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从“鲸鱼”玩家的态度看F2P游戏的道德性(中)

发布时间:2013-12-23 11:34:33 Tags:,,,

作者:Mike Rose

他们持续表示,“为了大众的福祉,应该停止创造成瘾导向的游戏。如果这种游戏公司拒绝改变其运营方式,那么就只有等到它们破产了才能解决这个问题。虽然看到大家失业是件不幸的事,但这可能是清除游戏行业劣根性的一个痛苦的必要之举。”(请点击此处阅读本文上篇下篇

我向该员工说明了我调查过程中所听到的消息,他表示对此非常不安。“人们玩游戏的时候,实际上是将自己的时间和金钱托付给开发者。作为开发者,我们有责任确保我们给予玩家等值的回报。”

这名前游戏公司员工总结了一个要点:“激发人们自我毁灭的行为是错误的。”

“烟草和赌博行业的这一行为就是如此,有相当部分的游戏公司的类似行为同样令人遗憾。”

尽管如此,该员工表示他们并不认为政府干预会是解决问题的好方法。他指出,这类游戏使用的某些机制能够以更积极的方式运用于其他地方,“所以政府规范可能会给整个游戏行业带来附带损害。”

他补充表示,“根据他们过去的情况来看,我当然不相信国会通过处理电子游戏的相关立法提案。”

但这一问题仍然存在:当游戏找到和剥削鲸鱼用户时,F2P模式才最为管用。

他指出,“如果玩家没有在游戏中花钱,就几乎无法在游戏中获得进展,那说明这款F2P游戏明显是针对鲸鱼用户而设计。允许玩家在不花钱的情况下继续向最高级的关卡挑战的游戏,比较不具有剥削性。至少他们并没有积极鼓励成瘾行为。”

现在他已经不在F2P游戏领域工作,也乐于制作不会剥削玩家的游戏。“我现在正开发严肃游戏,也就是那种可能对世界产生实际积极效应的游戏。我很抱歉自己过去的作做作为,但我保证用未来的行动弥补过去所做的一切。”

F2P开发者的观点

很显然,虽然大部分F2P付费用户推动了这一商业模式的发展,但也有不少人的生活因为这些游戏而被搞得一团糟。鉴于这一看法,我选择了那些与开发者直接相关的言论,试图查明为何这些人会在游戏中如此挥霍。

《战地英雄》就是开发者强调鼓励玩家花钱的一个活生生的教材。该游戏最初发布时是一款真正的F2P游戏。玩家可以直接进入游戏,试玩任何内容,通过刷任务获得特定道具,一般都能免费获得不少乐趣。

不幸的是,花钱所投入的钱并不足以支撑游戏运营,所以游戏进行了大规模的价格调整。这样玩家在游戏中能看到和操作的内容进一步受限,并且需要刷更多任务才可能解琐道具——当然,除非他们花钱。

在前文提到的John开始对游戏成瘾时,Ben Cousins是当时的《战地英雄》高级制作人。Cousins现在为DeNA开发F2P游戏,并且是F2P模式的坚定支持者。

ben cousins(from tuaw.com)

ben cousins(from tuaw.com)

在看过John的故事后,Cousins想起当初游戏进行价格调整时,有无数玩家为此不满。导致游戏的官方论坛出现了诸多消极评价,以及类似John的这种案例。

但Cousins也指出,价格调整带来了游戏收益,它保住了该游戏开发团队许多人的饭碗。实际上,由于迫使玩家为道具刷更多任务,以及引进那些能够给付费玩家带来优势的道具,这个EA开发团队引起了粉丝间的骚动——但与此同时却保证了游戏的长期收益,因为有许多这种玩家一直在游戏中逗留并服从了这种新的价格制度。

Cousins表示“我认为控制产品或服务的开销是用户的责任,除非有科学证据表明他们对产品和服务的成瘾就像酒精和赌博一样严重。如果能够证实游戏与成瘾存在关系,我认为游戏行业应该首先进行自律,如果他们无法对此负责,那就要服从政府调控。”

