作者：Pascal Luban

这个行业逐渐显现的某些趋势很可能会影响到游戏设计哲学，从而在未来几年内对整个行业产生影响，本系列文章的目标便是揭示这些趋势。

这些文章中的内容并非想象出来的，文章中描述的趋势已经显现，因而我们应当询问自己的问题不是这些趋势是否会出现，而是它们会对视频游戏设计产生何种影响。我希望这些文章能够引起众人的深思。尽情享受它吧！

大趋势1：增加游戏商业寿命的必要性

开发成本不断增加。这个现象在AAA游戏上体现得尤为明显，而这些游戏是推动主流发行商发展的主要力量。但是，此类游戏的商业寿命短得令人惊讶，只有几个月的时间，有些游戏甚至更少。

在发布之日执行商业闪电战之后，多数游戏便迅速退出舞台，被其他玩家所期待的AAA游戏浪潮所淹没。

只有随后的“预算”版本或扩展包的发布才能够重现玩家对游戏的关注。因而，发行商正面临着非常危险的境地：他们必须在游戏发布之前的18至24个月内投入大量资金，然后后在非常短的时间内获得回报，同时希望自己的产品不会受到同类产品的竞争！

受此问题影响最深的是发行商，因而其正在寻找解决方案，延长游戏产生盈利的时间。

这种想法对游戏开发的所有层面都将产生巨大的影响，因为游戏必须围绕上述需求来构建。哪些是值得探究的解决方案呢？

多人游戏

首个可以考虑的途径便是开发多人模式。近期发布的数款游戏显然都选择了这个途径，比如《使命召唤4》。单人竞赛惊险刺激，但是时间较短。发行商依靠多人模式来赚取游戏盈利并增加游戏寿命。

多人游戏还能够进一步扩展其发展前景，开发商可以向玩家提供自定义工具，让玩家自行通过创建地图或mod来丰富游戏。这样会极大地丰富玩家对游戏的兴趣。

Epic精于此道，《虚拟竞技场2004》和《虚拟竞技场III》都鼓励玩家开发出属于自己的内容。当然，mod开发不只需要游戏引擎的技术支持，而且还要求游戏基本机制也有足够的弹性以适应这些新内容。

可下载内容

游戏以模块化的方式来开发，其设计可以支持将来添加新的关卡、游戏模式和车辆之类的新资产等内容。关键在于，让玩家通过付费订阅或微付费来获取这些内容。

付费购买单机游戏的可下载内容这个概念已经被数百万玩家接受，他们为大型多人游戏支付月订阅费用。

同时，使用微交易来产生盈利在亚洲极为普遍，因而我们可以探讨下这种新型的经济模型。它已经成为了对抗盗版问题的利器，而盗版正是许多亚洲工作室普遍面临的问题。

假如内容的质量能够与价格成正比，很可能会有大量的玩家接受购买在线内容这种形式。那么，游戏设计就需要能够允许此类新增内容的加入。

就个人而言，我很信赖这种新兴的微付费模型（游戏邦注：可购买内容包括地图、游戏模式、角色装备和游戏新篇章等），它将成为行业内的新经济模型。它不会完全取代当前模型，而是弥补后者的不足之处。

面对这个挑战的关键点在于游戏设计团队和营销团队在项目早期阶段中的亲密协作。我将在以后的文章中深入探讨这个方面的内容。

周边产品授权

当今游戏的特征是内容丰富，其流行可能会催生出各种形式的产品，包括角色模型、漫画和杂志、配饰、校园用品、铃声和动画产品，甚至还有小说、戏剧剧本以及涉面更广的视频游戏锦标赛。

