作者：Tim Huntsman

之前我讨论了“执行”过程，即作为设计师你在早期设计过程中可能要做的事情。其焦点在于提问题，找到人们的需求，找到项目的重点，将其转化成人们可用（以及会用）的形式。本文指在为你提供一些在早期设计和执行阶段你应该考虑的思维框架。

考虑因素

这个“思考”章节包含了作为设计师和产品整体愿景把控者在提升游戏质量方面应该考虑的信息。思考是游戏设计过程的一部分。你应该与参与游戏项目的人保持联系，你应该知道项目进展，相关负责人，并要能够回答他们任何人对产品可能提出的任何问题。

1.提出更多问题：

以下部分内容也可以运用于开发过程。这是你进入Alpha阶段应该提出的问题，并且必须在你进入Beta阶段时终结的问题。（这样你才会知道自己处于哪个阶段，我一般将Alpha理解为你所有的“主要”技术已经到位，但还没有100%可行的阶段，这也适用于音频和美工；而Beta则意味着游戏中该有的一切都已到位，只需要进行一些调整和漏洞修复即可。）

我们的前端/失误如何运行？

这里适用的是“最简化原则”。永远不要强迫玩家经过六七个画面才能接触到真正的玩法，除非游戏的确有此必要。以合乎逻辑的方式设置游戏，不要害怕给予玩家提供帮助，或者告诉他们每个屏幕中相应按钮的功能。另管委会原则就是：如果你要求玩家为保存游戏而输入一个名称，那就要允许他们点击“返回”键来保存，而不是强迫他们用鼠标点击“保存”按钮，更不要说是删除一个旧的保存项目来腾出更多空间了。

这还要考虑到你将如何令玩家配置自己的游戏体验。

许多公司在前端服务这方面做得很不尽如人意。他们提供的选择很有限，导致玩家难以导航这些选项。这一点适用于大多数PC游戏公司而非主机游戏公司。主机游戏公司有自己坚持的标准。总之要允许玩家易于调整一些你所允许调整的东西。另外我还要补充一句，开发者完全应该让玩家知道自己该摁菜单屏幕上的哪个按钮。

应该包含什么选项或模式？

这个特殊问题可以是“我们该如何向玩家授权？”越来越多玩家希望能够“组建”自己的游戏。在《雷神之锤》的玩家特制关卡、皮肤以及音效中可以看出这一点，我所参与开发的《WWWF Warzone》和《WWF Attitude》也可以看到这种现象。给予玩家一些对环境的控制权可以增加你作品的重玩价值。Konami的《International Superstar Soccer ’98》就采用了相同的理念，允许玩家创造真正或幻想的团队，并将其用于长期的竞赛中。赋予玩家很酷的功能、选项和游戏模式还可以让你创造一个忠实的粉丝基础，他们有可能源源不断地购买你的游戏续作。

向你的作品添加选项和模式的简单方法就是询问你的测试部门（或者发行商），或者找一些焦点小组来进行测试。人人都有自己的看法，你最好听听大家的意见。

游戏节奏如何？

很简单的问题。整个游戏是否过于冗长？通常情况下，你会发现游戏太短。玩家掏出20至70美元不等的钞票来购买一款游戏，就是希望得到物有所值的回报。关于整个游戏体验究竟应该有多长并没有明确的规定（街机游戏除外），但玩家自己会感觉到花出去的钱是否值当。

第二个考虑就是，以你评价一本书或一部电影的方式来考虑游戏节奏设置。你的产品是否过于拖拉，让玩家不耐烦？它是否会因为速度太快而崩溃，从来不给予玩家喘气或者思考自己该怎么做的时间？节奏有变化是好事，但要记住如何管理这些变化。

究竟多困难才算困难？

考虑难度的时候要倾听QA的反馈。玩家能够以数分钟，数小时还是数天时间完成游戏？要记住那些购买游戏的玩家需求，而不是一味地迎合那些已经有6到9个月时间一直在玩这款游戏的QA测试者。无论如何都要考虑到，你的测试者所能接受的难度也许会令那些可能购买游戏的用户退却，导致他们因为无关闯过第一关而拒绝游戏。不幸的是，调整关卡难度（游戏邦注：如调整AI以及平衡游戏玩法）是一项艰难而耗时的任务，它需要所有参与项目的人共同解决。

