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设计手机游戏需注意的一些细节性问题

发布时间:2011-08-31 17:31:10 Tags:,,

作者:Mark Wilcox

我有很长一段时间一直在思考一个问题,即关键的游戏设计能否就用一些简单的公式加以表达,或者,至少是通过一个简单的规则去说明。

显然这是一种谬论。因为同一种规则不可能同时适用于所有人。举个例子来说,就像有些人深深着迷于《愤怒的小鸟》,而有些人却很讨厌这款游戏。

playing Angry Birds(from cgi.ebay)

playing Angry Birds(from cgi.ebay)

我曾经读过John Romero的一篇短文,在文中他提到作为玩家,我们总是喜欢清理一些东西。从诸如《吃豆人》和《太空入侵者》等经典游戏中,我们可以感受到这种说法的真实性。一开始我想不起能够推翻这一论断的例子,但是后来,我想到了《侠盗猎车手》(游戏邦注:以下简称GTA)。

在《GTA》中你不只需要想方设法引起混乱,同时你也可以从中获得大量的奖励。不可否认,你可能认为暗杀敌方首领是一种清除或者说是整治行动,但是说实在的,这款游戏并不只是包含这些行动而已。我记不清自己有多少次故意向FBI发怒而获取了大量的星星(即让自己变成被通缉的状态)而提升自己的威势。在游戏中我们只要处决掉一些无辜的人或者故意在大街上撞向其它车辆便能够获得游戏乐趣。虽然这种做法在现实生活中是不对的,但是在这里,这仅仅只是一种乐趣。

《愤怒的小鸟》是另外一个典型的例子,只是你并不需要清理所有东西而破坏整个场景。

但是我并不是要忽略这个最初的论断,即玩家总是喜欢清理一些东西。

游戏快感学深深吸引了我。游戏的乐趣在哪里?我们所说的游戏娱乐和乐趣是什么?

我们玩游戏的方式可以说是我们获得游戏乐趣的根源。当今的很多智能设备,如iPad都将我们禁锢于一个触摸屏幕上。触屏让我们能与游戏进行直接的接触,因此可以说是一种根本的反馈方式。虽然你是在触碰一个玻璃平面,但是慢慢的你便能感受到自己的行动与该设备逐渐趋于一致了。而这也正是这种设备能给你带来的最大乐趣。

Android系统推动了HTC Desire智能手机的进一步发展。触屏输入设备常伴随着一个轻微的震动触感。这种震感不仅能让我们感觉到快乐,同时它也在向我们传递着一种信息,即它会马上回应我们所执行的动作。

但是,在触屏上哪种动作最能清晰地反映设备已对我们点触玻璃屏幕的行为作出回应呢?

我想触碰一颗气球并看着它爆破的那一瞬间,真的是一种很棒的体验。或者用手指控制一个大铁锤猛击屏幕看着屏幕裂成一块块玻璃片并最终消失不见。是否触摸屏幕并在上面留下一些碎片残骸也会有趣?还是你想触碰一些装着液体的坦克,按压它们以卸货,并让那些液体溢满整个屏幕。是否这种满足感会等同于清除掉坦克上的货物?

我想触屏更适合一些清除类游戏。不论游戏的目的是破坏还是“爆破”,你只需要达到这一目标即可。

我认为手机游戏的另一大乐趣便是玩家的游戏时间安排。尽管我们当中有很多玩家喜欢待在舒适的家里或者办公室里玩手机游戏,但是也有一些玩家喜欢在上班路上的列车或者公共汽车上进行游戏。从总体上看,我认为每一名玩家投入于游戏中的时间大约是10-15分钟。

当然了,玩家总是想从自己投入的时间和努力中获得回报。一旦你进入手机游戏,你的情绪将融入游戏中而变得“紧张刺激”-我想我也将能够体会到这种情绪起伏的感受,并希望能看到自己在游戏中取得好成绩。

传统的电玩游戏也能让你有这般感受。

gamers playing Defender(from flickriver.com)

gamers playing Defender(from flickriver.com)

当你投进一枚游戏币并开始玩《Defender》就会进入一场动人心魄的游戏体验。虽然整个游戏过程只有2到3分钟,但是你却能完全体验到包括动作,破坏,速度,紧张以及得分等元素。

我之所以喜欢电玩游戏便是始于《Defender》。这款游戏带给玩家的体验是难以形容的,非常棒!

