作者：Ella Romanos & Martin Darby

（Ella Romanos是Remode首席执行官，以及前程序员和用户体验设计师。Martin Darby是Remode首席文化官以及该公司游戏总监和设计师。）

之前一切都很简单。在80年代，多数游戏是在街机上或早期的主机上运行。游戏机制以及设计都是根据必要性而直接呈现——当时有限的图像技术和计算效率还不允许开发者考虑其他元素。

从90年代开始，游戏玩法向PC平台转移，游戏也开始变得更为复杂，例如《模拟人生》、《命令与征服》以及《沙丘II》等鼓励玩家深度交互的游戏。在过去数年中，由于玩家进入网络和MMO等游戏时代，情况也开始变得更为复杂。

虽然硬核PC和主机游戏玩家仍然是热忱投身于游戏的发烧友，网络和移动新平台却更适合休闲玩家，他们想要的是快捷访问、便利，以及在获得体验和享受之前的一点点的投入感。对于这些游戏，用户体验（简称UX）设计就会成就或破坏游戏，但优秀的UX设计则会令所有游戏受曾使，对于MMO、模拟、战略以及社交游戏等UI丰富的游戏来说尤其如此。

sketches(from carynvainio.com)

什么是UX，它有何重要性？

UX设计并非游戏设计或UI设计。它是一个独立但是本质上互有联系的角色，因为它同时支撑了UI和游戏设计，为你所制作的游戏提供了粘合剂。它应该是任何游戏设计的起点，以及任何内容开始创造的蓝图。正如你应该找一名建筑师，而不是建筑工来设计你的房子一样，UX设计师的职能就相当于建筑师，为玩家创造一个用户之旅。与多数有效的结构规划一样，最佳UX设计就是用户甚至都没有注意到的地方，移除了玩家与他们在游戏中所发现趣味之间的障碍。

UX设计的挑战在于简洁就是复杂的。UX设计包含数个步骤，其中关键环节如下：

1.确定项目的目标和用户需求

2.功能说明（关键功能分析）

3.互动设计（用户流图表）

4.界面设计（线框图）

5.视觉设计（由2D/UI美术人员根据线框图而创造）

多数UX研究过程发生于游戏领域之外，主要是网络和软件开发行业。由于拥有网络背景，我们将这些过程自然运用到了游戏开发过程，并没有清楚意识到这并非我们行业的惯例。我们仍然使用UX书籍和资源来培训我们的员工，因为现在还没有太多与游戏直接相关的UX设计材料。

现在已经有了像Player Research这种提供出色的用户研究服务和测试的公司。他们所做的工作就是支持和加强你的UX设计过程，而不是将其替换。如果你承担得起雇佣类似Player Research这种公司的资金，我们强烈推荐你同他们合作。但本文主要专淬砺你可以在自己的工作室执行的UX过程。

有效的UX设计：你应该知道的要点

1.UX设计需要与游戏设计有所不同的理念和技能。这并不是说游戏设计师就无法成为UX设计师，但擅长游戏设计并不一定等同于擅长UX设计。UX设计是决定性的，它创造了游戏系统开发起点的蓝图。游戏设计是开放式的，并且在开发过程中需要多次迭代。因此，UX设计应该是有别于游戏设计的任务，但这两者应该一起开工，互补和强化对方的设计。

2.UX设计并非栓在一个优秀的游戏理念之上，或者在游戏设计完成之后，或者创造一些用户流及线框图之后再添加到游戏设计文件上的东西。它是一个从你的初始游戏理念开始，并一直贯穿至游戏发布的整个设计和制作流程的基本起点。

3.一个UX设计过程会让你的游戏设计文件更出彩。行业总有关于GDD（游戏设计文件）究竟有无必要的争论。我们的游戏设计方法就是将该文件视为两个部分：

*用户流，由UX设计师完成

*规则集：由游戏设计师完成

用户流提供了我们GDD的基础内容，规则集则是围绕用户流创造的内容。之后你可以转向更具体的细节，例如来自UX设计师的线框图（这就导向了来自UI美术人员的视觉设计环节）。这种创造GDD的方法允许宽泛的规则集设计，但可以在开发过程中进行迭代和更改，但同时又保持了令游戏不分散的框架，减少了功能蔓延以及整个游戏设计瑕疵的风险。

4.优秀的UX设计师应该有特定的技能，以及我们所谓的“系统性思维”——在他们脑中构勒复杂系统的能力。他们是那种会用到日常事件，并且如果用户体验不甚完美（无论是照明灯光不够艺术性，还是玩家所推开的门要有手柄等问题）就会十分抓狂的人。你的UX设计师不但要极端重视细节，还要能够找到解决每个问题的最简单方法。

