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解析动作冒险游戏的关卡设计要求(一)

发布时间:2013-10-02 08:08:49 Tags:,,,,

作者:Toby gard

简介–授权

不同人会采取不同方法去授权设计责任。

我便遇到过一些没有主见的创意总监,仅仅只是过滤团队的理念。

我也遇到过一些基于自己的想法而创造了一张粗糙图像,并在向团队成员进行描述后将设计任务授权给他们。如此便会导致团队很难创造出他所期待的“正确”解决方法。

比起寻找具有读心术的设计师,更有效的方法便是通过创造性去表达他们想要的,以及灵活性所在,如此他们的团队便会在避免迷失于创造性的前提下掌握如何全心投入创造中。

我相信,当我们能够把坚定的核心理念传达给团队(游戏邦注:基于整体团队的输入和反馈),并基于明确的参数授权责任时,我们便能获得有效的平衡。

本系列文章的第一部分将描述这一过程的第一阶段,即基于我所找到的最成功的方法。

该过程尝试着为一个关卡团队平衡创造性自由与所有权,并通过定义需要先想出哪些细节并传达给团队,以及基于成功标准去授权哪一部分内容等保持一个结构性观点。

整个过程描述的步骤对于独立设计师也同样有效,而不管他们期待的是怎样的授权程度。

因为每个项目拥有其自身的需求和团队结构,所以这一过程不可能直接适用于你身上。但是有许多理念可以用于任何基于故事的游戏中。

阶段1 关卡流程图

关卡设计的观点交流第一步便是传达关卡流程图。

高级关卡设计计划的制定应该遵循以下4大资源:

动机——我正在这里做什么?

与书中的任何场景或章节一样,一个关卡的冲突和解决方法应该源自主角的动机。这也是为何我们需要明确地告知玩家角色动机的主要原因,否则他们便会在游戏中迷失方向。

这些动机将转变成游戏目标,如“找到那个杀死你爱人的男人”或更简单的“杀死10个boss中的5个”。更强大的目标是那些角色和玩家动机相一致的内容。

如果你想要创造这种一致性的话,简单地传达角色的目的或动机还不够。你也需要让玩家真正感到这一目的的重要性。

举个例子来说吧,比起通过过场动画去传达主角讨厌boss敌人,并让玩家知道他们只有杀死boss才能前进,直接给予玩家厌恶boss的理由更能有效地传达这种一致性。

如果boss在玩家给予了信任之后转而背叛了他,或者夺取了玩家的某些东西(如通过杀死玩家所关心的NPC),那么玩家和角色便都有理由去恨boss了。

因为设置玩家动机需要投入一定的时间,所以设计师总是很难在一个开放式过场动画中将玩家动机与角色动机维系在一起。

通常你总是没有其它选择,只能在一开始传达角色动机,如此玩家只能在想法上与角色维系在一起,而非情感。

为了贯穿游戏加强这种一致性,我们必须让“我想要让女朋友复生”的动机与玩家想要“杀死巨人”的目的维系在一起。

如果目的与动机并没有直接关系(例如,你花了大量时间只是为了完成杀死无数老鼠的任务),如此玩家便会忽略体验背后的意义,而他们与主角动机间的一致性便会不断侵蚀他们想要继续游戏的兴趣。

情感/体验主题

在有关关卡设计的第一阶段,你必须通过预先头脑风暴而选择强大和有趣的设置组件与情感事件,并将其整合到游戏中。

你将围绕着这些内容去填充剩下的关卡设计。你可以在这些时候基于玩家的想法去定义游戏,重要的是它们将支持或推动你的故事。

设置组块是复杂的行动导向型理念,如“逃离燃烧的建筑”或“找到并去除四个炸弹”。设置组件是行动类游戏的基本建筑组块,就像动作电影中那样。在此我们所面对的挑战是创造之前未被实践过多次的设置组件。

控制情感的事件是你的游戏的核心—-例如寻找被废弃的村庄中的幸存者,当你进入窃盗城中只发现有关他们命运的一个骇人听闻的答案。

如果处理得当的话,情感事件比设置组件更具让人印象深刻,但是因为它们对于玩家和角色间的一致性有过高的要求,所以便导致我们很难创造这类事件。

柱子

游戏之柱会定义玩家能够做的一些基本内容,所以为了将设置组件和情感场景整合到关卡中,他们必须与玩家的能力相匹配,否则便会让玩家感到混乱。

如果在完成所有关卡流程图后才确定游戏之柱真正完结的话,我们便能看到最大程度的灵活性。而这只会在选取一些真正发生在玩家身上的事物的过程中才会发生,你将因此发现玩家真正的能力,以及你该如何灵活地去执行它们。

