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解析游戏乐趣的常量和创造性的关系

发布时间:2011-11-18 13:45:07 Tags:,,,,,

作者:Tadhg Kelly

当游戏开发者问道“什么是乐趣”,专业学者只能回答,乐趣看似简单,但却难以解释。任何东西都具有乐趣的潜质,但是我们却很难对其进行陈述。

当一个问题被广泛讨论之时,人们提出这一问题的初衷也就失去了意义。而且说实在的,开发者并不是真正想知道“什么是乐趣”这个问题的答案,他们只是想知道为什么自己的游戏会那么糟糕而已。如果从实用性角度来看,乐趣是指:

精通游戏机制后便会有一种胜利的喜悦。

但是这十多个字的简单描述也许会惹恼一些人,因为这就像是将游戏约束在一个没有门的框架中。

what is fun(from whatgamesare)

what is fun(from whatgamesare)

具有创造性的常量

当意识到“c”(光速)是一个物理常量之时,我们便能够根据相对论对时空进行描述了。而这一实践同时也会引出物理科学(从天文学到核物理学)中的其它问题,并且对于科学的发展具有重要作用。但是从直觉来看,我们却很难去接受它。

“c”描写的是一个有限的宇宙。它告诉我们速率是有限的,而且这也是不可避免的一个事实。从哲学上来看这是一个消极的观点,而作为人类的我们也不喜欢这个观点。因为人类总是有所追求,想象着我们的子孙能够乘坐着飞船在多维空间里穿梭,并翱翔于宇宙中的星际之门。但是“c”的出现便意味着我们的这些梦想永远不可能实现,而我们也会因此感到沮丧。

在艺术中,创造性常量相当于“c”。它的存在是用于寻找艺术,实践艺术,并约束艺术。创造性常量将所有创造性工作汇聚在一起,就像是鸡蛋米糊一样,能够形成受观众认可的形态。它形成了一种艺术形式,而且既是一种依靠也是一种认知助手。

所以,没有情节的故事不是故事。没有拍子的音乐不是音乐。没有韵律的诗歌不是诗歌。并且,没有乐趣的游戏不是游戏。然而,并非所有的情节都需要特定的情节设置,也并非所有的诗歌都必须基于严格的诗歌结构。传统类型(恐怖小说,十四行诗,第一人称射击游戏)与常量(图像识别,认知,情感吸引)存在着差别。传统可以也应该尝试着改变,但是常量却不能。

但是如果是取决于不同的目标观众,常量也是有变化的可能性,如与情节相悖的小说,自由爵士乐或者极端的现代艺术。这种颠覆性的作品很重要,因为它将会进一步挑战艺术的局限性,并纠正常量只是一种不能改变的惯例行为的观点。但是,这种颠覆性作品只能够吸引部分自我意识很强的群体,即通常是那些能够理解这些作品以及创造者创造动机的艺术家们。

乐趣的成份

乐趣并不是游戏所追求的永恒不变的常量,但是如果缺少了乐趣,游戏将很难被玩家所接受。让我们对乐趣进行详细分析:

(1)胜利的喜悦(2)精通游戏(3)公平游戏(4)游戏动态。

胜利的喜悦:玩家玩游戏就是为了获得胜利,但是一名玩家的胜利并不意味着其它玩家的失败。胜利包括形式上的成功以及个人所获得的成就感。胜利就像是一种奖励,能够让玩家打开游戏的下一个关卡,获得升级,完成游戏以及获得其它外部收获等。胜利让玩家们能够看到自己所控制的角色在游戏世界中具有多大作用。

胜利的喜悦同样也具有强制性。在同一种类型或者范围内重复获得胜利将会让玩家感到厌烦,并失去兴趣,或者执着地想去寻找更大的挑战并争取更大的胜利。这时候游戏便不再有趣了,相反地玩家更加沉迷于完成任务而不是享受游戏。

精通:精通意味着学习,完善并发展与战术截然相反的策略。但是有一点很重要的是,即使玩家在游戏中获得了胜利,但是那时的他们也不一定精通了游戏。而同样重要的是,一般精通于游戏的玩家所需要付出的代价便是,他们很少能够体验到胜利的快感。