我们该如何整合过场动画，FMV？

第一个问题很简单：你是否真的需要这种东西，或者说你的游戏没有它是否也能存活下来？如果真的有必要，可以试试“游戏内置”影片而不是预渲染的电影式恶作剧。这不但有助于保持玩家渲染感，也可以让你的转场对玩家来说更为流畅。《合金装备》、《半条命》以及《Soul Reaver》就是游戏内置影片的杰出典型。

我们该如何从中获得重玩价值？

有些游戏结束就是结束了。游戏中的一切惊喜也戛然而止。而有些游戏却可以让人反复体验，要不就是因为其中还有更多可探索的内容，要不就是因为它可以让玩家做一些个性化行为（如打败一个高分）。

我们的载入/保存时间如何？

没有人会想长久地坐等游戏完成载入。索尼在游戏加载方面有自己的标准，对于N64平台来说这并不是个问题。而PC游戏开发者就必须要求程序员优化这一点，因为这也是整个游戏体验的一部分。

顺便提醒一句，要允许玩家在自己所需的地方进行保存，除非游戏真的有必要阻止他们保存。PC平台的《Reflection’s Driver》就是一个强迫玩家先通过三四个场景才能保存游戏的例子。你应该知道这种做法有多令人讨厌，千万不可对玩家做这种事，除非只有这样做才能维持你游戏的基本设计功能。（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）

2.良好的习惯，敏锐的观察力，以及趣味因素

合并设计文档，日程安排和预算。

在预制作设计阶段之中，或者之后必须马上安排项目的真正相关数据，时间和日期。上述词语的通常问题在于，对于每个概念，你必须有不同的人来处理相关数据。他们彼此之间可能联系并不紧密。许多公司喜欢说，“我们必须填补这里的空白！你们要在8个月内做完这款游戏！”你的回答就是，“别做梦了，如果真是这样，那我们就需要更多资金和资源！”当然，他们并不想给你更多资金和资源来执行计划。这正是将所有相关团体引进开发过程的好处所在，让大家齐聚一堂来处理相关数据。这也正是它有助于将你的设计分解成需求、任务和功能的原因。

在你提炼设计细节的时候，正是检查资源和预算考虑因素的最佳时机，当然除非你此时根本无需考虑日程安排或预算安排。但如果你是负责引导产品设计方向的人，你就很应该处理好里程安排和预算考虑因素。一次性将所有相关人员召集到一起并列出具体数据。这个过程很痛苦，但从长期来看完成是值得的。记住，当设计文档变化，或者功能重新回炉时，你就要观察一下其中的影响并想想这是否会拖延你的开发进程。

更新设计文档

这听起来很简单，但在漫长的开发时间和压力之下，这可能会让大家忽略一些细节。你可能会在一个深夜的临时会议中提到一个功能，并打算在明天早上执行这个调整。你就应该将这个调整记录在档，尤其是在你打算一年制作一个续集的时候，这样你就会记得自己最初做的事情了。

当团队中的任何人决定完成一个功能，调整一个功能，或者添加一个功能时，就必须注明这种变化，将其记录在案，并且告知所有人。如果你已经创造了一个在线风格的设计文档，你最好让团队获知其运行机制和相关职责。

记录设计日志

这听起来很直观，即坚持记录项目开发过程中的正确经验和失败教训。你可以保持每周记录一次的习惯，除非你正处于赶工时期。这样做有诸多好处。首先，它可以让你在数月后想起你在项目早期所学到或没有掌握的情况，以免你在超时工作的压力下淡忘了经验教训。其次，它可以让你在事后分析项目开发过程中人们所遇到的关键问题。最后，它有助于你在相关媒体上发表一篇事后分析文章，这样就可以让同行设计师学习你的经验，何乐而不为呢？

批判性地评估

当你查看执行功能时，你所能做的最好的事情之一就是严肃评估竞争对手的情况。不要吤因为它们先于你的作品面市而抨击竞争对手，而要对其进行评估。每款游戏，无论它有多可恶，都有一些值得别人学的经验。这里的主要教训就在于避免犯下会扼杀一款竞争产品的相同错误。

要全面地查看一款游戏，看看它们的前端是否容易理解，检查其控制器设置，查看屏幕的实际使用率，并测试游戏内的计时问题和控制器取样。这样可以让你的开发工作更加省时省力。如果其他游戏在某些方面表现良好，可以借鉴该理念或想法。你只需确保自己并没有照搬照抄该理念。记住：优秀的设计并不仅仅表现在理念上，它还涉及到这些理念的执行。