除了不能从开发角度为每个设置组件创造全新能力外,它们也不会倾向于玩家,除非你包含像骑马和钩编等内容,如此这些能力便会在一开始出现于游戏之柱中。

虚构

不管你正在创造怎样的游戏,都存在一个与主角的故事几乎一样重要的故事,你需要谨慎对待;而这便是关卡本身。不管玩家是在经历外星人入侵还是尝试着去解决一个谋杀之谜,他们的沉浸程度都是取决你对于维持虚构内容的承诺。

关卡设计中会遇到的最常见的问题便是基于一套参数而相对宽松地定义一组挑战,然后尝试着去装扮它们。最终这只创造出一些牵强,乏味且容易被忘记的关卡。

尽管许多设计师提出了异议,即他们感觉会被虚构方法所束缚,但现实是当你决定遵守关卡的虚构性时,你便会发现自己设计出了会让玩家和你感到惊讶的空间和事件。

我将在第二阶段进一步研究这一点,但是现在,我们需要做的便是确保能在环境(游戏邦注:在虚构内容上能够保持一致性)下定义整体的关卡流程。

关卡流程元素

有些人为自己的关卡创造了全部流程表,但我认为这太过约束了,并且关于基本的空间布局也不能提供足够的信息。

我更喜欢混合了图解和动点进度表的关卡流程。

我并不追求流程图多详细,而希望它能够定义关卡的概略;这便是我所强调的流程图的核心。

我发现,通常在下一个阶段的时候团队会添加至少一半的最终关卡目标,所以保持这些目标的简单化便非常重要,因为那时侯关卡的难度至少会翻两倍。如果你不能在一页范围内调整流程图,那就说明它过长了。

基于你所创造的游戏类型,你所包含的元素类型也会有所不同,但你的目标总是一样的:就是确保它足够简单。

在这个例子中我使用了如下方法:

关卡刺激

我是以此去召唤玩家来到某一领域。它们不仅会作为图解的位置,同时也是在脚本事件发生时给予玩家的关键信息。

玩家回应

这是玩家所做的事。我们必须清楚地将这些内容传达给玩家。

锁就像一个“坚固的门”,限制着玩家在关卡中的前进,直到他们能够满足某些标准。(为了该墓地我将“软弱的门”整合到玩家回应中。)

钥匙

这是关于世界或玩家角色的状态改变,将能够打开任何地方的“锁”。

例子——《光晕:战斗进化》

《Campaign 2》、《Flawless Cowboy》和《Reunion Tour》

Halo(from gamasutra)

Halo(from gamasutra)

这一页图解只能描写2个需要1个小时完成的关卡(一个战斗)。

基于这一图解你应该包含一些注释去描述每个元素背后的意图,并参考它们所获得的4个资源。(这是关于你如何为关卡团队定义成功标准。)

动机

杀死Covenant。在Campaign 1中看到人类舰队和Pillar of Autumn被粉碎会提升玩家的仇恨,让他们愿意更长时间待在游戏中只为了杀死Covenant。

柱子

这包括基于三人驾驶/射击Warthog游戏玩法,并与AI军队协作而向玩家呈现他们最初的游戏体验。

主题

参考电影和其它游戏是一种快速传达游戏主题的好方法。《星河战队》便是一个很棒的例子,即能够唤醒那些在外星世界中被外星敌人所压倒的士兵们。

虚构

关卡是与推断出许多有关持续战争的大型故事和小规模独立故事的后期维系在一起:

被摧毁的逃生杆及其躯壳并未幸存下来,来自太空大战的残骸滑过了天际。每一个坠落点都代表着士兵Master Chief短暂而绝望的求生故事。

完成

当完成关卡流程图后,你还离下一个阶段很远。

为了评估关卡流程图,你需要证明整体游戏的机制。只有当它们一起出现时,你才能判断它们是否彼此适合,并清楚跌宕的游戏玩法是否能够从游戏的开始持续到最后。

将其罗列在墙上,你将看到玩家是在哪里改变了方向,在哪里不同的事件顺序能够创造更棒的解咒,以及哪里的情感事件因为出现得过早而阻碍了玩家和角色的一致。

基于游戏创造一个优秀故事的秘诀便是将玩家的行动当成推动故事发展的引擎。

《Ico》和《旺达与巨像》便拥有电子游戏中最成功的故事,尽管有些人认为故事元素并不重要。但事实却并非如此。故事无处不在,因为玩家就是生活在故事中。

《Ico》是关于逃脱与保护。每当你设法诱导Yorda从城堡中逃离时,你朝着自由前进的故事便会不断发展着。而在《旺达与巨像》中,贯穿游戏的英雄将为了拯救爱人而逐渐牺牲自己的生命以及每个巨像的生命。

killing Colossi(from gamasutra)

killing Colossi(from gamasutra)

保护女人并杀死巨像。正是玩家的行动塑造了故事,减轻了过场动画的负担并让故事在玩家心中变得更加重要。

总结

关卡流程图是关卡设计与团队的首个关键交流平台。

通过以下元素去创建关卡流程图:

*角色动机

*情感和体验式设置组件

*基于游戏之柱所定义的玩家行动

*环境自身的虚构性

*使用最小的元素去绘制图表,并代表主要的事件。

*确保图表不会超过1页。

*确保你能够通过玩家行动推动故事的发展。

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

Action Adventure Level Design, Part 1

by Toby gard

Intro – Delegation

Different people have different approaches to delegating design responsibilities.

