作者：Leigh Alexander

在今年的纽约大学游戏中心的年度设计大会PRACTICE上，Soren Johnson、Brad Muir和Keith Burgun这三位知名的游戏设计元老讨论了战略游戏设计的关键，其中包括制定决定的透明度，建立玩家投入和依恋性。

Soren Johnson：透明度是关键

这名《孢子》与《文明4》的参与作者，以及Mohawk Games创始人将战略游戏定义为有限的选择——玩家要做出特定的选择，即他们的随机或意外事件，他们的不同结果以及胜利条件的宽度。

Soren Johnson(from pcgamesn.com)

在静态游戏中，玩家选择的结果是由游戏设计师预先决定的。战略游戏却具有动态属性，用Johnson的话来说就是：“不可预测，规则导向及富有挑战性；这尖游戏具有重玩性并要求玩家精通掌握……”

有些静态游戏使用了动态机制，而有些动态游戏也使用了静态内容，关于如何在指定的范围设置游戏一直是个富有争议性的话题。在动态战略游戏中，游戏机制占主导位置，因此其透明度就成了一个关键因素。持续发展的“数字桌游”（将桌游设计理念与电子游戏相结合）趋势，则进一步突显了透明度的重要性。

换句话说，战略游戏的最重要因素就是玩家的心理活动，他们是否理解规则，是否能够清楚思考，是否了解自己所有的输入及输出结果。

Keith Burgun：有趣的决定

设计师和咨询顾问Keith Burgun代表作是iPhone游戏《100 Rogues》，他认为有趣的决定是战略游戏的重要价值。

100 rogues(from 100rogues.com)

他表示，“我的整体游戏设计目标就是尽量快速而有效地向玩家传递价值，如果他们给你5分钟时间，那就是很大的恩惠了，你就有责任完整地回报他们。”

一方面，游戏应该给予有助于玩家做出决定的一切信息（例如，“点燃所有的火把！”），要让他们坚定信念，觉得除此之外别无选择。另一方面，又要给玩家留下猜测想象的余地，其结果具有不可预测性。Burgun认为这两个极端都不是很有趣的决定。

他建议设计师通过确定核心机制取得两端的平衡，找到支撑机制，玩家目标以及清楚解释核心机制的主题和隐喻。

“你要制作连续的游戏玩法系统——许多游戏并非机制，它们实际上是一系列半关联的半系统组合。但当你创造一个大而紧凑的玩法系统，其中一切内容都指向一个核心机制时，你才能创造有趣的决定。”

Burgun在设计《100 Rogues》时曾想“摆平局面”，但并不确定如何执行。所以他开始选择roguelike题材，决定向这一题材的游戏设计添加策略。“但实际上，你不能只是向一个系统‘添加有趣的决定’，因为有趣的决定实际上是强大系统的一个属性。”

“此外，roguelikes游戏实际上并不能归结为此类游戏（除非添加新内容）。”例如，Michael Brough曾创造了一些类似roguelikes的游戏，但它们实际上却是全新游戏类型。

Burgun认为关于玩家做决定的问题应该是“我是否该做”而不是“我能不能做”。系统是制定决策的竞赛，玩家必须权衡在当时的情况下自己“应该”做什么。如果你专注于给予玩家许多他们“能”做的事情，那就说明你可能缺乏一个紧密的系统。

Brad Muir :创造依恋性的新方法

来自Double Fine的Brad Muir（游戏邦注：其代表作包括《Psychonauts》、《Brutal Legend》以及最近的战略游戏《Massive Chalice》）深受包括角色进展等元素的战略游戏的影响。这正是他为何想通过《Massive Chalice》的机制创造一种高度“角色依恋性”的原因。

玩家可以对战略游戏中的角色产生依恋，并为他们发展独立于游戏故事的个人故事，而失去这些角色则是一种富有意义的冒险。在《Massive Chalice》中，游戏角色会变老，结婚和死亡。

Brad Muir(from vimeo.com)

Muir称“我希望通过《Massive Chalice》的年龄系统，让玩家不得不应对这些英雄生老病死的问题。我希望制作一款会让人们成长死亡，让他们考虑自己的命数等问题的游戏。

他的团队计划向接受了死亡这一理念的玩家提供一项“安慰奖”，即死去的角色可以为家族成员留下一项能够提升家族能力的“遗迹”。他称“足迹不该成为一种武器——我们能否将其作为‘祖先攻击’的手段？……我们有效地将其作为‘鬼父’攻击手法。”

这一理念也启发了团队，并提升了世代武器的理念。当一名角色死亡时，如果他们的武器获得了足够的XP，那就可以成为能够继续升级的遗迹，并且留传给子辈。“为了让制定决策更有趣，我们让这个遗迹与角色终身相伴——当你的角色走出战场时，该足迹也会随之而去。”

Muir笑称“这个理念可能很糟糕，我不知道。但我们用这个方法令大家获得快乐，并且它也没有完全破坏游戏设计。我认为允许一点庸俗的存在并无大碍……不要执拗于让一切事情高度贴近你的设计，因为这可能让你陷入奇怪的境地。不要因为一味追求高雅而破坏了游戏设计的核心。”（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）

Three perspectives on strategy game design Exclusive

By Leigh Alexander

The New York University’s Game Center’s annual design conference, PRACTICE, has cemented itself as an intimate, exciting meeting of renowned design minds holding forth enthusiastically on complex, even controversial topics.