当然，在某些时候你也得用这些批判性的目光来看待自己的作品。测试反馈可以派上一些用场，在看待你自己的产品时，一定要把那点可怜的自尊心收起来。有些作品之所以失败就是因为开发者个人自尊与大众意见相抗，采用了扼杀了玩法的功能。

趣味因素

有些公司想让你制作出“趣味因素”。休闲玩家和一般用户都无法明确什么是真正的趣味。他们会告诉你某些东西很有趣，但他们无法告诉你游戏发生了什么情况，以及他们做出了什么回应。趣味一般是与特定游戏的节奏、时机和兴奋感等概念有关。这些是你可以理念论的内容，告诉人们“打这个人很好玩！”但除非你自己花时间去玩游戏去实践这一操作，否则就永远无法知道究竟有多好玩。作为设计师，你必须有能力批判性地评估竞争对手的情况。查看它们如何处理特定问题并对其进行记录。

趣味因素来自鉴别玩家在游戏中所做的事情，如何做事，持续在不会生厌的情况下做该事情的能力。这是执行游戏设计的一个棘手环节。许多人对细节存在诸多争议。解决这个问题的一个方法就是通过你的QA部门过滤合理的信息和反馈。

3.“禁忌”列表

这个“禁忌”列表对我来说已经发展成为十大诫律。它们已经发展了多年，通常会在玩游戏过程中标注和扩展。它们是我注意到，意识到以及与同行讨论的东西。我还注意到其中有些规则反复在游戏审查和评价中出现。

与所有优秀规则一样，它们也是可以被打破的。当然，你可以打破规则，但你最好确信自己有足够的底气打破这些规则。

1）永远不要让游戏过度复杂化。也就是之前所说的“保持简单性原则”。像我们这类已经上了一定年纪，知道何为“经典”电子游戏时代的人，都知道那时候大家很可能在屏幕前坐上数小时玩游戏。游戏包括一个简单的前提或者控制输入方法。这些游戏并不会受限于技术，而是牢靠的试验概念。保持简单性原则在今天仍然适用。《吃豆人》有一个摇杆和一个迷宫。《俄罗斯方块》有一些简单的形状从空中缓缓落下。即使是《雷神之锤III竞技场》也遵从了保持简单性原则不复杂化主要目标的理念，也就是不断轰炸你的竞争对手直到你的手酸为止。游戏情境可能会因玩家期待或技术而变化，但其原则却仍然管用。

从前的街机游戏设计师清楚自己在做什么。这里的理念就在于他们有30秒时间将用户引进游戏并维持其兴趣。人们也愿意投掷20美分来玩游戏。如果他们无法立即看到投币产生的效果，他们就不会再继续投入20美分。你必须快速抓住玩家，这要靠保持简单性来实现。下回你去E3或类似展会时，就要花点时间观察人们玩游戏的行为而不只是游戏本身。看看究竟是什么吸引了玩家的注意力。找到人们爱不释手的游戏，然后带着批判性的眼光自己试试这款游戏。

2）永远不要重复犯相同的错误。批判性地评估竞争对手意味着你得看看游戏中的得与失。这意味着如果你在制作一款类似题材的游戏，你应该借鉴它们做得好的方面，避开它们失败的方面。除非你真的很有时间，或者有更好的方法，不然就不要另起炉灶重头制作自己的游戏。

3）永远不要剥夺玩家的控制权。不要让玩家干坐着观看不必要的动画、过场动画或者音乐插曲。《合金装备》在使用运行时间转场吸引玩家注意力方面表现出色。Valve的《半条命》则是另一个利用转场拿走玩家控制权，但却不会让人察觉的杰出例子。Cinimatix游戏《Revenant》则是一个糟糕的例子，因为其开发者的脚本引擎总是让玩家在抓狂中摁压ESC键时，在屏幕上出现一些无所事事的角色。这个原则也适用于“游戏内部”事件。许多战斗、动作或者其他游戏中的一个普通问题就在于，当玩家正好是在与竞争对手“战斗”时被“卡”在一个点击反应循环中。玩家此时就会连续三四次挨打，却毫无还手之力。这真是个令人抓狂的缺陷。

