作者：Tadhg Kelly

不久前Raph Koster发表了一篇关于“叙事元素并非游戏机制”的博文，引起了各种正负面的评论。所以我们将在本篇文章中具体阐述叙述与游戏机制之间的关系。

什么是游戏机制？

没有人能够给出具体的解释。或者说，当人们在使用这一术语时知道它的意思，但是却不是所有人都会认可自己的定义。有些人认为机制就像是意外的交互式黑盒子或者是定义游戏玩法的规则。Raph在自己的文章中便使用了这一定义，他描写道，《阿甘之城》拥有一系列内容丰富的快速反应事件，但是却缺乏足够的黑盒子交互性。在这种意义上，游戏机制是成形于许多小操作和规则的流动性结构。

arkham-city（from gamefront.com)

也有些人认为“机制”具有更深层次的意义。几年前，我的朋友Daniel Cook（游戏邦注：《Triple Town》创意总监）从化学角度去阐述游戏设计。他在文章中说到，“技能原子”能够被映射在链条中，并因此创造出游戏的综合技能图表。以此来看，机制是基于游戏结果并且在游戏过程中不断重复或扩展的循环行动，决议，状态改变以及反馈环路。

除此之外，Jesse Schell认为机制是游戏中至关重要的因素。Schell认为空间，物体，属性，状态，行动，规则，技能以及机遇都属于“机制”。机制是游戏的基本定律，是能够用于创造游戏的工具，但是我们却始终未能明确定义机制的界限。他所描写的内容并不是关于游戏艺术内容，而是侧重于阐述那些对游戏进程有帮助的重要工具。

游戏化倡导者们也持有不同的观点。在gamification.org维基上他们列出了迄今为止所明确的24点“机制”内容，包括“分数点”以及“无限游戏玩法”等内容。他们认为机制是一种行为，是对于一种规则结构的预期回应，并且能够提高游戏的用户粘性和玩家忠诚度。也有人将其称之为反馈，但是也很多人因其“机制牌组”等工具而对此疑惑连连。

当然还有其它想法。在最近的“Zero Punctuation”评论中，Yahztee Croshaw便把恐怖求生游戏《Amy》中的计时器当成“机制”。Mattie Brice认为机制是致力于“提供给玩家如乐趣或焦虑等游戏体验”，所以算是一种情感反应推动力。或者还有人将机制看成是“玩家在游戏环境中所进行的各种行动，行为以及控制机制”（游戏邦注：这是Hunicke, LeBlanc和Zubek等人的理念）。

我之所以列出这些不同的看法并不是要分析谁对谁错，只是想明确这些想法之间的不同。甚至也有人将机制简单地看成是“机器零部件”。也许就是因为一些叙述者对于机制的草率定义才会导致人们对于这一术语及其功能的疑惑和争议。

整体叙述或内容叙述？

尽管机制本身的定义还不甚明确，但是每个叙述者都能在“叙述”的过程中理解它们之间的关系。他们认为游戏就是能够引起玩家沉浸，鼓舞，迷惑并且产生艺术共鸣的体验；并且不需要拥有戏剧般情节或规定，只要能够完全理解叙述本身的概念便可。

行动也具有意义，玩家能够扮演自己故事中的角色等等。基于这样的框架，叙述者便能够明确他们想要创造的游戏。正是这种概括式叙述理念让游戏中许多内容都能够变成叙述体验中组成部分。并且如果游戏不只是关于乐趣，那么它还需要体现出自己独特的感觉，就如Orson Welles（美国著名电影导演）和Benny Hill（英国著名戏剧演员）具有不同风格。

就像我之前说过的，整体叙述的短处在于缺乏实际的存在感；这是一种纯粹的猜想，是由玩家应该是什么而不是他们的本质属性所决定。并且这也不是说玩家是乐趣消耗者（捣毁游戏中的一切事物），而是说徘徊在游戏中编织自己的故事并体验着叙述内容的原型并非玩家的真人。

玩家可以通过玩游戏感受到艺术的超自然力量，但这取决于他们自己对游戏的理解。就像是玩家可能是家具设计大师Eames也有可能是开车的司机，所以不同类型的玩家会感受到不同的游戏体验，因此，比起互动戏剧，游戏艺术更像是具有游戏性的画廊。