他补充表示,目前尚无明显证据表明F2P“鲸鱼”与成瘾性之间存在直接关系,“我个人希望,在我们做出任何有关消极心理效应的结论之前,有广泛的独立工作室来证明这一点。”

Cousins还热衷于强调我所收到的过于消极的反馈也许只能代表一小撮“鲸鱼”用户的情况。

他称“调查一小部分样本,通常很难得到由此推及更大范围群体的准确数据。我认为如果我们发现有大量付费用户声称自己出现这一症状,那么我们才能够说开发者发现了一种极具破坏性的用户心理操纵方式。”

“如果只有非常非常小部分的用户有此反应,那就很遗憾了,我们只能认为是这些用户的个人问题,他们的消极情况可能不仅仅是出现于在F2P游戏上花钱。我相信几乎任何产品或服务也可能发现这种极少部分的消极成瘾案例。”

他对此澄清道:“我并不是这就一定是对的,而是说我们要搜集更广泛的数据才能下此结论。”

我询问Cousins他在DeNA的团队采用了什么系统来减少可能被F2P游戏剥削的玩家数量。

他答曰:“我们所采用的系统就只是团队游戏开发者自己的道德判断。我们通常会拒绝那些我们自认为存在剥削性的理念。我也建议其他开发者这么做,但每款游戏都有自身独特性,这里并没有什么通用的金律玉律。”

有一名主流社交游戏公司的业内人士告诉我,我所获得的案例是“非常极端,非常规的情况”。

这位人士指出游戏公司已经在服从诸多行业规范——消费者保护法要求游戏公司公平对待玩家。他引据我收到的案例指出,“我们并不希望玩家这么没有节制地玩游戏,因为这一点也不好玩,这也不是我们游戏的本意。”

“我们游戏的设计旨在让玩家享受短时间而非长期的体验,”——这位人士引据前文提及的《Mafia Wars》妈妈用户的行为指出,“这并非我们设计游戏的初衷。”

他还表示,自己所在公司的游戏回合都很短——其最热门的游戏回合一般为10分钟。公司有意设计短时间的游戏回合,这样玩家可以同他人联系。与多数F2P公司一样,游戏中的付费用户比例也相当之低。

我联系了其他F2P开发者,其中包括Nexon北美PR总监Mike Crouch,他很有兴趣回答我的问题,但在几周的接触之后却不再提及这一话题。

与此同时,Valve的Doug Lombardi却并不发表对这些玩家反馈的看法,不过他之后却有再同我联系谈论与此不相关的话题。

虽然最初索尼在线娱乐似乎有意同我讨论《PlanetSide 2》这款游戏,但最后却告知公司无意对此做出回应。

更大的益处

并非每个F2P工作室都瞄准“鲸鱼”玩家。在我执行调查过程中,《坦克世界》开发商Wargaming.net调整了其F2P战略,移除了所有的“付费获胜”选项,确保玩家无法花钱获得战斗优势。

Wargaming.net发行副总裁Andrei Yarantsau表示,“我们并不想压榨玩家,我们只想在公平对待玩家的基础上传送游戏体验和服务,无论他们是否在游戏中花钱。”

他补充表示,“F2P游戏有时候会被视为低质量的产品,我们希望通过《坦克世界》证实F2P游戏也有可能是高质量和平衡的游戏。

Wargaming.net并非唯一信奉这一原则的公司。Hi-Rez Studios发布了一系列F2P游戏,其中包括《Global Agenda》以及更受赞誉的《Tribes:Ascend》。

Tribes Ascend(from coolpctips.com)

Tribes Ascend(from coolpctips.com)

这两者的F2P模式都受到了玩家的欢迎:你可以免费下载游戏,尽情体验游戏,可以花钱购买其中的炫耀性道具,但不会获得战斗优势。

Hi-Rez首席运营官Todd Harris表示,他的公司所奉行的F2P哲学很简单:玩家会记得哪款游戏和哪家公司具有剥削性,并逐渐退也这些吸金工具,转向那些尊重玩家的游戏。

