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为什么说玩家是糟糕的游戏用户?

发布时间:2013-05-21 17:43:45 Tags:,,,,

作者:Vaizard27

我认为玩家是游戏的糟糕用户。

你会问为什么?好的游戏玩家会了解所有与游戏相关的内容,就像你能做什么以及不能做什么。对于它们来说,游戏不只是一种兴趣,也是日常生活中的组成部分。如果你正在创造一款面向这些用户的游戏,你就必须考虑他们对于游戏的了解。

当玩家开始玩一款新游戏时,他们总是会想起之前玩游戏中的机制。并且大多数玩家都习惯于零售模式。这也是为什么第一款可下载游戏出现时会引起如此巨大的骚动。

但是关于为什么玩家不是游戏最佳目标用户还有另一个原因:

一般情况下,玩家总是会抱怨心爱的游戏系列所发生的改变,以及之前游戏中迟钝且陈旧的机制,并总是想要看到全新,特别的内容。我想很多开发者应该都发现很难去满足目标玩家的需求吧。

我想这也是导致最近会出现如此多社交和网页游戏的主要原因。因为它们瞄准的是完全不同的用户:非玩家。

而游戏为何开始瞄准其他玩家而不是一般玩家呢?首先,非玩家不会抱怨任何事,他们只会开心地玩着游戏。其次,这些玩家更乐意在游戏中进行微交易。

我已经研究过了好几款网页游戏,并意识到大多数游戏都非常简单。它们不要求玩家具有技巧,并会因为任何原因给予玩家奖励。它们还会推动着玩家去购买各种好看,可爱且发光的功能。而许多非玩家也时刻准备着去购买这些功能。

大多数网页游戏的基本版本都是免费的,所以任何玩家都可以进行尝试。网页游戏的目标并不是从每个玩家身上赚取50美元,即使只从玩家那获得少量的利益他们也会很高兴,并会立即给予提升/道具/技能。有些游戏甚至未拥有玩家对抗玩家元素。没人能够攻击你,或破坏你所创造的内容,但是你可以间接与拥有较高分数的玩家进行竞争。有些游戏甚至未设定分数,感觉就像是多人电子宠物游戏。

但是你在Facebook上所看到的所有游戏或谷歌网页游戏都具有一个共同点:它们能够赚取足够的钱去满足创造者的需求。它们的利益总是多于你在一开始的期待。它们还会将一些普通人变成玩家。尽管它们不会将其当成是自己的玩家,但是这些人却有可能每天都在玩游戏。这才是我心目中真正的玩家。

gamers(from megagames.com)

gamers(from megagames.com)

而现在我所担心的则是:如果所有的浏览器玩家突然感到厌烦并想要玩更复杂的游戏,那该怎么办。他们可能会离开去玩FTP-MMO。有些人会玩《星战前夜》,也有些人会玩《魔兽世界》。然后我们便要告诉各种群体,真正的游戏是什么。对于一些玩家社区或菜鸟级玩家来说,他们并不熟悉MOORPG。

基于一些简单的设计,网页游戏便能够带来巨大的收益。它们是关于让玩家更轻松地学习游戏,然后逐渐沉浸于更深入的挑战中。它们不会让你因为受挫而猛击键盘,你只需要向后靠并四处点击便可。

同样地,它们对于硬件或装置也没有特殊要求。我们需要通过浏览器去访问这类型游戏,并且不需要加载屏幕。像《部落战争》以及其它有关怪物的游戏将能轻松引导玩家投入更多时间于其中。

所以让我们总结为何比起玩家来说,非玩家是更好的用户:

玩家讨厌一切新内容,但又一直想要尝试新内容。

玩家是小气鬼。

玩家可以轻松地写下有关游戏的负面评论而淹没了论坛。

玩家讨厌DLC/微交易等需要花费额外金钱的内容。

玩家既讨厌新功能,也会抱怨新功能。

玩家总是能够注意到你所犯的任何一个小错误,并抱怨连连。

玩家玩游戏的次数甚至远超于你。

另一方面,非玩家则是:

不是很了解游戏并愿意体验任何“新”功能。

总是准备着为游戏花钱,与此相比玩家则从未考虑过给你一分钱。

比玩家拥有更多钱(游戏邦注:因为他们并未花50美元去购买零售游戏)。

不会抱怨游戏中任何愚蠢的功能,因为他们中的许多人并不知道这些功能可以变得更好。

不会注意到你在设计中所犯的任何错误。

只是因为能够玩游戏就很开心了。

现在如果你拥有一笔预算和时间表,然后问你愿意面向哪一群组设计游戏,你会怎样回答?

