了15款iOS游戏，但更为重要的是他们乐于尝试新型运营模式。

从付费游戏到现在的免费增值模式，他们已经成功获得了将近4000万的下载量。他们近期发布的《Tiny Tower》的下载量已超过200万次，位列前26名游戏营收榜单的第5位。

PocketGamer采访了Ian Marsh，了解更多游戏开发的内容。以下是游戏邦编译的相关内容：

tiny-tower(from slidetoplay.com)

《Tiny Tower》中潜藏着何种灵感？

在设计《Tiny Tower》时，我们想要结合人们从现有的建筑、模拟、管理游戏中体验到的乐趣，让人们在iPhone上感受此类游戏的魅力。

《Pocket Frogs》对这款游戏是否有所帮助？

《Pocket Frogs》中的自由化和自定义化元素让其深受用户喜爱，因而我们想把这些内容融入《Tiny Tower》中。

你如何让其与其他免费增值社交游戏竞争？

我们尽力平衡游戏可玩性，无论玩家是否付费都可以获得良好的体验。我们还添加了些许在其他类似免费增值游戏中不常见到的元素和互动。

在游戏开发过程中，设计有何改变？

随着开发逐渐深入，我们越来越关注游戏中的居民，玩家在游戏中不只是简单地将塔建高。我们在游戏中添加了许多功能，允许玩家自定义或与其中的居民互动，甚至窥探他们的日常生活。

《Tiny Tower》的社交性看似并不如《口袋青蛙》。有相关计划吗？

《Tiny Tower》的目标之一就是测试免费增值游戏中的社交层面究竟有多重要。我感觉《Tiny Tower》的流行已证实，免费增值游戏能够满足许多在网络上不含有大量好友的人群，他们还是会玩此类游戏并为其付费。

你能否简要说说游戏的开发时间和使用的工具？

游戏由两人全职开发，大约耗费4个月的时间。在图像方面，我们使用的是cocos2d。

是否存在某些无所成效或你们没有足够的时间和资源来完成的功能或元素？

幸运的是，我们在时间上并没有受到限制，我们可以细心规划并包含所有我们认为必要的元素。

bitizen及其BitBook的想法是如何产生的？

一旦我们在游戏中设计了这些可爱的小人，我们就明白必须在这上面下功夫，因为他们很讨人喜爱。将他们命名为bitizen并添加BitBook（游戏邦注：游戏中居民所使用的Facebook）之类的东西能让他们显得更贴近我们的生活。

BitBook最终成为了游戏的一部分，给人们带来大量的乐趣。在最初的计划中，这只是个小功能，但最终成为游戏中的热门话题。

让你感到最惊讶的用户回应是什么？

我觉得人们对游戏的积极回应和喜爱让我们倍感惊奇。我们为消极反馈和评论做好准备，但游戏发布后这方面的麻烦并不大。

你觉得该游戏的用户与《口袋青蛙》的用户是否有所不同？

差异或许在于用户的数量。那些小人似乎比漂亮的青蛙更具有吸引力！

可否有添加更多内容的游戏支持计划？

1.2版本（游戏邦注：近期刚刚发布）中最大的改变是允许人们进一步自定义塔楼，他们可以对各个楼层重命名。（本文为游戏邦/gamerboom.com编译，如需转载请联系：游戏邦）

Small computer people, big iOS success: The making of Tiny Tower

Jon Jordan

The Marsh brothers behind US developer NimbleBit have released a lot of iOS games – 15 to-date – but, more significantly, they’ve always been happy to experiment with new business models.

From paid to free games, now firmly freemium, they’ve demonstrated success with 40 million downloads to-date, while their most recent release Tiny Tower has already been downloaded over two million times, ranking top 5 in 26 top grossing charts.

We caught up with Ian Marsh to find out more about the game’s development.

PocketGamer: What was the inspiration behind Tiny Tower?

Ian Marsh: When designing Tiny Tower, we wanted to take what people enjoyed about existing building/sim/management games and make it feel at home on the iPhone with lots of charm and character.

How much influence did you take from Pocket Frogs?

There were certainly lots of elements of randomisation and customisation that made Pocket Frogs enjoyable that we wanted to apply to Tiny Tower as well.

How did you design it to stand out against other social freemium games?

We made sure to balance the gameplay so that the game was an enjoyable experience whether the player decided to purchase in-app purchases or not. We also added a level of charm and interaction not commonly found in similar freemium games.

How did the design change throughout the game’s development?

As development progressed, more and more of the focus turned towards the bitizens themselves, in addition to simply building your tower up. Many features were added to allow the player to customise, interact with, and peek inside the daily lives of the bitizens.

Tiny Tower seems to be less socially focused than Pocket Frogs. Was this planned?

One of the goals of Tiny Tower was to test how important the ‘social’ aspect of these freemium games really is. I think Tiny Tower has proven that freemium games appeal to many people who don’t have lots of friends on networks, and still play and pay these sorts of games.

Can you give a rough breakdown of the development time and any significant tools you used?

The game took roughly four months of full time development by two people. On the graphical side we use cocos2d.

Were there any features or elements that didn’t work or that you didn’t have time/resources to complete?

Luckily we didn’t have any time constraints so each feature was carefully planned and included if we thought it was necessary for the game’s enjoyment.

How did you come up with the idea for the bitizens and their BitBook?

Once we had these cute pixelised people in the game, we knew that we needed to focus on them since they were so darned adorable. Giving them the name bitizens and adding things like the BitBook [their version of Facebook] helped us bring them to life.

The BitBook ended up being one part of the game that brings people a lot of enjoyment. It was planned as a small side feature but invariably ended up being one of the most talked about parts of the game.

What most surprised you about the audience reaction?

I think we were most surprised by just how positive the reaction was and how consumed people were with the game. We are always prepared for negative feedback and poor reviews, but they were very lacking after the game’s launch.

Did you notice any differences compared to the audience for Pocket Frogs?

Just perhaps the size of the audience. Pixelised people seem to have a much wider appeal than beautiful frogs!

What plans to have to support the game in terms of more content?

The biggest addition in version 1.2 [just released] will allow people to customise their tower even further by allowing them to rename their floors. (Source: Pocket Gamer)