In this session, three different experts — Soren Johnson, Brad Muir and Keith Burgun discussed what they each find important in the design of strategy games, from transparency to decision-making and building player investment and attachment.

Soren Johnson: Transparency is Essential

Spore and Civilization IV’s Soren Johnson, recent founder of Mohawk Games, defines strategy games by their limited options — players need to make specific choices and leave others behind — their random or unexpected events, and their disparate outcomes and breadth of victory conditions.

In static games, the outcomes of player choices are pre-determined by game designers. Strategy games are dynamic: “Unpredictable, rules-driven and challenging,” says Johnson. “They’re meant to be replayed [and] mastered. But it’s very much a continuum — it’s very clear when you have games on one extreme or the other, but most games are somewhere in the middle.”

Some static games use dynamic systems, while some dynamic games use static content; there’s lots of room for debate on how to place a game on the supposed spectrum. In dynamic strategy games, the mechanics are primary, and therefore transparency becomes a key factor. The ongoing “digital board game” trend, which marries board game design concepts with video game, helps show the importance of transparency.

In other words, the most important thing for strategy games is what’s going on inside the player’s head, that they understand the rules and are able to think them through clearly, that they understand all their inputs and their outcomes.

Keith Burgun: Interesting Decisions

Designer and consultant Keith Burgun, best known for iPhone roguelike 100 Rogues, says interesting decisions are the primary producer of value in strategy games.

“My whole goal with game design is to deliver value as quickly and efficiently as possible to players,” he says. “If they give you five minutes, that’s a huge gift, and you owe it to them to make sure that gift is totally and completely rewarded.”

On one hand, players can have all the information they need to make decisions (“light all four torches!”), and end up feeling strongly that there’s no better answer. On the other end of the spectrum is simple guessing (guess whether you’ll roll a hit!), where the outcome is uncertain. Neither extreme is an interesting deci sion, says Burgun.

Achieve elegance through determining your core mechanism, Burgun suggests, and minimize everything else. Find the supporting mechanisms, the player’s goal, and the theme and metaphor that explains the core mechanism clearly.

“You’re building a gameplay system that’s coherent — a lot of games aren’t systems, they’re actually a collection of semi-related half-systems. But when you create one big, tight gameplay system where everything is pointing to a central core mechanism, that’s the way you can build interesting decisions.”

With 100 Rogues, Burgun wanted to “boil stuff down,” but wasn’t sure how to go about it. So he began with the roguelike genre, and decided to add tactics to the genre’s kit of design. “But really, you can’t just ‘add interesting decisions’ to a system; interesting decisions are a property of a really strongly-built system.”

“Also, roguelikes can’t really be boiled down much more than this [without becoming a new thing].” For example, Michael Brough creates games that resemble roguelikes, but are essentially a new thing all their own.

Decisions are questions of “should I” (should I do this or that), not “can I,” Burgun suggests. Systems are contests of decision-making, where players always have to be weighing what they “should” do in their circumstances. If you focus on giving players many things that they “can” do, you may just be obfuscating the lack of a cohesive system.

His emphasis on interesting decisions concurs with legendary Civilization designer Sid Meier, who presented on the subject at GDC 2012

Brad Muir: New ways of creating attachment

Double Fine’s Brad Muir (Psychonauts, Brutal Legend, and currently tactical strategy game Massive Chalice) is influenced by strategy games that include elements of character progression. That’s why he wants to build a high degree of “character attachment” through mechanics in Massive Chalice.

Players can become attached to characters in strategy games and develop personal stories for them independently of the game’s narrative, and losing those characters feels like a meaningful risk. In Massive Chalice, characters grow older, get married, and die.

“With Massive Chalice, I really want to make sure, through this aging system…. [that] you’re going to have to deal with these heroes growing old and dying,” says Muir. “I wanted to make a game about people growing old and dying, and make people consider their own mortality,” he says — a generational component is intended to provoke self-reflection, in the game’s original fantasy world.

His team plans to provide a “consolation prize” to the player for embracing the concept of permadeath; a deceased characte can leave behind a “relic” that will power up members of his family. “We really wanted to avoid the design space of Researched Equipment,” he says. “Relics shouldn’t be weapons — and can we make them an avenue for Ancestor Attacks? …We effectively refer to these as ‘Ghost Dad’ attacks.”

This informs the team, too, “flavoring” the idea of generational weapons. When a character dies, if their weapon has gained enough XP, it becomes a relic, which can continue leveling up. Bound by blood it can be passed among children or siblings. “To try to make the decision a little more interesting, we want this relic to be bound to a character for its entire lifetime — when you take a character off the battlefield, that relic goes with them.”

“This idea might be fucking terrible,” laughs Muir. “I don’t know. But it’s a way we can make people happy, have that flavor and not completely wreck the game design. I think making something just a little bit inelegant is okay… don’t be too tied to the fact everything has to be super-streamlined in your design, because it can put you into some weird situations. Don’t cut the heart out of your game in search of elegance.” （source：gamasutra）