他称“你所提到的案例中的玩家很可能不会再去玩出自该发行商和开发者的游戏,我们要目光长远,维护工作室的品牌。我认为有些游戏有可能短期内能够获得商业成功,但我们工作室的品牌和定位不一样,我们瞄准的是那些希望在公平的战场上玩游戏的用户,我们希望他们通过以往的经历,认识到未来的Hi-Rez游戏会提供公平的战场而非剥削性的体验。”
你可能会认为Hi-Rez的收益并不像更具剥削性的工作室那么可观,但需要注意的是,约有10%的《Tribes:Ascend》玩家会在游戏中花钱——这一数据远高于我所听闻的其他F2P开发高1%、3%、5%的付费比例。Harris称这就是信任的力量,玩家觉得自己所花的钱值当。

“我并不能预言未来,但我们工作室认为有相当部分的玩家希望体验更多公平的游戏。我们所开发的正是这类产品。无论‘花钱买地位’的玩家数量会增长还是缩水……工作室都应该有所准备。”

“我个人认为剥削性的游戏会随着时间发展逐渐减少,如果你看看那些当前最为成功的游戏,例如《英雄联盟2》、《Dota 2》,以及我们自己的游戏,就会知道它们并不奉行付费获胜的理念。所以这些游戏会更有吸引力。”

我询问Harris他是否建议其他F2P工作室采用与Hi-Rez和Wargaming.net目前所运用的方法,他的回答很简单:“亡羊补牢为时未晚。”

Harris也认为政府干预并不是个好主意——事实上,他认为这是“游戏行业最不需要的东西”。

“但游戏记者和评论员可以发挥很大作用——他们可以报道游戏究竟有无‘剥削性’,我不认为游戏评论员为某款游戏贴上‘画面质量卓越’或‘音效出众’有多大用处——现在有这么多F2P游戏,大家自己试玩一下就知道质量如何了。即便是付费游戏,玩家也可以通过YouTube上的画面和玩法视频了解其质量。但‘剥削性机制’则难以通过一个预告视频中看出来,所以游戏评论员应该在这方面多出点力。”——未完待续

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

Chasing the Whale: Examining the ethics of free-to-play games

by Mike Rose

“The creation of addiction-driven games needs to stop, for the sake of everyone those games take advantage of,” they continued. “If companies like [that company] refuse to change how they conduct business, then the problem will only be solved if they go out of business. While it is unfortunate that people are losing their jobs, that may be a necessary, painful step in ridding the world of one of the harmful aspects of gaming.”

I showed the stories I had found to the employee, who found them upsetting. “When people play games, they are entrusting the developers with their time and money,” they told me. “As developers, we have a responsibility to make sure that we give them something equally valuable in return.”

The ex-employee says that it all comes down to one main point: “Enabling self-destructive behavior is wrong.”

“It’s wrong when the tobacco and gambling industries do it, and it’s a shame that portions of the game industry do it too,” they added.

Despite this, the former free-to-play employee says that they don’t believe government regulation would be a good way to fix the issue. As they point, some of the mechanics utilized in these games are used elsewhere in a more positive way, “so regulation could cause collateral damage across the games industry.”

They added, “Based on their track record, I certainly don’t trust Congress to pass responsible legislation dealing with video games.”

And yet, the trouble still remains: The free-to-play model has been proven to work best when games find and exploit whales.

“Any [free-to-play] game that makes it virtually impossible to advance beyond a certain point without spending money was almost certainly designed with whales in mind,” the employee notes.

“Games that allow players to advance to the highest level without spending anything are less exploitative. At least they don’t actively encourage addiction.”

Now that my source is out of the free-to-play space, they are happy to be making games that don’t exploit players anymore. “I’m now working on serious games, which have the potential to produce a substantial, positive effect on the world,” they tell me. “I’m sorry for what I’ve done, but I promise to more than make up for it in the future.”
Free-to-play developers speak.

