作者：Kirs Graft

免费游戏商业模式已取得不小成就，但下一代免费游戏将会如何发展呢？

在奥斯丁举行的GDC Online大会上，游戏开发者们阐述了他们期望的免费游戏的进展方式，及它将如何改变人们制作与体验游戏的方式。

free-to-play(from curse.com)

Machine Zone首席执行官Gabe Leydon

“免费游戏将演变为大型的全球性游戏，只需小型开发团队，游戏便能覆盖10亿部手机，重要的是，它能赚取大量利润。而电子游戏行业之前从未领略过这种优势。”

“我认为，目前免费游戏会在社区方面发生大量进展。在过去的30多年内，游戏主要涉及冲突话题——即你必须为了幸存而躲避某些物体，或赶在他人之前通过终点线。”

“现在，游戏带有更多的情感与心理元素。它提供更多互动渠道，不再纯粹地呈现一个故事。它们允许用户向对方讲故事。你将会发现，游戏的变革主要在社区方面。”

Kongregate联合创始人Emily Greer

“我期待游戏行业催生出更多类型的游戏与盈利模式。到目前为止，该领域存在大量的RPG和战略游戏。现在，众多开发者均了解如何制作这些类型的免费游戏，他们将会转投其它题材。”

“我希望看到更多相关试验，看到开发者制作出其它题材的免费游戏。我想这种现象将会继续发展。同时，开发者们也会越发聪慧，他们将会更加了解免费游戏设计领域发生的动态。”

“这个市场原先是大规模的跟风势头，即开发者复制某款亚洲游戏机制，并将其引用到Facebook游戏，他们无需理解人们产生某一行为的内在因素，便能复制他人的游戏机制。”

独立顾问Caryl Shaw

“开发者会开始在早期的游戏进程中植入数据。现在当你构造一款游戏时，你一般会考虑嵌入数据。如今已不是2、3年前，那时人们喜欢的是‘我制作了一款游戏！我们将会看到它的运行方式！’这种情况再也不会发生。因为人们开始使用数据。”

“在接下来的半年到一年半左右的时间内，开发者将会更加理解数据分析的运用。在今天早晨的一次对话中，有人谈到ARPU（每用户平均收益）是一个十分重要的数据。但在我看来，ARPU压根不具重要性。我并不在意每个用户的平均收益与总收益。我只在乎每个付费用户的平均收益，以及他们的支付数目。这可能是下一代数据分析模式，能够更好地理解数据。”

SOE首席执行官John Smedley

“过去我们采用的一些标准举措，至今仍在MMO游戏中延用，这种方式为背后取胜。比如，玩家可能会购买一款零售游戏，然后体验一段时间后便停下。这时，你会向他们发送一些奖励内容，刺激他们重新登录。”

“如今的方法完全不同。即每周或者每月，免费游戏有机会让玩家重新返回游戏进程。你会制作出一个全新的修订版，由于不存在登录受限，玩家可以再次体验游戏。这种方式也完全改变针对玩家的营销手段，以及同玩家的互动方式。免费游戏意味着你同玩家之间会产生源源不断的对话，你必须确保他们了解整个游戏的运行方式。现在，你还可以通过Twitter、Reddit以及玩家可能浏览的其它网站同他们接触，即使他们并未体验你的游戏。”

SuperData Research首席执行官Joost van Dreunen

“由于玩家对每次支付1美元、5元或10元感到更加舒坦，这可能是一种全新模式，即设计出满足用户需求的游戏。”

“上述情况表明，开发者将更多关注游戏的细分市场，不再注重大规模的范围。他们会将重点从玩家获取量转移到留存量上。”

“先前现象基本上是‘我们先确保有上百万用户进入游戏，然后将其中一小部分转变为长期玩家。’现在是‘我们先保证5万个用户基础，然后尽可能留存住他们’。”

“开发者有大量机会找到进入游戏市场的渠道。同时，这种全新的收益模式会为游戏设计带来新时机。而明智的开发者通常能够充分利用这些机遇。”（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）

This is the future of free-to-play

By Kris Graft

The free-to-play business model has seen its share of success, but what will the next generation of free-to-play bring?

