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以Peter Willington为例谈游戏媒体人向产品制作的转型问题

发布时间:2017-08-29 10:02:13 Tags:,

原作者: Matt Suckley 译者:Willow Wu

要顺利运作一个企业,你需要大量不同领域的人才共同协作。

手游行业当然也不例外,为世界各地的上千人才提供动态、多样的岗位。

因此,PocketGamer.biz决定推出一个系列访谈,我们将会每周邀约一位手游行业内的专业人士,谈论他们各自不同领域的工作内容——譬如说游戏设计、美术、公关,了解一下他们是如何在游戏中运用他们的职业技能。

虽然职业道路不尽相同,但是目标大体上是一致的:掌握技能,取得资格证书,对于这个职位有所抱负,还有我们能从中学到什么。

这次,我们把灯光聚焦到Peter Willington身上。他之前在PocketGamer.biz的姐妹网站Pocket Gamer and AppSpy担任记者和评论员,现在他已经越过栅栏,在位于(英国)Bristol的Auroch Digital公司中担任游戏制作人。

Civilization VI(from venturebeat.com)

Civilization VI(from venturebeat.com)

PocketGamer.biz: 跟我们谈谈你现在的工作吧。

Peter Willington: 在Auroch Digital,我是一个制作人,也是销售经理。

销售经理的职责自然不用赘述:我设定公司的营销方向,计划如何达成我们的销售目标然后和我的同事Jake Connor(我们的游戏社区经理)开始着手执行。

我们目前正在加速发布近期的新游戏——Ogre,在Steam平台上,所以我们俩现在都非常忙。

制作人的工作内容在不同工作室中差异可能非常大,鉴于不同工作室的团队规模、项目类型、公司文化等等的不同。

在Auroch的工作日常就是我跟踪团队确保制作过程顺利,并且至始至终都跟他们一起策划项目。

我得保证游戏走在正确的轨道上,和客户、股东保持联系,等等。我十分庆幸可以和Ilse Marshall和Nina Adams一起工作,我们三个为制作程序定制了一套工作室准则。

在这个项目中,我代表了玩家的利益(制作一个优秀的游戏)同时也代表了管理层的利益(控制预算),还有团队的利益(享受工作)。

把自己放在整个制作大格局的中心看,理解各方的需求,激发杰出人才的最大潜能。

关于那些已经公布的项目,我现在正在制作Dark Future: Blood Red States,改编自Games Workshop的经典桌游,但是还有更多的游戏正在筹备中,我真是迫不及待要跟你说说它们了。

你一开始是怎么得到这份工作的?

成为制作人之前,我在Pocket Gamer担任副主编,利用AppSpy将用户引入流媒体平台,增加阅读量。

这份工作让我获得了很多丰富的经验,关于员工管理、怎样带领数字化项目、寻求合作来扩大品牌认知还有理解游戏行业中的不同需求。

我决定把职业生涯转个方向,基于我的这些专业知识,成为一个制作人那是再合适不过的了。

我以前就认识Tomas Rawlings,就是Auroch Digital的老板,已经好几年了而且也对Bristol Games Hub也了解颇多,所以Auroch的求职机会一出现,我就毫不犹豫地抓住了。

你之前有想过当游戏制作人吗?

是的,当然。我以前计划着把记者生涯中想做的事都一件件完成,然后放弃这个工作去真正地参与到制作游戏的过程,出一份力。

我不会写代码,不会视觉艺术设计,我也无意涉足商业层面,所以制作人就是最合适的选择。

这份岗位结合了我的所有兴趣:能够全面参与游戏制作进程,开发有序系统去帮助其他人创造奇迹,成为一个组织的中心,和他们一起追求卓越。

你为了得到这份工作做了什么功课(如果有的话)?你对那些还在向专业程度进阶的人士有什么建议?

我从实践中学到了最重要的课程。

去参加活动和发布会,跟人们交流,作为一个评论员,我的工作能让我见识到这个行业的多面性,了解人们的需求。

我一直都是用非常简单的工具来制作我自己的游戏,这能够让我记着制作游戏需要运用到不同领域的知识和技能。

我从三岁开始就玩游戏,最重要的是我一直都没有停止玩游戏和研究游戏,这些经历提升了我的词汇量,拓宽了我的知识面,这些在行业内都是非常有用的。

策划播客节目Staying In,我们在节目中常常会谈到游戏,迫使我要对媒介保持批判性思维,并且去玩一些我平常不会考虑去玩的游戏。

我在大学学过表演。那段时间让我学会了如何给予、接受善意的批评,还有跟他人合作。

我听说英国有一些不错的游戏课程,但是比起实践经验,还有你去下载Unreal Engine 4, GameMaker或者Quest开始制作你自己的游戏,全身心投入其中获得的这种自豪感,我认为课程还是比不上的。

有没有什么关于工作/行业方面的东西你希望一开始工作的时候就知道的?

我在Auroch工作的第一周,我很快就明白如果一个制作人和开发者以“你能不就直接……”这样的开头对话,那么他们就注定走向失败。

制作游戏是一个非常复杂的程序,(看起来)最简单的要求可能实现起来也非常困难,其中涉及到的任务需要整个工作室各种领域的知识技术运用。

对于这个岗位的求职者,你还有什么建议?