铁杆叙述者不能接受这种观点，他们希望将论据焦点变成思想保守与思想开放，或者思维有限和无限可能之间的对抗。他们也希望在游戏中包含任何具有交互性的内容，并将游戏中的所有体验都看成“叙述”，但是因此却形成了一种逻辑临界点，即如果任何事物都属于叙事元素，那么游戏中还剩下什么呢？

关于“叙述”的一般理解，也是Raph在其文章中阐述到的，这是游戏幻想层中的部分内容，能够增强并向机制元素传递重要信息。它具有自己的功能，能够有序地维持游戏在不同任务间的过渡，但是与实际游戏玩法相比，它并不能带给玩家更明显的游戏体验。所以与其说这种叙述是戏剧，倒不如说它是具有故事感的故事。或者按照Raph的说法，这应该是反馈过程中的部分内容。

探究“机制”定义

我想我们并不能彻底理解“机制”一词的含义，因为到目前为止还未有人能够搞清楚它的复杂定义。再多的定义也不能解决这一疑惑，再多的尝试也不能让我们的思维更加透彻。机制可能将永远只是个模糊的问题，所以我打算先回避这个问题，而用不同实体和名称去定义这些不同的观点。

Jesse Schell认为机制是游戏中的所有机械配件，而我将其称为游戏的“框架”。就像能够支撑一座建筑物的大梁和架构，框架能够明确游戏的环境并推动游戏更好地运行。

Hunicke, LeBlanc和Zubek所提到的行动，控制问题和行为便是“杠杆”。杠杆是框架的子集。而Mattie Brice关于机制含义的描写则是“压力”。如果没有压力和杠杆，也就不能形成框架。并且因为失败是成功之母，所以没有任何压力的游戏顶多就是一件玩具。

我将Dan Cook的技能原子称为“循环”。你采取一个行动，产生规则决议和状态改变，并获得反馈；然后你再采取另外一个行动，便会继续重复这一过程。无需卷入“机制”便能够简单地解释这一过程，因为这都是玩家所熟悉的内容，包括传球，玩单词游戏，操控俄罗斯方块或者袭击妖魔等。循环也总是会参杂一些与心理有关的词汇（“开环”），即会引起玩家好奇的内容，如此便能够合理解释为何机制能够提高游戏用户粘性了。

而Raph Koster的黑盒子则是“动态”。动态是指面向更多决定性胜利（游戏邦注：如完成一个关卡或获得触地得分等）的群组循环。就像在足球比赛中将球成功传给队友就是一种循环，而相应的动态便是朝着得分不断进行传球。在《阿甘之城》中，每一次的交互行动都是游戏的动态表现。而这些动态都包含有一个或多个循环，并推动着玩家朝接下来的目标前进。

通过为不同观点重新命名，现在看来它们能够更加有序地组合在一起了。有些内容属于其它元素的子集，就像循环归属于动态而杠杆也是框架的子集一样。如此看来我们便更加容易理解机制的定义。就像是我们不需要从100个不同定义中去寻找一个“活塞”的真正含义，只需要明确区分游戏的主要结构和次要结构便能够更加清楚地表达我们的意思。只要理清自己的思维，那么任何关于游戏设计的讨论就不会再那般晦涩难懂，并且将变得更加务实。

整体叙述

创造令人难忘的体验需要的是感知而不是信仰，就像创作一篇诗歌并只是需要你的义愤填膺。你必须将观众带进你的作品中并与之相交流，就像是如果他们想要玩游戏，你就需要与他们一起游戏。这一点是不言自明的。

而整体叙述者则希望驳回这种现实，鼓励他们的观众变成其他人。因此，任何关于叙述定义的论点以及不断重申“我相信玩家在自己的旅程中就是一名英雄。我相信《俄罗斯方块》具有叙述性。我相信象棋游戏带有情节”等都只是关于信仰的陈述，除非人类本性发生了变化，否则这种信仰不会有任何结果。

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

Opinion: The narrative vs. mechanics circus

by Tadhg Kelly

Last month I contracted what seemed to be a simple cold which progressed into a bronchial infection combined with asthma that knocked me out for three weeks.

