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Paradox管理团队谈新的产品战略和结构转型

发布时间:2018-08-28 09:29:28 Tags:,

Paradox管理团队谈新的产品战略和结构转型

原作者:Matthew Handrahan 译者:Willow Wu

在不久之前,Paradox Interactive还处于一年发行一打游戏的节奏。与其因此被看作是一家高产的的游戏公司,Paradox管理团队却认为那是公司的低潮期,这些疯狂产出就像是喝太多Kool-Aid(一种广受大众喜爱的饮料粉)所导致的。

在近期的PDXCon活动中, 业务拓展部门副总Shams Jorjani跟媒体们说这是一个建立在意外成功上的失败。TaleWorlds Entertainment的《骑马与砍杀》(Mount & Blade)在2008年收获了不错的成绩,之后TaleWorlds与Paradox Interactive分道扬镳,《骑马与砍杀》系列也不再是他们的大战略游戏。但这也让Paradox有机会发行了年轻团队Arrowhead开发的《魔能》(Magicka),它成为了Paradox最成功的游戏之一。从此以后,Paradox每年发行大量游戏就成为了一种常态。

骑马与砍杀

Jorjani说:“你签下一个游戏,要花费1~2年的时间才有成品。《魔能》是2011年签下的。在2013、2014年,有一堆不靠谱的游戏摆在眼前,我们知道游戏本身的设计理念并不是很糟糕,但当时我们作为一个组织,可能还不太成熟,执行效果也不好。而且我们也没能在早期淘汰掉这些项目。”

这一时期的许多失误促使Jorjani、CEO Fred Wester和管理团队的其他人进行了内省式的讨论。Paradox的作品应该是怎么样的呢?

“我们有这样的愿景:玩家会在不知道游戏讲什么的情况下直接买下Paradox发行的产品,换句话就是我们希望Paradox这个招牌成为游戏体验的保证,”Jorjani说。“如果有谁会在不知道是什么游戏的情况下二话不说付给我们40美元,那时候我们就算成功了——我们有了完美的游戏核心支柱(对游戏有透彻的了解,有自己的独家秘诀),提高了整个组织系统的工作效率,拥有一套站得住脚的产品组合。”

Jorjani认为Paradox的游戏可以分成三大类:最受欢迎的策略类游戏、再来是经营类游戏和角色扮演游戏。他说Paradox有世界顶级的内部策略游戏工作室,其它两类则需要找优秀的第三方开发商合作。比如说与Colossal Order合作发行的模拟经营游戏《都市:天际线》(Cities:Skylines)以及与Obsidian合作的RPG《暴君》(Tyranny)。经历了那忙碌的一年,这种更加集中的策略让Paradox得以蓬勃发展,并填补了发行商追求3A产品而造成的市场空白。

“我以前经常会在展会上四处逛逛,跟同事说‘如果有看到类似Will Wright(《模拟人生》系列创始人)和Peter Molyneux(Bullfrog公司创始人)在90年代末做的那种游戏,我们就签下来,’第一年的时候大家都以为我在开玩笑,但是我每年都说,到了第三年他们就开始给我推荐项目了。”

他还补充说:“以前做PC游戏的某些大型发行商现在有了更宏大的目标,之前他们感兴趣的东西已经无法帮助他们走得更远了,但是对我们来说还是一个不小的挑战。长时间以来,普通规模市场都处于空白状态,于是我们就接手了。《都市:天际线》就是一个很好的例子。”

《都市:天际线》是Paradox的大热门游戏,发行时就打破了公司记录,2018年3月销量达到了500万,它也是Paradox第一季度收益的主要功臣,这正好体现了公司在过去的五年里的总体战略变化,同时也指出了他们未来几年的发展方向。