4）永远不要忘了用来玩游戏的控制器或I/O设备。PC游戏移植到主机平台时会出现一些显而易见的问题。你很难用Playstation控制器输入16个不同热键的动作。你得知道角色在游戏中会有什么举动，同时你还要知道玩家如何在游戏世界中驾驭角色。这适用于导航库存屏幕以及复杂的选择机制。一般情况下，你应该总是服从保持简单性原则。

5）永远不要假设玩家知道你的想法。玩家通常是聪明的群体，能够自己快速意会现存的谜题或情境。因此，设计师必须想方设法挑战玩家。有时候，我们会通过向他们呈现一些对我们来说挺合理，对执行测试的QA来说颇合理，但却无法令对游戏很陌生的玩家理解的东西，毕竟他们不像我们一样在过去9个月中一直同这款游戏打交道。《Soul Reaver》是遵从和打破这一原则的杰出典型。游戏的教程环节出色地将玩家引进游戏世界。但在某些节点上，游戏却会在没有任何解释的情况下让你去做一些事情。例如，游戏会让你向北走，但游戏中却并没有指南针，那我怎么知道哪条路是向北？光是理清这个问题就花了我4个小时的时间。

6）永远不要打破既定规则，除非你已告知玩家。有不少游戏是通过不允许玩家操纵其环境来向玩家传授游戏习惯。这并无不妥，但如果在之后你决定允许玩家使用一些不同于之前的方法时，一定要告诉他们！《合金装备》就很擅长此道。该游戏信息让你知道自己必须完成特定目标。在这一切发生时它会有一些悬念，但也好过让你挣扎数小时忘却之前学到的一些经验。对玩家隐瞒信息不应该划入谜题的范畴。这里还有个相应的说法就是，让你的谜题在一定程度上与现成的逻辑相关。《Return to Zork》就是一个逻辑与解决谜题毫无关系的例子，玩家就是因为这个原因而对游戏失去兴趣。

7）永远不要认为技术可以弥补糟糕的设计。这是行业在过去数年反复打破的一个大规则，我们每年都可以看到不少游戏声称自己实现了特定的技术成就，例如拥有“最为真实感的AI！”但如果要问游戏是否有趣，答案就不尽然相同了。如果游戏并不有趣，就没有人会想去玩。

有些时候技术的确可以缓解糟糕的设计。例如提升帧率和令图像更流畅。但有些技术却无法令普通的终端用户买帐。他们通常并不了解或关心技术标准，他们只想知道游戏是否好玩。

这方面的例子包括Terminal Reality的PC游戏产品《Nocturne》。该游戏拥有出色的“即时照明和阴影”技术，可让游戏实现一些真正惊悚的效果，但每次屏幕上同时出现2个以上的怪物时，画面帧率就开始大打折扣，在某些时候令玩家的战斗功能几乎失效，真是令人受挫的体验。

8）永远不要认为授权就是品牌保证。世界上没有哪一层关系可以助你热卖一款次品。这一规则也有些例外情况，但同第7）点一样，玩家只想知道游戏是否有趣。

9）永远不要欺骗玩家。这里的基本规则就是玩家如果做不到，CPU就不应该做得到。对程序员来说，设置完美的AI相当容易，但要让AI表现得像人类一样则更为困难。太过于聪明的怪物AI会给人不真实的感觉，因为它们做了一些人类玩家式的行为。

10）永远不要操纵道德感。如果玩家发现利用保存功能，可以绕过你游戏的一个“功能”，那就随他们去吧。我们在《Baldur’s Gate》或《Jagged Alliance II》等RPG中可以看到此类问题。我自己就曾经盲目地派出一些人去寻找坏人的来源，然后再重新载入游戏并据此制定计划。不要因为玩家重新载入某次失败的尝试而惩罚他们。这方面的特殊例子当属《Baldur’s Gate-Tales of the Sword Coast》的扩展内容包。它们有一个功能，如果你重新载入之前保存的游戏，它们就会向你抛出更多怪物或者为你制造更多障碍。如果玩家想保存自己的游戏，走进房间看有什么东西跳出来，然后再重新载入和重新配置自己的角色，那就允许他们这么做吧。这有什么关系呢？我们又不设计道德。如果玩家想“作弊”，那就随他们去吧，如果你能想出一个不惹恼玩家的方法那就更好了。（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）

A Primer for the Design Process, Part 2:

by Tim Huntsman

What to Think About

Previously, I talked about the “Do” process, about what you as a designer can do as you ramp-up in the early design process. The focus was on asking questions, finding out what people want, getting a focus for your project, and putting it into a format everyone could (and would) use. This next section should help in giving you some insight about the frame of mind you should be in during the early design and implementation phase.