不像几个月前那样,现在的我不再认为网页游戏是邪恶的,会破坏我喜欢的游戏中的任何内容。我反倒认为它们是游戏产业的发展机遇,能够将更多普通人变成玩家。从分析网页游戏中我们也可以学习到许多重要内容,我认为所有人都应该时不时看看这些游戏,因为有些游戏非常接近现实游戏,拥有真正的挑战,更重要的是,能够让玩家在游戏过程中获得自己想要的“乐趣”。

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

Why gamers make a poor audience

by Vaizard27

at 4/22/2012

All right, it is been over a month since my last post and I’m sorry for that.

But I really had my own school with getting a job, moving to another city and, well you know, somehow getting used to work.

But now to the topic at hand.

I believe gamers make a pretty bad audience for games.

Why you ask? Well gamers know all kinds of stuff about games, like what you can do, and what you cannot do. For them gaming is not just a hobby it’s part of their everyday life. So if you are making a game for that audience you always have to consider their knowledge about games.

Whenever a gamer starts up a new game he always sees mechanics that have been used in other games before. Also most are used to the retail model of buying games as a whole. That’s why there has been such an uproar when the first DLCs schowed up.

But there is another reasons why gamers are not the best target audience for games:

Generally gamers are broken, complain a lot about changes in the beloved gaming series, and about rusty old mechanics they’ve seen before, always want something new, and something special, and something that has never been seen before. I guess you can see how that target audience is pretty hard to satisfy.

In my opinion that’s the reason why so many social- and browser-games have been showing up lately. They target an altogether different audience: non-gamers.

But why is it that games are starting to target other people than the average gamer? Well first non-gamers don’t complain about anything, they are happy if they can just play a game. And another reason is, probably,that those people are actually ready to pay for micro-transactions.

As I have been digging my way through many browser games, I came to realize that most of this games are pretty simple. They require almost no skills, and they reward you for everything you do.
They also prompt you to spend money for pretty, shiny, cute, and all kinds of other features. And many non-gamers are actually ready to pay for those features.

The basic version of most browser-games is completely free so many people can try it out. Browser games are not aiming to get 50 bucks from yo, they are happy with little amounts of money and instantly give you the boost/item/skill/or whatever it was you bought. Some of them have no pvp aspects at all. Nobody can attack you or destroy what you created, but you can compete indirectly by who has the higher score. Some don’t even have scores and feel just like multi-player tamagochi.

But all of those games you can see on Facebook or when you google browser-games have one thing in common: They make enough money to fill the stomaches of the guys who made them (most of the time). They generate more Money than you would think at first. And they do something else. They convert normal people into gamers. Even though they won’t call them selfs gamers, they play a game, often every day of the week. And that is what I’d call a gamer.

The only thing that worries me right now is this: What will happen if all those browser-gamers out there are suddenly fed up and want to play something more… sophisticated. They’d probably go and play FTP-MMOs. Some of them might go play EvE, some might pick up WoW. And then we’d have to teach tons of noobs what real gaming is… MOORPG are not really known for having super-helpful communities or being very nice when asked questions by newbies… well we all went through it once.

Browser-games generate tons of revenue with really simple designs. They are more about being easy to learn then about being deep and challenging. They don’t want you to smack your keyboard through your monitor in frustration (dark souls will finally come out for pc!), they just want you to lean back and click around a bit.

Also they don’t require special hardware or installations. Most of them can be directly accessed via browser and don’t even have a loading screen. They might feel like child’s play to a seasoned gamer, but titles like Travian and other monsters out there can easily hook you to spend many an hour on a browser-game.

So lets sum why non-gamers a better better audience than gamers:

Gamers hate everything new, while wanting something new all the time.

Gamers are cheapskates.

Gamers can easily flood forums with bad comments about your game.

Gamers hate DLC/Microtransactions, basically anything that costs extra money.

Players hate new features while complaining about old features.

Players will notice every tiny little mistake you made, and will complain (again).

Gamers would have made that game a hundred times better than you.

Non-gamers on the other hand…

Don’t know much about games and will experience many of your features as “new”.

Are often ready to spent money for stuff gamers would never even consider giving you one cent for.

Have more money than gamers (because they don’t buy 50 buck retail games)

Don’t complain about stupid features, because many of them don’t know that it could be done better/different

Don’t notice mistakes you made in the design

Are just happy they can play your game

Now, if asked for which of those groups you would want to design if you had a fixed budget and timeframe, which would it be?

Unlike a few months ago I no longer think browser-games are evil and will kill everything in gaming I like. Now I feel they are an opportunity for the gaming industry to convert more people into dedicated gamers. Also they are interesting to monitor, there are no retail games out there we have nearly that much numbers and  fancy graphs on. You can learn a great deal from analyzing browser games and I guess everybody should at least take a look at them from time to time, since some of them seem to draw closer and closer to real games, with real challenges and, most important, the kind of “fun” gamers want to have while playing.

Well that’s it for now. I hope I will fall back to my old pace of posting again, but I really got my hands full with work and almost had to force myself to write this right now.(source:blogspot)


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