与多数独立开发者一样，我现在已经有点厌烦听到《Minecraft》这款游戏。我将通过商业视角而非设计角度来点评这款游戏，虽然这两者其实是相互依存的关系。

我们都已经看到这款游戏骇人的销售数据以及转化率，也许只有《Runescape》这种大型MMO游戏才能获得与之相当的市场表现。

这款游戏真是秒杀了开发和营销预算庞大的商业游戏，为何如此？我想有6个原因……

1.独特

2.零阻力

3.显而易见的深度

4.容易购买

5.创建病毒传播内容：故事、视频、跨品牌推广

6.临界点

在此我们挨个分析……

1.独特

我认为《Minecraft》具有如下独特性：

*建造系统

*多人建筑

*生存模式：敌人、动态地形、白天/黑夜循环……

*锻造系统

我相信你可能会想出一些与此类似的不少游戏，但我确实从未见过能够将这些元素都融合在一起的游戏。

还是让我们接受这个现实吧，《Minecraft》就是一个极为独特的命题，我真的认为要取得这种水平的病毒传播成就，你确实要有极为与众不同的点子才行。

这也正是我为何不认为人人都可投身独立游戏开发领域的原因——因为这是一个执行理念超越其他任何层面的领域。并且这一领域也已经很拥挤，每年都有成千上万的独立游戏面世，但却只诞生了一款《Minecraft》。

那么我们可以从它的设计中借鉴什么经验？我们必须瞄准细分市场并发挥创意，给予玩家一些独一无二的东西。这听起来似乎是老生常谈，但《Minecraft》确已证实了这一真理。

问题在于，这真是一个难以实现的目标：唯一的方法就是挖掘你自己的创意，并投入足够的热情令其成为现实。

我不否认，采取类似于某些社交游戏公司的做法仍有可能让你盈利——即瞄准已证明可行的模式，复制这一模式，并大力营销推广。但我认为多数独立开发者都只是希望能够最大化自身创意成果的收益。

2.零阻力

阻力在此的定义就是阻碍人们玩游戏的力量，也就是你开始玩游戏之前所遇到的一系列问题。

《Minecraft》却几乎没有什么阻力。

以下就是我玩《Minecraft》这款游戏所需采取的步骤：

1)谷歌一下Minecraft

2)点击排名第一的搜索结果

3)点击“单人模式”

[等街5秒]

4)点击窗口

这等于就是我开启一款已经从Steam下载到自己电脑上的游戏所需要的操作！

游戏开始运行时根本无需等待新手教程结束，我可以直接使用最便捷的方法与这个3D空间互动——方向键和鼠标。

我试摁了下鼠标左键，就在地形中砸了个洞——这真有意思。我在其中获得乐趣的速度远超过其他此前接触过的游戏。现在我试摁了下鼠标右键，发现可以添加模块，这就出现了第二种趣味。现在我就知道了这两种操作究竟有多简单了。

《Minecraft》是我所知道的最不具有阻力的游戏，其易用性甚至超过了一些极为简单的Flash游戏。你不需要输入自己的名字，观看广告，等待页面加载：你只需要直接点开玩游戏，你的首个操作就已经很有趣味。

我曾认为《重返德军总部》以及《毁灭战士》当时是热门大作部分是因为在这类游戏中四处移动很有趣。现在你去玩玩《毁灭战士》，在一个关卡中四处疾走，你就知道我是什么意思了。

3.显而易见的深度

这正是《Minecraft》的自相矛盾之处，也是它在销量上击败其他更简单的游戏的原因：它所有外面的简单性都隐含连续的复杂性。

你在《Minecraft》网站首先看到什么？一个用游戏内部创建工具制作的过山车视频。你很快就知道自己可以在这款游戏中创建任何你所能想到的东西，包括机器。

事实上，你可能已经借由他人之口听闻《Minecraft》的故事，或者看到他们向你展示的一些该游戏中出现的巴洛克风格建筑视频，你会觉得这些东西真是极为复杂。

这里我们可以用乐高积木打比方：乐高产品的包装盒总会呈现积木搭建的出色建筑，乐高电视广告也总是力图展现积木搭建的顶级复杂建筑和富有生气的交通工具。但这些都只是显示积木可搭建的潜力，当你自己动手搭建时，你最开始就只顾得上把这些积木拼凑在一起，不让它们倒塌就成。