Contents

Asking Even More Questions

Good Habits, A Critical Eye, and the Fun Factor

The list of “NEVER”

What to Think About:

The “Think” section contains info that you, as the Designer and maintainer of the overall vision of the product, should be thinking about to improve the quality of your game. To be thinking is to be involved in the design process. You should be in constant contact with all the people working on your title. You should know what goes where, who’s supposed to put it there, and be able to answer just about any question anyone might have about the product.

1. Asking Even More Questions:

The following section can be employed through the development process. These are things you should be asking as you go Alpha, and they should be finalized before you go Beta. (Just so you know where I’m coming from, I’ve always understood the terms Alpha and Beta as they apply to game development in the following way: Alpha means that all of your “major” technology is in place, but not working 100%. This also applies to sound and art. Beta means that everything that’s supposed to be in the game IS in the game. It’s all down to tweaking and bug hunting from there to turnover.)

How is our front-end/fluff going to flow?

The “KISS” rule applies here (See “Never” rule #1.) Don’t force the player to filter through 6 or 7 screens to get to the game play unless it’s absolutely necessary to the game. Put things in their logical place, and don’t be afraid to give the player help or tell them what buttons do what within each screen. Another rule for you PC developers out there: If you’re going to make me type a new name for a game save, please allow me to hit the “return” key to save instead of forcing me to go back to the mouse and click on the “save” button. I won’t even talk about deleting an old save to free up some space.

This also includes thinking about what you’re going to let the player do to configure their individual gaming experience.

On a side-note-many companies have front ends that, to put it simply, suck. They have limited options, navigating these options is a task Uri Geller couldn’t fake, and it’s usually a chore to try to configure something for your own liking. This comment holds true for the vast majority of PC game companies and not consoles. The console companies have standards that they are held to. Make it easy for players to modify things that you’re going to allow them to modify. And, I might add, there’s absolutely nothing wrong with giving players instructions on what button(s) they need to press to make something happen on a menu screen.

What options or modes should be included?

Creating a player in International Superstar Soccer ’98

This particular question could be restated as, “How can we empower the player?” More and more players want to “mod” their games. I’ve seen this with the popularity of Quake mods-special fan-made levels, skins, and sound FX-and in games I’ve worked on like WWF Warzone and WWF Attitude. Giving players some measure of control over their environment will do wonders to increase the replay value of your title. It pumps up the “cool” factor. Konami’s International Superstar Soccer ’98 had the same create a player idea allowing the player to make either real or fantasy teams and using them in long-term tournaments.

Empowering the player with cool features, options, and game modes also has a definite payback in the fact that you will build a loyal fan-base that will buy into the franchise you create. (Sequels, people, sequels.)

A simple way to find options and modes to add to your title is to ask your testing department (or your publishers) or get some focus group testing done. Everyone has an opinion, you might as well listen to them.

How’s the pacing?

Simple question. Is the overall game too long? Usually, you’ll find that the game’s too short. Players fork out anywhere from $20 to $70+ bucks for a game and it better be worth it. There are no rules on just how long the total gaming experience should be (with the exception of arcade titles) but players should feel like they got their money’s worth.

A secondary consideration is to consider in-game pacing in the same way you’d critique a book or a film. Does your product drag its heels for an ungodly long time, boring the player to tears from one scene to the next? Does it go crashing through it’s paces at breakneck speed, never giving the player time to catch a breath or reflect on what he’s supposed to actually be doing other than surviving? ‘Balance the flow’ are the words to remember. Changes in tempo are a good thing but remember to take care how you manage those changes.

How hard is hard?

Get QA’s feedback when considering the difficulty. Can players breeze through your game in minutes, in hours, or days? Remember the players who are buying your game, and don’t always look to please the QA testers who have been playing the game solid for the last 6 to 9 months. Whatever is going to be considered difficult for your testers will probably cream the average player who might purchase your game, and force them to return it because they can’t get past the first level. More than three levels of difficulty are usually better if you can swing it. Sad to say, tweaking levels of difficulty – adjusting AI to match and balancing game play to accommodate – is a tough and time-consuming thing that needs to be addressed by everyone involved on the project.