It’s clear, then, that while a large portion of free-to-play consumers are able to take business model in stride, there are also those whose lives are being strained and, in some cases, even ruined by a number of these games. With this in mind, I took the commentary I had found straight to the developers, to gauge what exactly is going on, and why these people are spending as much as they do.

Battlefield Heroes is an instructive example of a developer moving toward an emphasis on incentivizing players to pay. When the game originally launched, it was a true free-to-play game.

Players could jump into the game, sample everything it had to offer, grind a bit to unlock specific elements, but generally get plenty of enjoyment out of it for free.

Unfortunately, the amount of money coming in wasn’t good enough to keep the game afloat, and so a large-scale price restructuring was developed, as detailed in this article. With this in place, players were now a lot more restricted in what they could see and do, and had far more grinding to go through to unlock items — unless, of course, they chose to pay real money.

Ben Cousins was the senior producer on Battlefield Heroes back at the time when John (whose story is told above) found himself addicted to the game. Cousins now works on free-to-play games for DeNA, and is an outspoken proponent of the free-to-play model.

Upon reading John’s story, Cousins remarked that numerous Heroes players were upset when the price restructuring occurred within the game. This led to lots of negative comments on the official forums, and stories such as John’s.

However, Cousins notes that the restructuring led to an influx of revenue, it had the effect of safeguarding of many jobs on the Heroes team. Essentially, by forcing players to grind just that little bit more for items in the game, and by introducing weapons that gave paying players an advantage, the development team at EA caused an uproar among fans — yet suddenly its long-term revenue was assured, as many of these very same players stuck around and submitted to the new pricing regime.

“I believe that the responsibility to control spending on any product or service lies with the consumer, unless there is some scientifically proven link to addiction as is the case with products and services like alcohol and gambling,” Cousins tells me. “When these links are established, I feel industries should self-govern first and if they fail to act responsibly, be subject to governmental control.”

He adds that there is currently no proven link between free-to-play “whales” and addiction. “I would personally like to see wide-ranging independent studies done before we jump to any conclusions about any negative psychological effects.”

Cousins is also keen to stress that the overly negative responses that I received may well only represent a very small proportion of “whales.”

“When looking at a small sample size there is always going to be a lack of certainty in extrapolating that data to a larger population,” he says. “I think if we see a broad proportion of the spending userbase reacting as they claim to have in these accounts, it’s easier to read this as the developers having discovered a damaging method of psychological consumer manipulation.”

“When a very, very small proportion of the userbase react in this manner, while sad, it’s easier to read this as perhaps individual issues with those people which may be expressed in any number of negative ways, not just with spending in free-to-play games. I’m sure small numbers of very negative stories could be found for spending on almost any product or service.”

He clarifies: “I’m not suggesting either is true, just that we would need to do a broader set of data gathering before I’m comfortable reaching any conclusions.”

I ask Cousins what systems his team at DeNA has in place to reduce the number of players who can potentially be exploited in its free-to-play games.

“The systems we have in place are simply our own moral judgment as a team of game developers,” he answers. “We regularly reject ideas out of hand because we feel they are potentially exploitative. I suggest other developers do the same, but individual games are unique and there are no hard-and-fast rules.”

An industry source at one major social game company told me that the stories I received are “pretty extreme, and definitely not the norm.”

The source noted that game companies are already subject to a number of regulations — consumer protection laws that require companies to treat players fairly. Citing the stories I received, the source said, “We wouldn’t want our players to be playing like this, because it’s just not fun, and it’s not what the purpose of our games is.”

“Our games are made so that you have short play sessions,” the source added. “Our games aren’t meant for these long play sessions where” — the source references the story of the mother playing Mafia Wars — “those are not what [our] games are about.”

The source said the company’s game sessions are short — about 10 minutes for some of its most popular games. The company purposely makes game sessions short, such that players will connect with others, the source said. Like most free-to-play businesses, very low percentages of customers pay any money at all.

