本文原作者：Josh Bycer 译者：ciel chen

随着Kickstarter与crowdfunding这两家众筹网的兴起，游戏开发趋势又再次崛起了。如今消费者终于能如愿以偿地看到一款游戏从其模型到完整发行版本的整个开发历程。在这样的情况下，消费者对游戏开发有了细微的了解后却产生了非常大的影响，这也引起了一个有趣的争议——消费者对游戏开发应该了解到什么程度合适？

“香肠是如何制作出来的”：

游戏开发对于很多消费者来时始终是个迷；甚至对于第一次在游戏行业的工作人员来说也是如此——它就是属于那种如果你没亲自去做就真的一窍不通的东西。这使得那些没有游戏开发方面知识的记者媒体很难去报道游戏，而对于开发者们来说，要向他们解释怎么做成的游戏也很艰难。

我在近几年和开发者进行了交流，我发现对于他们来说就算是向消费者传达游戏范围都很艰难。那当一个饱受期盼的游戏模式不得不被删减会带来什么后果？你可以跟数以千计的人们解释清楚阻止他们群起暴动吗？

monkey_island._special_edition(from gamebuy)

我们慢慢地看到有消费者开始对游戏设计多少有一些相关的了解了，这要有赖于这些消费者通过抢先体验观看到游戏的发展历程或者他们观看了游戏设计相关的视频。然而，这有一个陷阱——你的消费者会开始觉得他们比设计者懂得多而且觉得自己有资格对游戏特色指指点点。

抢先体验和众筹使得消费者能看到游戏设计的幕后

曾经有个臭名昭著的案列——有人大言不惭地说多角色竞技游戏应该只用一礼拜来开发。如果只是因为某款游戏做到了某事，这不意味着这件事对于另一款游戏来说也可以做得到。

这里就可以引出今天这篇文章中要讲的一个大问题了：一个人对游戏开发应该了解到什么程度才能很好地享受游戏？

做游戏和玩游戏：

电子游戏深受广泛群众的喜爱。我们游戏的玩家范围从孩子到业余休闲玩家，甚至到那些会为自己最喜欢的游戏写增强修订程序的专业玩家。不过如果你只是想尽情地玩像《暗黑破坏神3》或者《Cookie Clicker》这类游戏的时候你是不需要去懂这些游戏的程序系统工作原理的。

而也因为这样，其实没有必要让那些主流游戏网站对游戏设计或者游戏行业这个话题进行报道。几个礼拜以前曾经有过对《地平线：空之黎明》中投影剔除技术的一些小小争议——这方面知识对于游戏设计师来说是常识，但对于普通玩家来说却不怎么熟悉。

不过这还是反映了部分问题的：要去哪才能真正学习到有关游戏开发的知识？几个礼拜以前我们进行过讨论——有关电子游戏新闻的一些问题；以及对于主流网站愿意花更多的时间报道每日新闻而不是设计作品的问题。事实上大部分主流网站没有时间和资源来致力于游戏产业这部分内容，而且对于读者对于游戏开发了解的愿望是否强烈还是个问题呢。

在最后，我们讨论了关于要对游戏设计了解有多深才能享受玩游戏的过程的问题；这其实就跟你想尽情地赛车但却不需要去把造车当成营生一个道理。还有另外一个点，就是你根本就没法知道你所面对说话人的知识基础怎样。

消费者的知识基础处在什么程度的都有

举个例子，我曾经跟会玩游戏或者对游戏行业有一定了解的人聊过天，他们却不知道什么是《Undertale》游戏或者the Humble Bundle是什么。

对于正在阅读这篇文章的你来说，我知道这可能会有些令人震惊，但是在游戏产业里确实存在普通玩家和狂热支持者之间巨大的差异。对于有的只是把游戏当消遣，偶尔浏览一个两个主流游戏网站的人来说，他们会去读程序生成设计有关的文章吗？

事实上，我们接下来马上要做一个小测试——你可能知道也可能不知道这个测试，不过我在网上交叉邮寄了很多我的作品给各个游戏网站想借此宣传《Game-Wisdom》。接下来的部分在每个游戏网站上都会不一样，而我想看到的就是你对游戏设计有多深的了解。那么开始吧：
想让游戏通过付费手段定输赢则需要哪些主要的决定因素呢？