How can we integrate cut scenes, FMV or Run-time movies?

The first question is simple: Do you really need something like this, or can your game survive (quite nicely) without this? If absolutely necessary, try for the “in-game” movie rather than the pre-rendered cinematic escapade. It not only helps to keep the player immersed, but your transitions will be less jarring to the player. Metal Gear Solid, Half-Life, and Soul Reaver were good examples of the In-game movie.

How can we get replay value out of this?

Some games are over when they’re over. The surprise is done and there’s really nothing left to look for. Others can be played again and again, either because there’s more to discover, or you’re trying to do something personal like beating a high score. (Score? Games keep score? What’s that? I’m sorry, but I’m a throwback to halcyon arcade days of the early 80′s where score was EVERYTHING!)

How are our load/save times?

No one wants to sit around looking at 2-tone bar fill while waiting for the game to load. Sony has standards for it and it’s not really an issue for the N64. PC guys, you’re on your own. Push the programmers to optimize this. It’s ALL part of the total game experience.

On a related note here-allow the player to save where they want to unless it’s fundamentally necessary to not let them save. Reflection’s Driver for the PC is a glaring example of forcing the player to get through 3 or 4 scenarios before they can save. You should know just how annoying this is and furthermore, you shouldn’t be doing this to the gamer unless it’s absolutely necessary to maintain the fundamental design features of your game.

2. Good Habits, A Critical Eye, and the Fun Factor

Merging Design Documents, Schedules, and Budgets.

Time will need to be taken during, or immediately after, the pre-production design phase to come-up with real numbers, times, and dates for the project. The usual problem with those above-mentioned words is that, for each concept mentioned, you have a different group of people crunching the numbers. They also don’t tend to be in very close contact with each other. Many companies are fond of saying, “Hey, we need to fill a gap in the quarter here! You guys, do this game in 8 months!” Your response is, “Not on your life, but if we must, we’ll need more money and resource to do it.” Of course, they don’t want to give you more money and resources to do it. That’s why it helps to gather all relevant parties to this portion of the development process, bring them together, and hash out the numbers. That’s why it helps to have your design broken down into needs, tasks, and features at the start.

There is no better time to examine resource and budget considerations then while you’re hammering out design detail, unless of course you have nothing to do with making the schedule or planning the budget. If you’re leading the design vision of the product, however, you should very well have a hand in the schedule and budgetary considerations. Get all the relevant people into the room at one time and hammer out the numbers. It’s a big pain in the backside, but it’s definitely worth doing in the long run. Remember, when the design doc is changed, or features are re-worked, you’re going to have to take a look at the impact and figure out if this is going to push you back in the development process.

Updating the design document.

This sounds easy, but in the throes of development long hours and crushing stress from all sides can cause details to slip through the cracks. You might talk about a feature in a late-night impromptu gathering and then implement the change the next morning. You should document that change, especially if you end up doing a sequel a year or so later, so that you remember what you did in the first place.

When anybody on the team decides to round out a feature, change a feature, or add a feature this change should be noted, documented, and brought to everyone’s attention. If you’ve created an on-line style design document not entirely unlike the one mentioned part one of this article, you’ll have the mechanism in place to keep the team informed and responsible.

Keeping a Design Journal

This is as straightforward as it sounds; keep a running dialogue of what’s gone right and wrong during the project. Week to week will probably do unless you’re in the middle of one heck of a crunch time. This will serve a number of purposes. First, it lets you recall, months and months after the fact, lessons you may have learned or not learned early in the project before the press of 15 hour days began to blur one day into the next. Secondly, it allows you to bring up key issues of good or bad work done by people throughout the project during the post-mortem (your company has post-mortems, right?) And lastly, it will help you in publishing a post-mortem article for a relevant publication so your fellow designers out there can learn from your experience, right?

Critical Evaluation

One of the best things you can do for your game when you’re looking to implement features is to critically evaluate the competition and I mean look at them. There is a saying, “It’s amazing how much you can see if you just look.” Don’t knock on the competition simply because their title is out before yours hits the shelves, evaluate it. Every title, no matter how heinous, has some lesson to be learned tucked within its folds. The primary lesson here is to avoid making the same mistakes that killed a rival product.