去年,Paradox的季度盈利增加了270%,收入翻倍,在此期间他们只发行了一款新游戏——Haemimont开发的《火星求生》(Surviving Mars)。虽说《火星求生》肯定是对收益有贡献,但Paradox的重头戏还是《群星》(Stellaris)《都市:天际线》《钢铁雄心4》(Hearts of Iron IV)和《欧陆风云》(Europa Universalis IV)的新扩展包。这些游戏最晚的是两年前发行的,最早的是五年前,Paradox通过持续发行各种扩展包来获得增长。

现场有一位记者指出在2012年二月发行的《十字军之王2》(Crusader Kings 2)现在所有的DLC合计已经超过了300美元——对于某些玩家来说这是一个比较有争议性的话题:他们觉得游戏售价太高,另外他们更习惯于发行后可以免费获得新的游戏内容。

“我们想为玩家制作出真正的好的游戏,但如果开发人员的得不到相应的回报,我们也无法实现这个目标,”Fred Wester的继任者Ebba Ljungerud回答道。“这是最基本的前提,然后我们才可以继续讨论利润问题,还有其它各种事情,但是没有收入是做不出游戏的。

“所以,我们要对游戏的额外内容收费是一件很正常的事。确实,《十字军之王2》这些年让玩家花费不少,但它包含的玩法也很丰富,玩家可以享受一段很长的游戏旅途。”

Jorjani补充说:“如果你能做出一个像《十字军之王2》这样内容丰富但是成本又低的游戏,那么你也没有必要出DLC了。从内容价值的角度来看,我们相信Paradox可以排进整个行业的前1%。

“玩家的观念会被其它游戏运作方式影响,我们必须要处理这个问题。在其它游戏中,如果你没有把所有的内容都玩了,你就会错过一些东西,而我们的游戏是不会这样设定的。我们必须要知道要如何才能更好地展示产品页面,这样你点进来的时候才不会被一大堆DLC搞得不知所措,好像这个游戏就是骗玩家钱的。”

Paradox CPO Mattias Lilja表示他们会全力解决这些问题,这样一个花费6年开发各种DLC的游戏不能指望Steam这样的平台来帮你。关于未来,Paradox会做出更多类似《十字军之王2》的游戏,而《魔能》这样的游戏体验应该会被逐渐边缘化。

“如果一个游戏的完整体验时长少于500小时,那我们或许就不应该发行它——这是一条基本准则,”Jorjani说。“但我们还是会发行游戏时间较短的产品,毕竟罗马非一日建成。如果你想做《上古卷轴5:天际》那样的游戏,你得慢慢来,不能第一个项目就做这么大规模的,要有个进阶过程。”

当然,除了付费游戏+DLC之外,还有很多方法能让时长500小时的游戏盈利,Paradox表示他们也会积极探索别的收益模式。有人怀疑会有部分玩家对Paradox发行F2P游戏感到非常愤怒,甚至会比那些批判游戏DLC总价超过300美元的那些玩家还要多,但这种更加灵活、开放的商业模式对公司的战略思维是有影响的。

“如果我告诉Henrik(《十字军之王2》的游戏总监)2018年我们要做个价值300美金的DLC,他估计会直接给我来一巴掌,”Jorjani说。“如今我告诉他们说我们六年之后就会得到一款身价30000美元的游戏,没人会想扇我。他们会问‘嗯……我们要怎么做呢?’”

至于为什么Paradox以往游戏大部分都是付费+DLC模式,Mattias Lilja说“因为这样有效。但我们并不是有意依赖于这种模式。”

“如果我们能找到让玩家满意的另一种收费模式,那我们会去尝试的,”他说。“但我们没有足够的数据,我们也不知道效果会如何……我不认为我们有什么特别的理由抵制F2P模式的大战略游戏。我们只是不太确定怎么做才是最好的。”

Paradox花了五年的时间进行结构转型,精简发行数量,类型更加集中,所有游戏都是以服务的形式高效运作。这种情况是否会一直持续下去还有待观察,但Jorjani很清楚游戏行业的局势,知道增长来自哪里。