这种显而易见的深度对MMO这类游戏十分管用——你很快就会看到拥有很棒装备的其他角色，或者你无法打败的怪物，或者你无法直接到达的地方。这款游戏会向你持续展现深度，让你知道“只要你投入更多时间或金钱，你就能实现这些目标”。

4.容易购买

我刚开始时觉得《Minecraft》网站兜售其付费版本的做法令我很不悦。你很难找到免费和付费内容之间的功能对比清单，事实上你得去Minecraft的维基网站才能找到。

以下就是该网站出现的内容……

[主打图片]

Alpha测试期间优惠50%，现在就开始抢购吧！

[主要文字说明]

《Minecraft》是一款在躲避骷髅等怪物追击过程中搭建模块的游戏。

[链接]

Minecraft Alpha版（最新！）在浏览器体验 | 下载

Minecraft 经典版（免费！）: 单人模式 | 多人模式

我第一次访问《Minecraft》网站时，我什么都没看，就直接点击了“在浏览器体验”，然后就看到以下说明：

“你得购买游戏才能玩infdev”

我都不懂什么是“infdev”。不过大家普遍知道只要你付费买了游戏，肯定可以享受到更多好处。

但这里所缺乏的就是细节，即使是FAQ都没有提到！

有用户提问：

Q：我买了游戏可以得到什么？

A：你在minecraft.net网站的帐号会出现一面旗帜，允许你多次在任何电脑上多次下载完整版游戏。请注意这款游戏仅通过数字渠道销售，没有推出实体零售版本。

若想知道这方面的信息，你得点击位于网站顶部的图片，但即使是这样你也看不到完整的大图。

我并不清楚这对游戏促销而言究竟是积极还是消极影响。一般来说，人们在买东西的时候都会很想知道自己究竟能得到什么好处，但通常是冲动消费。也许这正是《Minecraft》如此畅销的原因？

我曾听《Runescape》开发商Jagex说过，他们有许多付费用户会在根本没有体验过免费版内容之前购买订阅版本。游戏会畅销只是因为他们喜爱游戏，并希望从中得到更多。我想《Minecraft》也正是这种情况。

诚然，这款游戏的生存模式设置在公开区域确实有助于推动游戏销售，我也不是推荐大家混淆游戏付费版本的细节，而是要牢记人们买你游戏的原因。人们希望拥有和经历完整的游戏体验，他们希望剥离那些额外的累赘，直接体验完整版内容。

最后一个重要的细节就是：购买按钮。

你在玩这款游戏免费在线版本的过程中，总会在屏幕顶端看到一个写着“现在购买”的巨大按钮。你见过多少其他游戏演示版本也采用类似做法， 一直在屏幕显示一个直接购买游戏的按钮？

我认为《Minecraft》9欧元的标价“合情合理”：它是一个很适合大众市场的产品。我不认为这个售价点适用于所有游戏，但它确实减少了你购买游戏过程中的疑虑。

5.创建病毒传播内容

现在让我们重返设计问题。

以下是《Minecraft》允许你做的事情：

1）创建可向他人展示的任何事物

搜索下互联网，就不难发现玩家们使用《Minecraft》创造的艺术作品。在你的游戏中添加建造系统，或者创建引擎的能力，可以让玩家制作出令人难以置信的病毒传播内容。

2）讲述故事

这款游戏采用了类似于《矮人要塞》式的叙述方式，有些题材的游戏难以向玩家讲述故事，而如果你的游戏能够做到这一点，那就是一个极大的优势。AAA游戏试图通过线性体验实现这一目标，而《矮人要塞》这种生成式游戏则采用了随机组合元素的做法。

