作者：Epona

我每周都会评述若干游戏作品，旨在发现其中可能流失玩家的摩擦点。目前我正在辅导8家初创游戏公司，主要通过他们在IndieCade提交的内容。我和很多游戏新闻工作者沟通过，他们会因无法体验所有提交至他们手中的游戏而感到不痛快。

Web-Rating(from smashinghub.com)

下面是8点争取获得游戏评论的注意事项：

1. 游戏能够快速启动及加载：我没时间修复我这边的安装问题或追踪过去5年来早已被弃置的驱动程序。将其包装得整齐利落，然后加载至不同设备，让技术新手尝试运行内容（游戏邦注：前提是你不能告知他们如何操作）。

2. 保持体验的简单性：如果我无法立即获悉如何开始游戏，若内容无法顺利加载，亦或是我不知道体验开始后要进行什么操作，我会选择退出，转投另一作品。也许你在此投入很多精力，但我真的没时间帮你将此改造成具有可行性的内容。

3. 将趣味元素置于前面：不要期望我会静静等待游戏变得日渐有趣。若头几分钟的体验缺乏趣味性，那么我会觉得后面的内容多半也不会有趣到哪里。

4. 遵循所有提交标准：想要知道怎么样才能够让我们锁定你的游戏超过5分钟吗？这全部都体现在新闻网站、竞赛网站的FAQ和提交标准页面上。这就是你的检查清单。遵循这些要点，这样你的游戏就更有机会被尝试。

5. 顾及不同学习风格：这点是参考John Halter在Indie Game Developer Facebook页面的陈述，“我不知道评委会怎么看待我的作品，所以我尝试融入各式各样的资源，让游戏的学习过程变得更简单，积极提高前5分钟内容的效用。目前我正在制作游戏指南、独立txt文件、wiki及视频，旨在告诉用户如何体验游戏。”

6. 不要期望得到评论或反馈：我知道你需要这些内容，但你得清楚，通过IGDA聚会、本地游戏设计学校及论坛，你将发现最想要体验你游戏类型的用户。为什么你无法从我们这里得到评论和反馈？想想我可能是在经历1周加班加点的工作后，含着泪凌晨3点看到你的内容：a）我已经很久没和人沟通，我这个时候真的很想拥抱自己的枕头；b）你是否真的想要一个缺乏睡眠、劳累过度的人给你评论意见？

7. 不要离线或在线上表现得有些自大：如果我欣赏所体验到的内容，那么多半会想要立即搜寻更多有关你的信息。我会浏览你的网站，搜索你的名字，查看他人对你的评价。我寻找的答案是：“你是谁？你为什么要制作游戏？你想要制作什么内容？”不妨分享自己的故事，成长过程及目标。我想要知道你会如何把握这次机会。

8. 不要将成功寄托在评论身上：你要能够凭自己的力量做到。通过你的应用和网站向我们呈现你经营的工作室类型，回答此问题，“它是否真的能够获得成功？”如果看上去有些无助或绝望，你就是在告诉我们，你还没有做好把握这一机会的准备。我也就不会希望为你效劳。（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）

Getting Your Game Reviewed: Do These Things, Not Those Things…

By Epona

Every week I review games to spot friction points where you might lose a player. Right now I’m coaching 8 startup games companies through their IndieCade submissions. I’ve sat with many a games journo who feels rotten about not being able to play everything submitted to him – yet he knows there’s no way he ever could.

These 8 Do’s and Don’ts of getting your game reviewed are for you, for me and for them.

1. Quick to Launch and Load: I don’t have time to bug fix the install from my end or hunt down drivers that have gone unsupported for the last five years. Package it up neat and tidy, load it on a few different machines, have a total tech newb try to run it without you pointing out what they need to do.

2. Make it Easy to Play: If it isn’t immediately clear how I start the game, if it doesn’t load or I can’t tell what the hell I’m supposed to do when I start playing – I’ll quit to desktop and move on to the next one. Sorry, I know you worked your ass off trying to get this done, I simply don’t have time to chase you for a version that works.

3. Bring the Fun to the Front: Don’t ask me to wait for the game to get good. If the experience isn’t engaging within the first few minutes I find it highly unlikely that it’s going to get engaging later (Just going to take this moment, right now, to remind you that the word “foreplay” exists. It is a VERY important word. I’ll leave you to draw the appropriate conclusion as to which analogy I’m trying to illustrate).

4. Do Apply ALL the Submission Criteria: Want to know what it takes to get us to look at your game for more than 5 minutes? It’s all there, in stunningly clear bullet points, in every FAQ and Submission Criteria page published on news portals, competition websites, etc. That is your checklist. Do those things and you immediately improve your chances of getting your game played.

5. Take into Account Different Learning Styles: This one’s from John Halter over at the Indie Game Developer Facebook page: “I don’t know how the judges will approach my game, so I’ve been trying to create a variety of resources to make learning the game easier and therefore make that first 5 minutes as productive as they can be. I’ve been working on an in game tutorial, separate txt file (or read me), a wiki, and videos showing how to play the game.”

6. Don’t Expect Criticism or Feedback: I know you need it but you should be really be getting that from IGDA meetups, your local game design college and from forums where you’ll find the folks who most want to play your kind of game. Why won’t you get criticism and feedback from us? Take a moment, imagine me at 3am after a week of crunch, probably in tears: a) I haven’t communicated with another human being for hours and really want to communicate with my pillow b) do you really want a sleep deprived and overworked me giving you criticism? I’m a short, Italian, alpha female. I get scary when grumpy

7. Don’t be Absent or Arrogant Online: If I like what I play then I’m immediately going to want to find out more about you. I’ll go through your website, google your name, see what others have to say about you. What I’m trying to answer is: “Who are you? Why are you making games? What are you trying to do?” Share your story, your progress and your goals. We need to get an idea of what you’ll do with this opportunity.

8. Don’t Depend on Us for Your Success: You have to be able to do this on your own. Give us everything you can through your application and your website to show us the kind of studio you run and answer the question “Can they really pull this off?”. Come across as needy or desperate and you’re communicating to us that you’re not ready to hit the ground running if you do get this opportunity. I don’t want to do that to you.（Source：indiebits）