Jorjani在早些时候说:“纵观着整个游戏行业,你会发现付费游戏的市场规模正在缩小。即使如此,开发付费游戏并非一定就是亏本生意,我们在未来依然还会采用这种商业模式。但是公司整体的角度来说,我们的目标就是实现增长,而当下的F2P游戏就是最有效的工具。

“我们知道转换成F2P模式存在着很多不确定性,但有趣的是我们由此也看到了的一种混合模式:游戏一开始是付费的,但我们可以用其它的方式来对游戏内容收费,避免惹怒玩家,这就是我们之后五到十年要面临的真正挑战。”

本文由游戏邦编译,转载请注明来源,或咨询微信zhengjintiao

There was a 12-month period not so long ago when Paradox Interactive launched a dozen different games. Rather than being regarded as an example of its high productivity, though, the Paradox management team looks back on that period as something of a nadir – the result of drinking one too many glasses of its Kool-Aid.

Speaking in a closed room session with the press at PDXCon recently, VP of business development Shams Jorjani explained it as a failure built on unexpected success. TaleWorlds Entertainment’s Mount & Blade had performed well in 2008, despite it falling outside the Paradox comfort zone of grand strategy. This in turn led to the company taking a chance with Arrowhead’s Magicka in 2011, which “became such a huge success” that a future in which Paradox published a multitude of independent games each year seemed entirely plausible.

“You sign a game, and it takes 12 to 24 months before it comes out,” Jorjani said. “Magicka was 2011, so in 2013, 2014 you saw all of these wonky games, where the ideas were not necessarily bad, but we as an organisation maybe hadn’t matured to the point where we could execute well. And we didn’t have the maturity to kill them off earlier in the process.”

The many stumbles that categorised that period prompted introspective discussion between Jorjani, CEO Fred Wester, and others on the management team. What, exactly, should the Paradox portfolio look like?

“We had this vision of people buying a Paradox game without knowing what the game was; that ‘Paradox’ should be a guarantee for a type of game experience,” Jorjani said. “If we can get somebody to pay us $40 without knowing what the game is, that’s when we’ve succeeded. So that’s when we refined our core game pillars – what the game is, the Paradox secret sauce – and tried to streamline and have a portfolio that is consistent.”

Jorjani believes that all Paradox games fall into three broad genres: the strategy titles for which it is best known, but also management and role-playing games. With strategy, Jorjani said, Paradox already has some of the world’s best studios in-house; with the other two categories it has been necessary to cultivate relationships with “best-in-class” third-party developers – Colossal Order’s Cities: Skylines in management, for example, or Obsidian’s Tyranny in role-playing games. In the time since that misguidedly busy year, this more focused approach has allowed Paradox to thrive, and fill a gap in the market vacated by publishers chasing AAA glory.

“I used to go around at [trade] shows and say, ‘We’ll sign anything close to what Will Wright and Peter Molyneux did in the late Nineties’,” Jorjani said. “For the first year people were like, ‘Ha ha’, but I kept saying it and in the third year they started coming back with actual pitches.”

He added: “Some of the big publishers that used to do a lot in PC gaming have now all moved on to bigger things, and we’ve landed in this very comfortable middle-class of gaming that’s been dead for a very long time. That leaves a lot of doors open. Some stuff that used to be interesting for publishers is not big enough for them any more, but it is absolutely big enough for us. Cities: Skylines is a very good example of that.”

Cities: Skylines was a major hit for Paradox, breaking company records when it launched, and reaching five million sold in March 2018. Colossal Order’s game was also a key contributor to its Q1 results, which perfectly illustrated the way in which Paradox has changed over the last five years, and pointed towards where it will head in the years to come.

Paradox increased its quarterly profits by 270% over the prior year, and doubled its revenue, despite Haemimont’s Surviving Mars being the only completely new release during the period. While Surviving Mars certainly played its part, the bulk of the release schedule was expansion packs for Stellaris, Cities: Skylines, Hearts of Iron IV and Europa Universalis IV. The most recent of those games launched two years ago, the oldest three years before that, and yet all continue to receive premium expansions that drive company growth.