3）随机性的混乱

《Minecraft》中多人模式就有一些随机性的趣事，它们会迅速扩散，被更多人所知晓。

6.临界点

我认为这里存在一个关键点，游戏只有达到这个点才能成为一款足够卓越并几乎能够自我推销的杰作。只有极少数游戏能够做到这一点，但这真是一个很高尚的目标。

我一直纠结于将临界点视为一种理念：它似乎只是关于“成功孕育成功”的详细阐述，因此对开发者并没有什么太大的帮助。

我也不认为通过Notch本人的努力就能达到这个临界点。虽然他并没有积极推动PR和营销活动，但他对此确实很敏感，并聘请了一名“商业人士”来帮他处理所有能够最大化项目成果的任务。他自己也确实是一位友好、谦逊，只想做出好游戏的开发者，因此获得了人们的支持。其游戏简约而含蓄的网站也比较符合“好人”独立开发者的形象，我认为这也在一定程度上推动了游戏销售。

Nicholas Lovell对此曾提出“社交认同”的观点，即“如果许多人都已经购买某物，那么这一定是件好东西。”Cialdini所著的《Influence》也提到了这个观点，如果有兴趣可以到亚马逊网站看看，另外《Predictably Irrational》一书也值得参考。

总结

如果要让我筛选出《Minecraft》成功背后的三个关键因素，我的选择如下：

*零阻力

*极富深度

*容易购买

我们最近才开始看到《Minecraft》媒体的爆发式传播效应，所以我认为早前提到的“病毒传播”质量并不如以上三个因素那般重要。我将游戏的深度视为比简单性更重要的元素，因为一定的深度可以激发玩家克服最初的困难。我还认为深度的重要性甚于原创性——它正是人们对游戏口口相传的起源。

我并不认为人人都应该效仿《Minecraft》，获得像这款游戏一样的大众吸引力，当然也不认为人人都能够依靠克隆作品获得巨大的成功。

我的观点就是，这款游戏有些方面值得开发者借鉴，有些则完全归功于一种无法复制的魔力。我相信Notch会将自己的成功归结于运气，但你只有在能够完美执行优秀创意之时才能获得好运相助。

我希望独立开发者能够有所选择地汲取《Minecraft》的成功经验，但不要犯以下4点错误：

1）认为自己的下一款游戏也会这样出色

2）复制这款游戏的设计

3）将自己的商业、定价模式与不相称的游戏相比较

4）因无法达到这种水准而气馁

原文发表于2010年9月29日，所涉事件及数据以当时为准。（游戏邦注：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）

We take a look at this phenomenon and ask what it means for our business, as well as that of other indie developers…

by Mode7Games on Sep 29th, 2010 .

Like most indie devs, I’m a bit tired of hearing about Minecraft at the moment!  I thought I would collate my thoughts on it in order to put the issue to bed.

I’ll be viewing everything through a commercial lens rather than focussing on the design, although in this case I think the two are almost symbiotic.

We’ve all seen the outrageous sales stats and conversion rate which dwarf almost anything out there.  You’d need to look to big MMO’s like Runescape to find a comparable performance; here are some interesting benchmarks.

This game is destroying commercial games with much bigger development budgets and much bigger marketing spends – why?  I’ve got six reasons…

1.  Unique

2.  Frictionless

3.  Demonstrable depth

4.  Easy to buy

5.  Creates viral material: stories, videos, cross-branding

6.  Tipping point

Here we go with the breakdown…

1.  Unique
Here are some things that I believe are unique to Minecraft:

•Building system

•Multiplayer building

•Survival mode: enemies, dynamic terrain, day/night cycle…

•Crafting system

That’s practically the whole thing!

I’m sure you could come up with games which do one of those things in a slightly similar way, but I certainly haven’t seen anything which combines them before.

Let’s just accept for now that Minecraft is a very unique proposition;  I honestly believe that to achieve the same level of viral success, you’d have to come up with something equally remarkable.

This is why I don’t think anyone should jump into indie game development: it’s one field where the execution of a concept really does matter above almost everything else.  And it’s incredibly crowded – hundreds and hundreds of indie games come out each year and there is only one Minecraft.

So, what can we learn from its design?  We need to be pursuing niches and innovating; giving gamers something they can’t get from anything else.  Sounds a bit trite really, but Minecraft has just proved the validity of this.

The trouble is that this is incredibly hard to accomplish: the only way to do it is to explore your own ideas and become accomplished and dedicated enough to execute them.

This is the best guide to that process I’ve ever read in any creative field.