5.这就引出了我们最后一点，即程序员 vs UX设计师的关系。在一定意义上，程序员可以成为很棒的UX设计师，这正是Ella转向UX设计的途径。他们比游戏设计师更胜任这一职位，因为他们也有相同的解决问题能力以及重视细节的特点。但是，哪种方案对用户来说最理想，哪种方法最容易编码，这两个问题之间常常存在冲突，而只有当你拥有分头处理这两个问题的实体时才能解决这一矛盾。我们处理这一问题的方法就是永远不要让同一个人来编程和做项目的UX设计，即使他们真的兼具这两种能力。（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）

Why good user experience design in games is no longer a luxury

By Ella Romanos & Martin Darby

Ella Romanos & Martin Darby on why UX design can make or break your game

[Ella Romanos is the CEO of Remode and former programmer and UX designer. Martin Darby is the CCO of Remode and the company’s game director and designer. www.remodestudios.com]

It used to be simple. In the 1980s, most games were played on arcade machines or early iterations of consoles. The game mechanics and the design were straightforward out of necessity – the limited graphics and computing power wouldn’t allow for much else.

From 1990s onwards, game play shifted to PCs and games became more complicated, like The Sims, Command & Conquer and Dune II, encouraging deep engagement from the player. Over the last few years, things became even more complex as players moved online and genres such as MMOs evolved.

While hardcore PC and console gamers remain enthusiasts who are likely to dedicate themselves to a game, newer platforms online and on mobile are more available to casual gamers, who want quick access, convenience, and as little upfront commitment as possible before being able to enjoy and feel rewarded by their experience. For these gamers, user experience (UX) design will make or break a game, and while all games can benefit from better UX design, this is particularly the case with UI heavy genres like MMOs, sims, strategy games and social games.

What is UX and why is it important?

UX design is neither game design nor UI design. It’s a separate but intrinsically linked role, because it holds UI and game design together, providing the glue for the game you are making. It should be the starting point for any game design, and the blueprint from which everything else is created. Just as you would get an architect, not a builder to design your building, so a UX designer is comparable to an architect, creating a user journey for the player. And just like the most effective architectural planning, the best UX design is the one where the user doesn’t even notice it, removing any friction between the player and the fun they’re having with the game.

The challenge of UX design is that simplicity is complicated. UX design involves several steps, the key ones being:

Defining project goals and user needs

Functional specification (key feature breakdown)

Interaction design (user flow diagrams)

Interface design (wireframes)

Visual design (created by a 2D/UI artist, from the wireframes)

Most of the research and processes for UX have been developed outside of the games industry, primarily in web and software development. Having come from a web background, we brought these processes to our game development process naturally, not quite realising that it wasn’t the norm in our industry. We still use web UX books and resources to train our staff, as there is very little about UX design directly related to games.

There are now companies like Player Research, who offer brilliant user research services and playtesting. The work that they do supports and enhances your UX design process, but does not replace it. If you can afford to hire a company like Player Research, we highly recommend it, having worked with them ourselves, but this article focuses on the UX process that you can implement in your own studio.

Effective UX design: what you need to know

1. UX design takes a different mindset, and skillset, to game design. That is not to say a game designer cannot be a UX designer, but being good at game design does not necessarily equate to being good at UX design. UX design is definitive; it produces a blueprint from which to develop the game system. By comparison game design is open-ended and requires iteration as it evolves over the development process. Therefore, UX design should be treated as a separate task to game design, but they need to work closely together to complement and strengthen each other.

2. UX design is not something you bolt on to a good game idea, or do as an afterthought after you do your game design, or create some user flows or wireframes to add into your game design document.

It’s a fundamental way of approaching your entire design and production pipeline that starts right from the initial game idea and follows through to release.

3. A UX design process should make your game design documentation better. There is always debate about GDDs being relevant or not. The way we approach game design is to think of the document being made up of two things:

The user flows, which come from the UX designer

The rule set, which comes from the game designer

The user flows provide the fundamental basis for our GDDs, the rule set is created around that.  You can then move onto more detail, like wireframes from the UX designer, which leads into the visual design of the UI (from your UI artist). Creating a GDD this way allows for the rule set to be broadly designed, but allows for iteration and changes during the development process, whilst have a structure to work from that keeps the game focused, reducing risk of scope creep and major flaws in the overall game design.

4. A good UX designer needs to have a certain set of skills and what we refer to as “systems thinking” – an ability to map out complex systems in their head. He or she is the sort of person who uses every day things and gets frustrated if the user experience isn’t quite perfect, whether it’s the fact that light switches are not aesthetic, or that doors that need to be pushed have handles. Your UX designer needs to not just have an extreme attention to detail but also be driven to find the simplest solution to each problem.

5. This brings us to the final point and that is programmers vs UX designers. In one sense, programmers can make great UX designers, and this is how Ella moved into UX design. They can actually be a better fit for the role than game designers, because they have the same problem solving and attention to detail traits. However, there is a natural conflict between what is best for the user, and what is the easiest way to code, which can only be solved if you have two separate entities working from and representing each point of view. The way we approach this is to never allow the same person to program and do UX design on a project, even if they have the ability to do both.（source：develop-online）