作者：Giordano Bruno Contestabile（PopCap移动产品及运营策略高级总监）

如果你是在电子游戏产业中做事，那么你的工作目标应该是尽可能多地娱乐别人，而你所做的一切也应该依据对方的反应而得到评价。你需要知道玩家是你真正需要在乎的支持者：你所做的一切都应该让他们感到开心，如果他们不满意你的游戏，那么你的工作将会变得异常艰难，而如果他们喜欢你的游戏，你也会因此得到好处。

根据这种描述，玩家难道不就是一个急躁善变的老板形象？准确地说，如果你是这个产业中的一份子，那么你就不再是为了经理，CEO或者股东而工作，相反地，你必须去努力迎合玩家，真正为了他们而工作。

这听起来好像有点模糊，所以我想要在此详细描述这一观点的实际意义，以及为何我们要将其牢牢记在心里。首先，玩家，作为一个群体其实并不需要精通一款游戏所需要的所有原则：他们不需要知道如何设计游戏，如何平衡游戏，如何完善游戏，如何销售游戏以及如何让游戏变得有趣。你不需要让玩家做出这些决策，而是你应该全权承担起这些任务。

植物大战僵尸(from next-gen)

玩家擅长什么？

对于玩家来说，他们真正擅长的是享乐，快速理解一款游戏设计是否适合于自己。但他们的技巧却不只这些。经过验证，玩家同样也擅于判断游戏什么时候取悦了自己，欺骗了自己，利用了自己或者未公平地对待自己。总的来看，玩家扮演着一个熟练的经济学家角色，精通于评估自己能够从游戏中获得多少价值，并与他们所投入的时间，情感或金钱进行价值比较。

从传统意义上来看，这种等式总是很明确：当游戏进入市场开始说服玩家的时候总是会面临一道很高的门槛（游戏邦注：这里指价格因素），而如果开发者能够提供品牌价值，进行市场营销，发布新闻报道或者有效的游戏预告片，那么这道门槛将会有所降低。一旦玩家打算尝试游戏，并愿意为游戏投入自己的血汗钱，那么他们一定需要有足够的财政投入和情感投入才能保证自己可以掌握游戏技巧，并享受到游戏乐趣。如果开发者能够在游戏开发中多投入点时间，从而提高游戏吸引力，并让它变得更加优秀，提供给玩家难以忘怀的体验，那么这定是一个非常棒的作品，而玩家也会因此期待它的续作。

长期研究证明，这些观点都是正确的，但是我们同样也必须清楚，我们现在正生活在一个完全不同的时代里：在这个时代，玩家处在一个充满各种游戏的平台中，并且能够在游戏中频繁地进行交流，而且很多游戏都会免费为玩家提供部分内容。玩家之前是希望先付钱再玩游戏，现在他们却是希望先免费试玩，再判断游戏是否值得掏钱。除此之外，玩家的注意力也越来越有限，他们很容易分心，除非你已经建立起知名的品牌或者良好的声誉，不然很难让游戏获得玩家关注。无论如何，你都必须在一开始与玩家进行交流之时就向玩家明确地传达游戏的质量和“乐趣因素”。特别是在手机设备中，第一分钟的游戏体验是决定用户粘性和留存率的最关键时刻。

正确的起步

因此，制作出能让玩家感到有趣的首次体验变得非常重要，而这也是PopCap多年来一直在实践的一个观点。这也许是受到传统休闲游戏“先试后买”模式的影响，玩家可以在一个有限的时间内去尝试游戏并做出评判，然后决定是否购买游戏，但是在这里也有一些不同之处：你必须意识到现在的玩家也有许多选择，所以如果玩家愿意选择你的游戏，你就必须确保他们能够在游戏的前几分钟体验后便真正认可你的游戏。

在一开始便提供给玩家有趣的游戏体验非常重要，并且必须渗透到你的所有工作，且清晰地体现在你的游戏，你的营销信息，以及你所传达给玩家的态度中。如果你始终牢记自己是在为玩家效力，那么你将会努力地为他们创造出最优秀的产品，最大限度地为他们服务，清晰明确地向他们传达信息，并适当地给予他们支持。这其实是一件再简单不过的事了，所以你必须随时提醒自己，如此你才能够制作出最易亲近，且通俗易懂的有趣游戏。同时你还需要记得，如果游戏出现了错误，那这一定是你的问题，而不是玩家“不理解游戏”。

在这个过程中，如Facebook或者应用商店等发行平台扮演着一个很重要的角色，能够帮助游戏获得更多玩家，并且这些平台同时也为游戏提供了一个充满竞争的环境，让它们必须费劲心思才能够吸引玩家们的注意。同时，这些平台中还有许多收集和分析游戏数据的功能，如果你们能够合理使用的话，将能够更好地了解玩家在做什么，以及玩家对游戏的看法，而因此能够更好地完善并优化游戏体验。但是不管怎样，最重要的是你的游戏首先必须是有趣且具有独特的吸引力，因为缺少了这点，所有的一切也就不再有意义。

建立长期关系

一旦玩家决定花时间去玩你的游戏，建立玩家与游戏之间的长期关系就变得更加重要了，因为事实上，忠实的玩家会向好友宣传你的游戏，成为游戏的最佳宣传者，而且因为获取玩家的费用较高，所以一旦你获得了玩家，就一定要想方设法留住他们。最重要的是，培养信誉对于游戏最后的成功非常关键，包括建立坚实的品牌意识和良好的信誉。从玩家的角度来看，人们最讨厌的就是被欺骗或者受到非公平的待遇，所以你在游戏开发过程中应该尽可能地避免这些因素。如果能做到这一点，你不仅能够高枕无忧，也能够因此建立起稳定持久的用户关系了。