很关键的是,玩家们都很清楚游戏手段以及他们在游戏中的目标,所以他们自然也就清楚为了精通游戏需要做些什么。如果一款游戏并不能清楚地向玩家表明这些内容,那么将会严重打击玩家的兴趣,让他们不愿意继续前进。这就是为何游戏必须接近现实生活并比现实生活更加简化的原因。

公平:游戏必须保持公平。但是如果游戏本来就站在中立的立场上,那也就无所谓强调是否公平了。简单地来说,公平是指玩家因为自己的行动而创造出一种积极改变所带来的感受。所以,这就意味着他必须能够从自己的行动中看到胜利或者失败。

那些欺骗玩家的随机或系统化修改或者专制的设计都是不公平的做法。玩家并不会想去精通任何不公平的游戏,自然地他们也不会有兴趣去赢取游戏。而且,不管怎样也不能将公平与“困难”混淆在一起。就像是《Blackjack》是一种对玩家不利的游戏,而玩家也知道这一点。在游戏中玩家会遭遇随机杀害,而这也是一种不公平的机制。

游戏动态:游戏始终坚持着一种宽松的结构,并由玩家的行动拉开帷幕。而玩家的行动需要一定的响应(游戏邦注:包括来自于游戏或者其他玩家)才能够决定他们的胜利或失败,这也会形成一种循环。而当这些循环开始构建一种结构并表现出正式或非正式进程时,它们便形成了游戏动态。

游戏动态将游戏乐趣的所有成分组合在一起。游戏的乐趣不只是简单地精通一个游戏动作或者赢得一个奖牌,而是这些内容应该如何交织在一起从而促成整体游戏的乐趣。游戏要如何通过动态去延伸行动,玩家要如何通过动态去发展策略等等都是游戏的乐趣所在。这些看起来很小的事物其实都能够为玩家带来兴奋感。

创造性不受常量限制

按照一特定创造性阶段或者理论知识来看,情感障碍是乐趣常量的限制性因素。而这似乎是在述说着一个事实,即既然乐趣是有限的,游戏是有限的,那么它们也只能是作为人们娱乐消遣的对象而已。但是这却会让玩家感到消极,被动或者守旧。

小说是否会受到情节常量的约束?不会。同样的,音乐也不会受到拍子的约束。每一次,当人们认为艺术的表达形式已经达到极限时,就立即会有其他人指出,他们实际上又将惯例与常量的概念相混淆。但是其实,不论是主题,还是表达或者艺术内容,它们的表达形式都没有极限。

所以关于常量约束创造性的这种说法是不正确的。

正确的是,很多类型的交互乐趣是来自于游戏过程而非游戏本身。而意识到这一点我们也就不再会感到恼火了吧。因为这意味着除了“游戏”,其实还有更多不同的交互艺术形式的存在。

小说的常量并不适用于诗歌。文学并不是艺术形式的总体,它只是几大群组中的一个。交互性亦然。游戏亦是众多艺术形式中的一种。所以还有许许多多艺术形式的存在,有些甚至还没有名字,而有一些还有待人们的挖掘。(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

Fun: Simple to Explain, Hard to Accept [Constants]

By Tadhg Kelly

Game developers ask ‘what is fun?’ and academics often answer that fun is seemingly simple but actually fiendishly hard to explain. Everything is potentially fun and trying to encompass it all in one statement is impossible.

When any debate becomes so wide, the intent of the original question is lost. Developers are not really asking ‘what is fun?’’ in the universal sense. They’re asking why does their game suck. Pragmatically then, fun is:

The joy of winning while mastering fair game dynamics.

However the idea that fun can be reduced to 9 little words is just the sort of thinking that makes some people angry, because it sounds like (and is) a hard limit on what games can be.

Creative Constants

By realising that c (the speed of light) is a physical constant, we are able to describe spacetime in terms of relativity. This realisation unlocks many other problems in the physical sciences, from astronomy to nuclear physics, and has been vital to the progress of technology. But it is intuitively hard to accept.

c describes a limited universe. It tells us that there is a hard limit to velocity, which is necessary and inescapable. It’s philosophically negative, and as a species we just don’t like that, We like to aspire, to dream of future generations, starships in hyperspace and warp gates through the universe. c implies that we won’t see those dreams realised, which can be depressing.

