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论述创造全新游戏构思的5点建议

作者:Keith Burgun

回顾昨日……

在80年代前,几乎所有游戏作品都采用物理模式,例如笔和纸(角色扮演游戏),卡牌和骰子(卡牌游戏),或者小球和棍棒(运动游戏)。电脑的问世带来新的可能性空间。我们如今能够追踪成千上万的数字,能够即时进行同步运算,呈现之前没有的新玩法类型。

space war from wallpapergate.com

space war from wallpapergate.com

《太空大战》被称作是首款电子游戏,于1961年在MIT问世。这是款组织严密的双人射击游戏,融入特定星球的物理重力元素,供玩家发射的导弹,甚至还有“扭曲空间”的传送功能(游戏邦注:这一的功能的运用会逐步变得越来越具冒险性)。《太空大战》呈现全所未有的电子游戏新面貌。

在电子游戏早期时代,有许多属于这一类型的游戏作品;在电脑问世前,没有人会想到的有趣创新游戏。在《吃豆人》中,有4个幽灵会在迷宫中实时追逐你,这些幽灵各具特点。《太空入侵者》的外来暴民移动速度会随游戏的进展而提高。《大金刚》算是首款真正的平台游戏,当玩家试图跨越燃烧的圆筒时,游戏会呈现动态物理紧张感及释放模式。

创造性是否逐渐消失殆尽?

但自初期以来,创造性过程已逐步出现减缓。题材很快在90年代变得固定化,游戏作品有格斗类型、运动题材、赛车游戏、FPS、RTS、回合策略游戏、RPG游戏、战斗游戏、平台游戏、连线消除游戏,也许还有2-3个其他题材,大概就是这些内容。游戏通常是就既有作品做出细微调整,而不是从头提出新构思。

但它们完全不需要这么做。这里我将向那些期望制作出更有趣、更具创新性、更令人过目不忘的游戏作品的设计师提出几点建议。

1. 不要从特定题材着手

很多设计师都从特定题材着手,赋予其特定主题,然后做出稍微调整,接着就算是大功告成。例如,他们也许会说,“我想要制作类似于《街头霸王》的游戏,除《口袋妖怪》外,游戏会呈现新Super Double Max Combo计量器,你需要用尽其中的能量,方能执行连续技能。”

虽然这对刚摸到门道的新开发者来说是个可行模式,但想要认真投身设计领域的人士需要摒弃这一习惯。这一方式存在两个问题:首先,这限制新型有趣作品的发展空间。但更重要的是,你将延续旧问题。游戏作品会融入电子游戏题材的些许问题,若你没有从头开始,这些问题多半都得不到解决。

所以你应该怎么做?

2. 从头开始:抽象内容,而非具体主题

不要这么想:“我要制作基于Morgararrk奇幻世界的探险游戏,在此你扮演强大的主角Boorbus the Mighty”,而是应该考虑希望具体呈现什么样的玩法。描述玩法时,保持其抽象性:想想空间、资源和互动方式,而非这些元素的主题模式表达。所以若玩法围绕“战斗”,那么其就具有多个层面的抽象意义。“战斗”是否只是降低敌人的HP?也许“战斗”是将敌人推向后方特定位置点。也许“战斗”主要围绕先发制人。也许“战斗”就是像《围棋》中的就领土做出让步。

游戏主要围绕玩法;这是它们的特色所在,所以你应该从有趣的新玩法着手。树立这种想法后你会发现,还有很多游戏构思有待挖掘。发现优秀玩法构思后,选择表达这一玩法的主题,教授玩家如何体验游戏。原创游戏作品存在一个弊端,令电子游戏玩家有些手足无措:他们需要学习如何体验游戏。

3. 摆脱“多多益善”理念

电脑的最大优点(游戏邦注:能够无限制追踪众多数据)也是它的最大设计障碍。越少越好。你应该争取通过尽可能少的笔触完成自己的游戏设计:通过尽可能少的枪械、魔法和关卡。以最低数量的内容着手,然后进行测试,只在必要时候添加更多内容。

向机制添加过多内容所存在的问题是,既有内容会开始丧失特性。此外,这些内容的平衡工作会变得越发困难。最好还是引入少量内容,但要确保它们各具特色。

4. 跳脱固有思维模式

若你是电子游戏设计师,你不清楚过去20年设计师棋盘游戏的具体情况,那么你无疑需要做些调查工作。登陆boardgamegeek.com,查看其中的游戏作品。观看视频评论。简而言之,这些设计师棋盘游戏多数源自欧洲,包含些许文化复兴元素,打破固有游戏设计界限。作为电子游戏玩家,其中有很多值得我们学习的地方。

除此之外,查看运动题材、纸牌游戏,甚至是其他无法带来很多灵感的作品。有时抽象的玩法概念会源自主题性内容。也许是工作内容,也许是报纸中的内容,也许是家中出现的蟑螂,这些都可能激发有趣的新构思。

5. 鼓足勇气

最重要的是,你要有胆量。也许你制作的新RPG游戏不应该允许保存内容,这会让你的决策变得至关重要。也许你制作的“卡丁车手”应该融入随机关卡, 以提高游戏的重玩价值。也许你制作的足球游戏应该五五对阵,这样更便于控制,视觉效果更清晰。不要害怕做出彻底改变,忽略预期内容,如果这能够造就更杰出的游戏作品。设计出最杰出的游戏是首要目标。

游戏设计经常遭到忽视,很多小型游戏开发工作室都没有设置“游戏设计师”职位。这非常遗憾,因为游戏设计是游戏开发当中最重要的元素。不要让你的团队出现这种情况,务必确保游戏设计能够让你感到自豪!(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

Starting From Scratch: Five Tips for Better Game Design

By Keith Burgun

Back in the day…

Until the 1970s, just about all game-playing that had ever taken place had been done using physical means, such as pen and paper (in the case of role-playing games), cards and dice (in the case of boardgames), or balls and sticks (in the case of sports).  Once computers came along, they opened up a whole new world of possibilities.  We could now track hundreds, or thousands of numbers and have them simultaneously calculating themselves in real-time, providing new kinds of gameplay that just literally wouldn’t have been possible ever before.