It was really bad timing because around the same time, Raph Koster posted a blog bombshell when he said ‘Narrative is not a game mechanic’. A fair few commenters arose in support or ire. Posts flew about whether the meaning of narrative was too broad or limited, whether this was really about a limited formal view of games versus their possibilities, and so on. Exciting stuff, but I couldn’t really get into it.

I’m still recovering, but being ill has given me the chance to reflect and remember that there’s a reason that I don’t normally use the phrase ‘mechanics’. There’s also a reason why I tend to dismiss broad narrativism. It’s because both of them are part of a pretend debate over correctness, and each – in their own way – is just circular flame-bait, an ever-burning meme that goes nowhere.

What Is A Game Mechanic?

Nobody knows. Or rather, everybody knows what they mean when they use the term, but nobody agrees. To some it describes an emergent black box of interactions and rules that determines some pattern of play in the game. Raph uses that sort of meaning in his article, describing how Arkham City often has series of quick-time events that are large on content, but low on black box interaction. In this sense, the mechanic is a fluid structure that emerges from a number of smaller actions and rule resolutions, like a storm from a gathering of clouds.

To others, ‘mechanic’ means something finer. A few years ago, my friend Dan Cook (he of Triple Town) wrote a very influential article on the subject of the chemistry of game design in which he discussed ‘skill atoms’ that can be mapped in chains, leading to an overall skill diagram for the game. In this view the mechanic is a cyclic action, resolution, state change and feedback loop that may be repeated or branched during the course of the game depending on outcomes.

Yet another take on mechanics, this from Jesse Schell, thinks of them as factors that influence all games. Schell identifies space, objects, attributes, states, actions, rules, skill and chance all as ‘mechanics’. The mechanic is part fundamental law, part tool that you can bring into any game, but the exact demarcations are left intentionally vague. What he’s describing is everything non-aesthetic about the game and placing them all in the same big toolbox.

Gamification people have a different understanding. On the gamification.org wiki they maintain a list of 24 (so far) ‘mechanics’ that they have identified, from ‘points’ and ‘urgent optimism’ to ‘infinite gameplay’. They see a mechanic as a behavior, an expected response from a kind of rule structure which is supposed to increase engagement and loyalty. Other people might call this feedback, but the seed of confusion is out there thanks to tools like their ‘mechanic decks’.

And there are others. In a recent review on Zero Punctuation, Yahztee Croshaw refers to a timer in the Amy survival horror game as ‘a mechanic’. How about the idea (from Mattie Brice) that a mechanic is ‘to provide players with experiences such as fun or anxiety’, and therefore a driver of emotional outcomes. Or how about mechanics as ‘the various actions, behaviors and control mechanisms afforded to the player within a game context’ (according to Hunicke, LeBlanc and Zubek)?

The point is not to construe these different meanings as either right or wrong, but simply to show that they don’t match up. While there exists a rough understanding that ‘mechanics’ equates to ‘machine parts’, how individual writers scope them quickly leads to fuzziness, debating at cross-purposes and terminology wars.

Holistic Narrative or Content Narrative?

While mechanics may be fuzzy, narrativists pretty much understand one another when they use the term ‘narrative’. They mean the game as an involving experience that immerses, inspires, enchants and artistically resonates with the player. They don’t necessarily mean plot or the normal conventions of drama, but rather use a holistic understanding of the idea of narrative itself.

Actions can have meaning, players can be actors in their own narrative, and so on. And that being the framework as narrativists understand it, they can extrapolate on what games should be. It is this grander interpretation of the narrative idea that permits the inclusion of many other aspects of games as a part of the narrative experience. It also allows for some sense of what games would be like if they weren’t just about fun, like the difference between Orson Welles and Benny Hill.

As I’ve written before (a couple of times), the problem with this holistic view is that it has no verifiable existence in reality. It is pure conjecture, derived of an idea of what players should be rather than what they are. This is not to say that players are mere fun-consumers who trash everything they see, but rather that the archetype of the player wandering through game instantiating a tale for themselves and experiencing narrative as they go is not a real person.

Players do have the ability to feel the numinous presence of art through playing a game, but they do so on their own terms. Like an audience member regarding an Eames installation, or a driver behind the wheel, the experience of the player is not reliable, and therefore the art of games is more of the model of a playable gallery rather than an interactive drama.