步骤1-投币:玩家会听到机器发出的悦耳声音

步骤2-袭击开始:玩家将听到紧张的电子音乐响起

步骤3-按左右键加速前行:玩家加速直接投入战斗

步骤4-打出激光:玩家看到几束激光穿过屏幕发射出来(在30年内没有出现过比这更棒的效果)

步骤5-破坏东西(甚至是一些你想不到的东西):玩家在游戏中爆破一些东西将会放射出五彩缤纷的光线,就像一场烟花表演

你的操作方式以及游戏音效都能让你切身感受到这些精彩体验。

《DOOM》也提供了类似的游戏体验。玩家只需打开游戏来到主菜单选项,便能看到每一个让其满意的道具。游戏中充斥着猎枪射击,同时这种射击声也是非常真实动听,我曾经通过编辑WAD游戏软件并融入激光枪真实的声音也得到过如此真实的音效。

《DOOM》中的每一个环节都是经过精心设计的,旨在第一眼便牢牢吸引住玩家。这是一款名副其实的电玩游戏。当你搜索《DOOM》的资料将会发现很容易能够找到这款游戏,而这时你就需要感谢游戏设计者改变游戏指示的做法是对的。《DOOM》之所以能按照现在的这一整体模式出现在玩家面前确实全靠设计者们强烈的自我意识。这些设计者们切身体会并期盼能从电子游戏中感受到紧张刺激感,所以他们便将自己的这种想法通过《DOOM》表现出来。

电玩游戏之所以能够获得此般成就,一方面归因于它强调较短的游戏时间。而其需要去克服的障碍便是控制设置。电玩游戏的控制系统需要玩家用两手进行游戏操作。一手操作把手,一手用来按压炮火按钮。后来我们为炮火按钮选择了替代物。在《HyperGunner》(手机版本)中出现了自动发火功能,因此取代了炮火按钮。我立马停止了炮火袭击动作而变成一种躲避防御动作。但是这种功能其实并不常见。

但是如今,在手机游戏和休闲游戏中出现了很多我称之为女性友好型游戏,也就是益智类游戏。你需要点击移除那些与旁边宝石的形状或颜色相匹配的宝石。这是一种简单的重复性游戏,并且玩家不会在其中犯太大的错误。但同时我也认为这是一种懒惰的游戏设计。既然我们是游戏设计者,那就该为玩家呈现出更丰富的内容,而不只是这些重复性动作。

我一直在网上与一些电子游戏玩家进行交流。我很荣幸能够与Eugene Jarvis(游戏邦注:《Defender》创作人)互发电子邮件。并且也很开心能与传说中的Atari设计者Chris Crawford和《DOOM》的设计者John Romero进行交谈。这些人知道何时在游戏里安置正确的转换按钮,比起那些简单的益智类游戏设计者,他们能够提供给玩家更多惊险刺激的挑战。特别是对于Chris和Eugene来说,他们能够在科技不发达时期实现自己预期的目标,确实是件了不起的事。这些都与游戏平衡性息息相关,不论是整个开发团队还是个人都在尽力凸显这种游戏设计的平衡,这是一种完美的艺术表现形式,而且不能在一夜之间成型。

我并不是要说我们都应该投入体验手机版《Asteroids》和《吃豆人》,而是说我们应该借鉴电玩游戏设计者以及近来那些著名开发者的设计技巧,制作出可让人们在短时间体验并重复访问的好游戏。

游戏邦注:原文发表于2010年11月16日,所涉事件及数据均以此为准。(本文为游戏邦/gamerboom.com编译,如需转载请联系:游戏邦

More on designing games for mobile devices

I have for a long time been pre-occupied with the idea that the key to game design can be represented via a simple formula. Or at the very least a simple rule.

It is of course nonsense. What works for one person will not necessarily work for another. I for one love the painfully addictive experience of Angry Birds. Others will hate it.

I once read a short article by John Romero where he considered that as gamers we all seek to tidy. Citing such classics as PacMan and Space Invaders it seemed quite plausable that there was some truth in it. But I was struggling with the idea. Initially I couldn’t think of anything to counter the argument but then it came to me – Grand Theft Auto.

In GTA you not only seek to cause pure chaos you are rewarded heavily for it. Admittedly you  could argue that assassinating rival gang lords is a form of cleansing or tidying but ultimately the game is much more than that. I lost count of the amount of times I’d deliberately angered the FBI to get up to the maximum number of stars (wanted status).

Simply executing innocent people and piling up vehicles in the street was pure entertainment. Wrong, of course, but pure joy.

Angry Birds is another example. You don’t so much tidy anything as destroy the entire scene.

But I didn’t want to lose sight of the original argument – that we as gamers seek to tidy.

The hedonics of gaming fascinate me. Where is the fun ? What do we call entertaining and pleasurable in a game ?

Naturally the way we interact with a game dictates a huge amount of where we derive our pleasure from.

