游戏邦在:
杂志专栏:
gamerboom.com订阅到鲜果订阅到抓虾google reader订阅到有道订阅到QQ邮箱订阅到帮看

游戏设计是作品成功与否的关键

什么是游戏设计?

电子游戏的目标是向玩家传递有趣互动体验。深入探究那些取得突出商业成就或非常成功的游戏就会发现,这些游戏的最普遍特性是它们都富有趣味。虽然优质画面、神奇技术或大型授权作品能够促进游戏的成功,但单凭其中某元素,作品完全与成功搭不上边。

若要提高游戏吸引力,我们就要知道什么让体验富有趣味,如何创造这样的体验。能够回答这些问题的学科就是游戏设计。

游戏设计不是编程或美工

游戏的趣味价值和众所周知的图像艺术或软件工程学科毫无关系。游戏可以在具备优质画面、创新3D引擎或美妙AI(人工智能)的同时令人感到沮丧或觉得非常无趣。相反,像《文明》这样画面粗糙、2D显示引擎略显蹩脚的游戏却可能变成商业成绩突出的经典杰作。

Civilisation from direct2drive.com

Civilisation from direct2drive.com

所以娱乐活动的质量不只和画面质量或编程质量有关系,虽然二者都有一定的影响。杰出游戏开发商找到游戏制作的新方式,不再只是将画面和编程要素组合起来,而是瞄准和强调设计。其中的隐含意义是游戏设计与其他的游戏开发内容截然不同。

游戏设计绝非易事

仔细观察当前市场上的作品会发现,要制作出富有趣味的游戏非常困难。平均每年有多少平庸作品问世?有多少游戏富有趣味是因为存在若干哗众取宠的功能,然后作品在1个月后就被遗忘?若制作应用都很困难,那么制作富有趣味的应用就非常困难。

设计游戏需要时间、精力、技能和情感。清楚游戏设计富有难度,及能够在过程中合理分配资源非常重要。

学习游戏设计没有正规渠道

要制作富有趣味的互动体验,就需要把握什么是富有趣味的体验,如何制作这类内容。遗憾的是,虽然我们可能会学习各种学科(游戏邦注:如美术和编程),这些是游戏设计过程的组成要素,但这些学科和趣味性毫无关系。

更糟的是,目前没有教授如何制作有趣游戏的正规教育。是否至少存在一种学习游戏设计的非正式渠道?业内是否存在公认的游戏设计理论?答案是没有,主要原因是这片领域还很新,而且处在持续变化中。

这意味着,设计有趣游戏所需的技能无法被轻松掌握或传授。就像没有普遍通用理论一样,业内目前也没有共享词汇。常用于行业中的“技术”词汇作用较小,如“有趣”和“出色”。“可玩性”和“杰出玩法”有所进化,但依然不是能够促进我们深入探讨或成功执行游戏内容的基本、明确概念。同样,我们能够学习如何设计有趣游戏,但这需要大量付出和独创思维。这绝非能够凭运气实现。

游戏设计好坏缺乏公认的衡量标准

没有公认游戏设计理论,我们就很难认出优质游戏设计(在其出现的时候),容易在开发和关键评估中忽略此内容。公司如何判定某人是否是优秀设计师?如何训练游戏设计师?如何证明糟糕设计是上款作品失败的主要原因?

缺乏此常识的最糟后果是我们会很容易低估游戏设计的价值。若你无法将游戏设计当作教育学科进行研究,没有衡量游戏设计师投资回报的公认方式,你如何证明游戏设计需要投入时间和资金?你如何证明聘请他人专门负责游戏设计是明智之举?

游戏设计非常必要

假设游戏设计是产品成功与否的关键,那么更实际的问题是,你如何证明无需聘请他人专门负责游戏设计?无论当前游戏设计过程多么模糊,若没有设计师角色,制作出有趣游戏就全凭运气。若是公司聘请优秀设计师,设定明确职责,那么创作出杰出作品的可能性就大大提高。

需有专人负责游戏的设计

需有专人负责游戏的设计,同时确保游戏趣味的持续时间能够超越制作过程。若无人特别负责此方面,我们就很容易丧失最终目标,同时面临制作压力和困境。

安排某人负责游戏设计能够让游戏设计技能在团队中呈现。这也会促使团队成员更多思考游戏设计,因为他们需要同设计师沟通,就像主程序员不会独自进行有关画面方面的决策,因为他知道自己需要咨询主要的美术负责人。

游戏设计师是否负责项目中的所有创意决策?

