作者：Kirs Graft

游戏开发不再是开发商的专利。随着游戏种类的增多以及道具制作方式的普及，用户生成内容将日益突显其在商业及创新方面的重要性。

确切地说，用户生成内容并非一个新理念，但它仍然属于复杂概念，并且围绕这一理念而运营游戏仍存在极大难度。

尽管《小小大星球》、《Minecraft》、《特技摩托：进化》和《军团要塞2》这些支持用户原创内容的作品皆获得成功，但能够真正有效地挖掘社区人才，且令其心甘情愿掏钱的游戏公司依然相对较少。

玩家社区不断显露出其卓越的创作才能，他们通过Steam Workshop这类服务及其他创造工具制作的游戏内容已不容小觑。

skyrim-steam-workshop(from gamerant.com)

快速且可观的收益

Sony Online Entertainment首席执行官John Smedley决定大胆采用用户生成的游戏内容，他们利用这一举措解决MMO游戏内容制作周期及玩家留存率方面的问题，同时，他们也在此过程中获得了一些收益。

Smedley透露：“我们只需通过语言指出：‘这就是制作内容的方法。动手开始吧’。接着，用户会提交一些堪比专业电子游戏开发者之手的内容。但也有不少用户制作内容根本不能用，不过这一切都在向积极方向发展。”

就在几个月前，SOE宣布推出Player Studio，它是从Valve的Steamworks及《军团要塞2》这两个成功案例中获得灵感而出炉的产物，它允许玩家在此制作虚拟道具，在电子商店出售，并与SOE分享其中的抽成（游戏邦注：Valve曾表示公司已向社区内容制作者支付了200万美元）。

Smedley表示：“这将是我们全新的商业运作模式。Steam已经为我们展示了它的成功。Valve推出Steam Workshop实属一个明智的举措。”

当我们询问Player Studio是否会给公司带来效益，或者对SOE的收益产生更大影响时。Smedley回复道：“我认为，这种影响是快速的、重大的，同时也将改变我们的收入来源。”Smedley表示，该项目将首先入驻美国市场。

然而，对于打算与玩家分享收益的公司而言，这将是项复杂工作。显然，只有少数公司有过类似经验。当你向社区支付费用时，你必须考虑到不同国家的税收政策，还需要保证玩家的敏感信息不被泄露，比如社交账号等。

Smedley解释道：“这并非轻而易举的工作。这需要考虑真实的基础设施这些你原来没有想到的东西。”

然而，用户生成内容并不仅针对SOE旗下的PC端MMO游戏量身打造。该公司决定利用智能手机与平板电脑的网络及触屏界面功能，将用户生成内容延伸至移动领域，但该做法的前景仍有些渺茫。

延伸到移动领域

Caryl Shaw或多或少地了解电子游戏中的用户生成内容。她曾参与开发EA以用户生成内容为主的《模拟人生2》，以及将玩家创作内容发挥到极致的《Spore》。

现在她是为开发商Kixeye游戏《Backyard Monsters》的独立顾问，并仍在不断思考如何在游戏社区内部鼓励玩家创作内容并相互分享。

她表示：“我认为，移动游戏领域将为用户生成内容提供更多的支持空间。但我还不确定该平台的实现方式，因为同PC相比，这是个完全不同的开发环境。”

同时，Shaw还参与制作Ngmoco游戏《WeRule》，该游戏允许玩家以自己的独特方式建造城市。Shaw被玩家打造自己城镇的方法深深吸引，但该游戏并非真正意义上的玩家生成内容体验，而更像内容分享。Shaw打算从更深层次探索内容创作与分享，她认为，由玩家制作内容的游戏前景十分可观。

她指出：“用户制作的游戏将会吸引某一类玩家，而且玩家将会沉浸在这些游戏体验中。我并不认为移动游戏将与《模拟人生》一样具有大型广阔的市场，并且能够吸引大量用户投入其中。因为有些玩家是为了制作游戏内容而体验《模拟人生》，有些则是单纯为了体验模拟游戏。”

“也许，未来将有一款移动游戏囊括这两方面元素，届时你将获得自己喜爱的用户生成内容、内容分享以及社区感受。”

Shaw解释道，“用户生成”一词主要涉及内容创作，但该概念也同时类似分享功能。

她表示：“实际上，我认为《Draw Something》是一款用户生成与内容分享的有趣游戏。其开发商Omgpop确实在游戏中加入了一些分享元素，比如，用户可以十分方便地把图画上传到Facebook上。虽然我对游戏中的某些方面存在困惑，但它确已出色地呈现这些部分，而且它极具趣味性……”