总括来说，以玩家为中心的视角看问题要求你的游戏必须能够立刻体现出游戏乐趣，能够在游戏的第一分钟便吸引玩家的注意，容易理解（尽管不一定容易精通）并且能够为玩家带来真正的价值。你同样也要努力去满足玩家这个苛刻老板的要求，虽然你难以预见他们的喜好并且不是很了解他们。听起来很难？的确，但是制作一款优秀游戏哪有那么容易？（本文为游戏邦/gamerboom.com编译，拒绝任何不保留版权的转载，如需转载请联系：游戏邦）

Opinion: Always remember who you work for

If you work in the videogame industry, your goal should be to entertain and delight as many people as possible, and everything you do should be measured against it. The logical consequence of this is that players are the constituency you should really care about: everything you do should be aimed at making them happy, as they can make your life really difficult if they decide that they’re not being catered to properly, and reward you handsomely if they are satisfied.

Doesn’t this sound just like an impatient, fickle boss? Precisely, and that’s why, if you work in the industry, you’re not really working for your manager, your CEO or your shareholders: you are working for your players.

While by itself this is a vague concept, I’d like to use this column to offer my view of what it means in practice, and why it’s important to always keep it in mind. First of all, players as a group aren’t necessarily skilled in any of the disciplines that contribute to a great game: they don’t know how to design and balance it, they don’t know how to improve on it after it goes live, they don’t know how to market it and they don’t know how to make it fun. As such, you don’t want to “outsource” any of those decisions to them – you should be fully responsible for those decisions.

What are players good at?

But what players are really good at is having fun, and understanding pretty quickly if something is designed for them or not. But their skills don’t stop at this. It turns out that players are also pretty good at understanding when they are being pandered to, deceived, misused or otherwise treated unfairly. Overall, players are skilled economists, and very good at estimating how much value they are deriving from playing a game, and how much value they are contributing in terms of time, emotional involvement or money.

Traditionally, this equation was pretty straightforward: there was a very high barrier of entry (price) to convince a player to buy a game, a barrier which could be lowered with a mix of brand equity, marketing, press coverage and availability of demos. Once a player had taken the plunge and spent hard-earned money on a title, financial and emotional investment would have been significant enough to guarantee a certain level of effort in mastering and enjoying the game itself. If a game took its time to reveal its appeal and become a great, unforgettable experience that was perfectly fine, and even expected for some genres.

All of this was true for a long time, but we all know that we live in a different era now: an era in which players have ready access to a plethora of games on platforms with which they’re constantly interacting, and in which a lot of those games offer free access to at least part of their content. If before players expected to pay and then be entertained, now they expect to be entertained first, and then decide if it’s worth paying for it. Additionally, players’ attention spans are definitely getting shorter and capturing their attention is becoming more difficult, unless you can rely on an established brand and a large reservoir of goodwill. In any case, it has become critical to make an impact, and to convey clearly the quality and “fun factor” of your game from the very first interaction. This is particularly true on mobile devices, where the first minute of play is crucial to engage and retain players.

Right start

Making the initial game experience fun for your players therefore becomes extremely important, and it’s something that PopCap has been focusing on for many years. You could point to the classic casual gaming “try before you buy” model as being responsible for this, as players have a limited time to form a positive impression about a game and make a purchase decision, but it’s really about something else: recognising that players have a lot of choice and that, if they decide to give you a chance, they deserve a great, immediate experience from the very first minute of gameplay.

The realisation that providing the best possible experience from the very start is paramount should permeate everything you do and be immediately visible in your product, in your marketing messaging and in the overall attitude you display towards your players. If you always remember that you work for your players, it’s only logical that you will try to provide them with a great product, delivered in the way that’s most convenient to them, communicated clearly and supported properly. It’s as simple as that, and reminding yourself of it at every stage makes for a more accessible, easy to understand and ultimately fun product. And remember: if the game sucks it’s your fault, not the fault of the audience for “not getting it”, as they should not be expected and required to.

A big role in this process is played by distribution platforms such as Facebook or app stores, which should be seen as a way to reach a larger number of players, and also as the epicentres of strong and crowded competitive landscapes, where capturing players’ attention for the short and long term is harder. At the same time, those platforms also allow for the collection and analysis of gameplay data which, if used correctly, can give you an objective view of what players are doing and how they prefer to interact with the game, which in turn can be used to improve and optimise the overall experience. However, even before you get to that, the game needs to be incredibly fun and compelling and have unique appeal, or everything else becomes pointless.

Long-term relationships

Once a player decides to spend time with your game, building a long-term relationship becomes of paramount importance for a lot of different reasons, from the fact that loyal players will start telling all their friends about your game and become your best cheerleaders, to the realisation that gaining customers is pretty expensive and that, once you have succeeded, you stand to gain from keeping them around. Most importantly, cultivating your reputation is absolutely crucial to the success of your business, as is building strong brands and goodwill over time. Looking at this from the player’s perspective, what people hate more than anything else is to be deceived or to be treated unfairly, and that’s something you should absolutely strive to avoid in every aspect of your games. Not only you will sleep better at night, but you will also build a more sustainable long-term business.

So, to recap, a player-centric view requires your game to be immediately fun, to capture attention from the first minute of play, to be easy to understand (even if challenging to master) and to offer real value to players. It also requires you to focus all your efforts on satisfying a demanding boss, whose tastes are difficult to predict and about whom you know very little to start with. Sounds difficult? For sure, but who said that making great games is easy?（source:next-gen）