At GDC Online in Austin, game developers told us how they expect free-to-play to evolve, how it will shape the way people make games, and how people will play them.

Gabe Leydon, CEO, Machine Zone

“Where free-to-play is going is massive, global games, made by very small groups of people that can get onto a billion phones and, essentially, make a lot of money.

The video game industry has never seen this kind of leverage before.

“Most of the advancements right now [in free-to-play], I would say, are in community. Games have been largely about collision for the past 30 or so years — collision-based games where you have to dodge something to survive, or pass the finish line before somebody else.

“Now they’re getting a little more emotional, more psychological. The games are more conduits to interact with each other, rather than to tell them a story. They let the users tell each other the story. What you’re going to see is major advancements on the community side.”

Emily Greer, co-founder, Kongregate

“[I expect to see] more variety in terms of the type of game and monetization method. So far, it’s been a lot of RPGs and strategy games. Now that a lot of people understand how to make free-to-play work in those contexts, [people will bring it] to other genres.

“I’d love to see more experimentation and drive in how to make free-to-play work in other situations. I think that’s going on, and will continue to develop. People are also getting smarter, and learning the dynamics of free-to-play game design.

“There’s been, initially, a lot of fast-following, where people are copying a mechanic that they saw in an Asian game and bringing that to Facebook, and taking things from other people without necessarily understanding what the underlying factors are that make people behave a certain way.”

Caryl Shaw, independent consultant

“People are really starting to embed data in a much earlier place in their games. When you’re building a game now, you don’t even consider building it out without pulling in data. That certainly wasn’t the case two or three years ago, when people were like, ‘I put out a game! We’ll see what it does!’ That just doesn’t happen anymore. People are using data.

“In the next half-a-year to year-and-a-half or so, people are going to understand data analysis better. I was in a talk this morning, and the guy was talking about

ARPU (average revenue per user) being a really important stat. But to me, ARPU is not that important anymore. I don’t look at the average revenue per user. I don’t look at the sum total. I look at the average revenue per paying user, and how many of my users are paying. It’s got to turn into the next generation of data analytics, and understanding data better.”

John Smedley, CEO, SOE

“We used to do very standard stuff that’s still what most MMO games use, which are things called win-backs. A player would buy a retail game, play it for ‘X’ amount of time, then they’d stop playing. Then you’d send them emails with incentives for them to log back in.

“It’s different now. The difference is free-to-play gives people the opportunity to come back in on a weekly basis, or a monthly basis. You put out a new patch, and they just pop back in because there’s no barrier to entry. That changes everything about how you market to your players, how you interact with your players. [Free-to-play] means you have a constant dialogue with your players, and that you’re making sure they’re aware of what’s going on in your game. Now we reach out on other channels like Twitter and Reddit, places where players are, even though they’re not playing our games.”

Joost van Dreunen, CEO, SuperData Research

“As gamers get more comfortable with spending a dollar or five bucks or ten bucks at a time, that’s just kind of a new environment where you have to design games that suit those customer needs.

“What that means is that [developers] will be looking more at games that focus on a niche, rather than large scale. There’s going to be less of an emphasis on [player] acquisition, and a greater emphasis on retention.

“Previously, it’s been all about, ‘Hey, let’s get a million people in the door, and convert a small percentage of them.’ The next step will be, ‘Let’s get 50,000 people as our customer base, and try to keep them as long as possible.’ Those are the makings of what will ultimately be much more of a fragmented market in terms of genres and game mechanics.

“There’s a lot of opportunity for developers to find their way into the market. The new revenue models also offer new opportunity to design games. It’s up to whoever is nimble enough to make the most of that.”(source:gamasutra)