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探讨视觉效果对移动游戏的重要性

发布时间:2013-01-28 16:30:20 Tags:,,

作者:Zoya Street

问题:

手机、平板电脑和网页浏览器图像性能技术正飞速发展,那么图像质量对移动游戏的成功究竟有多重要?主机游戏领域中的图像保真度竞赛所带来的结果就是,将许多小型开发商和发行商排挤出局,那么这种情况是否也会在移动及社交游戏领域发生?是否还有其他比图像质量更为重要的元素?

infinity-blade(from soluce.jeuxactu.com)

infinity-blade(from soluce.jeuxactu.com)

回答:

Harry Holmwood(Marvelous AQL Europe首席执行官)

我认为图像质量/吸引力一直都很重要。但这是否意味着所有游戏都需要采用高端的3D引擎则是另一个话题了。看看应用商店收益排行榜,就会发现榜单前列仍是2D游戏唱主角。我们现在需要扪心自问——-你需要证明自己的游戏确实因3D效果而得到优化,而不只是因为像主机领域那样,认为“3D总是最好的”而盲目跟风。因为如果我们制作的是相对广泛的游戏,许多用户就很难看出3D和2D游戏之间究竟有何区别。他们看到的只是游戏,只不过外观好看与否不同而已。

Emily Greer(Kongretage产品、营销及财务高级副总裁)

我认为视觉效果好比是营销,是用来提升拥有出色核心机制的游戏流行度与流传性,但光有好看的外表还是不够的。如果让你在外表好看,但有点无聊的游戏,以及看起来并不起眼,但实际上很有趣的游戏之间作出选择,你当然更可能选择好玩有趣的游戏。粗糙的界面和丑陋的图像当然会让一些游戏失色,并且也确实值得改进,但这只能作为第二考虑要素。至少在Kongregate平台上,只有少数人气最旺,收益最高的游戏极具视觉吸引力。

Martin Darby(Remode创始人)

我认为图像质量是游戏取得成功的重要因素。我认为它是让游戏看起来具有感染力,趣味性、兴奋感,或者能够让我从玩游戏中逃避现实的元素。虽然我也承认从个人角度来说“图像品质”具有主观性,但总体来看这一方面还是有些明确的样式、标准和基准。

无论你在此是否意指游戏应该向高端的3D效果看齐(游戏邦注:这一技术在移动/网页平台仍具有局限性),我认为虽然未来我们会看到更多此类游戏出现,但我并不认为具备这一特点的游戏未必就是其他游戏的杀手。原因很简单,总有一些游戏并不需要逼真的3D效果,并且开放平台也能够接纳这些游戏的存在。正如大家所言,“人人都已经拥有移动设备”,而主机却通常是硬核玩家才会购买的专用游戏设备,只有他们才会消费大量极具视觉效果的游戏。

Mark Sorrell(Hide & Seek开发总监)

我认为特性更为重要。正如我们所说,人们玩的是游戏,而不是技术,许多“图像优化”的游戏通常只是在一种“技术炫耀”而已。因此比起能够吸引人们投入感情的特性,图像品质并没有那么重要。

《魔兽世界》从许多方面来看正是这方面的出色典型,它能够兼容许多PC运行性能,并且无需太多硬件要求就能呈现精美画面。

优秀的艺术感总是胜过技术优越性。

Eric Seufert(Grey Area营销及收购主管)

视觉效果是游戏给予玩家的第一印象,它可以让玩家知晓开发者在其中投入多少精力和资源。所以从这个逻辑来看,我认为画面品质对游戏早期阶段的留存率具有重要影响。如果要让我快速决定自己会喜欢哪种游戏(比如我刚安装了一款游戏,并且只有30秒试玩时间),我更可能重访那些由专业团队开发,具有良好视觉效果的游戏。

Charles Chapman(First Touch Games主管)

毫无疑问,画面效果良好的游戏更具优势,无论是2D还是3D都是如此。平台所有者更青睐那些在其设备上看起来养眼的游戏,所以画面具有吸引力的游戏更容易获得推荐,这是一个巨大的优势。但是,也有一些游戏虽然画面看起来并不诱人,但仍然能够脱颖而出。