This goes for the whole game, look at things like their front end to see how easy it is to get into the game, check the controller set-ups, examine screen real estate and test in-game timing issues and controller sampling. You don’t want to be reinventing the wheel if you don’t have to. If some other game is doing something well, borrow that idea or concept. You just have to make sure that you don’t outright steal the concept. That would be a no-no. Remember: Good design not only about ideas, but it’s also about the implementation of those ideas.

Of course, at some point you are going to need to turn that cruel, cold eye of unswerving criticism on your own title. Testing feedback will help here but ultimately someone’s toes are going to get stepped on. When looking at your own product, put your ego in your back pocket. Many a title has crashed-and-burned because someone’s ego fought against the tide of popular opinion and washed-out (or in) a feature (or features) that killed game play.

The ‘Fun Factor’

Some companies want you to work on the “fun factor.” Everyone’s looking for that elusive concept that you read so much about in fluffy design treatments and marketing blurbs. The causal gamer and average consumer can’t nail down what is really fun. They’ll tell you something’s fun, but they can’t tell you what’s happening inside the game and what they’re responding to. Fun tends to be a relative concept that revolves around things like pacing, timing, and excitement as specific to that particular title. These are things you can theorize about; tell people “punching this guy is fun!” but you’ll never really know until you spend time with the game and work it out. As a designer, you need the ability to critically evaluate the competitions efforts. Look at how they handle certain issues and make note of them.

The fun factor comes from being able to identify exactly what’s being done, how it’s being done, and you can continue to do it without the game getting boring. This is a touchy part of the implementation of the design. Lots of people are going to have arguments one-way or the other about the details. One thing that will help you with this is filtering proper information and feedback from your QA department, but I’ll go into that later.

3. The list of “Never”:

The list of “Never” has evolved into a kind of Ten Commandments for me. They’ve evolved over the years, usually noted and expanded upon while playing games. They are things I’ve noticed, come to realize, and things that are brought up in conversations with my peers. I’ve also noted that some of these rules get repeated in game previews and reviews.

Like all good rules, however, they are ALWAYS made to be broken. And, of course, you are allowed to break them. You just better make darn sure you know what you’re doing when you do break them.

1. Never overcomplicate a game if you can help it. Stated in the obvious way it reads, “Keep It Simple, Stupid.” Those of us old enough to look back on what is considered the “classic” era of video gaming remember it as being a time of very straight forward gaming that could keep you glued to a monitor for hours. Games evolved around a simple premise or method of controller input. Those games were not limited by technology or the lack thereof, but were instead solid concepts of experimentation. The KISS principle still holds true today. Pac-Man had one joystick and one maze. Tetris had a few simple shapes falling gently from the sky. Even Quake III Arena follows the KISS ideal of not over-complicating the main goal, which in this case happens to be blasting your opponent as many times as you can till your hands fall off.

The context may change with player expectation or technology, but the principle will always remain sound.

The arcade game designers from the good old days knew what they were doing. The philosophy there was that they had 30 seconds to introduce someone to a game and maintain that interest. People are willing to drop 25 cents into a cabinet to see what it does. If they don’t see it immediately, they won’t drop another 25 cents into the machine. You have to grab them quickly. You do that by keeping it simple. The next time you go to E3 or some such event, spend some time watching not the game, but the people playing the game. See what’s grabbing their attention. Find the games that people won’t put down then try them yourself with an eye towards critical evaluation.

2. Never make the same mistake twice. Critical evaluation of your competition means looking at what’s been done and what’s out there. It means if you’re doing a game in a similar genre, you should be borrowing from the things that they do well, and avoiding the things they don’t do well. Don’t re-invent the wheel unless you sincerely have the time and wherewithal to come up with a better way.

3. Never take control from the player if you can help it. Don’t make the player sit through some animation, cut-scene, or musical interlude if they don’t have to. Metal Gear Solid did a great job of using run-time transitions to keep you there and interested. Valve’s Half-Life was another excellent example of transitioning-taking control from the player-but it didn’t really feel like it. Revenant by Cinimatix, on the other hand, is a frustrating example of waiting for the developer’s scripting engine to putter characters around the screen while you mash the ESC key in frustration.

This rule also works for “in-game” events. A constant and common failing of many fighting, action, or other titles where the player is physically “fighting” an opponent happens when the player gets “stuck” in a hit reaction loop. The animation may have looked cool on the animator’s screen, but while the hero is writhing in pair from a vicious blow on the part of the attacker, this same attacker has finished his animation and has initiated another attack. (while the hero is still writhing) See where I’m going here? The player ends up getting hit 3 or 4 times with no chance to defend themselves. This is a very frustrating flaw.