我相信，我们可以发展出这种情形。有些游戏会上演极为吸引人的表演，被观众所观看和理解。

我曾是《细胞分裂：明日潘多拉》和《细胞分裂：混沌理论》的首席关卡设计师，这两款游戏的多人模式会有相当优秀的表现。为什么呢？

首先，游戏的节奏缓慢（游戏邦注：这两款游戏的主题是秘密行动），因而观众可以理解他在屏幕上看到的动作。

其次，游戏提供了许多的策略选择，每次游戏经历都可能有很大的不同。

最后，游戏的情境通常会采用电影式的方法。观看出色玩家在《混沌理论》多人比赛中的表现，然后自行做出好坏判断。

在线销售

过去几年来产生了许多新的销售模式，包括购买下载模式、游戏点播模式和试玩购买模式。

顾名思义，购买下载指的是玩家购买游戏后进行下载。就其表现而言，这种销售模式并没有改变传统的销售模式，除了购买者不用离开家门之外。但是，其真正的潜力表现在其他地方。

在线销售使得销售价格具有极大的灵活性，因而可以更加地根据玩家的需求来调整价格。而且，它还使得“老游戏”的回归成为可能。

最重要的是，它使得销售者可以掌控供求关系，因为数字化销售者对客户的了解要好过传统销售人员（游戏邦注：差别在于消费习惯分析），因而能够更直接地与消费者交流。这种方式在Xbox Live Marketplace上展现出了巨大的成功力量。

游戏点播是种较为不同的经济模型。玩家支付月订阅费用，就可以无限制地畅玩各种游戏。该市场的引领者是欧洲的Metaboli和美国的GameTap。

这种方式在欧洲逐渐蔓延，使得发行商可以在不背负任何成本的前提下产生盈利。在这种模式中，较老游戏和较新游戏是平等的，经验显示它对传统销售的冲击很小。

最后是试玩购买模式，玩家下载游戏并试玩，如果觉得好玩可以在线购买。这种模式最适合那些有着低下载量的休闲游戏。

漫长的加载时间可能会让潜在购买者离开游戏，也会让发行商承当巨额的高带宽费用。因而这种模型并不适用于大型游戏，但是对那些较小或依靠微付费盈利的游戏来说相当合适。

大趋势2：快餐式游戏和微付费游戏现象

我们先来阐述快餐式游戏，它与视频游戏的关系就相当于快餐与家中烹饪菜肴的关系，指可以快速购买而且玩家无需做出大量投入的游戏。注意，这里所说的投入不单指经济上的投入，还包括掌握游戏所需耗费的时间。

声明：我并非在推广这种类型的游戏或餐馆的价值。如果快餐变得很流行，只能说明其适应了目前的消费需求。快餐式游戏也同此理。

这些游戏已经在我们周围出现，比如手机上的可下载游戏、售价低于20美元的预算PC游戏（游戏邦注：不包括那些最初全价出售随后发行商打折来延长其商业寿命的游戏）、试玩购买形式的可购买游戏和充当广告媒介的免费游戏。

这些产品都反映出某种新需求：马上可以玩游戏，无需做准备。这些游戏的购买和消费更多可视为一种冲动，而不是有意地获取。Xbox Live Marketplace的成功很大部分归功于这个原因。全价游戏较为昂贵，不加思索就买下游戏的人只是少数。

因而，这些游戏的设计就必须适应这种新的游戏“消费”方法。如果游戏不能立即给玩家带来令其满意的快乐，那么玩家会迅速地抛弃这款游戏。

相对那些免费获得的游戏而言，玩家愿意在付费购买的游戏中花费更多的时间来探索。因而，游戏玩法必须显而易见：界面简单，玩家所需取得的目标清晰地显示。

对于手机游戏而言，上述做法的必要性尤为明显。当前的趋势是从主机游戏的概念和控制中获取灵感，尽可能地将它们运用到手机形式上，得到的是利弊并存的产品。我们或许应当去发现新的概念，适用于手机平台同时与主机游戏没有过多关联。

这些新概念来源于手机的特性（游戏邦注：交流、地理定位、用户与设备近距离接触和内置摄像头等），或许会改善设备的局限性（游戏邦注：如键盘和屏幕较小等）。因而，我们或许可以看到与当前体育赛事相互配合的游戏，甚至延伸出文化、政治和经济趋势。我们甚至可能看到以社会化为中心的游戏显现。在速配之后，我们或许需要为游戏约会的到来做好准备！