出众的画面固然是一个大优势,从时间和资源成本来看也是最容易实现的优势之一,而游戏玩法或游戏设计却很难达到出彩的境界,因为这其中的奥妙实在是万金难求。

正如人们所言,无论你怎样粉饰一款糟糕的游戏,它也还是一款糟糕游戏。

Andy Payne(Appynation首席执行官)

视觉效果确实很重要——这也正是包装的重要元素,但我们都知道空有好皮囊,但却没有出色玩法的游戏仍然不会有多大市场。我个人并不是特别关心2D与3D画面之争,凭我个人在主机游戏领域的经验,3D并非这个问题的“正解”。《Candy Crush Saga》在画面上就比《宝石迷阵》更胜一筹,它视觉效果更为丰富,其中的游戏活动也很精彩,充满趣味,甚至连音乐都令人痴迷。但如果作为3D游戏,它的表现可能就很逊色了。《断剑》系列的2D游戏体验堪比《行尸走肉》的3D游戏体验。如果美术和玩法都很出众那是再好不过了,但对于许多熟悉8位/16位图像的玩家来说,复古位图美术风格的游戏也同样具有可行性。

Candy-Crush-Saga(from mmohunter.com)

Candy-Crush-Saga(from mmohunter.com)

Oscar Clark(Applifier倡导者)

哇!我们现在又倒退十年了吗?现在居然还需要讨论这个问题?

自从我首次推出3UK的游戏服务,人们就已经在低估画面保真度在移动设备上的重要性。

正如Eric所言,人们更容易对游戏的美术设计作出反应,这也成了他们决定是否体验游戏的一个关键因素,在App Store中没有其他参考信息的情况下尤其如此。开发者不得不为此在美术设计上大做文章,并据此展开竞争。这里的关键在于,美术设计应与游戏体验相得益彰,即便这是复古或2D卡通风格。

但也不要因此低估了优质3D内容的价值。我记得在2004到2005年间,《Carmageddon》等游戏采用了原始3D图像,只能运行于一种设备,但创造的收益却堪比《俄罗斯方块》这种在所有设备上普及的游戏。那时这类3D游戏售价为10-15英磅左右。App Store比早前的运营商门户网站的环境更为复杂,但《无尽之剑》和《CSR Racing》等游戏表明拥有主机游戏画面质量仍然是一个重要筹码。但光有3D效果并不足以保证游戏获得成功,只有在正确的游戏中采用了合适的3D画面才能看出效果。光靠3D卖点来抬价已经行不通了。

CSR-Racing(from gameteep.net)

CSR-Racing(from gameteep.net)

我们已经能够针对移动设备制作出色的美术内容,我们应该将其运用于游戏设计和品牌/体验中。所有的这些元素都必须到位,你的游戏才有可能在成千上万个竞争者中胜出,如果疏忽了这一点,你的情况就危险了。

这也是我当初加入NVIDIA以及最近进入Applifier的重要原因。我清楚3D画面如果使用得当,仍然很有市场号召力,但我也并不会因此而无视那些拥有出色像素美术或2D角色,玩法上乘的游戏。我也清楚,比起静态的图片,向你的好友展示拥有高保真度画面的游戏玩法视频(其画面极具吸引力),更能够为其创造良好的第一印象。

Ben Board(Boss Alien高级产品主管)

当然,有些游戏,甚至是游戏题材,并不会因抢眼的图像而获益。我们也常看到不少企图在视觉效果上做文章的游戏到头来仍然失败的现象。但如果你的游戏核心吸引力就在于视觉效果,那么优化画面质量就会提升玩家的沉浸感。对《CSR Racing》来说,与多数大型主机游戏一样,情况正是如此:玩家喜欢抢眼的汽车,容易识记的位置,镜头在汽车疾驰过程中抖动的感觉,近距视角显示自己在终点线超过其他竞争者的情况。这些视觉效果并不会让一款蹩脚游戏起死回生,但它们确实可以强化出色的游戏体验。这种组合也是游戏获得病毒传播的一个重要因素。它并非手机游戏获胜的唯一法则,但确实会让游戏更有胜算。随着大量脱离主机游戏领域的开发者涌向移动平台,以及不断迭代成熟的设备问世,我认为未来将有更多团队把握和利用这一优势。

而如果一家开发商只是出于无计可施而为2D游戏添加3D效果,那么他们很可能血本无归。因为从2D到3D的转变极耗成本,并且也不太可能深化游戏体验。如果游戏在2D环境中就已经无人问津,那么它变身为3D体验时也同样如此。(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

[Gamesbriefers] How important is visual quality to success?