I have seen creative directors who seem to have no vision of their own but merely act as filters through which their team’s ideas are strained.

I have also seen creative directors who form a rough image of what they want in their heads and then delegate the design to their team after loosely describing it to them. Inevitably the team then repeatedly fail to deliver his expected “right” solution.

A better approach than searching for mind-reading designers, is for the creative leads to express clearly both what they want and where the flexibility is, so that their team can know how to take ownership without getting lost in the creative wilds.

I believe that balance is achieved when an unwavering core vision is delivered to the team (based on the whole team’s input and feedback) and then responsibilities are delegated with clearly defined parameters for success.

This first article describes stage 1 of a process that does just that, based on the methods that I have found the most successful.

The process attempts to balance to a healthy amount of creative freedom and ownership for a level team, while keeping a structured vision in place by defining what details are essential to work out first and communicate to the team and what parts are better to be delegated with success criteria.

The steps that the entire process describes can be just as useful for an individual designer regardless of the level of delegation expected to occur.

Since every project has its own needs and team structure, this process is unlikely to translate exactly for you. However, many of the concepts can be adapted for just about any story-centric game.

Stage 1 Level Flow Diagrams

The first step in the clear communication of vision for level design is delivering the Level Flow Diagram.

There are four sources from which the high level design plan should be drawn:

Motivation – What am I doing here?

Like any good scene or chapter from a book, the conflict and resolution of a level should be born from the main character’s motivations. This is why the character’s motivations should always be clear to the player or they will feel lost and directionless.

These motivations translate into game objectives such as “find the man who killed your lover” or more simply, “kill Boss 5 of 10″. The strongest objectives are ones where character and player motivations are in alignment.

It is not enough to simply state the objective or motivation of a character if you want to create alignment. You also need to make it matter to the player if you want them to become invested in it.

For instance, showing through cutscenes that the main character hates a boss enemy, while letting the player know they must kill that boss to progress, results in a much weaker alignment than giving the player reason to hate that boss enemy.

If that boss enemy betrays the player after the player has come to trust him or if he takes something from the player (for instance by killing an NPC that the player has come to care about) then the player and the character will both have a real reason to hate him.

The time it takes to setup player motivation is why it is so hard to align player motivation and character motivation in an opening cutscene.

Often you have no choice but to state the character motivations right at the beginning, in which case the player will only have an intellectual rather than emotional alignment with him or her.

To strengthen that alignment through the game, the motivation “I want to bring my girlfriend back to life” must be completely linked to the player objective “Kill the Colossus.”

If the objectives are not directly related to the motivation (for example, if you spend most of your time being waylaid by endless rat killing quests) then the player will lose sight of the meaning behind their experience and their alignment with the main character’s motivation will erode along with their interest in continuing to play.

Emotional / Experiential themes

It is during this first phase of the level design that you must choose which of the powerful and interesting set pieces and emotional events that came from the whole team during preproduction brainstorms will make it into the game.

These are the high points around which you will fill in the rest of the level design. They are the moments that will define your game in the player’s mind and it is crucial that they support or drive your story.

The set pieces are high-concept action-oriented ideas such as “escape the burning building” or “find and defuse the four bombs.” Set pieces are the basic building blocks for an action heavy game, just as they are for action movies. The challenge is in creating set pieces that haven’t been done a dozen times before.

The emotionally charged events are the heart of your game — i.e. looking for survivors of a deserted village, only to find a shocking and disturbing answer to their fates as you enter the town hall.

Emotional events have the potential to be more memorable than a set pieces if handled well, but they too require the building of player and character alignment, which makes them harder to pull off.

Pillars

The game pillars define the basic things the player can do, so to integrate the cool set pieces and emotional scenes into the level, they must be compatible with the player abilities or they will feel anachronous.

The most flexibility will come if the game pillars aren’t considered final until all the Level Flow Diagrams have been completed. It is only during the process of picking the things that will actually happen to the player, that you will learn what the player abilities really ought to be and how flexibly you will need to implement them.

For instance, if the game is about a jet skiing hacker, then it would be inappropriate to build a set piece around horseback crocheting. Doing so would have to rely heavily either on cutscenes and (shudder) quicktime events or would require specific controls, interface elements and abilities.