I’m not denying, by the way, that it’s possible to make money in the style of some social gaming compaines: targeting something that’s already demonstrably successful, copying it and then marketing it heavily.  However, I believe most indie devs are trying to simply maximise the money they can make from their own creative output.

2. Frictionless

Friction is simply defined as a force which resists the playing of a game: it’s a function of the number of things you have to do before you’re allowed to start playing.

Minecraft has virtually no friction.

Here’s how many steps it takes me to play Minecraft from the posting screen where I’m typing right now:

1.  Google Minecraft

2.  Click on the number one Google result

3.  Click “single player”

[Wait five seconds]

4.  Click in the window

That’s actually about the same amount of effort required to launch a game I already own from Steam on my own computer (providing I don’t already have Steam open)!

Once the game is running, there’s no tutorial to sit through and I can immediately use the most conventional way of interacting with a 3D space: WASD and the mouse.

I try the left mouse button and I bash a hole in the terrain – that’s fun.  I’m having fun faster than in almost any other game I can think of.  Now I try the right mouse button and I realise I can add blocks: a different kind of fun emerges.  The complexity of what I can do just with those two actions is now revealed to me.

Minecraft is the most frictionless game I know, even surpassing some very simple Flash games.  You don’t have to enter your name, watch an advert, wait for a page to load: you’re just playing straight away and your first actions are fun.

I have a theory that Wolfenstein and Doom were such massive hits at the time partially because moving around in those games is fun.  Go and play Doom now and scoot around a level and you’ll see what I mean.

3.  Demonstrates depth

Here’s the real Minecraft paradox and the reason it destroys simpler games in sales terms: all this outward simplicity is continually implying complexity.

What’s the first thing you see on the Minecraft website?  A video of a rollercoaster made using the in-game building tools.  Immediately, you know that you can build almost anything you can imagine, including machines.

In fact, you probably encountered Minecraft through someone telling you a story about it, or showing you a video of some ridiculous baroque structure: you know it’s incredibly complicated off the bat.

The Lego analogy is a great one: the boxes for Lego products always had brilliant huge constructions on them; the Lego TV adverts always showed over-the-top animated vehicles and complex buildings.  It was all about potential, but when you got your hands on it, all you wanted to do initially was just stick blocks together.

This factor of demonstrable depth works very well for things like MMO’s – immediately, you’ll see other characters with fancy equipment, or monsters you can’t beat, or places you can’t go straight away: the game is constantly shoving depth at you and saying, “Look at all this you can have if only you play longer / pay money.”

4. Easy to buy

I found it initially very vexing that the Minecraft website is so terrible at upselling the paid version of the game.  It’s REALLY hard to find a feature comparison list between the free and paid stuff: in fact, you have to go to the Minecraft wiki to do that.

Here’s what the website itself says…

[Top graphic]

50% off during Alpha! Pre-purchase now.

[Main text]

Minecraft is a game about placing blocks while running from skeletons, or something like that.

[Links]

Minecraft Alpha [The latest!]: In browser | Download

Minecraft Classic [Free!]: Single player | Multi player

Initially, when I first went the Minecraft website, I didn’t really read everything and clicked “In browser”.  You’re then presented with…

“You need to purchase the game to play infdev”

I had no idea what “infdev” is.  However, the general impression that there’s more to be had as soon as you buy is definitely presented.

What’s missing though, is the specifics.  Even the FAQ doesn’t have them!

Someone wrote:

Q: What do I get when I buy the game?

A: A flag gets set on your account on minecraft.net, allowing you to download the full game as many times you want, from any computer in the world. Note that nothing physical gets sent to you, the game is distributed digitally only.

To get any information on this, you have to click on the graphic in the top-left, and even this doesn’t give the full picture.

Personally, I don’t know if this has a positive or negative impact on upsell.  Usually, people are very keen to want to know exactly what they’re getting when they buy something, but the actual purchase decision itself is made emotionally.  Maybe this factor actually works in Minecraft’s favour?

I heard a talk by Jagex, the creators of Runescape, who said that many of their paid users bought a premium subscription despite having experienced hardly any of the content in the free version.  The upsell was just about them loving the game and abstractly wanting more.  I think this is certainly happening with Minecraft.