Often referred to as the first videogame, Spacewar! was created in 1961 at MIT.  It was a top-down two-player shooter game that had physics-based gravity around a central planet, projectiles you could fire, and even a “warp-space” teleport function which got increasingly more risky to use as you used it.  Spacewar! was one of the first examples of what could be done with videogames, that could have never existed before.

In the early era of videogames, we see many examples of games that fit that bill;  innovative, interesting, and new games that no one could have even conceived of before the existence of the computer.  Pac-Man had four ghosts chase you around a maze, each with their own unique personality, in real time.  Space Invaders’ alien mobs would move in patterns that would increase in speed as the game would go on.  Donkey Kong may have been the first true “platforming” game, creating a dynamic, physics-based tension and release pattern as a player tried to leap over flaming barrels.

Has the creativity dimmed?

However, since those early days, that innovation has slowed. Genres quickly hardened in the 1990s, and since then we’ve been largely cruising.  You have your brawlers (or their modern equivalent, the 3rd person action game), your sports games, your racing games, your FPS games, RTS games, turn-based strategy, RPGs, fighting games, platformers, abstract match-3 type games, and maybe two or three other genres and that’s pretty much it.  Games are generally expected to be minor tweaks on these existing designs, rather than new ideas from the ground up.

But it doesn’t have to be that way!  In this article, I’ll be giving a few pieces of advice to game designers who want to make more interesting, innovative, and memorable designs.

1.  Don’t Start With A Genre

A lot of designers essentially start with a genre, slap a theme on it, make a few tweaks, and are done.  For instance, they may say “I want to do a game like Street Fighter, except you’re Pokemon, and you have a new Super Double Max Combo meter that you have to use up to perform combos.”

While this can be an OK approach for a new designer who is just learning the ropes, anyone who is serious needs to drop this habit.  There are two significant problems with this method:  one, you’re limiting how new and interesting your game will be.  But more significantly, you’re going to be copying old problems.  Every genre that I know of in video games has some problems that it tends to have, and most of them cannot be solved if you don’t start from scratch.

So what should you do instead?

2.  Start From Scratch:  Abstract, Not Thematic

Instead of thinking “I want to make an adventure game set in the fantasy world of Morgararrk, where you play the mighty hero Boorbus the Mighty”, think about what you want the gameplay to be like.  When you’re describing the gameplay, keep it abstract:  think about space, resources, and interactions, not thematic expressions of these.  So, if your gameplay is about “fighting”, that could mean several things on the abstract level.  Is “fighting” just reducing enemy HP?  Maybe “fighting” is pushing an enemy back until they reach a certain point (like Sumo Wrestling or Super Smash Brothers).  Maybe “fighting” is all about getting the first strike.  Maybe “fighting” is actually an act of compromising territory, like in Go.

Games are about gameplay;  it is what makes them special, and so you should start with an interesting, new gameplay from the ground up.  There are millions of untapped ideas when you start to think this way.  After you’ve found a good gameplay idea, select a theme that will help express that gameplay, and help players to learn how to play your game.  That’s one downside to a truly original game that video gamers aren’t used to dealing with:  they’ll actually have to learn to play it!

3.  Avoid “More is More” Philosophy

The computers greatest strength – its near-limitless capability to keep track of so much data – is also its biggest game design liability.  Less is more.  You should try to achieve your game design in as few strokes as possible:  as few guns, as few spells, as few levels as possible.  Start with the smallest amount you could possibly imagine the game working with, playtest it, and only add more if more is actually needed.

The problem with adding more stuff to a system that doesn’t need it is that your existing stuff starts to lose identity.  Further, it becomes much more difficult to balance all of the elements.  It’s far better to have a smaller number of things, but have each thing be more different from each other.

4.  Think Outside the Box

If you’re a video game designer, and you don’t know about the incredible world of designer boardgames that has popped up in the last 20 years, you absolutely need to go do some research right now.  Go to boardgamegeek.com, and browse all of the games.  Watch video reviews.  Put short, these designer boardgames, mostly of European origin, have been having something of a Renaissance and are pushing the boundaries of game design all the time.  We video gamers have so much to learn from them!

Beyond that, look to sports, card games, and even things which aren’t games for inspiration.  Sometimes a great abstract gameplay concept can come from something thematic.  Perhaps something at your job, something in the newspaper, or even something like a household cockroach infestation could spark a fantastic new gameplay idea.

5.  Have Courage!

Above all, you need to be courageous.  Maybe that new RPG you’re making shouldn’t allow saving games, to make your decisions actually matter.  Maybe the kart racer you’re making should have randomized levels, for more replay value.  Maybe that football game you’re making should be 5 on 5, so that it’s easier to control and visually clearer.  Don’t be afraid to make radical changes and ignore what’s expected, if it would make a better game.  Making the best game you can is above any and all other priorities!

Game design is often overlooked, and many small game development teams don’t even have a “game designer” role.  It’s very sad, because game design is absolutely the number one most important element in game development.  Don’t let your team be that way: make sure that your game design – your actual gameplay itself – is something you can be proud of!(Source:iqu


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