Apart from being inefficient from a development standpoint to create new abilities for each set piece, they would be also be un-ramped for the player unless you included several such horse riding and crocheting sections, in which case those abilities should have been in the pillars in the first place.

Fiction

Regardless what sort of game you are making there is a story that is almost as important to consider as the main character’s; that of the level itself. Whether the player is experiencing an alien invasion, or trying to solve a murder mystery, their level of immersion is almost entirely dependent on your commitment to preserving fiction.

The most common mistake made in level design is defining a set of challenges loosely based on a manufactured set of parameters and then trying to set dress them to look like something. This inevitably results in unconvincing, bland and forgettable levels.

Despite many protestations from designers who feel shackled by a fiction-heavy approach, the reality is that when you resolve to respect the fiction of a level you inevitably find yourself designing spaces and events that surprise not just the player, but often yourself as well.

I will go into this in detail in the second stage of level development called “Building Through Fiction” but for now, all we need is the commitment to ensure that our overall level flow is being defined in a context that can be made fictionally consistent.

So no windsurfing on the moon — however much fun that may sound.

Level Flow Elements

Some people make full flow charts of their levels, but I tend to think that’s excessively restrictive and not informative at all regarding basic spacial layout.

I prefer a level flow that resembles hybrid between a schematic diagram and a simple beat sheet.

The goal is not to be exhaustive, but to define the skeleton of the level; the core of it.

On average I find that at least half of the final level goals will actually be added by the team during the next stage, so it’s important to keep these simple because the level will at least double in complexity from here. If you can’t fit the flow on one page, then it is probably too long.

The types of elements that you would include will be different depending on the type of game you are making, but the goal is always the same; keep it simple.

In this example I used the following:

Level Stimulus

I use these to call out the player’s arrival at an area. They serve as the locations on my schematic but also the critical information pieces given to player, during scripted events etc.

Player Response

The things the player does. These are generally objectives that have been clearly communicated to the player.

Locks

Locks are the “hard gates” that restrict forward progress in the level until a certain set of criteria are met. (I’m lumping “soft gates” into Player Response for the purposes of this.)

Keys

These are status changes either of the world or of the player character that will lead to opening a ‘lock’ somewhere.

Example – Halo: Combat Evolved

Campaign 2, Flawless Cowboy and Reunion Tour

This single page schematic actually describes two levels (one campaign) that takes about an hour to complete.

Along with this diagram you would include notes that describe the intention behind each element and directly references the four sources from which they were derived. (This is how you define the success criteria for the level team.)

Motivation

Kill the Covenant. Seeing the human fleet and the Pillar of Autumn being shredded in Campaign 1 gives the player enough animosity to last for a game’s worth of Covenant killing.

Pillars

This would include the focus on introducing the player their first experience with the three-man driving / gunning Warthog gameplay, and the cooperation with AI troops.

Themes

Referencing films and other games is a good way to quickly communicate theme. Starship Troopers might be a good example to evoke the feeling of soldiers being overwhelmed by an alien enemy on an alien world.

Fiction

The level is teaming with touches that infer a great deal about both the larger story and the smaller scale individual stories of the ongoing war:

Destroyed escape pods and the bodies of those that did not survive the landing litter the landscape, while debris from the space battle overhead fall through the sky. Each of the pod crash sites suggests the short desperate survival stories of the soldiers Master Chief meets there.

Finishing up

Once a Level Flow Diagram is done, you are still a long way from moving onto the next stage, the handoff to the team.

To evaluate a Level Flow Diagram you need to have done the whole game’s worth. Only when they are all side by side can you can see how well they fit with each other and how the ebb and flow of gameplay will move from the start to the end of the game.

Put them all up on a wall, and you will see where the player is being sidetracked, where a different order of events would make for a better rhythm and where emotional events are happening too early in a game for player and character alignment to have occurred.

The secret to making a great story based game is to make the actions of the player be the engine that drives the story, not the other way around.

Ico and Shadow of the Colossus are among the most successful stories in video games, yet many say the story elements were minimal. That’s not true. The story was everywhere, because the player lives it.

Ico was about escape and protection. Every time you managed to coax Yorda closer to escaping from the castle, the story of your struggle for freedom progressed. In Shadow of the Colossus, throughout the game the hero slowly sacrifices not just his own life but the lives of each colossi, in his mad quest to resurrect his love.

Protecting a girl and Killing Colossi. The player actions are shaping the story taking the burden off the cutscenes and making the story matter to the player.

Summary

Level Flow Diagrams are the first key communication of Level Design intent to the team.

Build Level Flow Diagrams from:

Character motivations

Emotional and experiential set pieces

Player actions as defined in the game pillars

The environment’s own fiction

Use minimal elements to draw the diagram, and represent only the main events.

Keep it to one page.

Ensure you are driving story through player action.(source:gamasutra)


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