4.Never forget the controller or I/O device you will be using to play the game. Obvious problems are when PC games are converted to consoles. It’s hard to type from 16 different hot-keyed actions with a Playstation controller. You’ve figured out what your character will be doing in the game, at the same time you should have figured out how the player is going to maneuver the character through your world. This applies to navigating inventory screens and complex selection schemes as well. You should always defer to the KISS philosophy here unless you absolutely can’t help it.

5. Never assume the player knows what you’re thinking. Players are usually bright people who can intuit a pre-existing puzzle or situation rather quickly. Because of this, designers must think of ways to challenge the player. Sometimes, we will challenge the player by presenting to them something that makes sense to us while we were working on it, and make sense to QA while they were testing it, but doesn’t translate for a player who hasn’t spent the last 9 months of their life working on the game.

Soul Reaver is a good example of maintaining this rule AND breaking it at the same time. The tutorial portion of the game was an excellent introduction to the game’s world. At several points, however, the game would tell you do something without any explanation. Case in point: Directions were given in the form of a compass point (go North, young man. . .) yet there is no compass in the game so, just how am I supposed to know which way is North? Sound’s easy, but I lost 4 hours backtracking to figure this one out.

6. Never break the established rules unless you TELL the player. There are a number of games out there that will teach the player certain habits by NOT letting them manipulate their environment. That’s OK, but if at a later date you decide to allow the player to use these objects in a way that’s different from previous lessons, TELL THEM! Metal Gear Solid was good about this. The game gives you the information you need to accomplish your goal. It begs a little suspension of belief when this happens, but it’s far better that fumbling around for several hours trying to unlearn something you’ve been doing the entire game to this point. Withholding information from the player should not be the extent of the puzzle. There’s also the parallel argument here about making your puzzles somewhat dependent on existing logic. Return to Zork was a prime example of logic having nothing to do with solving the puzzle and the players lost interest for that very reason.

7. Never assume technology can fix bad design. This is a BIG rule that this industry is guilty of breaking repeatedly in the last few years. We see a number of titles every year that claim to make certain technological feats, usually in terms of pushing poly’s or having “the most realistic AI ever encountered!” You’re answer to marketing ploy’s like this should be, “So, is it fun?” Real-Time Lighting! If the game’s not fun, no one is going to want to play it.

There are cases where technology can ease bad design. Pushing more poly’s, thus raising the frame rate and smoothing out your visuals, is a good thing. Some technologies, however, don’t or won’t filter through to the average end-user. They generally don’t know about or care about technical specs, they just want to know if the game is fun.

An example here is the PC product Nocturne by Terminal Reality. The game has great “real-time lighting and shadows” FX that lead to some truly creepy moments in the game, but anytime more than two creature jumped on screen, the frame rate would bog to amazingly bad rates, making combat near unplayable at certain points. Very frustrating.

8. Never assume the license is all you need. No association in the world will help you sell an inferior product. There are some exceptions to the rule but as above, players want to know if the game is fun.

9. Never cheat the player. The basic rule here is that if the player can’t do it, the CPU shouldn’t be able to do it. It’s AMAZINGLY easy for a programmer to set up the AI to be perfect but it’s a lot harder to get that AI to act like a human would. The hand’s-down winner of cool creature AI would be Unreal because they do human player-type things to get on you.

10. Never design morality. If players find a way to circumvent a “feature” of your game by utilizing the save feature, let them. You see this kind of problem in RPG’s like Baldur’s Gate or Jagged Alliance II. I myself was guilty about sending guys blindly into the fray just to see where the bad guys were coming from, then re-loading the game and planning accordingly. Don’t penalize the player for re-loading a failed attempt at a room or hurdle. A specific example of creaming the player in this manner would be the expansion pack to Baldur’s Gate-Tales of the Sword Coast. They had a feature that, if you re-loaded a previously saved game, they would throw MORE monsters at you or make some sprung trap hit you even harder. This, quite simply, sucks. It’s also a poor excuse for problem solving. If the player wants to save his game, walk into a room to see what jumps out, the re-load and re-configure his characters, let him. So what? We don’t design morality. If the player wants to “cheat” let them but if you can come up with a solution that DOESN’T screw the player, even better.（source：gamasutra）