Now, it definitely helps that a lot of the information about the amazing Survival mode is out there in the public domain, and I’m not recommending anyone obfuscate the details of their paid version, but just why people want to buy your game is definitely something to bear in mind.  People want to own the experience and undergo it as fully as possible; they want to strip out all of the stuff around it and just get the full thing.  They often don’t care about exactly which bullet points they are getting.

One final and very important detail before we move on: the buy button.

All of the time you’re playing the free online version, there’s a huge button that says BUY NOW at the top of your screen.  How many game demos have you ever seen where there is a button on the screen at all times allowing you to buy the game?

I’d say Minecraft’s price of 9 euros is at the “nobody can argue with this” level: it’s perfect for a potentially mass market product.  I don’t think this price point is appropriate for all games by any means, but it certainly eases the doubt of exactly what you’re getting when you buy Minecraft!

5.  Creates viral material

Back to design now for a second.

Here are some things Minecraft allows you to do:

1.  Create anything and show it off to people

Just today, I’ve seen two examples of art made with Minecraft that have been shared around on the internet.  One was in this Kotaku post, the other was this amazing video of the Starship Enterprise…

Having some kind of building system, or an ability to create machinima in your game makes for an unbelievable amount of viral content.  See also Garry’s Mod.

2.  Tell stories

The game allows for Dwarf Fortress-like epic narratives, as Gabe of Penny Arcade and Quinns of RPS have demonstrated.

It’s very hard to tell stories about certain genres of games, and if your game allows for this, it’s a major advantage.   AAA games try to do this with linear experiences (“Oh, that bit where the lobster comes out of the cupboard?  Wow, that made me cry”); whereas generative games like Dwarf Fortress try to do it with the random combination of elements.

3.  Experience random chaos

I’d include Minecraft’s hilarious multiplayer mode in this: again, the Garry’s Mod comparision is there.  Also, this…

Random dramatic events that are easy for outsiders to understand?  Instant viral material.

6.  Tipping point

Finally, I don’t think anything has demonstrated the tipping point as effectively as Minecraft.  There is a point which it is possible to reach with a good enough game that it will almost literally start selling itself.  Only a tiny, tiny percentage of all games will get there, but it is a good and noble target!

I always struggle with the tipping point as an idea: it seems to just be a huge elaboration on “success breeds success”, and thus not particularly helpful.

I do think reaching that point has been helped by Notch’s approach as well.  Although he hasn’t been proactive at all with PR or marketing, he has been fairly responsive and has now hired a “business guy” to help him out with all of the necessary tasks required to maximise his success.  He does come across as a friendly, humble guy who is just trying to make a great game: thus he interviews well and people symapthise with him.  The simple, unpretentious website also smacks of a “good guy” indie creator, and I think this helps the purchase decision.

Nicholas Lovell makes a very good point about social proof which is linked to this.  Social proof is roughly summarised as this idea: “If a lot of people have bought something already then it must be good”.  I’d read Cialdini’s Influence if you have any interest in that idea – it’s an essential book for anyone involved with selling anything.  Oh and while you’re at Amazon, pick up Predictably Irrational as well.

Conclusions

If I were going to select three key factors behind Minecraft’s success I would choose the following…

•Frictionless

•Extremely deep

•Easy to buy

We’ve only recently seen the massive explosion of Minecraft media, so I think the “viral” quality I mentioned earlier is slightly less important than those top three.  I rate its depth as more important than the simplicity of its first few moments, simply because a promise of depth can motivate players through a difficult beginning (see Dwarf Fortress).  I even rate depth as more important than originality: it’s what gets people talking.

I don’t think everyone should try to aim for mass appeal titles like Minecraft, and I certainly don’t think anyone will have any significant success with a clone.

My point is that there are some aspects of it which should genuinely have an impact on developers, and some which have to simply be discounted as Minecraft Magic!  I’m certain Notch would attribute a lot of his success to luck, but luck only comes about when you are as good at executing great ideas as he is.

I hope indie devs will try to learn intelligently from Minecraft’s success, rather than…

1.)  Assuming their next game will do as well

2.)  Copying its design

3.)  Pairing its business and pricing model with unsuitable titles

4.)  Being discouraged by it

It’s great to see another indie doing so well; this only serves to make people more open to indie games and to buying them direct from developers.（source：indiedb）