作者：Ian

在《Frozen Endzone》开发的头两年中，只有8个人玩过这款游戏。在过去6周中，有40名局外人玩了游戏。我们将在未来2周发布公测版本。我们对这些测试者所提交反馈的回复方式将会对游戏的未来市场行情产生很大影响。

Beta测试人员的反馈极为重要。其中隐藏着宝贵而可能对游戏调整产生重大影响的信息。既然你已经完成游戏了，不妨继续完成这一步的工作。

接受和回应玩家反馈是一件极为困难的事情。因为你爱自己的游戏，也会对任何批评产生不良情绪反应。并且测试人员认为你应该做的事情与你实际上需要做的事情之间也存在巨大的鸿沟。每条反馈信息都是一个情绪化的分析历程——以下是我针对如何回应论坛贴子或电子邮件反馈的一些建议：

1.仔细看完，然后静下心来，之后再看一遍。

你第一次通常不会正确地看待反馈。

2.给反馈归类

以下是一些常见的反馈类型，其中标注了相应的处理方法：

“我不喜欢游戏的美术设计”

如果你制作的是僵尸游戏，而这个反馈者却讨厌僵尸游戏。那么他的反馈就是无效的。

关联性：0

出现频率：高

你当时的感受：“啊，没人喜欢我选择的美术风格。”

你应有的感受：这同美术风格的流行度与其他使用这一风格的游戏数量之间存在直接关系。所以保持乐观心态吧——这要不是说你制作的是流行的游戏，要不就是你制作了不走寻常路的东西。这两者都属于乐观情况。

应对措施：无

“我喜欢它的美术风格！为什么它不是一款JRPG？”

这个人不喜欢你的游戏题材。但他确实喜欢美术风格。所以要记在心上。

关联性：0

出现频率：高

你当时的感受：“嗯……”

你应有的感受：我处理其他事情已经很不容易了，这个可以忽略了。

应对措施：无

“我无法执行这一操作（游戏邦注：该操作实际上已经在教程中详细体现了）”

这个人是不关心教程的家伙，可以忽略。

那你就错了。这是一个极为有用的反馈，这位用户辨别出了难以执行的操作。他应该不会是唯一获得这一发现的人。这就是让你改进游戏易用性的机会。也许应该将操作设置得更简单一点？或者你的控制机制并不灵活？总之千万不可忽略这种反馈。

关联性：高

出现频率：高

你当时的感受：“我可不为不看教程的人制作游戏。”

你应有的感受：没人会去看教程说明。

应对措施：迭代这一功能直至人们不再抱怨无法操作为止。

“我做了一些很奇怪的操作，游戏就崩溃了。”

这是一个很好的测试原则：如果在测试过程中发生了某些情况，那么它就有可能在发布当天出现成百上千次。无论这个漏洞有多奇怪，如果漏洞所产生的结果是人们无法接受的，那你现在就必须修复它。

关联性：高

出现频率：非常高

你当时的感受：“天呐，又有一个漏洞要修复了”

你应有的感受：谢天谢地漏洞现在就出现了，而不是发布时才出现。

应对措施：修复漏洞。

“你们引以为傲的这个功能简单是垃圾——你们得删除它。”

这是一条很棒的反馈信息，它包含一些非常重要以及你应该忽略的信息。

这条反馈的潜台词就是：“这个功能有问题。”你必须关注这条反馈，但测试者的描述太极端了。人们通常会选择对这类反馈保持沉默，因为他们并不认同测试者所提的要求。这里要忽略测试者所提的改进要求——只要注意你必须有所行动这一事实即可。

想想他为何不喜欢这个功能——有可能是教程引导不到位，也可能是漏洞问题，也可能是操作功能不详。总之要收起你们的骄傲，多进行几次迭代。

关联性：高

出现频率：中

你当时的感受：“胡扯，你不过是个测试者，你不懂游戏设计。”

你应有的感受：这是一个让我心爱的功能更完善的好机会。

应对措施：迭代

“我真的希望自己喜欢这款游戏，也试过了，但我就是无法喜欢上它。”

这是一个很残酷的现实。有时候人们就是不喜欢你的游戏——即使它真的很棒。《Frozen Synapse》极为成功，但我还是碰到有人说“我尊重这款游戏——但我个人就是不喜欢玩。”你永远无法取悦世上所有的人，如果不打破鸡蛋你也做不成煎蛋。只要接受这一观点即可。