依赖于微付费的游戏有着稍微不同的逻辑。类似于快餐式游戏，这些游戏也有着快速的上手体验，但是也会怂恿玩家通过购买额外的成分来加深游戏体验。

这些成分有简单的装饰元素，比如改善玩家化身的形象，也有影响游戏玩法的元素。这种经济模型在亚洲发展迅速，我们预计它也会对西方市场产生重大的影响。开发商需要接纳此类游戏的设计方式，即便是类似竞速或射击等已经确立市场地位的题材。

首个限制条件便是注册的简易性。需要改变的是，玩家通过最少次数的操作就能够玩游戏。今天，大量的可下载游戏需要玩家做许多事情：玩家必须提供大量信息进行在线注册，然后登陆邮箱激活注册，下载较大的文件，同时期望网络连接能够稳定，解压和安装游戏，最后注册和下载更新！

其次，游戏机制本身必须尽量简单，这样理解和掌握便相对简单。这并不是说游戏不能有复杂性，而是应当逐步地将玩家导入游戏中。

最后，游戏设计必须支持大量的插件和升级，并分散不平衡玩家。可采用的解决方案包括《War Rock》中的设备租赁和系统分散配置高级玩家。

大趋势3：不断增加的真实感环境

这个趋势应当不会让大家感到惊讶。每年我们都可以看到各种发展，包括面部动画、日益增加的细节化角色和背景模型、逼真的物理原理、大气效果和动态光照等。所有这些内容都是当前游戏制作的必需品。

那么，在未来的数年内，我们将看到什么呢？以下是某些可能出现的趋势以及他们对游戏设计的影响：

户外环境的发展

今日的游戏正开始呈现广大的愿景和葱翠的世界。但是，到目前为止动作游戏多数还是在室内环境发生。

PC版《孤岛惊魂》率先开始使用户外环境，但仍然只是浮于表面，将来的游戏设计需要进一步利用这些方式。

对于动作游戏而言，广阔的全景画使得玩家可以从远处观测到对手的位置，反之亦然。因此就会出现某些新的游戏玩法系统，比如伪装、新的远程侦察机制、水平和垂直游戏玩法的融合以及大气效应的使用等。

大气效应的实时效果

现在，我们知道如何创造雨水、雾气和烟雾，但是我们无法与之互动。以下新的游戏玩法应用应当会出现：风会直接影响交通工具的控制，或者根据玩家的互动，有可能传播或驱散烟雾。

雨水也能够被背景元素影响，可能玩家的某些动作使之转变成洪水。

角色动画和环境的自动整合

今天，我们会根据预定的环境元素修正角色动画。明天，我们将看到角色的动画自动与背景环境相适应。从设计的观点来看，角色在完全基于现实的环境中行动将成为可能。

《刺客信条》展现出了发展的途径。随着更多的第三人称动作游戏的出现，这个趋势似乎愈发明显。在这些游戏中，玩家可以看到角色及其与环境和游戏中其他实体的互动。动画的质量成了关键元素。

完全具有互动性的环境

与背景元素的互动意味着那个元素必须像我们周边的显示世界那样运转。因而，根据每个物体的本质和所施加的行动，都可以被移动、抛射或破坏。当代游戏正开始提供这种设计方式。

背景的高互动性毫无疑问会提升游戏的现实感，但它对游戏设计有何影响呢？首先，它能够给玩家提供破坏任何物品的愉悦感。

虽然这种行为在道德上存在争议，但是我自己的体验显示，这是个很强大的驱动力。比如，《火爆狂飙》此类游戏的成功证实仰赖于满足玩家这样的需求。

而且，环境互动性还使得我们可以进一步开发所谓的“系统化游戏设计”。在这种有良好前景的设计方法中，玩家被放置在某个有着自身运行规则的世界中，需要自行寻找解决方案来解决面临的问题。

因而，他的常识就成了他唯一的指导因素，因为他知道游戏中的世界与“现实”世界的运转方式相同。《冲突：拒绝行动》和《战地：叛逆连队》等许多第一人称射击游戏便以此来开发出新颖的游戏玩法。

游戏邦注：本文发稿于2008年8月28日，所涉时间、事件和数据均以此为准。（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）

The Megatrends of Game Design, Part 1

Pascal Luban

The purpose of this series of articles is to attempt to shed some light on emerging trends likely to influence game design philosophy, and therefore, our industry at large in the next few years.