忠实度

对SuperData Research首席执行官Joost Van Dreunen来说，用户生成内容不单单是在线游戏开发者源源不断地为玩家提供游戏内容的渠道。

他指出：“我认为就在线游戏而言，在某种意义上，你可能需要不同的用户生成内容，以便玩家可以在他们参与的游戏中获得更多归属感。我投入大量时间研究了《命令与征服：将军》这款游戏。其中涉及两种玩法：单人模式与在线模式，而玩家在选定模式后，便可在自己的地图上体验自己的故事。”

他继续提到：“他们主要围绕特定的游戏创造故事情节。但这种做法也需要发行商确保自己拥有一批忠实的粉丝。这是吸引玩家的实效之举。而设计方面的困难即你需要开发一些真实或虚拟的代理功能，这属于比较困难的设计问题。”

“不过很显然，少了IP持有者或授权公司的控制与授权，你可以进行更多的创新与创造之举……只要我们为玩家提供一点制作空间，他们便会想出一些出色的创意。”

更大的开发空间

在线社区Roblox（游戏邦注：即Robots与Blocks的结合词）的联合创始人David Baszucki为玩家提供了更多的制作空间。而且该公司的项目运营完全依赖于用户生成内容。如果用户生成策略失效，游戏制作工具或者社区整合失败，那么其整个公司就将走向末路。

Baszucki表示：“我们对用户生成内容的前景十分乐观，我们也完全信任这一功能，因为Roblox的每款游戏或游戏体验均由用户打造。”该公司通过多种渠道获取利益。其中一种便是通过自身的Builders Club，它的性质类似于Roblox游戏制作工具授权。此外还有一些开发者额外特权（例如允许他们销售道具）。

同时还有一种方式是虚拟货币Robux，玩家可以用其购买虚拟道具，比如衣物或者武器。目前，玩家无需在购买虚拟道具时向内容制作者支付现金，而是使用Robux方式付费。

robloxship(from gamasutra)

Baszucki指出：“我们认为，游戏内容的创作过程十分有趣。我们的宗旨是‘人们参与游戏体验是因为他们喜欢创作过程。’而Roblox的游戏本身也十分有趣，因为这是由用户参与制作的。”

Baszucki表示，玩家每个月在Roblox上的体验时间可达到4000万小时。据其保守估计，其中有5%-10%的时间主要用于制作游戏内容。

他指出：“最终，我们的游戏平台将聚集大批的内容制作者，如同YouTube一样。而这些内容的多样性将赋予我们网站强大的功能，同时将吸引更多玩家投入其中。”（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）

User-generated content: When game players become developers

By Kris Graft

Game development: it’s not just for game developers anymore. As game and item creation tools become more accessible, user-generated content has become more relevant than ever, from both business and creative angles.

User-generated content isn’t exactly a new idea, but it’s still such a complicated concept that actual execution of a game that revolves around user-generated content seems extremely overwhelming.

Despite success of user-gen-supported games like Little Big Planet, Minecraft, Trials Evolution, and Team Fortress 2, relatively few companies have really been able to tap into their communities’ talent — and wallets — in a really meaningful way.

And as the amount of creative talent in the player community continues to emerge, through services like Steam Workshop and other creation tools, the potential for user-generated content has become too hard to ignore.

“Immediate, meaningful” revenues

Sony Online Entertainment CEO John Smedley is turning to user-generated content in a big way, using it to try to solve issues with MMO content production cycles and player retention problems, while making some bank in the process.

“What we’re really doing is saying, ‘This is how to make stuff. Go to town,’” Smedley tells Gamasutra. “And people are submitting things that look like quality content made by professional video game developers. There’s a lot of stuff that isn’t usable too, but it’s going very well.”

Just a couple months ago, SOE announced Player Studio, which — taking a hint from successful initiatives like Valve’s Steamworks and Team Fortress 2 — gives players the means to create virtual items, sell them on a digital storefront, and share revenues with SOE. (After one year, Valve said it paid out $2 million to its community creators.)

“I think it’s going to be an entirely new business model for us. Steam showed us the way. [Valve] made a really brilliant move with Steam Workshop,” says Smedley.

We ask if Player Studio will have an incremental effect, or a greater impact on SOE’s revenues. “I think it’ll be immediate, meaningful, and it will change our dynamics,” replies Smedley.