由于游戏设计关乎趣味价值,这是关系游戏成功与否的最主要因素,游戏设计师在团队中占据重要位置。但若没有优质图像和编程,即便是设计最精良的游戏也无法获得成功。这是完整体验,此协同效应让整体超越局部,成就富有趣味的游戏。与公众意见不同,游戏设计师最主要的任务就是吸收其他团队成员的意见,找出将这些概念融入连贯整体的最佳方式。其他时候,很重要的一点就是,设计师要能够阐述既定设计建议的影响,维护设计的质量和连贯性,摒弃那些会损及项目整体目标的建议。

游戏设计的其他优点

除提高游戏趣味性及成获可能性外,设有专门设计师和明确设计流程还有其他优点。首先就是节约制作过程(游戏邦注:这是创造优质设计的过程)线性操作的成本。最终会有更少基于投机目的而植入游戏的功能,这些内容最后会被剔除。会出现有更少意外情况,这只是因为某人已提前考虑各种设计选择的结果。会产生更少道德问题,因为从一开始,关于产品会呈现及应该呈现什么样的态势就已存在可行的明确蓝图。

总结:设计很重要

Resident Evil from cheat-pcgame.blogspot.com

Resident Evil from cheat-pcgame.blogspot.com

游戏设计是游戏开发过程的重要元素。《黄金眼 007》、《合金装备》、《星际争霸》、《生化危机》或《半条命》之类的游戏成为杰作绝非偶然。这些作品不是凭借优质画面或基础代码而变得富有趣味。它们之所以变得如此杰出是因为制作这些作品的人士想要向玩家传递富有趣味的体验。和所以非凡活动一样,达成此目标需要仔细思考和特意关注。

对于任何商业制作,着手前理清想要做什么及如何做非常重要。虽然这是相当新的媒介,交互娱乐活动没有什么不同,没有精致设计作为制作的基础,作品的成功就只能靠运气。此外,坚持优质游戏设计没有什么有害影响,所以我们更应该在各作品中及在全公司范围内积极追求优质设计。

游戏邦注:原文发布于2007年10月1日,文章叙述以当时为背景。(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

Why game design is important

A long, long time ago I worked at a company that did not have a game design position, and I wanted to convince the people there that, you know, maybe you should have game designers. Like, one per project, at least. Ah, the good old days.

So with the help of Mark Barrett I wrote a little essay and sent it around. And although I am not claiming a direct causal link, we did get a proper game design position after a while and game design was taken a bit more seriously.

This was a long time ago and I hope nobody nowadays has to convince people that maybe you need someone who is paid to think about exactly how this game will be fun. But you never know…

Here is the essay, unchanged from what I wrote around a decade ago:

Why Game Design is Important

Introduction : What is game design?

The goal of a computer game is to deliver an entertaining interactive experience to the player. If we examine games that have been commercial and/or critical successes, we find that the most common trait of these games is that they are entertaining. Although beautiful graphics, fancy technology, or a big license can contribute to a game’s success, none of these, on their own, are sufficient for even minimal success.

If we want to increase the appeal of our games, it is necessary to understand what makes an experience entertaining, and how such an experience can be created. The discipline that tries to answer these questions is called game design.

Game design is not programming or art

The entertainment value of a game is not linked to any well-understood discipline such as graphic art or software engineering. A game can have brilliant graphics, a groundbreaking 3D engine, or fantastic artificial intelligence, while at the same time being frustrating or uninteresting to play. Conversely, a game such as Civilization, with lousy graphics and a lame 2D display engine, can be a classic masterpiece that has become both a critical and a commercial success.

So quality of entertainment is not solely linked to the quality of graphics or the quality of programming, although both certainly have an impact. Instead, successful game developers have found a way to make a game more than the sum of its graphical and programming parts, by focusing on and emphasizing design. Implicit in this is the idea that game design should be recognized as distinct from other aspects of game development.

Game design is hard

A close look at games on the market today clearly shows that making entertaining games is hard. How many mediocre games are released each year? How many games are exciting because of some gosh-wow feature, only to be forgotten a month later? If making software in general is difficult, then making software entertaining should be recognized as being extremely difficult.

