作者：Toni Sala

这是本系的第二篇文章。这次我想谈谈游戏中的奖励系统以及我如何在《推箱子》中运用。(请点击此处阅读本系列第1、3篇）

游戏奖励系统是游戏设计中的一个非常重要的概念。事实上，玩家玩游戏一定程度上就是为了获得奖励。这是人类的本能需求。玩家需要合情合理的评价。这就是为什么哪怕是最简单的游戏也必须谨慎地设计和平衡游戏的奖励系统。

rewards(from gamasutra)

一款游戏可以包含多种奖励形式，比如赞美的话、得分、延长游戏时间、道具奖励等，通常来说，游戏应该包含尽量多的奖励。然而，不要忘记游戏奖励必须保持平衡。你必须在适当的时候给玩家适当数量的适当的奖励。

当设计《推箱子》时，我尝试加入不同类型的游戏奖励。然而，真正指导设计《推箱子》的奖励系统的过程的是我关注的两个更一般性问题：

*奖励 vs. 惩罚

*休闲玩法 vs. 硬核玩法

*分层奖励系统设计

所以，我需要的奖励系统必须既能满足休闲玩家，又让硬核玩家满意，同时还要避免惩罚。为此，我设计了一个分层奖励系统。所谓的分层奖励系统就是，一开始玩家只能看到明显的目标和得到明显的奖励（第一层），但玩了一段时间后，他开始发现游戏中还有更复杂的挑战和更吸引人的奖励。

我的意图是，不要让休闲玩家对那么多“不可能得到”的游戏奖励感到不知所措，同时给硬核玩家机会发现更具挑战性的隐藏层。事实上，对硬核玩家来说，发现隐藏层本身就是一种奖励。

所以，一开始先用最基本的目标——解决谜题鼓励玩家。解决谜题就是第一层。通关的满足感、屏幕上的赞扬、得分和解锁后面的关卡就是这一层的奖励。

此时，第二层是什么就很明显了：如果你解决了谜题，但没有得到所有的三颗星，那么你就会看到奖励画面上的未填满的星星。另外，如果你再等一下，你会看到你挣到的所有额外奖励和它们如何增加到你的最终得分中。这是对硬核玩家的奖励，因为他们总是想得到更高的分数。

这种额外奖励系统增加了更多层次。每一个玩家都会注意到自己所感兴趣的额外奖励。休闲玩家看完得到多少颗星星后就会直接跳过这个画面。硬核玩家会看完自己挣到的所有额外奖励，然后想想自己是否可以提高分数。理解得分系统对硬核玩家来说，是一个有趣的挑战，能带来巨大的满足感。

所以，只有玩过几个谜题后，玩家才能根据他想得到的奖励树立自己的目标。休闲玩家把解决谜题当作目标，至于能得到几颗星星，并不重要。有些玩家力求每一个关卡都达到颗星星。有些玩家想获得更高的得分。还有些玩家希望冲上排行榜第一名……其实理论上，所有玩家都可能经历这些阶段，这只是一个时间早晚的问题。

“隐藏”层

简单地说，休闲玩家只要求游戏有趣。大部分休闲玩家只要能解决谜题就满足了（游戏邦注：解决不了的谜题就跳过去）。所以，只要你的游戏够好玩，就能满足休闲玩家。

然而，硬核玩家的要求更高。显然，他们除了要求游戏有趣，还要求游戏具有挑战性。

所以，《推箱子》中有一些最有趣的“隐藏”层。

额外奖励系统

一开始，《推箱子》是纯惩罚性的。也就是说，如果你解决一个谜题花的时间太长，你就会受到惩罚。使用撤销选项？要受惩罚。重新开始游戏？要受惩罚。硬核玩家能忍受游戏中存在一定程度的惩罚。事实上，惩罚在一定程度上增加了游戏的内在价值。然而，休闲玩家讨厌被游戏惩罚。所以，《推箱子》必须“正能量”一点，奖励玩家而不是惩罚玩家。

积极平衡（奖励）的好处在于，没有人讨厌它。无论是休闲玩家还是硬核玩家，都喜欢奖励。有些类型的游戏必须把惩罚控制在最低程度。比如，那些算“命数”的游戏，在这类游戏中，你失败一次就损失一条命。比如在《超级马里奥》中，蘑菇撞到你，你就损失一条命。然而，《推箱子》可以设计成完全不需要惩罚的样子。这也是我最终选择的方案。