In the arts, a creative constant is the equivalent of c. Its presence unlocks the art and makes it work, and yet at the same time sets a hard limit on what it can be. A creative constant binds creative work together, like an egg in a batter, and gives it a shape that the audience can recognise. It puts the form in art form and is both crutch and cognitive aid.

So story without plot is not story. Music without tempo is not music. Poetry without meter is not poetry. And games without fun are not games. However not all plots need to be genre plots any more than all poems need to be based on a strict verse structure. There is a difference between the conventions of genre (horror novels, sonnets, first person shooters) and constants (pattern recognition, cognition, empathic hooks). Conventions can and should be challenged, but constants remain.

Depending on the audience there is also the opportunity for subversion through constants, such as anti-plot novels, free jazz or the extremes of modern art. Subversive works are important because they test the limits of an art and sometimes uncover that what was thought to be a constant was actually just a convention. However subversive works tend to only hold appeal for a self-conscious niche, usually comprised of fellow artists who understand both the work and the motivations of the people who created it.

Components of Fun

Fun is not the only constant for games, but it is probably the hardest one to accept. Let’s break it down:

The (1) joy of winning (2) while mastering (3) fair (4) game dynamics.

Joy of Winning: All games are played to win, though a win does not imply that other players have to lose. Winning covers both victory of the formal kind and achievement of the personal kind. A win looks like a reward, unlocking the next part of the game, an increase in level, completing the game or various other outward expressions. It is empowering, where the player can see the effect of their agency in the game world by the change that it causes.

The joy of winning is also compulsive. Repetitive wins of the same type and scale become boring over time, which can lead to the play brain losing interest or searching obsessively for the bigger win. At that point the game is no longer fun, but instead tolerated in the quest to get back to fun.

Mastery: Mastery means learning, improving and developing strategy as opposed to just tactics. An important point to note about winning and mastery is that wins only delivered at the point of achieving mastery are usually too few. It is important that the player is experiencing little wins while mastering as well as the big payoffs.

It is also critical that the levers of the game be clear to the player, as well as the goals, so that he or she knows what they have to do in order to achieve mastery. If the game is vague or opaque then this actively discourages the play brain from proceeding. This is why games must be enclosed and simpler than real life.

Fairness: The game must be seen to be fair. However it does not have to actually be fair from a neutral standpoint. At its simplest, fairness is the sense that the player is creating active change (or not) because of his actions. So that means that his actions need to be seen to cause wins or failures that are the player’s own fault.

Randomness, systemic corrections that cheat the player or arbitrary design are all examples of unfairness. Unfairness cannot really be mastered so there is little joy in winning against it. It should not be confused with ‘difficulty’ however. A game of Blackjack is stacked against the player, but the player knows it. A game that randomly kills players, on the other hand, is just unfair.

Game Dynamic: Games adhere to a loose structure that starts with the actions of the player. Those actions demands a response (from the game, from another player) to determine a win or loss, which forms a loop. As loops build into a structure that starts to show formal or informal progress, they become a game dynamic.

The game dynamic brings it all together. The fun of a game is not simply becoming a master of an action or the winner of prizes. It’s the dynamic of how those things interweave that makes the overall game fun. How the game extends its actions through the dynamic, how the player develops strategy over the course of the dynamic and so forth are fun. Everything smaller is just cheap thrills.

Hard to Accept

To a certain class of creative or academic, the limits of the fun constant are an emotional hurdle. They seem to say that because fun is a limit, games are also limited and so they will only ever be amusements. It feels negative, unambitious or conservative.

Are novels limited by the plot constant? No. Nor is music by the need for tempo. Every time that someone thinks an art has reached the limit of its expression, along comes someone new who shows them that they have confused convention with constant once again. That there are no limits to theme, expression or artistic intent.

So the idea that a constant limits creativity is not true.

What is true is that there are many kinds of interactivity that may be playful fun but are not gameful fun. Recognising that should not be a cause for anger however. It just means that there are more interactive art forms than ‘game’ can really cover.

The constants of the novel don’t apply to poetry. Literature is not one art form, it’s a grouping of several. So too with interactivity. Games are but one art form among many. There are others, some of which don’t even have names yet and are waiting to be discovered.(source:whatgamesare


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