作者：Mike Darga

最近我听到许多人在讨论游戏中的不同定价模式。而不管是常规的销售，微交易，免费游戏还是设置较低价格，任何开发商都希望能够明确一个有效点去吸引大多数玩家的注意。

让我们暂时停下手中的工作来勾勒一个充满完全免费游戏的世界。更重要的是让我们假设每一家公司每个小时将向玩家支付5美元而鼓励他们玩游戏。如果所有游戏都是免费的你又该如何做出选择呢？

时间并不等于金钱——它比金钱更重要

玩家总是会抱怨他们想玩的游戏很多，但是却没有时间一一尝试。每个人都必须选择如何支配自己宝贵的休闲时间，而一旦变得忙碌了他们便更难尝试自己想做的事了。

过去我曾为EA效力，其首席执行官John Riccitiello说过一句让我印象深刻的话：游戏总是在与人们的其它休闲方式竞争。也就是游戏的竞争对手可能是其它游戏，也有可能是Facebook，按摩，跳舞，睡懒觉，电视节目以及莫奈的画展等。

busy_person(from mikedarga)

游戏公司总是在努力说服玩家自己的游戏有多棒，但是对于那些只拥有3个多小时空闲时间的玩家来说，虽然摆在他们眼前的是20多款优秀的游戏但是他们只有时间挑选其中的一两款。所以只是创造出一款好游戏并不足以吸引玩家进行尝试。

但是极端讽刺的是游戏产业中的人士并不理解这种情况——就像我们自己。例如我会利用空闲时间进行写作而不是安装游戏。

应提供短小而令人满足的游戏体验

就像我的一个朋友便只会选择休闲游戏，但是他却并不喜欢这些游戏。虽然我将其归类为休闲游戏玩家，但是当他表示自己会选择这类游戏只是因为没时间去挑战其它更复杂的游戏时，我真的十分惊讶。

休闲游戏能够让忙碌的人在较短的时间内得到一点点的乐趣与满足感。不管游戏是拥有较少的回合，每天只设置有限的操作还是只有一个无限暂停键，玩家们都可以根据自身情况去体验游戏。

bejeweled(from mikedarga)

虽然有许多较大的游戏让玩家能在半个小时至一个小时内享受乐趣，但是却很少游戏能够在短短的15分钟内带给玩家满足感。《反恐精英》中最快的回合只需要15分钟，在《波斯王子时之沙》中每个保存点之间的间隔也是15分钟左右，或者在《Burnout》中学习并赢得一场赛车也只要15分钟。我曾在空闲时间多次退出《蜘蛛侠2》而出门闲逛。

许多MMO都让玩家认为自己很难在短时间内完成任何有意义的事。《EVE》让玩家登录并选择一些新的技能而开始学习游戏，而《The Agency》让玩家接收一些来自游戏中的信息并向其分配任务。有些玩家喜欢登录《魔兽世界》并快速查看他们的交易。总之，虽然开发者总想要鼓吹自己上百个小时的游戏玩法，但殊不知这将会消灭那些忙碌玩家的游戏热情。

玩家并不喜欢压力

虽然你无需假设人们是否更愿意挑战游戏的小块内容，但是忙碌的玩家却不得不思考游戏是否适合短期挑战（游戏邦注：即使他们在之后会决定逗留更长时间）。人们有可能观看电视节目长达6个小时，但这却不是他们的本意。人们也会想要坐下休息半个小时，但总会不知不觉地发现时间如流水般飞逝而去。

想象一个电视节目拥有多个季且每季长达6个多小时（而不是半个小时），那么那些长期观看6个小时的电视观众便不会再继续看这个节目了，因为这听起来太有压力了。而如果每一季只有半个小时，观众便可以更轻松地从节目中脱身——较短的节目时间设定能让观众放松警惕并不再担心自己该在这浪费多少时间。

维基百科，Youtube以及Hulu（现为美国第三大视频网站）便是非常典型的例子。这些网站中都提供一些让用户能够快速消化的短小内容，但当用户访问这些网站时总会不知觉地延长逗留时间，至少我就是这样。

游戏邦注：原文发表于2009年2月28日，所涉事件和数据均以当时为准。（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）

Games compete against everything

February 28, 2009

Mike Darga

Lately I’ve heard a lot of people discussing different pricing models for games. Whether it be frequent sales, microtransactions, free to play, or just very low prices, everybody wants to figure out the sweet spot to attract the most customers.

Let’s stop for a second though, and imagine a world where every game is completely free. Better yet, let’s say every company pays you 5 dollars an hour to play their game. How do you decide which games to play when money is no object?

Time isn’t equal to money – it’s more valuable

Gamers always talk about how many great games are out that they want to play, but won’t have time to. Everybody has to make choices about how to spend their precious free time, and once life gets busy enough, even really wanting to do something isn’t enough.

I used to work at EA when John Riccitiello was first hired back as CEO. One thing he said really stuck with me: games are competing with everything for people’s leisure time. Your competition is other games, but it’s also Facebook, getting a massage, a night out dancing, sleeping in on Saturday, trash tv, and the new Monet exhibit.

Marketeers work hard to try and convince people that their games are great, but for a busy player with only 3 hours between work and bed, there may be 20 games they think are great, but only time to play one or two. Having a good game isn’t enough to get people to play it.

It’s ironic that game industry people don’t understand this situation better, since we’re a prime example of it. For example, I’m spending the few hours between work and bed writing, instead of installing the game I intended to try.

Short play sessions should be satisfying

I have a friend who only plays casual games, but doesn’t actually prefer them. I referred to him as a casual gamer one day, and was surprised when he told me he only plays those games because he doesn’t have time for a game that requires more commitment.

Casual games allow busy people to have a little bit of fun and satisfaction in a very small amount of time. Whether the game has very short rounds, a limited number of actions per day, or just an infinite pause button, people who like gaming but have other priorities can enjoy these games on their own terms.

There are lots of bigger games that let people have fun in a half hour to an hour, but not many that feel satisfying for fifteen minutes or less. A very fast Counterstrike round may take 15 minutes, and it’s about 15 minutes between save points in Sands of Time, or learning and winning a race in Burnout. I used to leave Spiderman 2 in my console, so I could aimlessly swing around the city whenever I had a spare moment.

There aren’t many MMOs that let players feel like they can do something useful in a short period of time. EVE lets players log in and select some new skills to begin learning, and The Agency is going to let players receive text messages from in-game henchmen and assign them jobs. Some people enjoy logging into WoW to quickly check their auctions. All in all, though, games seem to be much more interested in advertising hundreds of hours of gameplay, which are more likely to discourage a busy player than to entice them.

No player likes feeling intimidated

You don’t have to assume that people will only ever play your game in very small chunks, but a busy person has to think of your game and consider it a viable option for a short play session, even if they decide to stick around longer after that. People watch tv for 6 hours straight all the time, but not on purpose. They intend to sit down for a half hour, but the time just flies by.

Imagine a tv show that had episodes that were 6 hours long instead of half an hour. Even people who regularly watch 6 hours of tv wouldn’t watch it, because it’d sound too intimidating. Because half hour episodes let people opt out much more easily, they ironically let their guard down and stop worrying about how much time they’re spending.

Wikipedia, Youtube, and Hulu are also great examples of this effect. All of those sites have smallish chunks of content that can be consumed very quickly, and yet any time people visit one of those sites, they seem to get sucked in for much longer than they intended. Or at least I do.

I’m trying to learn this lesson a little better as well. These posts are still probably too long, but I’m trying to get away from the terrifying walls of text I started out with.(source:Mike Darga’s Game Design Blog)