One journalist present pointed out that Crusader Kings 2, which was first released in February 2012, and now has more than $300 worth of DLC – a contentious point for some gamers, who feel overwhelmed by the cost of entry now, and are perhaps accustomed to receiving more post-release content for free.

“We want to make really great games for our fans, and we can’t do that if we don’t charge something for the development,” replied Ebba Ljungerud, who will replace Fred Wester as CEO later this year. “That’s the base of it, and then you can discuss margins, and you can discuss this and that, but if we don’t make money then we’re not going to be able to make the games.

“So for us it’s not so strange that we actually charge people for extra content. And yeah, you can say with Crusader Kings 2 it’s a lot of money over the years, but it’s also a game with a lot of hours, with a lot of gameplay.”

“I’d argue go out and find any other game that can involve this many hours of gameplay at the base cost, never buying any more DLC,” Jorjani added. “I think we’re in the top 1% of the industry in terms of the value we provide.

“We have to deal with the issue of people being conditioned by how other games in the industry work. And the conditioning is, if you don’t get all of the content then you’re missing out on something, which is not true in our games. We need to get better at bundling and presenting stuff on our product pages, so that when you come in you’re not inundated with a torrent of DLC and you feel like you’re getting gouged.”

And Paradox must be fully engaged with these issues, chief product officer Mattias Lilja pointed out, because individual games with six years’ worth of DLC is not a problem it can expect a platform like Steam to solve. Going forward, Paradox will be moving further and further towards experiences very much like Crusader Kings 2, and further away from experiences like Magicka.

“If a game can’t be played for 500 hours we probably shouldn’t be publishing it – as a general rule,” Jorjani said. “But we will still probably publish games with shorter play times, because Rome wasn’t built in a day. If you want to make a Skyrim-type experience you can’t start making that day one. You need something else first, and then you move on to that.”

Of course, there is more than one way to monetise a 500-hour experience, and Paradox is open about looking well beyond premium games and DLC to inform where it goes from here. One suspects that the portion of Paradox’s audience that would bristle at the idea of free-to-play would outnumber those who take issue with $300 worth of DLC for one title, but these more open and flexible business models are influential in terms of the company’s thinking.

“If I’d gone to Henrik [Fåhraeus, game director of Crusader Kings 2] and said that in 2018 we’d have $300 worth of DLC, he would have slapped me across the face,” Jorjani said. “Today I could walk in and say we’ll have $30,000 worth of content in six years and people wouldn’t smack me. They’d say, ‘Hmmm, how are we going to do that?’”

Mattias Lilja added that one of the main reasons that the Paradox portfolio is dominated by “premium plus DLC” is simply “because it works”. Indeed, not only is the company looking at other models, “we’re not particularly attached to [premium plus DLC] either.”

“If we could simultaneously have different ways of paying that would make people happy, we would do that,” he said. “But we don’t have the data, and we don’t know how that would play out… I don’t think we have anything particularly against a free-to-play grand strategy game. We just have no idea how that would do.”

Upon leaving the room, it was difficult to see past Lilja’s comments as the most telling of all. Paradox has spent the last five years moving towards a structure where it has a smaller, more focused catalogue of games, all of which effectively operate as services – only under a financial model more at home in the industry of five years ago. Whether that will always be the case remains to be seen, but Jorjani was clear about where the real growth in the games industry is now happening.

“If we look at the industry as a whole, the premium business model is shrinking, that part of the business is shrinking” Jorjani said, earlier in the conversation. “That doesn’t mean that you can’t drive or grow [within it] – we can probably do that for many more years – but as whole, our focus as a company is growth, and what’s growing is free-to-play.

“We know that our games don’t perhaps translate that well to free-to-play, so the interesting thing is where the convergence point is with the hybrid models we’ve seen; where there is a premium, starting price-point, but there are other ways to charge for content without upsetting everyone. That’s the real challenge for the next five to ten years.”(source:gamesindustry.biz


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