作者：Ben Briggs

在很长的一段停歇后，我们又开始编写有关游戏设计的系列文章；我们发现这能够基于各种游戏的不同方面去划分我们的想法，并分析为什么我们会采用某种方法去划分不同游戏。在本篇文章中我们将着眼于与游戏玩法一样重要的用户界面。一个出色的用户界面是不会让用户必须越过重重关卡才能到达目的地。

多个保存状态

当玩家通过按压home键或接到电话时，游戏通常都会保存玩家当前的游戏状态。而本来不常见但却变得越来越重要的理念便是。游戏应该保存每个模式的状态，包括用户想要开始挑战新游戏。比起删除记录，游戏将会为玩家之后的游戏保存状态，并在玩家想要结束游戏时重新设置模式。

《植物大战僵尸》便拥有这样一种系统，即同时为多个游戏保存状态。与冒险游戏一样，你也可以在快速游戏模式下保持多个游戏，即包括迷你游戏以及一些小场景（游戏邦注：如僵尸对你的家园所展开的不同进攻）。这里有许多不同的关卡，所以系统可能会被认为太具有杀伤力，但是如果你想要尝试其它阶段的话也不会遗失任何过程。

多个保存游戏

devil-invasion（from gamesuncovered）

我们需要在iPhone OS中包含多个配置文件；即使仅仅是因为需要将你的设备交给好友让他们访问你的个人数据。虽然保存多个游戏的能力变得不再那么重要，但是我们认为这仍是个必要添加的元素。这将能够提供给好友玩游戏的机会，并且是从头开始的体验，而不只是从具有极高难度的第五个关卡开始。这也将避免他们妨碍你的进程！

《Devil Invasion》便有效地执行了这一点；如果你只拥有一款游戏，那么自动保存插槽将能够帮助你避免丢失进程。除此之外你还可以保存6个插槽。

屏幕方向检测

iPhone和iPod在不同位置上都带有耳机插孔，当屏幕处于横屏模式时，你便会希望耳机线能够位于设备的最上方。如果在玩游戏的过程中，玩家的手会不时碰到左下角的耳机线的话，这便会大大影响到游戏体验，但似乎大多数游戏都是面向iPod Touch所设计的而不是插座位于睡眠/唤醒按键以及SIM卡槽旁边的iPhone。因此，对于游戏来说有效地持有设备是个大问题。不过我们可以通过检测设备的方向并相应地轻弹屏幕而轻松解决这一问题，就像在《愤怒的小鸟》中那样。

angry-birds（from gamesuncovered）

同样地，这一技巧也可以用于为人像或场景优化用户界面；比起小型设备，这一功能更能造福iPad，但这却并不代表iPhone游戏就不能具有这一能力。就像较早前的《Smiles》，那时候我们刚开始基于设备方向旋转界面，并有效地影响着游戏玩法。

手指友爱地碰触目标

fieldrunners（from gamesuncovered）

如果你将使用虚拟按键的话，那么越大会越好，《炮塔防御》中的底部图标便是一个有效例子。你肯定不愿意牺牲太多可行的游戏领域，但是如果控制是必要的话，千万不要让用户难以按压。这点似乎很明显，但是许多手机端口都带有极小的按键，所以比起原生iPhone游戏，它们看起来并不符合标准。

轻拍开始

历史上来看，程序员们会在过程需要暂停，并且之前的命令行又不能发挥作用时使用“按压任何按键继续”这一文本内容。而在今天，“按压以开始”或“碰触屏幕”已经没有用了，除非是让玩家跃过一个呼啦圈开始游戏；即为了确保吸引玩家的注意。不过这其实是多余的，我们希望能够永久地摆脱这一“功能”。

加速器校准

我们总是很难为游戏的加速器调整一个完美的视角，特别是当存在许多使用于某些内容并不适用于其它内容的不同的配置。那就将这种校准留给用户；《Tilt to Live》便有效地做到了这点，即提供3个预先装置好的配置，以及一个定制设置让玩家能够根据自己的喜欢去调整设备的角度。这也能够帮助你避免在玩游戏的时候需要不断调整设备。

tilt-to-live（from gamesuncovered）

游戏中的高分挑战

我们认为应该有更多游戏能够使用视觉效果去标记其他玩家到达某一关卡（随后打败了目标）的位置。《涂鸦跳跃》是最终使用这一功能的游戏，而后来《Wheeler’s Treasure》和最近的《Super 7》也纷纷使用了这一功能。《Super 7》是至今为止执行得最好的一款游戏；玩家可以将自己最后的分数或者个人最高分发布在OpenFeint的好友墙上或全球高分排行榜单上。