The initiative launches soon, initially in the U.S.

For companies entertaining the idea of sharing revenues with players, it will be a complicated task — it’s no wonder there are relatively few companies delving into the area. When paying your community, you have to deal with the varying tax laws of different countries (SOE needs to have a 1099 from people it pays), and secure highly-sensitive player information like social security numbers.

Smedley explains, “There’s nothing simple about this. It takes real infrastructure, stuff that you don’t think about.”

But user-generated content isn’t just for SOE’s brand of PC-centric MMOs. The network and touch screen interface features of the smartphone and tablet market point to possibilities with user-generated content on mobiles, but the future is a bit foggy.

Taking it mobile

Caryl Shaw knows a thing or two about user-generated content in video games. She worked on EA’s The Sims 2, which delved into user-generated content, and also Spore, which had an even greater emphasis on player-created content.

Currently an independent consultant at Backyard Monsters developer Kixeye, she’s still thinking about how games can enable creation and facilitate sharing within a game’s community.

“I think we’ll start to see more room for [user-generated content on] mobile,” she says. “I’m not sure how it’s going to play out on mobile, just because it’s a really different environment for user-generated content.”

She’s also worked on mobile developer Ngmoco’s successful game WeRule, which allows players to build up cities in their own unique way. Shaw was compelled by how players shaped their own towns, but it wasn’t centered completely around the user-gen experience, or around sharing. Shaw wants to explore creation and sharing on a deeper level, and thinks user-generated games that aim deep instead of wide might be the future.

“Games with user-generated content are going to appeal to a certain kind of player, and I think that player is going to become very invested in [those games],” she says. “I don’t think it’ll be like The Sims, where there’s this huge, broad, mass market where lots of people have played it. Some played The Sims for the fabulous user-generated content, and some played it for the sim.

“Maybe there’s a game for mobile where you get a little bit of both, where you can get that user-generated, content-sharing, community feeling that I love.”

The term “user-generated” revolves around the creation of content, but the concept is just as much about the ability to share, Shaw points out.

“I actually think Draw Something was an interesting user-generated, shared-content game,” she says. “[Developer Omgpop] actually did stuff for sharing, like posting your drawings on Facebook pretty easily. There were problems I had with that game, but they did those parts pretty well, and it was pretty entertaining. There’s a direction to go there — there’s something there…”

Loyalty

To Joost van Dreunen, CEO at SuperData Research, user-generated content is more than just a way for online game makers to keep a constant flow of content coming in to players.

“I think that online, you’ll have a different need for user-generated content in the sense that it allows people to take ownership of the game they’re participating in,” he says. “I spent a lot of time for my dissertation studying Command & Conquer: Generals. You had a few types of gameplay: single-player mode, online, then you have people who take the editor, and tell a story with their own maps.

“They create this mythology around a particular game,” he continues. “To allow that is to ensure yourself as a publisher that you’ll have a very loyal fanbase. That’s really the way to rope them in. The difficulty on the design side is that you have to develop something that allows a degree of agency, real or illusory, and that’s very difficult to do.

“It’s quite remarkable how, with less control, less authority, from an IP holder or a license company, how much creativity and innovation you run into. … Just give people and inch of rope, and they come up with some really good stuff.”

A mile of rope

David Baszucki, co-founder of online building community Roblox (that’s Robots + Blocks) gives his players more than just an inch of rope. His company is 100 percent dependent on user-generated content. If its user-gen strategy fails, if its game-making tools or community integration fails, the company fails.

“We’re very bullish on user-gen, and we’re 100 percent committed to it, in that every single game or experience in Roblox is created by our users,” says Baszucki. The company makes money in a variety of ways. One is via its Builders Club, which works like a developer license for Roblox game makers. Along with other developer perks, the license lets them sell items.

There’s also the virtual currency Robux, which players can buy and spend on various virtual items, such as clothing or weapons. Content creators are not currently paid in cash for any sales of virtual items, but are paid in Robux.

“We have a vision that creation and building is very fun and interesting,” says Baszucki.

“I think our philosophy centers around ‘Everyone is here because they believe in the creative process.’ And the games themselves on Roblox are interesting because other people have made them.”

Baszucki says players log around 40 million hours of play time on Roblox per month. He estimates that, conservatively, 5 or 10 percent of that time is used towards content creation.

“That ends up being an enormous army of content creators,” he says, “just like you’d get with YouTube. And that variety of content is what powers our site and makes it interesting for others.” (source:gamasutra)