作者：Josh Bycer

今年，有两款截然不同的游戏发行了较大的修改补丁，它们分别是《暗黑破坏神3》和《收获日2》。它们都是基于相同的设计目的，即将人们带回游戏中去尝试全新的挑战与奖励。然而，在人们享受着《暗黑破坏神3》的乐趣时，《收获日2》却遭遇了倒彩，这也引出了游戏设计中奖励和难度设置所具有的挑战。

做出正确的修改：

在我们谈论奖励前，让我们先回顾最近的一些改变。《暗黑破坏神3》发行了补丁2.0，并为了确保战利品平衡以及为游戏准备好即将到来的扩展而基于其主机版本创造出了PC版本。这个较小的版本重新创造了战利品表去呈现循序渐进的改变。新版本重新设计了难度设置去扩展挑战而不是让游戏变得太过简单或太过复杂。

《收获日2》拥有发行商Overkill所谓的“死亡愿望”更新。首先，他们重新设计了潜行的难度级别。现在的游戏更加困难，或者在某些地图上甚至不存在任何警卫。

但最大的改变还是来自全新的难度，也就是所谓的“死亡愿望”。“死亡愿望”是《收获日2》最初的Overkill 145种难度的新版本或专家模式。在此，当你基于“死亡愿望”挑战一个游戏级别时，该级别将突出像坚不可摧的摄像机，更多障碍和更难的战斗等变化。

Payday-2(from gamasutra)

更难的战斗指的是将出现更多敌人，他们会更快速地移动，更快速地瞄准对象，拥有更多生命值并创造更大的伤害，并且还会出现两个新敌人。即带有沉重铠甲的精锐部队以及“skulldozer”：使用带有巨大破坏力的轻机枪的重型单位。

Overkii同样也介绍了一种新挑战：如果你能够在每个难度级别中战胜每张地图，你便能够从中获得每个独特的面具。但就像我们之前提到的，人们并不乐意看到《收获日2》的改变。

问题是双重的，一方面是因为游戏补丁添加了太多难度，另一方面则是游戏会激励或奖励接受挑战的玩家。

难度提升是一个不同的主题，我们并不打算在本文中详细说明，而奖励玩家则是我们要在此分析的内容。

归根结底就是玩家是否希望因为玩一款复杂的游戏或者更加复杂的难度而获得奖励。我知道存在一些专业玩家准备好对“玩一款复杂的游戏便能够获得奖励”做出回应，他们是对的。但其实玩一款具有挑战的电子游戏也具有其内部奖励。

战胜某种难度能够带给人们一定的兴奋感，我们可以在《忍者外传：黑之章》或《暗黑之魂》等游戏中感受到。但也存在另一种说法：创造一款复杂的游戏很简单，但创造一款具有挑战性的游戏则是另外一回事。

内部奖励：

为了让一款复杂的游戏具有内在的奖励，我们需要有效设置一些元素。首先，游戏必须让玩家觉得是公平的，而不是呈现一些不必要的难度。

像提高敌人的价值并不会改变游戏，这只意味着玩家需要花更多时间去刷任务或与敌人相抗衡。《忍者外传：黑之章》便是基于你的难度级别改变敌人而让游戏变得更加复杂的典型例子。更难对付的敌人将能更快地做出反应，拥有全新的攻击能力并且能够基于不同方式带给玩家挑战。

另外一个禁忌便是限制选择。如果你让玩家拥有各种技能，道具，但之后却说在复杂模式下他们只能使用1或2种方式战胜游戏，这便是一种矛盾。因为你将更高级别的游戏变得更加单一，并迫使玩家进入一种非黑即白的体验中。

外部奖励：

外部奖励是一个更轻松的话题。从根本上来看，任何能够提供给玩家某种奖金或奖品的内容都可以作为外部奖励的例子。所以战利品，成就，甚至是玩家角色的新图像都属于这类型奖励。外部奖励并不需要游戏做出改变，但是它们希望能够对某些内容产生影响。

