开发者谈产品开发本质上就是在有限中带着镣铐跳舞

原作者：Jake Birkett 译者：Willow Wu

我刚刚从波士顿回来，在那里和几位独立开发者、Valve公司人员一起参加圆桌会议，话题主要围绕着如何才能做出有销路的游戏。

我想对这一话题做一个自我总结，尽管现在人们能够轻松获取到各种信息，我还是能看到不少独立开发者（初出茅庐和经验丰富的都有）一直在犯同样的错误。

和往常一样，我的文章针对的是正在经营工作室，或者正在考虑创业的人。我是一个全职的独立开发者，我会写出我所知道的东西。

1.你想做的游戏

我们喜欢游戏，想做游戏，这就是我们加入这个行业的的原因，对吧？有人把它当成爱好，另外一些人想转成兼职或者是全职工作。

我有一份记录游戏点子的Google doc文件，足足有27页长。我甚至都没有坐下来认真思考过这些点子，它们只是在某个时刻蹦出来的想法。每页大概有5个游戏，所以这里头大概有150个游戏点子。如果有准备的话，我也许可以在一天内再想出另外100个。

想法不是问题，如何制定一个可行的方案才是挑战，也就是上面韦恩图所展示的那样。

Games with a market（from gamasutra.com）

2.你能做的游戏

除非你是个不愁钱、不愁时间的天才，不然你可能会遇到以下这些限制：

-你的技术能力限制

-预算限制

-时间限制

这些限制应该能让你认识到做一个3A级别的MMO游戏是不可行的——不仅是这个方案，还有其它很多也是不可行的。

这就是为什么我坚持做2D游戏，它们的开发周期短（大部分），成本也在所能承受的范围内。

另外一点就是其实很多人都高估了他们的能力、低估了做游戏所要耗费的时间，于是你就有大麻烦了。

所以你要非常清楚地认识到你的现实条件，设定一个切实的目标，然后稳妥行事。

3.考虑游戏市场

这是一个既简单又复杂的话题。

考虑到销量，首先你得确保游戏的受众范围足够大，并且你能争取到这些人。（通过营销、社区、病毒式传播等等，这是另一个话题了。）

如果你选的是一个已经饱和的市场，潜在用户基数肯定是很大，但是你很难从众多产品中脱颖而出，除非：1.你的游戏非常特别 2.你的游戏能够成为该市场的经典产品之一。

反过来说，如果你选了一个的非常小众市场，你可能挣不到足够的钱来维持生计。

还有就是除非你的广告预算非常多，或者是得到大型平台商店的推广、又或者是你有其它有效的营销方式，不然你只能争取到市场的其中一小部分用户。这就是为什么你在计算预计销售时不能参考市场的异常值。

总而言之，做好调查工作。你可以使用SteamSpy、看看别人的分析文章、跟独立开发者们交流心得、研究市场，训练你的敏感度，要能知道什么样的游戏是可以大卖的（要有具体的数据支持）。我一直都在这么做的，因为游戏市场从来就不是一成不变的。

如果你开发游戏主要是因为爱好，或者是你不一定要依靠游戏挣钱，事情就会简单很多，你可以直接移除韦恩图上的这个圈。但是你可能还是想要为自己的游戏争取一些用户，具体得看你做游戏的动机了。

4.进行数据/风险分析

算一算你的游戏开发时间要多久，成本包括什么，以及你的游戏点子投入市场实际能带来多少收益。你能达到收支平衡吗？或者……盈利？

如何减轻你的成本负担？有人给你投资吗？

要是你没能在预定的时间内做完游戏或者是超出了预算怎么办？

要是你无法做到收支平衡怎么办？

结论

这篇文章旨在给所有现任独立开发者和想要成为独立开发者的人做个提醒，而不是深入分析每个话题。当然，需要考虑的因素不止这些，要取决于你的个人情况。

也请切记，即使选择了理论上最适合你的游戏，任何人都无法保证这个游戏一定会成功。

但是，我可以肯定，从上面的维恩图入手就是一个很好的开始，它可以引导你走上正确的轨道。祝你好运！

本文由游戏邦编译，转载请注明来源，或咨询微信zhengjintiao

I just got back from a trip to Boston where I took part in several roundtable discussions with indies and Valve that were mostly about how to make games that have a chance of selling OK and related topics.

I wanted to summarize my thinking on this topic because despite the wealth of information out there I still see many indies (new and experienced) needlessly making the same mistakes.

As per usual, my blog post is assuming that you are running a business, or are thinking of doing so. I’m a full-time indie and so I write about what I know.

Games you want to make

This is why we all got into making games right? We love games, and we want to make games. Some of us keep it as a hobby and some of want to turn it into a part-time or full-time business.

I have a Google doc of game ideas that is 27 pages long. These aren’t even ideas I have sat down to think about, they are just random ideas that spawned over time. Each page has approx. 5 games on it. So it’s approaching 150 game ideas. I could probably think about another 100 in a day if I set my mind to it.

Ideas are not a problem. Filtering them to something viable is the challenge, and that’s where the Venn diagram above comes in.

Games you can make

Unless you are a genius with an infinite pool of money and time you probably have some constraints such as:

- Your technical capabilities

- Your budget

- Your time

These constraints should help you realise that making a AAA-quality MMO is not viable, and nor are a bunch of other things.

This is why I stick to 2D games with a short development cycle (mostly) that don’t cost too much too make. Watch my talk on this topic.

Add to that the fact that many people over-estimate their capabilities and under-estimate how long making a game will take, and you run into big problems.

So make sure you are very clear about what you can realistically achieve and err on the side of caution.

Games with a market

This is simple topic and also a complex topic

Basically you must make sure your game has an audience that is big enough to generate the sales you need and that you can reach them (via marketing, community, virality etc. but that’s a whole other topic.)

However, if you choose an oversaturated market, the audience may be huge, but it will be very hard to stand out in that market unless you make a) a game with something special about it and b) one of the best examples of games in that market.

Conversely if you choose a niche market that is too small, you may not make enough sales to survive.

Also remember that unless you have a huge advertising budget, or get some kind of mega store featuring, or your marketing excels in some other way, that you will only reach a fraction of that market anyway. This is why you cannot base your projected sales on outliers in a market.

Anyway, do your research. Use SteamSpy, read postmortems, talk to indies, study the market until you have a good “feel” for what sort of games sell backed up by hard numbers. I do this all the time because it’s a constantly shifting landscape.

If you are a hobbyist dev or you don’t need to make money from your games, this greatly simplifies things and you can leave out this entire circle on the Venn diagram. Though you may still want to reach an audience for your game, depending on your motivation for making it.

Do the Math/Risk Analysis

Work out how long your game will take to make, what it’ll cost, and what sort of revenue your chosen game idea could realistically make in its market. Will you be able to breakeven or even, gasp, make a profit?

Can you get some funding to reduce your personal costs?

What happens if it takes too long or you run out of budget?

What happens if you don’t breakeven?

Conclusion

This blog post is intended to be a reminder for all current and potential indies rather than a deep dive into each topic. Also there are of course other considerations to take into account and those will alter depending on your personal circumstances.

Also please bear in mind that even if you select what is in theory the right game for you, there are absolutely no guarantees it will be a success.

However, I’m pretty sure that the above diagram is a good starting point in order to nudge you in the right direction. Good luck!（source:gamasutra.com ）