Zoya Street

Question:

With so much rapid technological progress focused on increasing the graphical capabilities of phones, tablets and web browsers, how important is visual quality to the success of a game in this sphere? The console business became an arms race of graphical fidelity which ended up all but excluding many smaller developers and publishers from the top table; does this risk happening in mobile and social, or will other factors always trump visuals in the end?

Answers:

Harry Holmwood CEO at Marvelous AQL Europe

I think visual quality/appeal is as important as it’s ever been. Whether that means that all games have to have whizzy 3D engines is another matter though. Look through the top grossing charts and it’s still the case that most of the games making most of the money are 2D. It’s a question we’re asking ourselves at the moment – I think you need to prove to yourself that your game is genuinely enhanced by 3D, rather than feeling the remnants of the ’3D is always best’ attitude which is a hangover from the console business. I think, if we’re making relatively broad games, then many of our customers won’t even realise the difference between a 3D and a 2D game. They just see a game, and one which either looks appealing or doesn’t.

Emily Greer SVP Product, Marketing and Finance at Kongregate

I think that visuals/polish are like marketing — leverage to increase the popularity & spread of a game with a good core mechanic, but not enough in and of itself. Given the choice between a beautiful, slightly boring game (of which there are many) and an unattractive but fun game people may be slightly more likely to start the beautiful game, but much more likely to keep playing the fun game. Poor interface & ugly graphics definitely hold some games back, and are worth investing in, but only as a secondary concern. On Kongregate at least the top played, top revenue games are rarely the most visually appealing.

Martin Darby Founder of Remode

I believe visual quality is an important ingredient for success. I think it is one of the things that can help a game seem immersive, exciting, interesting, slick or culturally in-tune which helps provide the escapism we get from playing games. While I’ll acknowledge that on an individual level “visual quality” can be subjective, on mass there are clear patterns, standards and bench marks.

However if you are more referring to high-end 3D, to which the limits are still evolving on mobile/web then I would say that while I think we are going to see more of it in the future, I don’t think that it will necessarily cannibalise games that don’t require it. This is simply due to the fact that there will always be a demand for games that don’t need real-time 3D and open platforms are by their very nature able to accommodate this. “Everyone already has a mobile” as the cliché goes: consoles on the other hand are specialist gaming devices bought by hardcore gamers who, as the evidence clearly shows, consume a lot of graphically advanced games.

Mark Sorrell Development Director at Hide & Seek

I’d very much agree that character is far more important. As we often say on here, people play games, not technology and a lot of ‘graphical polish’ is often ‘technological showing off’. As such, it’s massively less important than having characters people can emotionally engage with.

World of Warcraft is, in many ways, the high watermark for this stuff. It scales brilliantly with the power of your PC and requires very little oomph to look good. But it clearly works.

Good art direction trumps technological superiority every time.

Eric Seufert Head of Marketing and Acquisition at Grey Area

Visual game quality communicates to the user from the very first session a qualitative impression of the amount of work that was put into the game. So by that logic, I think visual quality can play a significant role in early stage retention. If I have to make a snap decision about how much I’ll like a game (say, I’ve just installed it
and my bus stop is 30 seconds away), I’ll be more inclined to return later if I can tell that it was developed by a team of professionals with care taken to ensure that it looks good.

Charles Chapman Director and Owner of First Touch Games

There’s no doubt that appropriate polished visuals can give a big advantage, regardless of 2D or 3D. Platform holders like games that make their devices look good, so a visually polished and appealing game is more likely to be featured, which is still a huge boost. However, there are plenty of games which do fantastically well despite not being as visually polished as they might be.

It’s definitely a big advantage though, and really one of the easiest advantages to get given time & resources – you can’t say the same about gameplay or game design, where you can’t buy the ‘magic’.

