作者：Jeremy Kang

Vanillaware的《奥丁领域》于2007年由Atlus公司发行。这款游戏尽管在是否属于动作RPG类型上尚存争议，但它既是2D游戏史上的耀眼明珠，也是基于2D sprite的杰作典范。从各个评论看，即使按今天的标准，这款游戏也堪称上乘佳作。

但在我看来，更令人惊讶的是，《奥丁领域》之后的制作团队Vanillaware，其成员仅有12名！其中7人为美工，3人为程序师，2人为游戏设计师（或按日本游戏开发的术语称为策划师）。

对于这样一支小团队来说，居然能超越今天由100人组成的大团队，实在不能说不是壮举。

我认为他们的成功是因为着眼于小开发团队有限的人力和技术，作出了一些非常明智且经济的设计选择。

在我玩这款游戏时，我看到了一些很好的设计决定：

1、平行剧情

平行剧情总是被当作增加游戏重玩价值和收益的好方法。但《奥丁领域》在这方面比大部分开发者做得更完美和周全。

各个角色的故事实际上与至少另一名角色的故事紧密相关，这一方面让玩家得以用新的眼光看待之前的剧情，另一方面通过揭示某个之前不明确的关键事件的新线索，将整个故事串联起来。所有故事各自完整，同时又给后续的故事留下足够的空间填补空隙，这显然证明了制作团队在安排剧情和节奏上，充分考虑了故事的连贯性和连续性。

存在一个整体的游戏时间线，有助于将各个角色剧情中的与其他角色相关的事件排列起来，从而使整个故事更加容易理解，游戏更加容易进展。

2、资源重复利用

不像某些游戏，以拙劣手法循环利用资源，而且只用脆弱的剧情作掩饰，《奥丁领域》的资源重复利用做得非常巧妙。

Odinsphere_worldmap(from gamasutra)

游戏中存在8-10个区域，基本上每个区域都有大BOSS，不断重复利用元素的弊端一定程度上被角色剧情、升级规则和等级本身的相互交织所抵消。

为什么不同的角色会在个别相同的区域穿梭？这个问题总是存在有说服力的答案。因为游戏规定要经历的剧情是提前安排好的，并且肯地仔细考虑过将新区域或带有新剧情的BOSS引入的节奏。

将之前的BOSS置入某个角色的故事中，作为后面可操作的角色使用，这一设定非常酷。

3、简单的核心机制

为了让3名程序师能管理游戏，《奥丁领域》保持了简单的游戏玩法。“环形”的小地图两端相连，角色在这个2D平面上朝左朝右地跑，战胜BOSS后就能通向下一个小地图。小地图通过大地图连通起来。如果你把大地图分解开来，基本上可以说《奥丁领域》只是一个添加了RPG元素的横版卷轴游戏。

simple core game mechanics(from gamasutra)

角色的POW值是固定的，而各个不同角色自身又带有2-4个特殊技能，这就给游戏增加更多乐趣。设计师可能认为杀死屏幕上的怪物固然有趣，但可能有些老套，混合不同角色的技能可以增加游戏的动态，以及丰富玩家实际上对付相同敌人的方法。

4、配方系统

《奥丁领域》中最少被提及的方面大概就是复杂的配方系统了，它为整个游戏的的动态系统增加了大量的深度。

在一款迫使你从1级开始升级每个角色的游戏中，我认为，在不同角色之间保持配方秘笈始终如一是一个极其高明的选择。这至少让玩家从一个角色移动到另一个角色时能产生连续的感觉。

配方在游戏中非常有用，可以帮助角色更快升级，获得新能量等。在我最近玩过的RPG里，我不记得有什么游戏能不太依靠角色的属性值就让我如此强烈地感到“长知识”了。

5、魔素系统

本质上，这是一个相当简单的设定，但在游戏中引入了一系列“管理”元素和玩家选择。玩家可以选择使用从打败的敌人那儿得到的魔素（魔力浮球），来升级自己的武器、学习新的魔法或用于食物（游戏邦注：让玩家保持命值的物品）的生长。

当从一个面画转到另一个画面时，我总是面临着艰难的选择，原因有很多，比如仓库有限、敌人太强。得到更强的武器，或保证角色生存，或特征宝贵的仓库空间以留着魔素增加角色属性值，在这些决定中，配方是非常关键的。

对于一个绝对不难编写的简单系统，从这个资源扩展出来的想法，导致每2-3个画面我就要有意识地作出选择，这是相当吸引人的。

整体上说，当你考虑它的技术缺陷，如减速和帧率问题（与Odessa打一场你就知道我说的是什么了）和某些一般的重复性，《奥丁领域》绝不是一款完美无缺的游戏。

但就它的优点来说，它是游戏的典范之作，因为它突出的“设计感强”的特征，如剧情和资源管理元素，同时努力克服技术和人力限制，我们可以忽略这款深刻又有趣的游戏的技术短板。
（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）

Design Analysis: Odin Sphere – Small Team, Big Game

by Jeremy Kang

Released by Atlus in 2007, Vanillaware’s Odin Sphere was a critically received Action-RPG that was not only a tribute to the glory days of 2D games, it was a 2D-sprite-based masterpiece, still considered gorgeous even by today’s standards, as noted in the multiple game reviews.

