《怪物吃糖果》（Cut the Rope）仅仅是俄罗斯游戏工作室ZeptoLab开发的第二款iPhone游戏，但发行才十天就已突破百万销量，不能不令人称羡。

近日，Pocketgamer记者采访了ZeptoLab公司的首席技术官Efim Voinov，了解到这款令人爱不释手的休闲物理益智游戏的开发过程，以及该公司第一款有趣而复杂的iPhone游戏《降落伞忍者》（Parachute Ninja）的有关情况。下文是访谈内容：

Cut the Rope

问：《怪物吃糖果》的灵感从何而来？

ZeptoLab的第一款游戏《降落伞忍者》原本打算命名为《悠悠球忍者》（Yo-Yo Ninja），它的主要特点就是吊在绳上摇晃的小忍者。在这款游戏的一个视频截图中，你还可以看到忍者胸前绑着的绳子。

但在开发过程中，我们团队发现这款游戏的控制系统并不太管用，就决定用倾斜操纵的降落伞来代替绳子。我们花了许多时间创造并微调这些绳子的现实物理效果，所以当我们开始考虑下一个开发项目的时候，很自然地想到要使用同样的游戏引擎，这也就是《怪物吃糖果》的游戏设计出发点。

另外，《愤怒鸟》（Angry Birds）这款游戏的成功，也鼓舞了我们开发物理益智游戏的决心。

问：有人认为《降落伞忍者》的难度太大，这对《怪物吃糖果》的开发有何帮助？

《降落伞忍者》具有触摸屏和倾斜控制的功能，这也是它对一些玩家来说比较费解、难操作的原因。其实我们自己也已经从一些YouTube视频中看出，那些玩家回顾这款游戏的玩法时，甚至不知道还可以倾斜控制降落伞。

大多数人都不喜欢阅读游戏指南，不管这些指南有多简短，大家都喜欢自己摸索着找到玩法。如果摸索不出来，玩家就会对游戏失去兴趣。

另外，有些玩家还认为《降落伞忍者》的复杂玩法有时候很令人抓狂，所以我们在开发《怪物吃糖果》时就极力避免出现这种情况。

parachute-ninja

问：让游戏物理效果顺畅运行的难度有多大？

控制绳子的物理效果并不像看起来的那么容易，我们使用的是自己的游戏引擎而不是业内的Box2D技术，一方面是因为我们希望绳子看起来尽可能自然，另一方面是因为我们觉得这是一项很有趣的挑战。

我们最初遇到的挑战之一是游戏的运行效果，但随着时间的推移，我们终于可以保证游戏的高帧速率不受影响。

问：要让游戏具备趣好玩同时又有挑战性的特点，难度有多大？

在游戏开发过程中，我们找了许多朋友来试玩，他们玩的时候我们就站在后面看。我认为这是最好的办法，只有这样才能知道游戏的难度设置是否恰当，游戏总体开发方向是否正确。

另外，游戏中的三星级奖励系统确实取悦了大量玩家。有些玩家只是享受将糖果喂到怪物Om Nom嘴里的过程，有些则非要拿到这个游戏每一关中的三颗星才肯善罢甘休。所以，这款游戏的难易程度完全掌握在玩家自己手里，他们可以自己作出选择。

问：谁想出了怪物“Om Nom”这个点子？

在项目开发之前，我们已经有一些关于将物体从A处转移到B处的想法。集体讨论了一些主题后，决定采用给怪物喂食的创意，因为我们相信普通游戏玩家比较喜欢和卡通形象接触，而不是跟砖块或者几何图案打交道。

另一方面，我们还想挖掘玩家的母性，因为给婴儿喂食是父母最温馨的经历之一，所以我们认为玩家想要顺利闯关的意识已经足以奏效，如果再加上这个怪物吃食的可爱咀嚼动作，一定会制造意想不到的效果。

问：为何选择与Chillingo进行发行合作？

Chillingo公司发行的游戏多次进入排行榜前列，说明他们的确很有实力，另外我们的游戏也比较符合Chillingo游戏玩家的口味。

目前为止与我们与Chillingo的合作都很顺利，他们团队提供的用户反馈和相关支持，也确实在引导我们开发出更好的游戏。

问：《怪物吃糖果》会投放其他的手机平台吗？

我们现在也正考虑向其他平台投放这款游戏，《怪物吃糖果》应该很快就会出现在多个手机平台上。

问：ZeptoLab公司下一个开发项目是什么？

《怪物吃糖果》居然征服了那么多游戏玩家，这一点让我们很惊讶也很兴奋，我们很希望通过具有新级别、更多有趣功能的游戏更新版本回馈用户。

接下来几个月，可能开发这款游戏的更新版本和移植版本，当然也不会将所有的精力都放在更新版本上，我们不久还会推出新款游戏，希望大家继续关注！（本文为游戏邦/gamerboom.com编译）