Rather than an essay in futurology, which is by definition very hypothetical, the trends described in these articles are already in motion — so the question we should ask ourselves is not whether these trends will appear, but rather what their impact will be on video game design. I hope that these articles will be food for thought. Enjoy.

Megatrend I – The necessity of increasing the commercial life span of games

Development costs continuously increase. This phenomenon is especially true for triple-A titles representing the driving force behind major publishers. Yet, the commercial life spans of such titles are surprisingly brief — a few months, sometimes less.

Beyond the initial commercial blitz of their release dates, most games quickly exit the main stage for good, overthrown by the new crop of triple-A titles everyone is waiting for.

Only a later “budget” version, or the release of an expansion, will renew the attention given to a game. Publishers are therefore facing a very risky situation: they must commit large investments 18 to 24 months before a game’s release and require a return within a very brief period, all whilst hoping the competition will have the decency not to beat them to the post with a similar product!

Publishers are those most affected by this problem, and as such, are researching solutions to spread out the revenue generated by a given game over a longer period.

The consequences of this on all aspects of a game’s development will be major, as a game will have to be built around this need. What solutions are worth exploring?

Multiplayer gaming to the rescue

The first avenue lies in the development of a multiplayer mode. A few recent titles, such as Call of Duty 4, have clearly made this choice. The solo campaign is breathtaking, but brief. The publisher relied on the multiplayer mode to gain profit on its title and to increase its shelf life.

The multiplayer’s role in securing a successful title can be taken further if the developers give tools to the players themselves with which to enrich the game by creating maps or mods. The latter can unexpectedly increase the interest given to a game.

Epic has grasped this well. Unreal Tournament 2004 and UT III were conceived to encourage the players to develop their own content. Of course, the development of mods does require not only that the game engine allows it, but also that the game’s basic design is sufficiently flexible to accommodate new uses.

Downloadable content

A game can be developed in a modular way — designed to support future levels, game modes, new assets such as vehicles, etc. The key is to make these add-ons available via paying subscriptions or micropayments.

Paying for downloadable content for a solo game is not too popular today with western gamers, but this may change. The concept is already accepted by millions of players who pay their monthly subscriptions for massively multiplayer games.

On the other hand, the use of microtransactions to generate revenue is quite common in Asia, so much so that we can talk about the emergence of a truly alternative economic model. It boasts the advantage of being an efficient weapon against piracy, a scourge plaguing Asia on a scale beyond the awareness of many studios.

It is probable that a sufficient number of players will accept purchasing online content, assuming said content is of high enough quality relative to the price. The game design will need to be adaptable enough to allow such add-ons.

Personally, I have great faith in the emergence of micropayments (purchase of a map, game mode, character accessories or equipment, episodes, etc.) as a new economic model for our industry. It will not replace the current model; but rather, complement it.

A closer collaboration between game design teams and marketing teams in the earlier project stages will be a crucial point in facing up to this challenge. I will bee investigating this further in a future article.

Merchandising

Today’s games feature rich and popular universes, which may yield products taking many forms: action figures, manga and comics, ornaments, school supplies, ringtones, animated series or even novels, theatrical screenplays, or the much wider broadcast of video game tournaments. Yes, you read correctly.

I am convinced that we will get there. Some games will give more compelling shows than others, in the sense of being watched and understood by viewers.

The multiplayer modes of Splinter Cell: Pandora Tomorrow and Chaos Theory, on which I have worked as lead level designer, would work particularly well. Why?

