作者：Neils Clark

注：本文是源自我的博客中的一本书的一个章节。在那本书中这些内容是遵循了有关J.R.R. Tolkien（英国语言学家，作家，创造了《魔戒》三部曲）和逃避主义的内容，并伴随着一个有关沉浸于《Star Wars Galaxies》一年的故事。

在自己的书籍《Flow》中，流理论之父Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi写道：“我们将这种状态称为流体验，因为这是我们所访问过的许多人在自己描述处于最高点的感受时所使用的表达方式‘这就像在漂浮一样，’‘我被流所载着。’”

当我们精通某事，如《Star Wars Galaxies》中潜行追踪Jedi，我们便会有这种感受，然后我们会将这一技能与一些同样让人激动的任务相配对，如同时获得三个Jedi。当我们拥有技能和挑战时，我们会觉得自己非常有能力，而这种感受只停留在当下。我们知道自己应该做什么，但是事情的发展总是太过迅速，从而让我们很容易丢失自我。我们将完全沉浸其中。这是Csikszentmihalyi在工人，CEO，专业运动员，科学家和钢琴家等身上都能发现的一种心理状态。

Star Wars Galaxies(from 52pk)

行动和意识会集中在一起，“当一个人需要使用自己的所有技能去应对某种情境所呈现给他的挑战时，这个人的注意便会完全被该事所吸引。这时候他便不会留下任何多余的心理能量。”我们需要为此投入足够的注意力，如此我们便不会再专注于生活中一些不好的事。如果体验本身也具有意义的话，这便具有双重的作用。

也许这是对于人类来说最具吸引力的体验。不过这有时候也是问题所在。Csikszentmihalyi解释道：

早前的人种志学者认为北美平原的印度人非常沉迷于关于水牛肋骨的赌博，即输者将在寒冷的冬天不穿任何衣服而离开帐篷，同时还要留下他们的武器，马匹和妻子。几乎任何有趣的活动都有可能让人上瘾，比起作为一种有意识的选择，它将成为干扰人类其它活动的必要元素。例如外科医生认为手术就是让人上瘾的，“就像在吸食海洛因一样。”

当一个人非常依赖于控制愉快的活动的能力，即他不能再将注意力放在其它事情上，那么他便算失去了最终的控制力：即决定意识内容的自由。因此能够创造流的有趣的活动也具有潜在的消极面：尽管它们能够通过影响人们的心理而完善他们的生活质量，但是它们会逐渐变成一种瘾性，这时候的人们将完全被俘虏，并且不愿意在应对生活中一些具有分歧的事。

流是非常强大的，所以对于Jane McGonigal在《Reality isBroken》中使用了Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi的理论作为游戏定义的主要支撑我们并不感到惊讶。她称能够理解流的玩家为幸福工程师，这样的流是唯一能够帮助人们解决现实问题的元素。但她同时也清楚游戏的强势，即她描述在一个周末，“我花了24个小时在玩《魔兽世界》，这比我所打算的多了23个小时。我还能说什么呢？在游戏中有太多需要做的事了。”

“当周一早上到来时，我甚至抵抗着回到‘现实’工作中的想法。我知道这并不理性。但我的部分意识一直想要继续赚取经验值，堆积珍宝，收集点数以及完成拯救世界的任务。”

“当然了我最终还是回到了现实工作中。当我花了一点时间去消除想要升级的念头。我的部分意识认为自己在Azeroth王国中所做的事比在现实生活中还多。《魔兽世界》的确提供了非常强大的生产力。它传递的是一连串像毒药一般的任务与奖励。”

“我并不在乎这样的任务并不是真实的。因为对于玩家来说我们所获得的情感奖励是真实的，这才是真正重要的事。”

尽管Jane只提到一个周末，但《Galaxies》却让我迷失了一年。她的书将流描述为游戏让我们感到开心的根本元素。即使流是真正关于幸福，这里仍存在更多情况。有时候游戏将超越“乐趣”，甚至是“吸引人”。

《Galaxies》让我第一次感受到了一种奇怪的状态，即游戏中吸引人的奇怪空间延伸得太长了。不管是因为游戏世界太丰富，或者剩下的世界中的替代选择太可怕，任何世界中的运行能力都开始崩塌了。

Eric Weiner的旅行书《Geography of Bliss》的每一章节都是从这样的标题开始的，即“幸福是……”而书中的每个国家也都有自己引人注意的大标题。如在泰国，幸福是可以抛下烦恼，在摩尔多瓦，幸福是待在任何其它地方。

在今天，幸福似乎是来自电视，杂志以及全新的广告的短暂的承诺。在看了Weiner的书几个小时后，我前往了当地的一家超市并经过了一个写着“这就是幸福的味道！”的冰淇淋蛋糕盒。这便是结构化流—-即专门为我们所设计的流，所以我们可以获得体验然后转身离开，这将遭受到与巧克力蛋糕一样的问题。即巧克力蛋糕只会让我们暂时感到快乐。但是我们并不会每一天每一餐都吃巧克力蛋糕。所以没有实质性的味道便只是在刺激味蕾罢了。

当然了，我也很喜欢蛋糕，但是我不可能吃很多很多。有些游戏会无止境地延续下去。但是我的想法与Jane McGonigal并非完全相同，我并不相信每一款游戏都是基于“真实的人类的需求是真实世界所不能满足的”的理念。与许多艺术一样，游戏体验可能会让我们脱离自己，将我们与之前从未看过的一些很酷的事物联系在一起。在某种程度上，社会组织和高科技都在人类，生物及其无限的人体美之间挖起了一条很深的护城河。

我们从世界那所获得的流与我们自己创造的流之间是具有差别的。首先，体验是由某些人仔细创造并基于适当的安排而给予奖励，所以便能够吸引大众用户的注意。这是基于最少的努力并让我们感觉到对人类来说最强大的体验之一。流只是关于挑战与技能的结合。我们可以在任务一开始（容易学习）或伴随着大量复杂任务（较难精通）的时候感受到它。在这两种情况下，优秀的游戏设计能够保证我们始终都能够获得有关接下来的前进方向或如何更好地应对更大的挑战的提示。这些提示通常都是以奖励的形式呈现出来。

Jane在有关幸福的研究中提到了外在奖励与内在奖励的区别。所谓的外在“美国梦”目标是指：金钱，权利，汽车等等都可以让我们感到不幸福。这也是该研究所要传达的内容。但是奖励，目标以及游戏中基于结构的流等等都是来自外部。它们就像金子，信誉和金钱一样。它们是行走的老虎，是酷炫的喷射式自行车也可以是大胆的裸骑。它们是富丽堂皇的豪宅，是传奇的宝剑，是成就，是明显的技能排行，是显赫的头衔等等能够代表身份的标识。但因为我们仍然对游戏具有根深蒂固的误解，所以我们总是很难看到这些。

在给书命名为“打破现状”的一个大问题便在于它从一开始便明确了“游戏”和“真实生活”之间的二分法。而真正的区别在于什么东西被打破了。如果你们所看到的是有人基于计算机显示器赢得了比赛，那么这可能是本来就设定好的。就像让人们坐着待20个小时的动机便是源自内在。这就像是病理学中的流那样。当你感受到这些世界有多丰富，即关于你将遇到的人，寻找珍宝的乐趣以及无止尽的刷任务，你便会觉得这是一个真实，并不完美，并且多变的地方。我们可以追逐着一些平庸的的现成目标（就像许多人做的那样），我们可以寻找现成的流，我们也可以创造属于我们自己的流，并在这个过程中我们将对自己有更深入的了解。说实话在《Galaxies》中，我们创造了比之后任何在线游戏（包括《魔兽争霸》或《英雄联盟》）中更多属于自己的流，而对于Jane，我也不能去随便评判其书名的真正含义。

自由流—-在聆听了世界和我们自己的想法后，拿Csikszentimihalyi的话来说，我们所创造的流体验是“俗语所说的‘生活的意义是什么？’其实非常简单，生活的意义便在于意义：不管是什么，不管来自哪里，唯一的目的便是带给生活意义的元素。”

如果我们能够在混乱的生活中找到一些“和谐的主题”，我们便能够采取措施在更多地方为自己创造流体验。对于那些创造出自由流，也就是坚持一个目标并塑造自己的技能，同时也会去处理大问题的个人，尽管整个宇宙并不会为之鼓舞，生活仍然很艰难，但是他们有可能带给自己一个最强大的礼物，即目的。

我们总是很容易依赖于那些能够往我们的娱乐，工作或生活中添加吸引人元素的专家们。我们可能会收到更多鼓舞而去从事某种工作，并过着某种生活。但是我们可能不会注意到我们可以更加热爱我们所面对的世界，它可以拥有更多的含义，我们也可以为其创造出流。

游戏并不是幸福的自动导航仪。可以说并不存在这样的导航仪。它们将通过提供基本的比较对象而揭露生活。就像一条鱼也只会在你将其带出水面时才会知道自己其实一直待在水里。《Galaxies》也是如此。它将我带到了一个丰富的世界，这里有着各自奇怪的生物，还有一些由各种人，也包含我在现实生活中仍充满尊敬的人所组成的社区。对于我这种一直待在Gig Harbor的人来说这并不是一个闪耀的黄金时代，但它也并未完全丧失其价值。即使没有任何所谓的“体验语言”，我也能够了解到一些有关乐趣和无聊的刷任务等事情。

Wrote Weiner所说的：“有些读者想要知道他们是否应该搬到像冰岛或不丹等让人开心的国度。也许那是你的心所向往的地方，但真正重要的并不是我们搬到哪里，而是我们能够让这些地方真正走进我们心里。”

“我相信这也适用于任何地理上的变动。改变你的位置的同时你也需要改变自己。并不是说遥远的领土就包含了一些特别的‘能量’或那边的居民拥有一些我们所不知道的知识，但对我们来说更加重要的是：通过迁移，重新定位，我们能够松开期望的枷锁。漂泊到不同地方的我们应该将自己也变成不同的人。”

（本文为游戏邦/gamerboom.com编译，拒绝任何不保留版权的转发，如需转载请联系：游戏邦）

Flow

by Neils Clark

Some notes: this comes from a book chapter you can find on my personal blog. In the book this stuff follows other stuff (posted here at Gama) about J.R.R. Tolkien and Escapism, and occurs alongside a personal story about vanishing into Star Wars Galaxies for a year.

–

In his book Flow, father of flow theory Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi writes, “We have called this state the flow experience, because this is the term of many of the people we interviewed had used in their descriptions of how it felt to be in top form: ‘It was like floating,’ ‘I was carried on by the flow.’”

We get there once we’ve mastered something, say, Stalking Jedi in Star Wars Galaxies, and then matched that mastery to some equally breathtaking quest, say Take Three Jedi Masters at Once. When we have the skills, and the challenge, we can feel utterly competent, and in the moment. We know what we’re supposed to do, but things are happening so fast that we lose track of our own selves. We’re completely invested. It was a state of mind that Csikszentmihalyi observed in factory workers, CEOs, professional athletes, scientists, pianists.

Action and awareness come together, “When all a person’s relevant skills are needed to cope with the challenges of a situation, that person’s attention is completely absorbed by the activity. There is no excess psychic energy left over.” It takes enough of our attention that we can’t focus on the bad shit in life. It’s a double whammy, if the experience itself can also be involving and meaningful.

It is, perhaps, the most engaging experience available to humankind. Which can on occasion be a problem. Csikszentmihalyi explains,

Early ethnographers have described North American Plains Indians so hypnotically involved in gambling with buffalo rib bones that losers would often leave the tepee without clothes in the dead of winter, having wagered away their weapons, horses, and wives as well. Almost any enjoyable activity can become addictive, in the sense that instead of being a conscious choice, it becomes a necessity that interferes with other activities. Surgeons, for instance, describe operations as being addictive, “like taking heroin.”

When a person becomes so dependent on the ability to control an enjoyable activity that he cannot pay attention to anything else, then he loses the ultimate control: the freedom to determine the content of consciousness. Thus enjoyable activities that produce flow have a potentially negative aspect: while they are capable of improving the quality of existence by creating order in the mind, they can become addictive, at which point the self becomes captive of a certain kind of order, and is then unwilling to cope with the ambiguities of life.

Flow is powerful, so it’s no surprise that in her Reality is Broken, Jane McGonigal uses Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi’s theory as a major pillar for her definition of games. She calls the gamers who understand flow Happiness Engineers, saying they’re uniquely positioned to help fix reality. But she too seems aware of gaming’s potential to overwhelm, describing a weekend where she, “…spent twenty-four hours playing WoW – which was about twenty-three more hours than I’d intended. What can I say? There was a LOT of world-saving work to do.

“… When Monday morning came around, I resisted the idea of going back to ‘real’ work. I knew this wasn’t rational. But some part of me wanted to keep earning experience points, stacking up treasure, collecting my plus-ones, and checking off world-saving quests from my to-do list.

“…I did go back to real work, of course. But it took me awhile to shake the feeling that I’d rather be leveling up. Part of me felt like I was accomplishing more in the Kingdom of Azeroth than I was in real life. And that’s exactly the IV drip of productivity that World of Warcraft is so good at providing. It delivers a stream of work and reward as reliably as a morphine drip line.

“…and it doesn’t matter that the work isn’t real. The emotional rewards are real – and for gamers, that’s what matters.”

While Jane only mentions one weekend of “blissful productivity,” Galaxies had me lost for a year. Her book means to use flow as the foundational evidence that games make us happy. Even if flow was ever really about happiness, there’s more happening here. At some point, games go beyond “fun,” or even “engagement.”

Galaxies gave me a first taste of that strange limbo, the awkward space where engagement stretches too long. Whether because the game world is simply too rich, or the alternatives in the rest of the world too awful, the ability to function in any world starts to corrode.

–

Eric Weiner’s travelogue Geography of Bliss starts every chapter title with, “Happiness is…” And each country gets its own catchy headline. Thailand is, for instance, where Happiness is Not Thinking, and in Moldova, Happiness is Somewhere Else. The former NPR correspondent chuckles at the “self-help industrial complex,” then consults glowing Indian gurus and happiness politicians in Bhutan.

Happiness seems to be the distracted, ephemeral promise of near every television, magazine, and news advertisement out today. A few hours after cracking Weiner’s book open, at the local supermarket I walked by a box for a Snickers-brand ice cream cake with the slogan, “It’s what happiness tastes like!” Structured flow – flow that’s designed for us, so we can take the experience and leave – suffers from the same problem as a chocolate cake. Chocolate cake makes some of us happy, for awhile. But not if we eat it every meal, every day. Flavor without substance is just dumb stimulation.

And sure, I love cake as much as the next guy – probably way more – but I can only eat so much of it. Some games go on indefinitely. Though I haven’t exactly given Jane McGonigal a fair shake yet, I’m not convinced that every game fulfills “…genuine human needs that the real world is currently unable to satisfy.” Like a lot of art, game experiences might take us outside ourselves, connect us with cool shit the likes of which we might never have seen otherwise. If she means the kind of escape Tolkien is talking about, I absolutely agree. To some extent, social organization and high technology have dug some deep moats between the planet’s human beings, her creatures, and her boundless physical beauty. Past that?

There’s a difference between flow that we can take from the world – that we consume like a Hot Pocket – and flow we create. In one, the experience is carefully structured (by someone else) to mete out rewards on just the right schedule, so that a mass audience can detach. So that with minimal effort we can feel one of the most powerful experiences available to humankind. Flow is just a good mix of challenge and skill. We can feel it at the start of a task (easy to learn) or even with the complexity of a massive task (hard to master). In both cases, good game design ensures that we’re always given hints as to where we ought to head next, or just how to better build ourselves up for the larger challenges. Those hints usually come in the form of rewards.

Jane talks about the difference between extrinsic and intrinsic rewards, in the happiness research. That the extrinsic “American Dream” goals: money, power, cars, can go so far as to make us unhappy. That’s certainly in-line what the research suggests. But the rewards, goals, what have you, which evoke the structured flow in games are by and large extrinsic. They’re gold, credits, currency. They’re rideable tigers, floating jet bikes, and other thoroughly pimped rides. They’re palatial mansions on Naboo, legendary swords, achievements, visible skill rankings, visible titles, and all manner of status symbols. That’s hard to see, because we’re still struggling with a more fundamental misconception about games.

The big problem in naming a book “Reality is Broken,” is that it establishes from the outset that false dichotomy between “games” and “real life.” The distinction is what’s broken. If all you can see is someone winning a staring contest with a computer monitor, it might look intrinsic. Like the motivation to sit twenty hours at a time is all coming from within. It looks just as much like flow as it does pathology. When you know how rich these worlds can be, about the people you can meet inside, the treasure troves of fun and the abysmal bullshit grinds, it becomes clear that they’re a place that’s real, imperfect, and changeable as any other geographical subsection of the planet. We can go after trite readymade goals (and many do), we can find readymade flow (and many do), we can also build our own flow, and in so doing learn a thing or two about ourselves (and many do). To be fair to Galaxies, I made a lot more of my own flow there than in later online games, say Warcraft or League of Legends. To be fair to Jane, I can’t be too judgmental where book titles are concerned.

Free flow – flow experiences we build ourselves, after listening to both the world and ourselves – show us that, in Csikszentmihalyi’s words, “…the old riddle “What is the meaning of life?” turns out to be astonishingly simple. The meaning of life is meaning: whatever it is, wherever it comes from, a unified purpose is what gives meaning to life.”

If we can discover some “harmonious theme” to the chaos of our lives, then we can take steps to building for ourselves the experience of flow in more and more places. The individual who embodies free flow – who sticks to a goal, builds their skills, and tackles big problems – the universe might not be there cheering them on, life might be awful, but they have perhaps the most powerful gift an individual can give to themselves: purpose.

It gets really easy to just rely on the experts, who can build engagement into our entertainment, our jobs, our lives. We might get a lot more motivated (intrinsically and extrinsically) to do those jobs, and live those lives. But in so doing we might not notice the worlds we could’ve liked a lot more, which could have meant more, had we been the ones making them flow.

Games aren’t autopilot for happiness. That doesn’t exist. They reveal life by giving it a basis for comparison. A fish doesn’t know it’s in water until you snatch it out. Galaxies did just that. It transported me to rich worlds populated by strange automated creatures, shady guilds composed of shady human beings, and people I’m still grateful to have in my life. It wasn’t exactly a shining golden age for the part of me doing misdeeds in Gig Harbor, but it wasn’t completely bereft of merit. Even without any so-called “experience language” I’d learned – first hand – a few things about fun, and the futility of grinds.

“…some readers wanted to know if they should move to happy places like Iceland or Bhutan.” Wrote Weiner, in his Geography, “Perhaps, if that is where your heart lies, but the point is not necessarily that we move to these places but, rather, that we allow these places to move us.

“I believe, now more than ever, in the transformative promise of geography. Change your location and you just may change yourself. It’s not that distant lands contain some special “energy” or that their inhabitants possess secret knowledge (though they may) but rather something more fundamental: By relocating ourselves, reorienting ourselves, we shake loose the shackles of expectation. Adrift in a different place we give ourselves permission to be different people.”(source:gamasutra)