比起内部奖励，外部奖励最重要的一方面便是它们需要始终都处于玩家的控制范围内。这便是玩ARPG的强制力来源：你的下一个战利品就在眼前。

在比较《镇压》和《侠盗猎车手》的收集品时，你将能看到基于正确和错误的外部奖励方式的区别。在《镇压》中，每一个敏捷的球体都能够提供给收集它们的玩家短期和长期的奖励。

而在《侠盗猎车手》系列游戏中，你在收集特殊包或在《侠盗猎车手4》中杀死鸽子时只能获得一种奖励。

也就是前者不断提供奖励，而后者只在玩家完成足够的任务时提供奖励。让我们回到《收获日2》和《暗黑破坏神3》中看看这些区别。

衡量：

《暗黑破坏神3》从最初发行到补丁2.0之间的最大改变在于奖励的派发。比起长时间未找到获得任何战利品并在之后获得非常惊人的战利品，新版本中的战利品是围绕着循序渐进的方式进行设计。所以你将能够更快地找到更棒的战利品，并且能够从最底层逐步走向更高级别。

这是创建外部奖励系统的一种正确方式，因为它将不断激励玩家向前移动。从内部看来，在《暗黑破坏神3》中体验新设计的难度关卡（游戏邦注：结合了内部和外部奖励）将让人兴奋不已。

这时候《收获日2》所面临的问题在于任何一种奖励都不能使用全新的“死亡愿望”模式。从内部来看，更高的难度在技能树以及游戏当前的装备中难以达到平衡

而从外部来看，承诺提供新的面具但却只有在经历所有强盗后才能使用。让我们列举其它可行的例子，如每次战胜一个强盗便能够打开游戏中的某些内容，如安全藏身处或专门面具，这能够激励玩家朝着更大的奖励不断前进。

哪种更好呢？

最后，我想要谈谈哪种奖励更好：内部价值还是外部价值？

这是一个有趣的问题，并且我觉得比起设计，这更多的是关于个人。就像对于我来说，比起成就我更关心挑战。

同时，我并不想玩那些只是为了难而难的内容，我想要接受那些全新且让人兴奋的挑战，并且是更简单的设置中不存在的挑战。这并不意味着我不喜欢像帽子或其它装饰物等奖励，而是我希望它们能够附加在一些有意义的行动中。

理解如何激励人们去玩你的游戏非常重要；并非所有人都是出于同样的原因去玩一款游戏。尽管同时拥有内部和外部选择很棒，但是它们也需要符合一个困难且公平的复杂系统，如此才能发挥真正的作用。

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

Rewarding Difficulty in Game Design: Intrinsic vs. Extrinsic

by Josh Bycer

This year, two very different games released grand changing patches: Diablo 3 and Payday 2. Both were designed around the same purpose of bringing people back to playing with new challenges and rewards. However, while people enjoyed Diablo 3, there has been an outcry over Payday 2 and this brings up the challenge of rewards and difficulty when it comes to game design.

Making the Right Carrot:

Before we talk about rewards, let’s go over the recent changes. Diablo 3 released patch 2.0, bringing the PC version in line with the console in terms of loot balancing as well as getting the game ready for the upcoming expansion. I spent an entire post talking about the Diablo 3′s 2.0 patch on Game-Wisdom. The short version was completely redoing the loot tables to offer gradual improvements as opposed to polarizing ones. And a redesign of the difficulty settings to spread out the challenge instead of making the game too easy or too difficult.

Payday 2 had what Overkill called the Death Wish update. First, there was a redesign across the difficulty levels of how stealth works. Now it is a lot harder, or even impossible on some maps to take out every guard one at a time and have the level to yourself.

But the big change came in the form of the new difficulty, of course titled Death Wish. Death Wish is Payday 2′s version of the original’s infamous Overkill 145 difficulty or expert mode. Here, when you play a level on death wish, the levels feature slight variations such as unbreakable cameras, more obstacles and harder fights.

Harder fights as in enemies spawn more, move faster, aim quicker have more health and damage and there are two new enemies. Elite units with heavy armor and the affectionately titled “Skulldozer”: a heavy unit wielding a light machine gun with heavy damage.

Overkill has also introduced a new challenge: If you can beat every map on each of the difficulty levels, you’ll receive a unique mask for each. But as we mentioned earlier, people are not happy about Payday 2′s changes.