Firstly, because the game’s rhythm is slow (it’s a stealth game after all!), it thus allows a spectator to understand the action he’s seeing on screen.

Secondly, the game offers so many tactical options that each playing session will feature great diversity.

Lastly, game situations often take a cinematic dimension. Watch a good player drawn in multiplayer match of Chaos Theory and judge for yourself.

Online distribution

New distribution modes have arisen over these past years: the buy-and-download mode, the games-on-demand mode and the try-and-buy mode.

Buy-and-download refers to buying a game and downloading it, as the name says. By all appearances, this mode of distribution does not bring anything new to the traditional sales model beyond the fact that the buyer does not have to leave the house. However, its real potential lies elsewhere.

Online distribution allows for greater flexibility in sales price and thus for better adaptation of price according to demand. It offers the possibility of bringing back “old” titles.

Most of all, it allows for custom tailoring of offers, since a digital distributor can get to know its clients better than a traditional seller (thanks to the analysis of their consuming habits) and thus can communicate with them swiftly and directly. This formula has shown great success on the Xbox Live Marketplace.

Games-on-demand suggests a different economic model. The player pays for a monthly subscription, affording him unlimited access to a vast number of games. The leaders of this market are Metaboli in Europe and GameTap in the United States.

This formula, growing in scale in Europe, allows publishers to generate revenue without any burden of cost. It works for older games as much as for newer ones, since experience shows that the impact on traditional sales is minimal.

Last but not least, the try-and-buy model is also self-explanatory: players download the game and try it, and may buy it online if they enjoy it. This formula works best with casual titles with low downloading volume.

High loading times would likely deter potential buyers and accrue high bandwidth costs for the publisher. This model is thus poorly adapted to big titles, but works perfectly for less ambitious games or games relying on micropayment.

Megatrend II: The emergence of fast gaming, and games relying on micropayments

Let us start with fast gaming, which is to video games what fast food is to home cooking — i.e. games bought quickly and consumed without any important investment from the player. Note that the investment is not exclusively financial; it can also refer to the time spent in mastering the game.

Make no mistake: I am not making any value judgement on either this particular type of gaming or restaurant. If fast food became so popular, it is simply because it answered an existing consumer need. The same is true of fast gaming.

These games already abound around us: downloadable games on your cell phone, budget PC games created to be sold under $20 (not to be confused with initially fully-priced games receiving a price drop from the publishers to prolong their commercial lives), buyable games in the try-and-buy format, and free games serving as advertisement media.

These products respond to a new need: the one for immediate gaming, without forethought. The purchase and consumption of these games is more of an impulse than an informed acquisition. The success of Xbox Live Marketplace rests largely on this motivation. Let us not forget that full-price games are costly, and the consumer who does not think twice before snapping out his/her credit card is rare.

The design of these games will thus have to adapt to this new way of “consuming” games, which players would not have bothered paying for otherwise. If the games do not bring sufficient immediate gratification, their users will quickly abandon them.

Players will be willing to spend more time discovering games they have paid for than those obtained freely. The gameplay must therefore be instantaneous; i.e. the interface kept simple, and the player’s objectives shown clearly.

This necessity is all the more obvious for cell phone games. The current trend is to draw inspiration from concepts and controls found in console gaming, adapting them as fully as possible to the mobile format; the results are a mixed bag. We shall probably see new concepts — native to mobile platforms and largely removed from those of console games — arise.

These new concepts would draw from cell phone specifications (communication, geo-location, near-constant presence of the owner, integrated camera, etc.) and would disregard their limitations (small keyboard, tiny screen, etc.). We may thus see games interacting with current sporting events, or even cultural, political, and economic trends. We might even witness the apparition of games centered on socialization. Who knows… after speed dating, we might have to prepare ourselves for game dating!

Games relying on micropayments are founded on a somewhat different logic. Like fast gaming, these games are conceived to be immediate hands-on experiences, but are also designed to entice the players to deepen their experience of the game by purchasing affordable additional components.