尽可能地去玩不同种类的游戏,热切关注游戏媒介。如果要是不这么做的话,你的那股满腔热血很快就会没了,因为制作游戏真的是很难。

如果你想成为一个制作人,要弄清楚你真的是想做一个制作人,而不是设计师,我之前看过好几个人陷入这个误区。

去参加game jams,还有尽可能加入那些能够帮助你更好地理解团队协作,还有他们所需的成功要素的实际项目。这些知识能让你的生活轻松很多。

为人谦虚点,听从专业人士的建议。你也许可以估计出程序员要花多久能完成这个任务,但是只有程序员才知道要花多久才能完成。

坚定自己的立场,实事求是。制作人经常需要保持实际头脑,但是千万不要悲观。

本文由游戏邦编译,转载请注明来源,或咨询微信zhengjintiao

It takes a great number of individuals working together in various disciplines to make any commercial enterprise function.

The mobile games industry is certainly no exception, offering dynamic and diverse roles to thousands the world over.

As such, PocketGamer.biz has decided to celebrate this with a regular series of interviews where each week we chat to a mobile games industry professional from a different field – be it game design, art, or PR – to learn about how they bagged that job in games.

Obviously every career path is different, but the goal is to give a picture of the sorts of skills, qualifications and ambition one might need to find themselves in such a role – and how we can all learn from it.

This time, the spotlight is on Peter Willington. A former journalist and critic on PocketGamer.biz sister sites Pocket Gamer and AppSpy, he has since hopped the fence into a production role at Bristol-based developer Auroch Digital.

PocketGamer.biz: Tell us a little about your current role and what it entails.

Peter Willington: At Auroch Digital I’m a Producer and Marketing Manager.

The Marketing Manager role is pretty self-explanatory: I set the direction for the company’s marketing, define how we achieve our marketing goals and then set about with my colleague Jake Connor (our Community Manager) on meeting them.

We’re currently ramping up to the release of our latest game – Ogre – on Steam, so we’re both very busy at the moment in this area of our duties.

What a Producer does can vary pretty wildly between studios based on factors like team size, the types of projects being worked on, company culture and so on.

The way things work at Auroch, on a day-to-day basis, I’m checking in with the teams to make sure production is smooth and planning projects with them from start to end.

I keep the vision of the game on course, liaising with our clients and stakeholders and so on. I’m fortunate enough to work with Ilse Marshall and Nina Adams, and between the three of us we set studio-wide standards for the production process.

I’m also on projects to represent the player’s interests (making a great game) while representing the management’s interests (keeping to the budget), and the team’s interests (enjoying their work).

I do this by being in the middle of the web of development, understanding the needs of all parties and enabling incredibly talented people to do their best work.

In terms of projects we’ve announced, I’m currently producing Dark Future: Blood Red States, our adaptation of the classic Games Workshop tabletop game, but there are some more titles in the pipeline I’m involved with that I can’t wait to start talking about.

How did you first get into this job?

Before I became a producer, I used to be Deputy Editor of Pocket Gamer and led the direction and growth into streaming platforms with AppSpy.

This gave me a great deal of experience managing people, leading digital projects, making partnerships to amplify the brands I was a part of and understanding the different needs of the games industry.

I decided to take my career in a different direction that built upon this expertise and being a producer was a natural fit.

I’d known Tomas Rawlings – the owner of Auroch Digital – for a few years by this point and had been around the Bristol Games Hub a lot too, so when the opportunity at Auroch came up, I jumped at the chance.

Is it something you ever imagined yourself doing?

Yes, absolutely. I’d always planned on ticking off the games journalism bucket list and then moving on to actually help making games.

Since I’m not a coder, I can’t do visual art and I’m not interested in being a designer at a commercial level, becoming a producer was a natural fit.

It intersects with all my interests: being involved deeply in games on all levels, developing ordered systems to help people do amazing things and being a central part of an organisation that aspires to do great things.

What did you study (if anything) to get your role? What courses would you advise for aspiring professionals in the area?

I learned my most important lessons in a practical setting.

Going to events and conferences and talking to people, as a critic, let me see lots of different facets of the business and what people’s needs are.

Always making my own games using simple game-making tools keeps reminding me about the kinds of skill sets different disciplines use and require.

Playing games from the age of three and, most importantly, never stopping playing and studying games, has given me the vocabulary and depth of knowledge that is so useful in the industry.

Running the podcast Staying In, where we talk about games quite often, forces me to keep thinking critically about the medium and play games that are outside of what I usually consider playing.

I studied acting at university. It taught me to take and give constructive criticism, and work with others.

I hear there are some good games courses available across the UK, but I don’t think you can beat the experience and sense of pride you gain from downloading Unreal Engine 4, GameMaker or Quest, getting stuck in and making things for yourself.

Is there anything about the job/industry you wish you would have known when first joining?

In my first week of work at Auroch, I learned very quickly that a producer that starts a conversation with a developer with “could you just…” is setting themselves up for a fall.

Making games is a complicated process and the (seemingly) simplest of requests can actually be highly complex, involving tasks that require multiple disciplines from across the studio.

What other advice do you have for someone looking for a job in this profession?

Play as many different kinds of games as you can and be passionate about the medium. If you’re not, you’ll burn out real fast because making games is hard.

If you want to be a producer, make sure you actually want to be a producer – and not a designer, which is a trap I’ve seen a few people fall into.

Get involved in game jams and other practical projects where you can in order to better understand how teams work and what they need to be successful. This knowledge will make your life a lot easier.

Be humble and defer to your experts for advice. You can guess at how long a task might take a coder to complete, but only the coder knows how long it will take them.

Stick to your guns and be realistic. Producers very often need to be the realist in the room – though you should never be the pessimist.(source: pocketgamer.biz )


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