On modern smart devices such as iPad we are limited to touch. Touch is of course the ultimate in feedback since it is a direct interaction with the source. Yes you are touching glass but ultimately you are able to do something so natural it feels as though you are at one with the device. In terms of pleasure this has to score highly.

The Android powered HTC Desire smartphone takes it a step further. Touch input is often rewarded with a gentle buzz. Not only is this pleasurable as a reward it is also informing us of something. An action. An immediate response to something quite positive that we just did.

But what action on screen most accurately rewards the physical action of touching glass ?

I suppose to touch a balloon and watch it pop would be satisfying. As would swiping a hammer across the screen and seeing several glass bottles shatter to nothing.
Would it be satisfying to touch the screen and leave a trail of debris behind you ? Perhaps you touch a number of tanks that each hold a liquid. When you press them they unload their contents and fill the screen. Is that as satisfying as removing the contents of the tanks ?

I suspect that the process of touching the screen best lends itself to the theory of removing content. By whatever means. Be it destruction or a simple “pop” and you’re gone approach.

I think another  starting point for where we find fun in mobile games has to be the timeframes that we allow for playing them. Although many of us play our mobile games sat in comfort at home or at work for many there is probably an urge to “have a go” on the train or bus in to the office. I generally assume that a gamer’s allotted time for playing a mobile game is somewhere around 10 – 15 minutes.

Certainly by that time the player would want to have achieved something and been rewarded in spades for his efforts.
Once you set yourself up to play a mobile game your mindset is one of “quick thrills” –  I’ll just have a dip in to this and see how great I can be.

Classic arcade games got this spot on.
When you drop your coin in to Defender you know you’re in for one hell of a ride. It may be nothing more than a 2 or 3 minute ride but in that time you got everything – action, destruction, pace, thrills and of course a score.
My love for arcade gaming is epitomised by Defender. The feedback to the player is immense.

Step 1 – drop the coin: player greeted to electronic acknowledgement sound

Step 2 – hit start: player greeted to electronic wind up sound

Step 3 – speed left and right: player hurled straight in to combat at high speed

Step 4 – hit lasers: player sees stream of lasers thrash out across the screen (never bettered in 30 years)

Step 5 – destroy things (even the things you’re not supposed to): player witnesses firework display as everything he blasts turns to a multicolour scattering of pixels

So much in that game came at you through your controls and the use of sound.

DOOM is a similar experience. Just launch it and go through the main menu. Every item is met with a satisfying clunk. And the Shotgun. Oh the shotgun. The sound the shotgun made was so beautiful I edited the WAD to have the chaingun use the exact same sound. Glorious.

Everything in DOOM was designed to hit you square in the face. It was immediate and could easily have been an arcade game. When you trawl the DOOM archives and see what the game could so easily have been you have to thank the game’s designers for changing direction. So much of DOOM is the way it is because it has the egos of its key designers all over it. These guys live and sweat arcade thrills and so much of their personality is on show in DOOM.

So much that was created for the arcades has its place on a short timeframe game. The hurdle to overcome is the controls.

In the arcades (certainly the older ones) the controls were two-handed. One for the stick the other for the fire button. Later of course we had alternate fire buttons.

I overcame the issue with fire buttons in HyperGunner (mobile version) with auto-fire. I instantly removed the need to hit fire and turned the game in to more of a game of avoidance. This is not uncommon.

But there’s a growing trend in mobile and casual gaming to present what I suppose used to be termed female friendly games. That is, more puzzle oriented games. We’ve all seen them. A wall of gems and shapes that you click on to remove based on how they match their neighbours. It’s mindless and repetitive and there’s not much wrong with that. But I also think it’s lazy game design. There’s so much more that we can do as designers to present a puzzle or challenge.

I have scoured the web for interviews with arcade game designers. I was lucky enough to share a couple of emails with Eugene Jarvis (creator of Defender). A couple more with Chris Crawford (legendary Atari designer) and John Romero (DOOM). These guys know exactly how to throw the right switches at the right time in a game. They push the boundaries and challenge you far beyond matching 4 orange diamonds in a row. For Chris and Eugene in particular it was about pushing the immature technology to achieve the desired results. Not to take anything away from id who of course were ground-breaking in their own way, but for John (who of course had the incomparable John Carmack at his side) it was I suspect more about working a layer above the technology to provide the best thrills and challenges. It’s all about balance and whether it’s a team or the lone developer striking balance in a game’s design is an art form and not something that comes overnight.

I am convinced that the future of mobile gaming is a large step back. But as a designer you have to be brave. I don’t for one minute mean that we should all be playing Asteroids and PacMan on our phones. More that we should observe the tricks that arcade game designers and notable designers of recent times employed to pack as much in to a short game time as possible and what’s more made you want to come back for more.(source:rebelfive.wordpress


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