But more than that, what was more amazing about Odin Sphere in my opinion, was that the team behind the game, Vanillaware, only consisted of 12 members. Expectedly, 7 of which were Artists, 3 were Programmers and with 2 Game Designers (or Planners, in Japanese Game Development lingo).

For a small development team to ship a game that can hold its own against today’s 100-man-blockbuster-games environment is no small feat.

I believe that this was made possible by the team making a few very smart and economical Game Design choices that gave the most gameplay-bang for the asset-buck in Odin Sphere, and produced a game that worked around the manpower and technical constraints of a small development team.

Some of the good design choices that I concur with as I played through the game were…

1) Parallel Storylines – Bits and Pieces

Parallel storylines are always a great excuse to extend the replayability of a game and get more bang-for-your-buck with what you already have. But Odin Sphere does it with much more panache and thought than most others.

Each character’s story is actually deeply-intertwined with the at least one other character’s storyline, giving players a new perspective on previous stories, while contributing to the overarching story in Odin Sphere, by revealing new details of certain key events previously left ambiguous. The fact that each story is complete in its own right and yet gives enough room for subsequent stories to fill in the gaps is evidence of the thought put into the writing and pacing of the story to ensure its coherence and continuity.

Parallel Stories

It helps that there is an overall game timeline, which sequences the events in each character’s story against those of the other characters and makes the entire story more easily referenced and accessible to players.

Naturally, parallel storylines make the game more “design-heavy”, and is a great way to cover up for…

2) Reusing of Assets – How to do it with Style

Unlike some other games which shamelessly reuse assets and cover it up with some weak storyline excuse (I’m looking at you, Devil May Cry 4), Odin Sphere’s reusing of assets is done with a lot more finesse.

Between 8 -10 areas and an almost equal number of bosses, the repetitive factor that plagues the constant reusing of assets is somewhat nullified by how smartly the game interweaves the character stories with the level orders and the levels themselves.

World Map

There is always a convincing reason as to why the different characters are transcending the same few areas, and since the order in which the stories have to be played are pre-determined, certain thought had surely been put into the pacing of which to introduce new areas or bosses with each new storyline.

As an additional cool factor, it’s always cool to use a what was previously a boss in one character’s story as a playable character later.

3) Simple Core Game Mechanics – K.I.S.S.

To keep the game manageable by a team of 3 programmers, Odin Sphere keeps it core gameplay simple. Run left to right in a “circular” stage, which is essentially a 2D plane connected at both ends, kill all enemies, proceed to next stage. Stages are interconnected predeterminely through a “map.” If you break it down, essentially, Odin Sphere can be said to be simply a side-scrolling brawler infused with RPG elements.

Kill Him, and Everything Else that Moves

Things are kept a bit more interesting with the limit imposed by the POW meter and the different 2-4 unique abilities of the different characters. The Designers probably understood that killing all things on screen are inherently fun, albeit or perhaps intentionally old-school, and mixing things up with different character abilities adds to the dynamics of the game and how players would actually tackle the same enemies in different ways.

4) Recipe System – The Power of Knowledge

Perhaps the most understated aspect in Odin Sphere, the complex Recipe System adds substantial depth to the dynamics of the overall game.

In a game that forces you to start from Level 1 with each new character, it is an extremely smart choice, in my opinion, to allow the Recipe Book to remain consistent between the different characters, giving at least a sense of progression as you move from character to character.

It sure helps that the recipes in the game are extremely useful, like helping characters level up faster, giving them access to new power-ups, etc. I don’t remember a recent RPG that I played that I felt so empowered simply by “knowledge” and not so much by character stats.

5) Psypher System – Player Choice

Absorbing Psyphers

Essentially it is a rather simple feature, but introduces a sort of “management” element and player choice into the game. Players can choose to use Psyphers (floating orbs) from defeated enemies to power up and upgrade their weapons, learning new magic spells in the process, or use it to grow food items, which allow you to regain health.

This choice was an extremely crucial one as I moved from screen to screen due to a number of reasons, the limited inventory, the difficulty of the enemies, and the food recipes were all crucial in my decisions between getting a more powerful weapon or ensuring my survival or saving it up to power up my stats while taking up precious inventory space.

For a simple system that was not at all hard to program, the options that branched out from this resource led to a rather engaging player choice that I consciously thought through every 2-3 screens.

Overall, Odin Sphere is by no means a perfect game, when you consider its technical shortcomings like slowdown and frame rate issues (try fighting Odessa and you will know what I’m talking about), and some general repetitiveness.

But for what it’s worth, it’s an example of a game that retains much of its charm with the emphasis on “design-heavy” features, like story and resource management elements, while trying to keep the technical and artistic manpower limitations in mind, resulting in a rather deep and engaging game that is greater than the sum of its technically-simple parts. (source:gamasutra）