I also got in contact with other free-to-play developers, including those mentioned in the stories I received. Nexon’s North American director of PR, Mike Crouch, appeared to be interested in providing me with answers, but after weeks of correspondence went quiet on the topic.

Meanwhile, Valve’s Doug Lombardi chose not to respond to my multiple requests for comment, even though he did get back to me on an unrelated topic in the meanwhile.

And while it at first appeared that Sony Online Entertainment might talk to me about PlanetSide 2, I was eventually told that the company wasn’t interested in responding.

For the greater good

Not every free-to-play studio is gunning for the “whales.” While I was conducting my research, World of Tanks developer Wargaming.net revealed to Gamasutra that it is changing up its free-to-play strategy, removing all “pay-to-win” options and making sure that players cannot pay money to gain an advantage in battle.

“We don’t want to nickel and dime our players,” Wargaming.net’s VP of publishing Andrei Yarantsau told us. “We want to deliver gaming experiences and services that are based on the fair treatment of our players, whether they spend money in-game or not.”

“Free-to-play games have the challenge of being sometimes viewed as low quality, and we want World of Tanks to serve as proof that a quality and balanced free-to-play game is possible,” he added.

Wargaming.net isn’t the only company that feels this way. Hi-Rez Studios has released a string of free-to-play titles, including Global Agenda and the more widely acclaimed Tribes: Ascend.

Both are notable in that players are very accepting of these versions of “free-to-play”: You can download the game for free, and then play for as long as you want, with no advantages given to those people who choose to purchase vanity items and the like.

Todd Harris, COO at Hi-Rez, tells me that his company’s free-to-play philosophy is simple: Players will remember which games and companies are exploitative, and gradually over time, we’ll see a shift away from these money-grabbers, to the games that treat the players with respect.

“The players in the stories [you've related] are likely to not play a game from that publisher or developer again,” he reasons. “Our perspective is a long-term thing, thinking about the studio brand.”

“I think there’s cases where it financially works in the short-term for that title,” he continues. “In our case, our studio brand and positioning is different, and we are particularly looking for gamers that expect a fair battlefield, and we want them to know that in a future Hi-Rez game, from past experiences, that they should get a fair battlefield and not get an exploitive feeling.”

While you might guess that Hi-Rez doesn’t make as much money as some of these more exploitative studios, it’s notable that around 10 percent of Tribes: Ascend players choose to pay money — a figure that is much larger than the 1, 3, and 5 percents that I’ve heard from the majority of other free-to-play developers. Harris reasons that this is down to trust, and players feeling like they are getting their money’s worth.

“I don’t have a crystal ball, but our studio thinks that there are enough players that want more of a sports-like fair game,” he says. “That’s the type of titles that we are developing. Whether the audience of the other type — ‘pay for status’ — whether that is growing or shrinking… you know, studios have to place their bets.”

“I personally think that it’s going to go down over time,” he adds, “because if you look at the games that are having the most success — League of Legends, Dota 2, as well as our own titles — they are not perceived that way, not perceived to be pay-to-win as much. So those games seem to be having more traction.”

I asked Harris whether he would advise other free-to-play studios to consider taking the approach that both Hi-Rez and Wargaming.net are currently running with. His response was simply, “Better late than never.”

Harris is also of the view that government regulation would not be a good idea — in fact, he describes it as “the last thing gaming needs.”

“But game journalists and reviewers could play a valuable role — in reporting how ‘exploitive’ specific titles are or are not,” he says. “I don’t think a game critic’s rating of ‘Graphics Quality’ or ‘Audio Quality’ is all that important anymore — now that so many games are free-to-play, people can try for themselves. And even with buy-to-play, potential buyers can see graphics and gameplay on YouTube or via live streaming.”

“But ‘exploitive mechanics’ could be harder to detect in a single ‘Let’s Play’ video, so game critics could help a lot in that area,” he adds. (source:gamasutra


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