显然，如果玩家立马就注意到游戏的糟糕设计的话，那么再好的用户界面也是徒劳。但是面对着现今如此多的游戏，我们再创造带有一些细节内容的用户界面就没有什么意义了。只要遵循这些方法，你便能够收获奖励。

（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）

On game design: User interface is as important as your game

by Ben Briggs

After a long hiatus, we’re going to start up our series on game design again; we find it helps to catalogue our thoughts on different aspects of various titles and they also give an insight of why we grade various games the way that we do. In this article we’re going to take a look at user interface which is arguably as important as the gameplay itself. A great interface doesn’t make a user jump through hoops to access what he or she wants to get to.

Multiple save states

It’s now common for games to save the current state of play when exited via the home button or on an incoming phone call. What’s less common but becoming increasingly more relevant is the idea that a game should save state for each mode that it includes should the user wish to begin a new game. Instead of wiping progress, the game simply saves state for a later time and only resets the mode should the player want to end their game.

Plants vs. Zombies—amongst others—has such a system that keeps state for multiple games at once. As well as being able to keep an adventure game you can keep multiple games in the quick play mode which includes minigames as well as a handful of scenarios for each of the different assaults on your house. Because there are so many different levels that are available the system could be considered overkill, but it’s great that you don’t have to lose any of your progress if you want to try another stage.

Multiple save games

There is a definite need for multiple profiles to be included on the iPhone OS; if only because handing your device over to your friend gives them access to your personal data. Slightly less important is the ability to have multiple game saves, but we think that it’s a worthy addition. It gives your friend an opportunity to play the game but to experience it for themselves from the beginning, rather than at five levels in where the difficulty is more unforgiving. It also stops them hindering your progress!

Devil Invasion has a good implementation of this; an autosave slot is kept so that you don’t lose progress if you have only one game. But you also have six slots that you can save in when you like!

Screen orientation detection

The iPhone and iPod touch both have headphone jacks in a different location on the device, and ideally you want the headphone cord to be coming from the top of the device when it’s in landscape mode. It’s uncomfortable to try and wrap your hands around the device with the lead sticking out in the bottom left, but the majority of games seem designed for the iPod touch and not the iPhone with the jack on the top alongside the sleep/wake button and SIM card slot. Therefore, holding the device in the right position for the game can be a problem. It’s easily solved by detecting the device orientation and flipping the screen accordingly, much like Angry Birds.

Similarly this technique can be used to optimise the user interface for portrait or landscape; this feature benefits the iPad more than the smaller devices but it doesn’t mean that iPhone games haven’t been designed with this capability. We can think back as early as Smiles when we started to see interfaces that rotated depending on device orientation and that also affected the gameplay.

Finger friendly hit targets

If you’re going to use virtual buttons, bigger is always better, and the bottom strip of icons in Fieldrunners is a perfect example. True, you don’t want to sacrifice too much of the available playing area but if that control is absolutely necessary don’t make it difficult to press. It sounds obvious, but many ports have come over from mobile with minuscule buttons and they look substandard compared to native iPhone games.

Ditch tap to start

Historically, programmers have used the text “Press any key to continue” whenever processing needed to be suspended as in old command lines where a scrollable output wasn’t possible. Nowadays, “press start” or “touch the screen” to continue serve no purpose except to make the player jump through a hoop to begin the game; just to make sure it has your attention. They are completely unnecessary and we’d love to see the back of this “feature” for good.

Accelerometer calibration

The ideal viewing angle for accelerometer based titles is hard to get right, especially as there are a myriad of different configurations that may work for some and won’t for others. Leave calibration to the user; a great example of how to do this is in Tilt to Live which offers three preset configurations plus a custom setting that allows you to angle the device how you’d like. Certainly it helps you to avoid hunching over your device whilst you’re trying to playing a game.

In game high score challenging

Visually marking where another player got to in a level (and subsequently beating that target) is a great concept that we think more games should be using. Doodle Jump started this all off, but later Wheeler’s Treasure and most recently Super 7 have made use of it. Super 7 is by far the best implementation yet; giving you opportunity to beat your last score or personal best alongside your OpenFeint friends and global high score leaders.

Obviously, the best user interface is invisible as bad design is immediately noticeable. However, with the amount of games available today it doesn’t make sense to craft user interfaces with anything but the finest attention to detail. Do this and you will reap the rewards.(source:gamasuncovered)