话虽如此，但也有可能是你的游戏还不够好。如果你听得多了，可能就说明你得好好考虑一下了。

关联性：中

出现频率：低

你当时的感受：“我真想把自己扔出窗外”

你应有的感受：我得先暂时把游戏搁置一边，好好思考一番。

应对措施：基本上是无

“我喜欢这款游戏——我真想看到你们添加X功能”

如果一名测试者要求添加一个简单的功能特征——例如在第一人称射击游戏中的对手行为提示，那么我就会在自己能力允许范围内添加。

一般情况下，我不会直接回应。也许该测试者所建议的功能会给我一些灵感，认识到人们最喜欢游戏的哪一方面，以及他们想看到的添加内容，这是非常有用的信息。但你最了解游戏的总体方向，所以不要因为因此而受到干扰。

关联性：中

出现频率：中

你当时的感受：”噢！你可能还想要跟怪兽交谈的功能。“

你应有的感受：我不想走岔道。

应对措施：记在心上，考虑考虑。

“这款游戏太棒了！”

这是我们心里暗暗希望收到的反馈。但要注意以下情况：

首先，我知道你希望测试者第一眼就爱上游戏，但这通常不会发生。如果是已经发布的游戏，新玩家还可以通过评论和媒体报道了解关于游戏的情况。但如果是未发布的游戏，人们不可能立即为你的游戏所着迷——他们得先了解游戏。如果你在头两天没有收到足够的积极反馈，也不要太沮丧，再观察一两周吧。

其次，不要因此而兴奋得跳出窗外；有人喜欢你的游戏并不能保证游戏马上就可以发布，以及95％出现在所有杂志的概率。

关联性：高

出现频率：低

你当时的感受：“对！我已经赢得独立游戏开发大奖！”

你应有的感受：好吧，这真是很棒的感觉。

应对措施：出去奢侈一把吧。

最后，你该如何应对缺少反馈的情况？

关于这个问题的答案都足够写成一本书了，但我要简单归纳如下：

*有50％报名参加游戏测试的人永远都不会再玩这款游戏。忽略这一情况吧——这完全正常，也不能反映你的游戏情况。

*如果有人一周后仍在玩这款游戏，那就说明他们喜欢游戏。就这么简单。

*如果没人多次玩这款游戏，那就是一个很大的警告信号，说明你的游戏出了问题。不要忽视这一点——他们不玩你的游戏就已经能够说明情况了。（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）

Indie advice: how to respond to beta feedback

In the first two years of Frozen Endzone’s development only eight people had ever played it.  In the last six weeks, forty outsiders have been playing.  In two weeks we will launch the first public beta.  How we respond to the feedback from those testers will have a big impact on how well the game is received by the world at large.

Beta tester feedback is incredibly important.  Buried within it are the nuggets of information you need to make the small changes which will have the big impact.  You’ve done a great job getting your game this far – now finish the job.

But taking and responding to feedback is very difficult.  You love your game and you will get emotional about any criticism of it.  And there is usually a gulf between what testers say you need to do and what you actually need to do.  Each piece of feedback is an emotional and analytical journey – here’s my checklist for how to deal with each forum post or email.

1. Read it, then calm down, then read it again

You didn’t read it properly the first time

2. Classify what kind of feedback it is

Here are some broad classes of feedback, with some notes on what to do with them:

“I don’t like the aesthetic”

You’re making a zombie game and this guy hates zombie games.

Move on – his feedback isn’t useful.

Relevance: zero

Frequency: high

What you’re feeling: “whaa no-one likes the aesthetic I’ve chosen”

What you should be feeling: There’s a pretty direct correlation between popularity of aesthetic and the number of other games using it.  So be happy – either you’re doing something popular or you’re doing something unusual.  Both of these things are positive.

Action to take: None.

“I love the aesthetic!  Why isn’t this a JRPG?”

This guy doesn’t like the genre of your game.  But he does like your aesthetic!  So take heart in that.

Relevance: zero

Frequency: high

What you’re feeling: “Hnnnnrgh… fuck…. off…”

What you should be feeling: Well, I have a hard time thinking anything but fuck off on this one.

Action to take: None.

“I can’t do this thing <which was taught perfectly in the tutorial>”

Oh this guy’s just an idiot who doesn’t pay attention to the tutorial.  Ignore.

WRONG.  This is an exceptionally useful piece of feedback you need to immediately jump on.  This guy has identified something which is hard to do.  He’s not going to be the only person who finds this hard.  This is your opportunity to make your game more accessible.  Maybe the thing could be made easier?  Maybe your control scheme for it is bad?  It’s crucial not to ignore this kind of feedback.