Hard-core narrativists tend to become very defensive when this is pointed out, and try to change the argument to one of closed- versus open-mindedness, or limited thinking versus unlimited possibilities of games. They also tend toward inclusion, pulling in everything that is interactive as a game and every moment of experience as ‘narrative’, but this reaches a logical tipping point very quickly: If everything is narrative then nothing is.

The more ordinary understanding of ‘narrative’, and the one that Raph uses in his article, is content that exists as a part of the fantastical layer of the game, enhancing and informing the mechanical aspects. It has a function, which is to move the game along from task to task, but is less vital to the playing experience than the actual play. The story is not so much drama as storysense. And, as Raph described, part of the feedback process.

Holistic narrative is really just a way of saying ‘high minded’ as contrasted with some ill-defined ‘low-minded’ embarrassment over games as they are. While this arguably results in a set of games that are really just having an internal conversation with one another, the outside world doesn’t really care.

Moving Past Mechanics

I don’t believe that the term ‘mechanic’ can be saved. Its complicated layers of meaning are already out there in the world, like threads than can never be un-spun. One more definition will not solve that, nor one more attempt to seize the high ground. It will remain forever fuzzy, so I sidestep the issue by treating each meaning of the term as a different entity, and give each its own name.

Jesse Schell’s definition of mechanic means basically all the machine parts in the game. I just call it the ‘frame’ of the game. Like the framework of a building holding the girders and wiring that make it work, the frame holds the environment and levers that make the game function.

Hunicke, LeBlanc and Zubek’s actions, control methods and behaviors? ‘Levers’. Levers are a subset of the frame. Mattie Brice’s descriptions of mechanical intent is called ‘pressure’, or ‘picking up the gun’ as I wrote back when this blog got started. A frame is not a frame without some form of pressure and levers have no purpose without it. Without the prospect of loss there can be no wins, so without pressure a game is instead a toy.

I call Dan Cook’s skill atoms ‘loops’. You take an action, there are rule resolutions and states change, and then feedback. And you take another action. This is easy to explain without involving ‘mechanics’ because it is grounded in things that players do, like pass a ball, play a word, slot a tetromino or hit an orc. Loop also ties in with the psychological use of the word (‘open loop’) as a question that the mind wants answered, which is very relevant to explaining how games can be so engaging.

Raph Koster’s black boxes I call ‘dynamics’. A dynamic is a cluster of loops which build toward more decisive wins (like completing a level, scoring a touchdown etc). If completing a pass to a teammate in soccer is a loop, then the corresponding dynamic is completing a bunch of passes toward scoring a goal. Each set of interactions in Arkham City is a movement of the game’s dynamic. Each comprises one or more loops, and a win which plays the next bit of content

By naming the components of play as separate things then they can sit together more comfortably. Some sit as subsets of other components, such as loops within dynamics or levers within frames. And that’s perfectly fine. Just as you wouldn’t try to describe an engine by mangling ‘piston’ into 100 different meanings, identifying the super- and sub-structures of games as separate entities makes it much easier to be clearer about what you mean. Sanity prevails, and so the discussion of game design becomes less mystical and more pragmatic. (In a forthcoming project I plan to expand on this tendency by the way. Stay tuned.)

And Holistic Narrative

I’m also not interested in winning the holistic narrative debate because I think it’s become theological. There is no harm in thinking of games in the ideal as well as the real, but this particular conversation has become internal and self-referential. Its participants simply believe that their ideal player is a real thing, or may one day be, and will not be convinced otherwise.

Crafting traumatic experiences is something that requires perception more than belief, just as crafting a great poem requires more than a written-down form of your indignation for your literature class. You have to bring the audience in and work with them, which means if they they want to play then you have to work with that. There’s no getting around it.

My sense is that the holistic narrativists want to reject that whole line of thinking and instead encourage the audience to become someone else. Hence the meaning-of-narrative argument and the endless restatement of the ‘I believe the player is a hero on their own journey, I believe Tetris has a narrative, I believe Chess has a plot’. It’s just a belief statement, and it can go nowhere unless human nature itself changes.

While that may happen one day, my sense is that it is a conversation that will simply run and run. So, for different reasons to the question of mechanics, it too is to be sidestepped.(source:GAMASUTRA)