小知识，大影响：

电子游戏已经不再是小众产业，它已经成为一个市值数十亿美元的产业了。然而，在游戏制作和创作的大部分过程仍旧是个迷。我个人觉得关于游戏领域和游戏设计流程的文章与讨论还应该要有更多。随着设计者设计工作越发地透明化，这给消费者的理解能力终将会是件好事。

如果你想让消费者明白电子游戏的制作需要什么，那么我就需要给他们提供学习用的必要信息。当然了，我们需要注意的是，并不是每个人都会想得到或者用到这些知识的，不过这没关系，重点是至少要让人想了解学习的时候不至于无处可寻。

如果你希望下一代能有更多的游戏设计师，那么我们就不应该再隐藏这些有关信息。

本文由游戏邦编译，转载请注明来源，或咨询微信zhengjintiao

The rise of kickstarter and crowdfunding has had the impact of pulling back the curtain on game development. Consumers now have a chance to actively watch a game go from a prototype to a full release. With that said, a little knowledge can go a long way, and presents an interesting debate on how much should consumers know about making games.

game development

How the Sausage Gets Made:

Game Development for a lot of consumers is still a mystery; even for people working on their first game. It’s one of those things that you don’t really know about it until you start doing it. This makes it very difficult for journalists to cover games who have no experience on the dev side, and hard for developers to explain what goes into a title.

Speaking to developers over the last few years, what can be near impossible to do is to convey the scope of a game to the consumers. What happens when a promised game mode has to be cut? Can you explain that to thousands of people without them wanting to riot?

We are starting to see consumers who are at least somewhat knowledgeable about design, thanks to watching a game grow through early access or watching videos on the subject. However, this comes with a catch — You have consumers who think they know better than the designers and feel entitled to demand features.

Early Access and crowd-funding have allowed consumers to see behind the curtain
There was the infamous case last year of someone claiming that multiplayer should only take a week to develop. Just because one game does X, doesn’t mean that the same can be done with other games.

That takes us to the big question for today’s post: How much should someone know about game development to enjoy video games?

Making and Playing Games:

Video Games can be appreciated by a wide audience. Our audience ranges from kids and casual players, to experts who may even mod their favorite games. You don’t need to understand how a progression system works in order to enjoy a game like Diablo 3 or Cookie Clicker.

And because of that, it’s not a necessity to cover game design or industry topics on major sites. A few weeks ago, there was the slight hubbub over frustum culling with Horizon Zero Dawn– Common knowledge for designers, but not so well-known for the general market.

But this represents part of the problem: Where can someone go to actually learn about game development? We talked about the issues with video game journalism a few weeks ago and how major sites spend more time on news of the day rather than design pieces.

Most major sites don’t have the time or resources to dedicate to this part of the game industry. There still is the issue of how much would an audience want to learn about game development.

In the last section, we talked about how you don’t need to understand game design in order to enjoy games; just like you don’t need to build cars for a living to enjoy racing. Another point is that there is no way to know the knowledge base of the people you’re talking to.

The knowledge base of consumers is all over the place

As an example, I’ve talked to people who play games or know about the industry, but have no idea what Undertale or the Humble Bundle were.

For you reading this right now, I know that may be a shock, but there is a big difference between the general and enthusiast sides of the game industry. For someone who just plays games casually and visits one of the major sites, would they want to read an article about procedurally generated design?

In fact, we’re going to have a little test right now, and yes, I’m talking to you. You may or not may not know this, but I do crosspost my pieces to various game sites on the Internet to help spread awareness for Game-Wisdom. This next part is going to be different on each site, and I want to see how knowledgeable you are about game design. Here we go:

What are the main factors that determine if a game is pay to win or not?

A Little Knowledge Goes a Long Way:

Video games are no longer a niche genre, but a multi-billion dollar industry. And yet, so much of what goes into making and working on games is still a mystery. I personally think that there should be more articles and discussion on the industry and the design process. With designers being more transparent about working on games, giving consumers the ability to understand will ultimately be a benefit.

If you want the consumer to understand what it takes to make a video game, then we need to provide the necessary information for them to learn. Of course we need to mention that not everyone is going to want or use this knowledge, but that’s okay; the point is that it’s out there.（source：gamasutra.com  ）