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游戏设计应重视目标平台的“输入方式”和“用例”

发布时间:2012-07-05 16:44:23 Tags:,,,,

作者:Nicholas Lovell

你是否正在用Unity或HTML5设计游戏?决定好要以浏览器为主导平台,以便游戏可以在PC、智能手机等任何可打开网页的设备上运行?你是从技术角度来考虑“平台”吗?

请果断放弃这一错误想法。

今天不同游戏平台间的根本差别并不在于技术,而是“输入方式”和“用例”。

用户与设备的互动方式

智能手机游戏与网页游戏的主要差别并非技术,而是触摸屏与鼠标结合键盘的操作方式。

所以,当你的首席技术官说“我们要制作一款基于HTML5或Unity的游戏,这样我们就可以在任何平台上发布游戏”时,要记得提问“我们又该如何让游戏在触屏设备上顺利运行”?

玩家体验游戏的场所

我在小时候曾在ZX Spectrum设备上玩游戏。如果我想玩游戏,我就得翻箱倒柜得拿出Spectrum,将磁盘播放器的两条线插到电脑上。我得按下播放键,然后等待电脑加载程序。一切准备就绪的时候我就只能玩这款游戏,如果我还想玩其他游戏,就得再重复一遍这种操作。

我希望自己的游戏能够在一瞬间给我带来乐趣。

玩家从游戏过程中能收获多少乐趣,往往与其开始游戏前需投入多少精力有关。

对我们大多数人来说,手机几乎是我们日夜难离身的设备,如果我们想玩游戏,可能只需数秒时间就可以投入游戏中。

而主机游戏则需我们付出更多精力。你得先走到客厅,打开电视屏幕,等待PlayStation 3启动完成。这一过程可能还会让你升级系统。然后你才能通过屏幕导航,从浏览器和其他媒体选项等条目中找到自己想玩的游戏。你还得再耐心等一会儿,让游戏检测它是否升级到最新版本,并迫使你安装补丁。你在等待加载过程中,进入之前的存档就会看到一些警告信息,折腾完这一切后终于可以开始玩游戏了。

以下是我对不同平台游戏“用例”的一些看法:

use case(from vator.tv)

use case(from vator.tv)

*手机:从决定玩游戏到进入游戏只需5秒。其短暂的互动体验(游戏邦注:例如在《Tiny Tower》为某一层楼填充货物)令人十分满意。

*平板电脑:需要20秒(从包里取出iPad,或者在沙发坐稳准备开始玩游戏)。互动体验也很短暂(填充整个大楼的货物)。

*浏览器:略长于平板电脑,可能是一分钟?如果你已经坐在电脑前,没有其他事务的干扰,就可以快速启动网页游戏。你完全有可能享受短时间的游戏乐趣(例如,切换到Facebook游戏中收租或收割庄稼),但比起智能手机等平台,玩家在此似乎更可能进行大量互动操作。

*主机:从在屏幕前坐稳到真正进入游戏至少需要5分钟。

迎合玩家游戏习惯

需注意的是,这里的计时内容与玩家每次体验游戏的时长无关。你在每个平台上投入的游戏时长可能相差无几,重要的是如何促使玩家重返游戏。

手机游戏玩家可能很愿意在等待电视节目开始的时候,先玩30秒游戏,但如果你若设计出富有沉浸感的游戏体验,他们也有可能在其中逗留1小时。

主机游戏玩家不太可能只是为了收割几株庄稼就启动PlayStation设备,那些长达1小时以上的扩展性、沉浸性游戏体验更有可能说服他们重返游戏。

所以无论你是针对平板电脑、主机、智能手机、浏览器设计游戏,最好不要再纠结于技术条件,而要更多地考虑使用习惯问题。这样才更有可能设计出成功而受欢迎的游戏。(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

Designing for Mobile, for Browser, For Console – Understanding the Use case

Nicholas Lovell

Are you designing a game in Unity, or HTML 5? Have you decided to lead development in the browser, because then your game will be be playable in any device that can read a web page, whether it be a PC, a smartphone or an intelligent toaster? Do you think of “platforms” in terms of technology?

STOP! You are making a terrible mistake.

The fundamental difference between the different platforms that gamers are using these days are not mainly about technology. They are mainly about input methods and use case.

How will your user interact?

The difference between a smartphone game and a browser game is not predominantly about technology. It is about the difference between a touch interface and a mouse/keyboard combination.

So if you hear your CTO saying “we’ll make the game in HTML 5 or Unity so we can launch to whichever platform we need”, remember to ask “and how are we going to make the game work with a touch screen?”

The user experience is a much tougher problem to solve than the technology issue.

Where will they play the game?

When I was a child, I used to play on a ZX Spectrum. If I wanted to play a game, I had to get my Spectrum out of a box. I had to plug two leads from a cassette player into the computer. I had to press play and wait while the computer loaded in a program by decoding the sounds played by that tape player. I had to play that game and if I wanted to play a different game, I had to go through the whole rigmarole again.

I expected my games to give me quite a lot of enjoyment in a single session.

There is a strong correlation between how much effort a player has to go to to start playing a game and how much enjoyment he or she expects from that play session.

For most of us, our mobile phone is never more than 5 feet away from us at any point during the day or night. If we decided to play a game, it is probably only a few seconds between deciding to play and being in the thick of a game.

At the other end of the spectrum, a console game is a real commitment. You have to walk into your living room. Turn on your big screen and wait for the PlayStation 3 to boot up. You might be forced to do a mandatory update. You navigate across the screen to find the game in amongst the television options, the browser and the other media options. You have to wait while the game checks to see if it is up-to-date and forces you to patch. You wait while the game loads, pulls in previous saves, hits you with a few warnings and, eventually, lets you play.

You better have a good, lengthy experience if you are going to get through all of that.

This is how I think of “use case”:

•Mobile: 5 seconds from deciding to play to playing. Very short interactions (e.g. restock one floor in Tiny Tower) are satisfying.

•Tablet: 20 seconds from deciding to play to playing (getting your iPad out of a bag, or settling down on the sofa with it). Short interactions (restock your entire tower).

•Browser: Longer than a tablet, maybe one minute? A browser game can be fired up very quickly if you are already sitting at your desk, avoiding work. It is entirely possible to have a very short play session (Alt-Tabbing to a Facebook game to collect rent or harvest crops, for example), but it seems to me that players are likely to be looking for a more significant interaction than they are with, for example, smartphones.

•Console: At least 5 minutes from deciding to play to actually settling down in front of the thing that you want to be playing.

Making the player happy

Note that these timings are not about how long each play session should be. You can have an equally long play session on each platform. It is about how you motivate the player to return to your game.

A mobile player will happily snack for a 30 second experience while waiting for a TV show to start, but if you design an immersive experience, he might stay playing for an hour.

A console player would be unlikely to boot up a PlayStation just to harvest a few crops. She would be more likely to return to a game because of a promise of an extended, immersive experience lasting an hour or more.

When you are thinking about the consequences of designing for a tablet instead of a console, for a smartphone instead of a browser, stop thinking about the technical implications.

Think about the user implications. You will be much more likely to design a successful, popular game if you do.(source:gamesbrief)


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