于是诞生了额外奖励系统。所有惩罚都换成额外奖励。所以，当你完成一个谜题时，奖励页面会告诉你得到了什么额外奖励，比如时间延长、重玩/撤销一次，等等。所有额外奖励都被换算成得分添加到你的最终分数中。额外奖励系统非常管用。

另外，这个额外奖励系统可能很容易被忽略，或者被部分忽略。你选择了你感兴趣的一种额外奖励，同时忘记了其他的。

高于标准系统

这个系统直到开发进入尾声才添加到游戏中。参加游戏测试的硬核玩家要求更复杂的挑战和更吸引人的奖励。所以“高于标准系统”应运而生。起初认为达到三星就表示用可能的最佳方案解决了难题，然后发现自己居然用比标准的还少的步数就解决了谜题，这对硬核玩家来说是非常有成就感的。

此外，高于标准的解决方案会带来额外的奖励，并换算成得分计入最终得分中。

整体得分系统

一开始，得分是根据玩家解决谜题所走的步数计算出来的。后来，我增加了这个额外奖励系统。然而，我还需要一种细化玩家争取排行榜名次的方法。基于步数、星星或固定额外奖励的系统给玩家表现作的评估结果是非常相似。

所以我增加了基于时间的额外奖励系统。游戏会记录玩家解开每一个谜题所用的时间。时间产生的额外奖励进入最终得分不是根据线性函数计算的，而是根据指数函数。这样，费时多的玩家得到的额外得分往往接近，而费时少（几秒内就通关）的玩家得到额外分数的计算却精确到小数点第二位。所以，排行榜上的两名玩家几乎不可能得到完全相同的分数。

这种精确度增加了排行榜的意义，使整体得分系统（游戏邦注：步数、星星和额外奖励）具有更大的评价维度。

Game Center

《推箱子》中的Game Center像一根把一切串起来的绳子。一切都是相关的：步数与星星有关；星星与得分有关；得分与额外奖励有关；额外奖励与成就有关；成就与排行榜有关；排行榜又与得分有关。

这个紧密的循环非常有效。

结论

我认为，我花了那么多时间设计《推箱子》的分层奖励系统是值得的，因为这个高明的系统让几乎所有类型的玩家都对自己得到的奖励感到满足。

注意：具有复杂而平衡的奖励系统的简单游戏，有两个优势：它的简单能吸引休闲玩家，硬核玩家也能在游戏中得到挑战。（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）

Game Design Theory Applied: A Layered Rewards System

by Toni Sala

Today’s article is the second one in the series “Game Design Theory Applied”. You can find the first article of the series here. Today I would like to talk about game rewards, and how I applied them on New Sokoban.

Game rewards are a very important concept in game design. Actually, in some sense, players play games to be rewarded. It is a human need. Players need to be evaluated favorably. That’s why a well designed and balanced game rewards system is key in any game, even for the simplest one.

There are lots of kinds of game rewards that could be included in a game: praise, points, prolonged play, spectacle, powers, resources, completion… In general, you should include as many rewards as you can. However, never forget that game rewards must be balanced. You need to give the right reward, at the right time and in the right amount.

When designing New Sokoban I tried to include different types of game rewards. However, I focused on two more general issues that drove the design process of the rewards system of New Sokoban:

Rewards vs. Punishment

Casual Gameplay vs. Hardcore Gameplay

A layered rewards system design

So, my aim was to offer a game reward system that included rewards for both casual and hardcore players while avoiding punishment. To achieve that, I designed the game rewards system in layers. A layered rewards system design means that the player initially only sees the obvious objectives and gets the obvious rewards (the firsts layers) but after playing a while, he starts to discover that there are some more complicated challenges with more satisfying rewards.

The idea is not to overwhelm casual players with tons of “impossible” game rewards to achieve but at the same time give the opportunity to hardcore players to discover the hidden layers with the more rewarding challenges. Actually, discovering the hidden layers is a reward itself for a hardcore player.

So, the player starts by encountering the basic objective: solve the puzzle. Simply solve it. This is the first layer. The reward is the satisfaction of completion, the praise in the rewards screen, the score and the following puzzle that is unlocked.