Designing games takes time, effort, skill and sensibility. It is important to realize that game design is difficult, and to make sure that appropriate resources are directed at the process.

There is no “official” way to learn game design, therefore it is often ignored

In order to make an interactive experience entertaining, it is necessary to understand what an entertaining experience is and how it can be created. Unfortunately, although it is possible to study various disciplines that are part of the game development process, such as art and programming, these disciplines are not concerned with entertainment.

Worse, there is no formal education that teaches how to make entertaining games. Is there at least an informal way of learning game design? Aren’t there theories on game design that are commonly accepted in the industry? The answer is no, and the central reason for this is that the field is new and constantly changing.

Which means that the skills needed to design an entertaining game cannot be easily learned or taught. Just as there are no accepted universal theories, there is no shared vocabulary. “Technical” terms commonly used in the industry, such as “fun” and “cool”, are less than helpful. “Playability” and “good gameplay” are a slight improvement, but are far from being basic, well-defined concepts that allow for deeper discussion, or successful implementation. Still, it is possible to learn how to design entertaining games, but it requires a lot of effort and original thought. It cannot be done incidentally.

Game design is hard to identify

Without a commonly accepted theory of game design, it is hard to recognize good game design when it is present, and easy to ignore it during development and critical appraisal. How does a company determine if someone is a good designer? How does it train game designers? How does it prove that bad game design was why its last game was a failure?

The most serious consequence of this lack of common knowledge is that it is easy to underestimate the value and worth of game design. If you can’t study game design as an educational discipline, and there are no accepted methods by which to measure the return of investment of a game designer, how can you justify investing time and money in game design? How can you justify paying someone to focus on game design?

Game design is essential

Given that game design is integral to product success, the more relevant question is, how can you justify not paying someone to focus on game design? However vague or ill-defined the process of game design currently is, without someone in the role of designer, the probability of making an entertaining game is largely left to chance. With a talented designer in a well-defined role, the probability of making a great game is greatly increased.

Someone must be responsible for a game’s design

Someone must be responsible for the design of a game, and for making sure that the enjoyment of the game survives the production process. If no one is specifically charged with this responsibility, it is too easy to lose track of the end goal while facing the pressures and necessities of production.

Making someone responsible for game design ensures that game design skills are actually present within the team. It also forces people in the team to think more about game design, because they have to deal with the designer, in the same way that a lead programmer cannot make graphical decisions on his own because he knows the lead artist has to be consulted.

Does a game designer make all of the creative decisions on a project?

Since game design is about entertainment value, and this is the aspect of a game that has the highest correlation with success, the game designer has a vital position within the team. However, without good graphics and programming, even the most well designed game will not be successful. It is the entire experience, the synergy that makes the whole more than its parts, that makes a game entertaining.

Contrary to popular opinion, one of the most important tasks of the game designer is taking the ideas of other team members and advising on the best way to integrate those ideas into a coherent whole. At other times it is important that the designer be able to explain the consequences of a given design suggestion, and to defend the quality and coherence of the design against suggestions which might damage the project’s overall intent. (A lead programmer has the same task.)

Additional benefits of game design

While increasing the chance that a game will turn out entertaining and successful, a dedicated game designer and design process also provide other benefits. Chief among these is the cost savings associated with the streamlining of the production process that a good game design yields. Fewer features end up being implemented on a speculative basis, only to be cut later. Fewer surprises arise if only because someone has considered the ramifications of various design choices beforehand. And fewer morale problems arise because there is, from the beginning, a viable, coherent vision of what the product can and should be.

Conclusion: Design is good

Game design is a vital element of the game development process. Games such as Goldeneye 007, Metal Gear Solid, Starcraft, Resident Evil or Half-Life, to name just a few recent successful games, did not become great games by accident. They did not become hugely entertaining because they had good graphics or fantastic code. They became great because the people who made these games wanted to deliver an entertaining experience to the player. Like any non-trivial activity, achieving that end required careful thought and an intentional focus.

In any act of commercial production, it is important to know what you want to do, and how you are going to do it, before you begin. Although a relatively new medium, interactive entertainment is no different, and without careful game design as a basis for production the success of a given product is left to chance. When taken together with the fact that there is no detrimental effect related to an insistence on good game design, it only makes sense to pursue good design as vigorously as possible on a product-by-product and company-wide basis.(Source:intelligent-artifice


上一篇:

下一篇: