作者：Greg Johnson

超越简单的路线结构

就像我们之前提到的，在这一路线结构上许多游戏发生了改变，并且一些稀有的故事游戏更是完全偏离了这一路线。在我们谈论这些游戏所采取的一些方法前，让我们先欣赏一些优秀的路线结构游戏。在我们追逐具有沉浸感的互动电影体验的路上，我们并不希望因此忽略了这些优秀的作品，并且有些作品其实可以称得上真正的艺术品。就像我最喜欢的两款游戏便是《ICO》和《旅途》，尽管所有游戏玩家都有自己的喜好，但有些游戏甚至会改变他们的生活或者推动他们从事游戏创造的工作。其实基于简单的公式也需要我们做很多事，并且有时候它能够约束你的多样性从而让你专注于少量的内容，即那些对你来说真正有帮助的选择。

Journey(from douwan)

在接下来的文字中我们将列出现有游戏用于推动故事中玩家参与感的一些技巧。我们将首先着眼于路线结构中的一些变量，然后深入人们用于强化故事沉浸感和参与感的技巧。最后我们将列出一些刚出现不久的新概念。值得注意的是，每一款游戏通常会使用一种以上的技巧，设计师也不会将它们当成特定的“技巧”。而通过将这些技巧区分开来进行分析，我们希望能够以此帮助设计师们更准确且更有效地实现他们的目标。

免责声明：我们会在概念后会列出游戏案例。这些例子旨在帮助读者更好地理解这些概念，并没有其它特殊含义。

结构路线变量：

开放世界部分

这些游戏将其有限的路线分布在一些更开放的空间里，通常是在城市或城镇中。这些开放区域通常拥有一些轻微模拟元素能够赋予其活力，并且这里将会出现NPC角色和敌人。（如《时空之轮》，《最终幻想7》，《疯狂麦克斯》，《死亡左轮》）

分支路线和连接路线

有时候玩家将会到达一个十字路口，并且他们将在那里选择不同路线。通常情况下这些路线都是沿着主要路线延伸。在故事中它们代表的是“可选择”的故事线程。有时候游戏将允许玩家在之后回头去打开路线，而这不仅能够创造一个更大的开放世界实感，同时也能够约束玩家最初的游戏进程。有些游戏创造了一个路线网并将其用于地图上，如此玩家便可以从一个地方前往另一个地方并且始终都处于一条有限的路线上。（如《神鬼寓言》，《Magicka》）

嵌入式路线和区域

沿着一条路线移动的玩家有时候也会找到一个通向一条“嵌入式”路线或开放区域的门道。这与分支路线相似，只不过分支路线是一种选择（即路线A或路线B）并且将把你引向一个全新场所，而嵌入式路线则是一个新增路线，将把你带回到入口处。

迷宫路线

许多游戏会通过婉转路线或将路线的组成部分变成迷宫而改变路线的线性结构。但这仍然是一条有限的路线，只是不再是直线而已。如果我们将“迷宫”换成“地下城”的话，你可能会更好理解。（如《小龙派斯罗》）

高级地图和支线任务

许多游戏都拥有一张主要地图，即玩家可以使用某些方式在这里自由移动。当玩家到达地图上的目的地时，他们便会进入“嵌入式”路线中或开放区域里。有时候，这些地图也设有自己的大门将把你引向全新的“嵌入式”路线或开放区域（如进入一栋建筑）。通常情况下，在一款带有地图的故事游戏中，玩家需要基于某些顺序打开一些区域，即让故事能够按顺序展开。通常情况下存在一些玩家可以以任何顺序选择进入的区域，它们便是所谓的支线任务。（如《双重国度》）

额外的技术

多重结果和多种结局

让玩家觉得自己能够影响故事发展的一种最常见也是最有效的方法便是让他们的特定行动能够改变故事结果。最棒的结果应该是它不会再引出一个全新的故事分支。通常情况下如果设计师非常聪明，他们便会在故事过程中往玩家的行动中添加多种结果。即可能是导致一些NPC角色的死亡或者能够拯救它们的生命，并因此会改变一些故事元素。这里存在的技巧便是，如何在不改变主要故事进程的前提下让玩家觉得自己能够真正影响故事。（如《骇客任务》）

玩家声誉，好人vs恶人，玩家行动的所有AI记忆

有些游戏会创造一些简单的AI到游戏的NPC中并让他们能够参考玩家在游戏前面所做或所说的一些事。有时候这些NPC的影响会很大，并可能呈现出不断发展的“玩家声誉”的感觉。NPC可能会变得更让人印象深刻或更有价值，或者更害怕或更生玩家的气。有些游戏专注于让玩家选择“好的”或“不好的”路线，并且结果和声誉都会影响到玩家的故事体验感。（如《神鬼寓言》，《黑与白》，《辐射》，《疯狂麦克斯》，《宇宙在我心》，《动物之森》）

随机的NPC

有些游戏创造了拥有不同外观或行为的随机NPC。这会让游戏的后续进程变得不同，并让不同玩家能够拥有稍微不同的“定制”故事体验。《暗影魔多》的开发者便投入了许多精力去创造这些的系统并将其命名为Nemesis系统。

同伴NPC

有时候游戏会提供给玩家一个能够成为他们旅行伙伴的NPC角色。这也是创造与NPC间的情感连接的有效方式。这些角色并不需要非常聪明。而通过以一种传统结构（如路线结构）去提供游戏中的同伴角色，设计师将无需投入太多努力于NPC的AI上，并且它也无需承担太多游戏责任。（如《ICO》，《最后的守护者》，《永不孤单》，《2 Brothers》，《野兽传奇》）

世界转换

有些游戏会基于玩家的表现采取某些方法逐渐改变环境的外观以及某些主角的状态。这种选择通常是以好的行动vs邪恶的行动或光明vs阴暗的形式表现出来。（如《黑与白》，《神鬼寓言》）

无意义的世界故事

其实这并不是一种技巧，它只是一种“回避”策略。许多游戏创造了一个让玩家体验的“无意义的世界”故事。这么做的好处是无需创造许多看起来很聪明且受AI驱动的角色。并且这将创造出某种孤独感并在游戏中呈现出一种神秘的氛围。（如《旅途》，《Rime》）

分支视频

这是Telltale等公司非常擅长使用的一种技巧。玩家将观看一个如电影般的高质量故事，并随着影片的播放通过点击做出某些选择。当他们这么做时，故事便会出现分支。还有许多其它技巧能够用于该方法中，如限制玩家做选择的时间，要求玩家搜索选择等待。（如《行尸走肉》，《我们身边的狼》，《国王密使》）

持续时间

这一技巧指的是当玩家不再游戏时，游戏世界中的世界也不会静止。这让玩家在游戏结束时能够继续收集资源，让玩家会想念NPC角色或者让玩家会想要回到游戏中去看看游戏世界或角色状态发生了怎样的改变。这将赋予游戏世界巨大的可信度，但这同时也具有巨大的设计挑战。（如《动物之森》，《人面鱼》，《疯狂麦克斯》）

多人玩家伙伴

有些游戏能让2名以上的玩家在一个在线故事冒险中一起潜行。这也是将真正高质量AI带进游戏的有效方法。这会让玩家觉得自己并非孤身一人在游戏世界里，他们能够在情感上与其他人联系在一起，并让整个游戏体验变得更有意义，即使游戏世界本身并不存在其它角色（游戏邦注：例如《旅途》）。而这一设定的缺点便在于玩家将很难去控制其他玩家在故事中所做的事，他们可能不会按照你所用的方式进行游戏。而处理这种问题的一种方式便是限制他们可以执行的行动或输入内容，不过即使如此问题也还会出现。

开放世界结构

一款开放世界游戏总是会避免在玩家前进方向上限制他们。在一款真正的开放式接游戏中，玩家从一开始便会进入一个完整的世界。通常情况下这里仍会存在一些封锁区域或会限制玩家进入全新区域的元素，如难以对付的敌人或需要搜索的资源。开放世界会呈现出有关故事序列的挑战，如控制事件或叙述的流。

轻，重，局部和世界模拟

轻模拟是指当NPC执行一些让他们看起来很有活力或很忙的简单循环行为。这些AI只拥有最小的反应性，但是它们却能够提供让人感觉具有动态的背景。（如《辐射》，《侠盗猎车手》。重模拟（或深度模拟）是当一个模拟NPC（或生物）影响了其它NPC行为时。这会创造一些因果链（或串联行为）以及比较难以预测并且更加生动的世界。从故事角度来看这是较难控制的。重模拟也代表对于玩家更加复杂的NPC反应。（如《矮人要塞》，《孢子》，《模拟人生》）局部模拟指的是在较小的空间进行紧凑控制的模拟。这一模拟能够以较低的成本创造出更大的回报。（如《刺客信条）世界模拟是指整个游戏世界是一个巨大的连接模拟的一部分。（如《动物之森》，《模拟人生》）

沙盒游戏

这与开放世界没什么区别，但却也值得注意。沙盒世界能够提供给玩家有关行动的有趣结果，但却不需要玩家基于任何顺序去完成目标。玩家能够自由地在一个巨大的沙盒中探索。（如《我的世界》）通过创造一个充满关于玩家行动的有趣结果的世界，游戏便能够让玩家创造属于他们自己的故事。但是开发者仍然很难去创造一个能够生成复杂或让人满足的故事的系统。

对话互动

我们很难通过不存在任何对话的书籍或电影中想象一个吸引人的故事。而这也是我们在一款电子游戏中最难做到的事，甚至我们还需要同时营造给玩家自由感。处理对话最常见的方式便是使用对话树。这能够提供给玩家一个句子或句子片段等选择，当玩家做出选择后，NPC将提供另一个句子作为回应。这里也有一些其它技巧，如“情感姿态”选择，非言语的交流行动选择或对话块。最后一种方法便是将对话分解成小部分并让玩家能够基于非特定顺序看到这些内容。（如《星航》，《宇宙在我心》）

持续故事和背景故事

我们必须清楚持续故事和背景故事间的区别，因为它们对于递交内容具有不同的要求。持续故事是指随着玩家的前进而不断展开的故事。（例如玩家对于故事中的事件的反应是源于他们的行动。）而背景故事则是已经发生过的故事，有可能是很久前发生的事。基于持续故事玩家的行动可能会对所发生的事产生影响，因为故事就像是“现在”发生的，这需要故事以某种逻辑顺序展开。相反地，背景故事之所以有用是因为玩家不会期待自己的行动会对这样的故事产生影响，并且故事的展开也是不受玩家控制的。大多数科幻小说都包含发现与揭露背景故事（游戏邦注：如该文明中真正发生的事或某个人是如何被杀的）。玩家也许能够基于任何顺序找到相关线索。也许对于玩家来说这不如“生活在故事中”有趣，但这也是提供给玩家吸引人的故事“感”的有效方法。（如《命运》和《质量效应》）

创造一个附属门网

创造一个开放式互动故事游戏结构的一种方法便是创造一个附属故事门网。我们可以先从最终的玩家目标开始并回到一个巨大的网格中。就像为了获得D你必须拥有“C”，为了拥有C你必须获得“B”，以此类推。为了获得“C”你可以前往场所7或场所8。在每个场所中都存在如何让你获得所需要东西的条件。为了了解如何满足这些条件或该去哪，你就必须将你在之前行进路上所了解到的背景故事组织在一起。最终游戏将通过要求玩家获取旅行资源以及在偏远区域设置更复杂的敌人而限制玩家到达这些场所的能力。这是一些早前的开放空间探索游戏会使用的方法。这也是一种开放世界结构，这里不存在任何路线（尽管可以添加一些嵌入式路线）。并且这主要依赖于背景故事。（如《星航》和《StarControl 2》

（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）

Designing Interactive Story (PART THREE)

by Greg Johnson

BEYOND SIMPLE PATH STRUCTURE

As we mentioned earlier (um… I think), there are quite a few games out there with variations on this path structure, and some rare story-games that deviate from it entirely. Before we talk about some of the approaches these games take, let’s have a moment of silent appreciation for some of the great Path-Structure games that have been made. In our noble quest for the Holy-Grail of the Immersive Interactive-Movie experience we don’t want to blindly rush past these great achievements, some of them truly inspirational and… dare I say it? …works of art. Two of my personal favorites are ICO and Journey, although every gamer has their own favorites, often games that changed the course of their life and perhaps even launched them into a career of making games themselves. There is a lot that can be done with a simple formula, and sometimes limiting your variables so you can focus on doing fewer things well, is exactly the right choice.

In the next few pages we’re going to run down a list of some of the techniques existing games have used to promote a sense of player-involvement in story. We’ll start by looking at a few variants on the Path Structure, and then devolve into a grab-bag list of some techniques people have been using to enhance story immersion and involvement. Lastly we’ll list out a few newish concepts that are just starting to be explored. It’s worth noting as well, that individual games generally use more than one technique. Designers may do this without thinking of them as specific ‘techniques’ per se. Whatever works, right? Still by pulling them apart we can hopefully empower designers to achieve their goals with greater clarity and efficiency.

A disclaimer: Examples of games are listed under the concepts below. These examples are meant to help readers understand the concept, and aren’t meant to be exhaustive by any means.

Structural Path Variants:

Open World Sections

These games intersperse their constrained path areas with, wider, more open spaces, often cities or towns.These open areas usually have some light simulation element to them to make them feel alive and populated with NPC characters and enemies. (Chrono Trigger, Final Fantasy 7, Mad Max, Red Dead Revolver)

Branching Paths, and Networked Paths

Sometimes players will come to a crossroad where they must choose one path or another.Usually these new paths will re-converge along the main path.In a story sense they represent “optional” story threads.Sometimes games will allow players to re-traverse unlocked paths later, giving a sense of a bigger open world but still constraining players in their initial play through.Some games create a network of paths and apply these to a map, so that players can go from place to place but still always be on a constrained path. (Fable, Magicka)

Embedded Paths and Areas

Players moving along a path will sometimes find a doorway leading to an ‘embedded’ path, or open area.This is similar to a branching path, except a branch is a choice (path A or path B) and it lets you out in a new location, while an embedded path is an addition, and it brings you back to your entry point.

Maze Paths

Many games will make a path feel less linear by turning the path, or parts of the path, into a maze.It is still a constrained path, but it’s not a straight line.If we replace the word “maze” here with “dungeon” it becomes easy to see that it is commonly used. (Skylanders)

High-Level Maps, and Side-quests

Many games will have an overarching map that players have some means of moving freely on.When they get to destinations on the map they drop into ‘embedded’ paths or open areas.Occasionally, these may, in turn have their own portals that drop you into new ‘embedded’ paths or open areas as well. (e.g. going into a building). Usually, in a story-based game with a map players need to unlock sections in some order that allows the story to be told in sequence.Usually there are optional areas players can go to in any order, and these are called side-quests. (Nino Kuni)

A Grab bag of Additional Techniques

Multiple Outcomes and Multiple Endings

One of the most common, and powerful ways to give players a sense of impact on an unfolding story is to allow their specific actions to alter the conclusion of the story.The wonderful thing about a conclusion is that it doesn’t lead to new branches of the story.Often, if designers are super clever (and if they have an adequate budget to create content) they will add in multiple outcomes to player actions that happen midway along the story.This might be something like causing the death or saving the life of some NPC character, and thereby changing some aspect of the story. The trick here usually, is to figure out how to make it feel like you’ve really impacted the story without changing the course of the main story – at least not until the very end. (Deus Ex)

Player Reputation, Being Good vs. Being Evil, and AI Memory of player actions

Some games will build some simple AI into the game’s NPCs that allows them to refer to things the player has done or “said” earlier in the game.Sometimes this NPC impression can be widespread and result in what feels like a growing ‘player reputation’. NPCs might become more impressed or appreciative, or more afraid of, or angry with the player.Some games focus on giving the player choices that take them down a ‘good’ or ‘evil’ path, with consequences and a reputation that affects the ‘flavor’ of the story experience.(Fable, Black and White, Fallout, Mad Max, Doki Doki Universe, Animal Crossing)

Random NPC Generation

A few games have taken the approach of creating random NPCs with different appearance or behaviors.This allows subsequent play-throughs of the game to feel different, and it allows different players to have slightly different, ‘customized’ story experiences.Shadow of Mordor put a lot of work into a system like this and called it their Nemesis system.

Companion NPCs

Occasionally games will provide players with an NPC character who becomes their travelling companion.This can be an effective way to build emotional connection with an NPC.These characters don’t need to be super smart for this connection to be effective.By having a companion character in a game with a more traditional structure (e.g. path structure), it allows the designers to put as much or as little effort as they want into the NPC’s AI, without requiring it to bear the entire weight of the game. (ICO, Last Guardian, Never Alone, 2 Brothers, Brutal Legend)

World Transformation

Some games take the approach of gradually changing the appearance of the environment or the state of some main characters, based on how the player chooses to act. This choice usually takes the form of good actions vs. evil actions, or light vs. dark. (Black and White, Fable)

Barren World Fiction

This isn’t a technique so much as it is a ‘side-step’ strategy.Many games create a fiction of an “empty world” that the player travels through.This has the wonderful advantage of not needing to create a lot of intelligent-seeming AI-driven characters.It can also lend itself well creating a certain tone of somber loneliness, and give an epic, mythic mood to a game. (Journey, Rime)

Branching Video

This is a technique that has been used to great effect by a company called Telltale, as well as a few others.Players watch a high quality movie-like story, and make choices as the movie plays by clicking on things.As they do this, the story branches.A variety of other techniques can be applied to this approach, such as limiting the time players have to make choices, requiring players to search for the choices, etc. (Walking Dead, Wolf Among Us, Kings Quest)

Persistent Time

This technique involves allowing time to pass in the game world when the player is not present.This can allow a player to gain resources when the game is off, or make players feel missed by NPC characters, or let players return to see world or character states having changed.It can lend great believability to a game world, but it poses a number of design challenges (…that we’ll conveniently ignore right now).(Animal Crossing, Seaman, Mad Max)

Multi-Player Companions

Some games are built to allow 2 or more live players to go on a journey together in an online story-adventure.This is an effective way to bring really high-quality AI into the game. (OK, fine, it’s not Artificial Intelligence, it’s RI …“Real Intelligence”).Feeling like you are not alone in a world can connect people emotionally and make the entire experience feel more meaningful, even if the world itself is devoid of other characters. (Journey) The down side here is that it’s hard to control what other players do in the story, and they may not want to role-play the way you want.One stratagem for dealing with this, is to severely limit the amount of actions or input they can have, still this has obvious downsides and only works if it fits your fiction.

Open-World Structures

An Open World game is one that tries not to constrain players in terms of where they can go.In a truly open world game the player has access to the entire world right from the beginning. Often, there are still locked areas, or factors that limit the player’s access to new areas, such as tougher enemies, or resources needed to travel. Open world games pose challenges for story sequencing – i.e. controlling the flow of events or narrative. (We talk more about this below).

Light, Heavy, Local , and World Simulation

Light simulation is when NPCs do simple looping behaviors that make them appear alive and busy.These AI’s are only minimally reactive, but they provide a backdrop that feels less static. (Fallout2, GTA,) Heavy Simulation (or deep simulation) is when one simulated NPC (or creature) affects the behavior of other NPCs.This creates causal chains, (or cascading behaviors) and worlds that feel much less predictable and more alive.This is harder to control from a story perspective. Heavy simulation can also mean more sophisticated NPC reactions to the player as well. (Dwarf Fortress, Spore, The Sims) Local simulation refers to simulation that is tightly controlled in a small space.This can have big payoff for relatively little cost. (Assassins Creed) World simulation is when the entire game world is part of one big connected simulation. (Animal Crossing, The Sims)

Sandbox Play

This is not very different from Open World, but it’s worth a mention.Sandbox worlds are ones that offer players interesting consequences to their actions, but don’t require players to satisfy goals in any order.Players are free to explore at will and experiment in a giant virtual sandbox.(Minecraft)By creating a world filled with interesting consequences to player actions it’s not hard to allow players to create their own stories.Still it becomes very difficult to create a system that yields sophisticated or satisfying stories.

Conversational Interactions

It’s difficult to imagine a compelling story from a book or movie that doesn’t have any conversations.Sadly, this is one of the most difficult things to pull off in a videogame while maintaining a sense of player freedom.The most common way to handle conversation is with conversation trees.These offer players fixed choices of a sentences, or sentence fragments, and then after players make their selection, NPCs deliver their sentences in response.There are a few other techniques used, such as ‘emotional posture’ selection, non-verbal communication action selection, or conversation chunks.This last approach involves breaking conversations into pieces and allowing players to access these in a non-specific order. (Starflight, Doki Doki Universe)

Ongoing Story vs. Back Story

It is worth being aware of the difference between ongoing story and back story because they have different requirements for delivery.Ongoing story is a story that is unfolding as the player plays. (i.e. the perception is that the events in this story are happening due to the players actions). Back story is a story that has already happened, possibly long ago.With ongoing story there is the expectation that the player’s actions may be able to affect what happens, and because the story feels like it’s happening “now”, there is a much stronger requirement that the story unfold in some logical order.Back story, on the other hand, can be useful because players don’t have any expectation of affecting it with their actions, and it can be revealed in a much less controlled order.Most mysteries involve discovering and uncovering back story – (i.e. what really happened to this civilization, or how did person X get killed).Players may find clues to this in a random order.This may not be as satisfying as ‘living the story’ but it’s a great way to give players the ‘sense’ of compelling story.(Destiny and Mass Effect)

Creating a Network of Dependent Gates

One approach to structuring an open ended interactive story game is to create a network of dependent story-gates.One does this by starting at the final player-goal (we’ll call that “D”) and working your way backwards in a big networked chart.In order to get D you must have “C”, in order to have C you must have “B”, and so on.To get “C” you can go to location 7, or location 8.At each location there are conditions for how to get the thing you need.In order to know how to satisfy these conditions, or where to go, you piece together bits of back story that you learn as you travel about. Finally, you limit the player’s ability to get to these locations by needing resources for travel, and by placing increasingly tougher enemies in the outlying areas.This is essentially the formula that some very old-school old open-ended space exploration games used.It is a very open-world structure and has no paths in it (though one could certainly embed paths).It relies heavily on back story. (Starflight, and StarControl 2. )（source：Gamasutra）