As they say, you can’t polish a turd, and a bad game with fantastic visuals is still a bad game.

Andy Payne CEO of Appynation

Visuals are really important – all part of the packaging really- but as we all know all visual no gameplay leaves Jack and Jill very dissatisfied ultimately. I personally don’t care too much about the 2D vs 3D argument having come from the comic generation, and my experience with consoles tells me that a rush to 3D is not ‘the one’ answer. Candy Crush Saga is a fantastic example of what Bejewelled should have been. It is really polished and visually rich and has wonderful pay offs with so many crazy little events. It is fiendish and it is a lot of fun. Even the music is mad. As a 3D game it would probably suck. Broken Sword series works fantastically as a 2D experience just as the Walking Dead works as 3D. Art and gameplay are joined at the hip, although retro bitmap art can work for many gamers or those familiar with 8/16 bit graphics (much like comics).

Oscar Clark Evangelist at Applifier

Wow! Have we stepped back 10 years? Are we still having this debate?

People have been underestimating the importance of visual fidelity on mobile since I first launched 3UK’s games service.

As Eric says the evidence (even in the Java days) is that people immediately respond to the art of a game and this forms a key decision maker, especially when there is very little other information available on the App Store. This was an arms race then and it’s an arms race now. The key to that race is that the art is perfect for the experience – even if this is Retro or 2d cartoon styles.

But don’t underestimate the value of good 3D content. I remember in 2004-5 how games like Carmageddon in relatively primitive 3D and only running on one device earning as much revenue as games like Tetris which were available on all devices. I do recall we sold those 3D games at a premium (£10-15). Ok the App Store is a more complex place than our long departed operator portal, but games like Infinity Blade and CSR Racing show console quality graphics still has an important effect. However, 3D alone is no guarantee of success as others have said it needs to be well implemented and in a game worth playing. Just using it to raise price (as I once did) no longer works.

We already have the capability to create amazing art on mobile and we need to leverage that power as part of a great game design and within a great brand/experience (often including quality characters). All of these elements have to be brought together if you want compete against the hundreds of thousands of competitor apps and we ignore this at our peril.

This very issue was why I joined both NVIDIA and most recently Applifier. I know 3D still has an amazing impact on adoption when it’s done well and when appropriate to the game. But that doesn’t stop me loving amazing pixel art or 2d characters if they are more appropriate to the game experience i am playing. I also know that showing your friends great video of gameplay that’s shows high visual fidelity, where the art is compelling (2D or 3D) that also creates an amazing first impression; much more than a static image.

Ben Board Senior Product Lead at Boss Alien

Sure, some games, even genres, really don’t benefit much from visual snazz. And we’ve seen visual gimmickry fail as a differentiator for so-so games time and again. But if the core appeal of your game is closely related to its visuals, in conjuring a sense of place, then improving your visuals will improve the player’s absorption, natch. For CSR Racing, like most big console games, this is clearly the case: Players like great-looking cars, an evocative location, scenery blurring and camera shaking with speed, and a close camera showing them edging an opponent on the finish line. Those visuals wouldn’t keep a crap game alive, but they do amplify great mobile gameplay. That combination also makes it a great viral proposition in pubs and playgrounds. It’s not the only formula for success on mobile but it’s a good one – and with the diaspora of console-trained talent coming to mobile, plus the increasingly ripply muscles of successive devices, one I think more teams will be tackling.

When a dev gets to the point where they’re adding 3D to a 2D game because they can’t innovate any other way, they are likely making a very expensive mistake. That transition is a vastly expensive one and, if the game was doing fine in 2D, unlikely to deepen the experience – if a player doesn’t want to play it in 2D, they probably won’t like the zoomy-rotatey version either. If it adds to the promise of the game, though – we made Theme Park World with an extra dimension, literally and experientially, with ride-riding and park-wandering adding to that sense of place – then fill yer boots. Clash of Clans is not desperate for 3D. But I could imagine a CoC-related game for people who wanted to get more immersed in that world, with entirely different gameplay, in which the graphics mattered. But I think they’re busy leafing through superyacht catalogues (and good on them).(source:gamesbrief


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