Relevance: high

Frequency: high

What you’re feeling: “I’m not aiming this game at people who can’t read instructions”

What you should be feeling: No one in the world reads instructions.

Action to take: Iterate this feature until people stop complaining that they can’t do it.

“Hey I did something really weird and the game broke”

Here is the golden rule of testing: if something happens once during testing then it will happen twelve thousand times on release day.  It doesn’t matter how weird the bug is – if the outcome of the bug is unacceptable, you must fix it now.

Relevance: high

Frequency: very high

What you’re feeling: “Oh god another bug to fix”

What you should be feeling: Thank god this came up now and not on launch day.

Action to take: Fix it.

“This feature you’re really proud of is shit – you need to get rid of it”

This is a great piece of feedback because, like most in-the-wild feedback, it contains something very important and something you should ignore.

Here is a direct translation of this feedback: “there is something wrong with this feature.”  It doesn’t mean anything more than that.  You must pay attention to this feedback, but the tester has made it hard by being too extreme.  People fall into the trap of not responding to this kind of feedback because they disagree with what the tester thinks you should do about it.  Ignore what the tester thinks you should do about it – just pay attention to the fact that you must do something about it.

Try to work out why he doesn’t like it – it could be badly taught.  It could be buggy.  It could be unclear.  Swallow your pride and iterate your feature more.

Relevance: high

Frequency: medium

What you’re feeling: “Pff.  You’re just a tester – you have no idea about game design.”

What you should be feeling: This is an opportunity to make my pet feature even better.

Action to take: Iterate.

“I was really expecting to like this game, and I really tried, but I just don’t”

This is a tough one.  Sometimes people just aren’t going to like your game – even if it’s great.  Frozen Synapse has been a huge critical success, but I still meet people in person who say “I respect it – but I don’t personally like playing it.”  You’re never going to please everyone in the world, and you can’t make an omelet without breaking some eggs.  Take it and move on.

Having said that, it’s always possible your game isn’t good enough yet.  If you’re hearing this a lot, maybe it’s something you need to think about properly.

Relevance: medium

Frequency: low (hopefully)

What you’re feeling: “I’m going to throw myself out of a window”

What you should be feeling: I’m going to get away from the game for a while and get some perspective.

Action to take: Generally, none.

“I’m enjoying this game – I’d really like to see you add feature x”

If a tester asks for a simple functional feature – something like the “opponent done turn” notification in FS – then I tend to implement if I can.

On larger things, I don’t tend to directly respond.  Maybe a feature a tester suggests will give me some inspiration, and getting a general idea of what people especially like about the game and what they’d like to see expanded is useful.  You have the best idea of your game’s overall direction – don’t get too distracted by new directions.

Many times testers come up with really great ideas which resonate with me straight away – that can be one of the best parts of indie game dev.

Relevance: medium

Frequency: medium

What you’re feeling: “Ooh! Maybe you should be able to talk to the monsters”

What you should be feeling: I don’t want to get derailed.

Action to take: take it in, and think on it.

“This game is fantastic!”

This is the feedback we all secretly hope we get deluged in.  A couple of things though:

First, I know you want your testers to fall in love with your game at first sight, but it doesn’t tend to happen.  With a released game a new player already has a context for your game from reviews and general buzz.  Without this people don’t tend to immediately fall head over heels – they need to get to know the game.  Don’t get depressed if you aren’t getting enough positive feedback in the first couple of days – look for what happens after a week or so.

Second, just as one guy not liking your game wasn’t cause to jump out of a window; one guy loving your game isn’t cause to release it straight away and expect 95% in every magazine.

Relevance: highish

Frequency: lowish

What you’re feeling: “Yes! I’VE WON INDIE GAME DEV”

What you should be feeling: well, that’s a pretty great feeling – enjoy it.

Action to take: Go get wasted.

<Crickets>

Finally, how do you respond to a lack of feedback?

A whole book could be written on this, but I’ll just go with a couple of things.

A good 50% of the people who signed up for your beta will never play it.  Just ignore this – it’s completely standard and is absolutely no reflection on your game.

If someone is still playing it after a week, then they like it.  It’s as simple as that.

If no-one plays it more than once, then that is a massive warning sign and there is something wrong with your game.  Don’t over-think this – the main way people tell you your game is bad is by not playing it.（source：mode7games）