At this moment the following layer is presented clearly: if you solved the puzzle with less than 3 stars you will see unfilled stars on the rewards screen that claim to be filled. That’s layer two. Moreover, if you wait a moment, you will see all the bonuses you earned and how they add to your final score. That is rewarding for hardcore players as they always want higher scores.

The bonuses system adds some more layers. Every player will pay attention to the bonuses he is interested on. Casual players will just skip this screen after seeing the number of stars achieved. Hardcore players will examine all the bonuses earned and wonder if they could improve their score based on the score system of the game. Understanding the score system is an interesting challenge for a hardcore player with a great satisfaction reward when it is achieved.

So, only after playing a few puzzles every player has established his own objectives based on the game rewards he wants to achieve. Casual players will keep just solving puzzles. With 1 star, doesn’t matter. Some other players will go for the 3 stars for every puzzle. Others will try to maximize score, others will fight for the first row at Game Center leaderboards… Actually, theoretically, all the players may go throughout all theses phases eventually. Ones earlier than others.

The “hidden” layers

So, to say it short, the casual player “only” needs the game to be fun. Most casual players are satisfied simply solving some puzzles (and skipping others). So, you “only” need a good game to satisfy casual players.

However, hardcore gamers need more. Obviously, they need a fun game but also a challenging one.

Next, you have some of the most interesting “hidden” layers of New Sokoban.

The bonus system

Initially New Sokoban was pure punishment. You take too long to solve a puzzle, you get punished. Used the undo option? You get punished. Used the restart option? You get punished. Hardcore players tolerate certain level of punishment in games. Actually, punishment enhance endogenous value in some sense. However, casual players hate to be punished by games. So, New Sokoban needed to be “positivated”, rewarding players instead of punishing them.

The advantage of positive balancing (rewarding) is that nobody hates it. Both casual and hardcore players love it. There are some types of games that need a minimum level of punishment to make sense. For example, games based on “lifes”. If you fall down you lose a life. If that mushroom touches you, you lose a life. However, New Sokoban is not that type of game. Actually, New Sokoban can be designed without any kind of punishment. And that was the way I finally followed. New Sokoban went from hell to heaven!

And the bonus system was born. All punishing features were reconverted to bonus ones. So, when you complete a puzzle the rewarding screen informs you about all the bonuses you acquired: time bonus, no undo/restart bonus, etc. And all the bonuses are translated to points that are added to your final score. The bonus system worked really well.

Moreover, the bonus system may be easily ignored. It can even be partially ignored. You decide which bonuses you are interested in and forget about the others.

The under par system

The under par system was added in the final stages of development. Hardcore testers were claiming for more complicated challenges with really satisfying rewards. And the under par system was created for that. Believing that 3 stars is the best possible solution and then discover that you solved one puzzle under par is very satisfying for a hardcore player.

Moreover, under par solutions adds a great score bonus to the puzzle final score.

The whole score system. Discovering how to get the best score possible

Initially, the score was based on the moves the player needed to solve the puzzle. Then, I added the bonus system. However, I needed a way that players fighting for the first position on Game Center could differentiate from each other. A system based on moves, stars or fixed bonuses produced very similar scores from player to player.

So I added the time bonus. Every puzzle records the time elapsed to solve it in tenths of a second. The final time bonus score is not calculated with a linear function. Instead of that I used and exponential one. That way, the time bonus score for long periods of time tends to be the same but you have tenths of a second precision for short periods of time (a few seconds). So, it’s almost impossible that two players get exactly the same score on Game Center.

This kind of precision adds interest to the Game Center leaderboards and makes the whole score system (moves, stars and bonuses) take a bigger dimension.

Game Center

Game Center in New Sokoban is the rope that tie everything together. Everything is related: moves are related to stars. Stars are related to score. Score is related to bonuses. Bonuses are related to achievements. Achievements are also related to leader boards and leaderboards are related to score again.

It’s a nice and elegant cycle that works really well.

Conclusion

I think that the time I spent designing the layered game rewards system of New Sokoban was worthwhile. The final result is elegant and almost every type of player feels comfortable with the rewards he receives.

Mental note: a very simple game with a sophisticated and well balanced rewards systems offers the best of the two sides: simplicity for casual gamers and challenge for hardcore ones.(source:gamasutra)