These components vary from simple cosmetic elements, such as improvements on the appearance of player’s avatar, to elements affecting the gameplay itself. This economic model is fast-growing in Asia, and we can expect to witness an important impact on the west — perhaps even a major one. The design for such games will have to be thoroughly adapted, even for established genres such as racing games or shooters.

The first constraint is the ease of set-up. All must be arranged so that the player has a minimal number of actions to perform before playing. Today, the great majority of downloadable games ask much of the player: one must register online by often giving (too much) information, validate the registration by accessing one’s email client, download a (typically) sizable file whilst hoping that the connection stays stable, unzip and install the game, and finally register and download updates!

All of these operations can be simplified or rendered invisible to the player. Another solution is to develop games strictly for Internet browsers. InstantAction is one of the pioneers in this field.

Secondly, the game mechanics themselves must be as simplified as possible, so that they will be easy to grasp and master. This does not mean that the game cannot retain any complexity; rather, it ought to be introduced progressively.

Lastly, the game design must support a great number of add-ons and upgrades without leading to blatantly unbalanced players. Interesting solutions are surfacing, such as equipment rental in War Rock or systems grouping more or less advanced players together.

Megatrend III – Increasingly believable universes

This trend shall surprise no one. Each year we witness progress everywhere: facial animation, increasingly detailed character and background models, lifelike physics, atmospheric effects, dynamic lighting, and so forth. All of these features are must-haves for current game production.

What can we expect in the coming years? Here are some likely tendencies and their consequences for game design:

Development of outdoor environments

Today’s gaming platforms are beginning to display both vast perspectives and lush worlds. It was no random chance that action games mostly occurred indoors up until now.

Far Cry for the PC was ahead of its time in terms of rendering and utilizing outdoor environments, yet still only scratched the surface, as future game design will need to take further advantage of these perspectives.

For action games, vast panoramas allow spotting one’s opponents from afar, and vice-versa. New gameplay systems will thus unfold: camouflage, new remote detection mechanisms (or disruption of the latter), fusion between horizontal (on the ground) and vertical (airborn) gameplay, use of atmospheric effects, etc.

Real-time impact of atmospheric effects

Today we know how to create rain, mist or smoke, but we cannot interact with it. New gameplay applications shall appear: wind can directly impact the controls of a vehicle, or it may propagate or dissipate a smoke column, as determined by player interaction.

Rain can be channelled by a background element, perhaps though the player’s actions, thus transforming into a torrent.

Automatic integration of character animation with the environment

Today, character animations are fixed according to pre-defined environment elements. Tomorrow we shall no doubt see characters whose animations will automatically adapt to the background. From a design point of view, it will become possible to make the characters act in environments completely based on reality.

Assassin’s Creed shows the way. This trend seems increasingly obvious as we see more third-person action games being developed. In these games, the player sees the character and his interactions with the environment and other entities of the game. The quality of the animation becomes a key factor.

Completely interactive environments

Interaction with background elements means that said elements ought to react like the world surrounding us would. Thus, every object can be moved, flipped over or broken according to its nature and

the action applied to it. The games of this current generation are starting to offer real possibilities in this realm.

Higher interactivity with the background shall doubtlessly contribute to a game’s realism, but what would it bring to the game design? It will first offer the players the pleasure of wrecking whatever object they want.

While morally debatable, my own experience has shown it to be a powerful motivating agent. A game such as Burnout, for instance, greatly relies on answering this need.

Moreover, environmental interactivity will especially allow for further development of what we call “systemic game design.” In this thoroughly ambitious approach to design, the player is placed into a universe led by its own rules, and it is up to him to find solutions to overcome the trials he encounters.

His only real guide thus becomes his common sense, since he knows the game’s universe works like the “real” one. Many first-person shooters such as Denied Ops and Battlefield: Bad Company are developing innovative gameplay along these lines.

In my next article, I shall address the following Megatrends:

The search for immediate playability

Gaming as a teaching tool (Source: Gamasutra)