ZeptoLab CTO Efim Voinov on how its million selling Cut the Rope was inspired by a yo-yo ninja

Plus the joy of feeding babies

With only its second iPhone game already a million seller, ten days after launch, things are going very well at Russian studio ZeptoLab.

Probably a good time then to catch up with CTO Efim Voinov and find out the development process behind its addictive, casual physics puzzler Cut the Rope, and how it learnt from its debut game, the charming but tricky Parachute Ninja.

Pocket Gamer: What was the inspiration behind Cut the Rope?

Efim Voinov: ZeptoLab’s first game Parachute Ninja was actually intended to be called Yo-Yo Ninja and feature the little ninja swinging on the rope. You can still see the rope bundle inside the ninja equipment chest which is presented in one of the game’s cut scenes.

However, at a certain point in development, the team realised that the controls weren’t working well, and decided to swap the rope with the tilt operated parachute. By that time, many hours had been spent creating and fine tuning the realistic rope physics, so when we started to think about the next project, we’ve decided to utilise that engine – and that was the starting point for the game design.

The success of Angry Birds also encouraged us to try the physics puzzle genre.

Some people also said Parachute Ninja was too difficult so how did that affect Cut the Rope?

Parachute Ninja had a combination of touch and tilt controls, which made it tricky to understand and operate for some players. In fact, we have even seen a few YouTube videos where players were reviewing the game without knowing that the parachute can be operated by the tilt.

Most of people just don’t read tutorial messages no matter how short they are, and prefer to find out the controls themselves. If they are not able to do this, the game will lose a big part of an audience.

Also, some players felt that Parachute Ninja’s gameplay was frustrating at times, so we’ve tried to minimise that feeling in Cut the Rope.

How difficult was it to get the physics working in a smooth way?

Rope physics are not as easy to get right as it might look. We’ve decided to go with our own engine instead of using an existing technology such as Box2D, partly because we wanted the rope looking as smooth as possible, and party because it looked like an interesting task.

One of the challenges we initially had was the game performance, but over time we were able to maintain quite a high framerate.

How difficult was it to get a good balance between an enjoyable game and a challenging game?

During the development, we’ve asked many of our friends to try the game, and while they were playing it, we were observing the process behind their backs. I think this is the best way of knowing if the difficulty curve is good or not, and if the game is moving in a right direction overall.

Also, the three star system is a great way to satisfy a wide range of players. Some people will just deliver the candy to the Om Nom’s mouth, but some won’t stop until they get all three stars in all of the game levels. So, the game difficulty is pretty much manageable by the players themselves.

Who came up with the idea of Om Nom?

We had a concept of some object being delivered from point A to point B from the very beginning of the project. After brainstorming several theme possibilities, we’ve got a monster feeding idea, since we believed that the casual audience likes interacting with the animated characters much more than with the blocks or geometric shapes.

In a way, we also wanted to exploit the parental instinct of the players, because feeding a little baby is one of the warmest experiences the parents get. So, we felt that the emotional motivation for the player to complete the level would work best, not to mention that chewing action itself has some weird power of emitting the cuteness.

Why did you publish the game with Chillingo?

Chillingo has showed many times its ability to deliver the games to the top of the charts, and also our game fits Chillingo’s audience really well.

Working with Chillingo so far has been a great experience, and all the feedback and help its team is providing to us has definitely helped us making a better game.

Will Cut the Rope come to other mobile devices?

We are now looking into possibilities of porting Cut the Rope to other platforms, and most likely it will appear on many kinds of devices quite soon.

What’s next for ZeptoLab?

We are positively surprised and very excited about all the love players are showing to Cut the Rope, and we are eager to pay the credit back with the new levels and other cool features coming with the updates.

Quite likely, we’ll spent at least a few upcoming months doing the updates and possible ports of the game, but of course we don’t want to stuck on just doing the updates, and will start developing the next game quite soon.

Thanks for the interview and stay tuned!（source:Pocketgamer）