The problem is twofold, one being the intense difficulty increase that was added in the patch and the other is motivation or rewarding the player for taking on the challenge.

The difficulty increase can be a separate topic and one we’re not going to focus too much on here, but rewarding the player.

What it comes down to is that no matter the player, they want to be rewarded for playing a hard game or harder difficulty. Now I know that there are expert players out there getting ready to respond with “But playing a hard game is its own reward for me,” and they are right. However playing a challenging video game does provide an intrinsic reward.

There is a certain thrill with being able to beat something difficult, we see this in games like Ninja Gaiden Black or Dark Souls. But there is a saying that I keep coming back to: It’s easy to make a hard game, but a challenging one is a different matter.

Intrinsic Rewards:

In order for a hard game to be intrinsically rewarding there are several factors that need to be in place. First is that the game has to be fair to the player in the sense that it can’t be needlessly difficult.

Elements like just raising enemy stat values doesn’t change the game, it just means the player is going to have to spend more time grinding or fighting. Ninja Gaiden Black is a great example of making a game harder by actually changing the enemies you would fight based on your difficulty level. Harder enemies reacted quicker, had new attacks and challenged the player differently.

Another no-no is restricting options. In the sense that if you let the player have a variety of skills, power-ups etc, but then say that there is only one or two ways to beat the game on hard mode that doesn’t work. Because you’re making the game less varied at the higher levels and forces the player into a black and white experience of pass or fail unless they do X.

Extrinsic Rewards:

Moving on let’s talk about extrinsic rewards which is a lot easier to discuss. Basically anything that provides some kind of a bonus or award to the player counts as an extrinsic example. So loot, achievements, even a new avatar picture on your profile is an example. Extrinsic rewards don’t all have to be game changing, but they do need to have an impact of some kind.

The most important aspect behind extrinsic rewards compared to intrinsic, is that they need to always be within the player’s grasp. This is where that compulsion to play ARPGs comes from: That your next piece of loot is always around the corner.

You can see the difference in the right and wrong way of extrinsic rewards when comparing Crackdown to GTA in terms of collectibles. In Crackdown, every agility orb provided both a short and long term reward for collecting them.

While in the GTA series, you only received a reward for collecting certain # of special packages or killing pigeons in GTA 4.

So while the former provided constant rewards, the latter only did after the player performed enough tasks with nothing in between. With that said, let’s go back to Payday 2 and Diablo 3 to see where the differences lie.

Measuring the Stick:

Diablo 3′s biggest change from launch to patch 2.0 was how rewards are delivered. Instead of going long periods of time without finding anything good and then getting that one amazing piece, loot is now designed around a gradual and tighter increase in improvement. So you’re going to find better loot quicker and work your way up to that bad-ass level, instead of just getting there all of a sudden.

This is the right way of building an extrinsic reward system as it constantly motivates the player to move forward. Intrinsically, there is the thrill at playing on Diablo 3′s newly redesigned difficulty levels which combines both intrinsic and extrinsic for a great experience.

The problem with Payday 2 at the moment is that neither side is fully developed with the new Death Wish mode. Intrinsically, the higher difficulty doesn’t feel balanced to the skill trees and equipment currently in the game, and requires an almost robotic like method of playing to stand a chance.

Again extrinsically, the promise of a new mask but only after going through all the heists doesn’t really work. A possible alternative for example, beating each heist unlocked something in game like something for the safe house or a specialty mask in of itself, which could provide some motivation along the way towards the big prize.

What’s Better?

For the last point of this piece, I want to touch on the question of what is better: intrinsic or extrinsic value?

This is an interesting point and I feel that this is more about the person rather than the design. For me, I could care less about achievements and more about the challenge involved.

But at the same time, I don’t want to play something that is hard just for the sake of being hard, I want to be challenged with something new and exciting that wouldn’t have been possible on the easier difficulty settings. That doesn’t mean that I don’t like rewards like hats and aesthetic items, but I want them to be attached to a meaningful action.

Understanding how people are motivated to play your game is an important consideration; not everyone wants to play a game for either one or the other. And while having both intrinsic and extrinsic options are great, they need to be paired with a tough but fair difficulty system to truly get the impact right.(source:gamasutra)