转：前魔兽世界主设计师谈魔兽任务的九大问题

sea_bug

From:NGACN

　　(括号部分是译者注释)

　　已经转去设计暴雪新网游(传暴雪正在开发除暗黑3、星际2、魔兽世界、新网游之外的第5款游戏)的Jeffery Kaplan，在GDC上的演讲中总结了魔兽世界任务的九大问题，这也是魔兽世界开发组正在注意和改进的地方。

　　1. 圣诞树效应

　　这个名词的意思就是,当你来到任务集中地,然后你的小地图上一个一个感叹号亮的跟圣诞树上的礼物一样,这让人总感觉很古怪.但是更奇怪的是,无论你去问哪个WOW的粉丝,他们都会很喜欢这个设定,因为这能帮助他们清理各种任务而且无遗漏.但是对于我们来说,这样做完全失去了慢慢引导玩家自己寻找发现任务的乐趣。

　　Kaplan同时提到这也会使的玩家更倾向完全不看任务内容,以及根本不去记是哪个人交代给他们这个任务,同时也会让他们忘记完成任务的顺序(剧情来说)。

　　"我更希望的是逐渐的被诱导的这样一种游戏体验" 他说到 "我想当你进入WLK地区的哪哪哪以及哪哪哪以后你就会看到.你总有一箩筐的任务要做,但是你的任务栏里永远不会有超过6个或者7个的任务"。

　　Kaplan同时也开玩笑的提到一些WOW任务的设计师试图把所有的任务集中到一个NPC上来解决这个问题,他展示了一个NPC,这个NPC会同时交代你8个任务"或许那上面只要写 '去艾尔文森林的某地做啥啥啥' " 他说着,并且笑到 "到60级以后记得回来找我"。

　　(简单的说,圣诞树效应就是吐槽过分简单的任务接受系统导致玩家进城不看人不记得他们都是做啥的 总之戳了感叹号然后杀怪*&$^#& 回来再戳问号做完任务大脑一片空白 "谁给了我任务?我怎么帮着他了?"←完全不知道)

　　2. 字墙啊!看不起啊!

　　Kaplan 解释了这个长久存在于因特网中的现象,顺便把它跟WOW的任务说明文字繁复现象联系在了一起

　　"WOW的任务设计师把任务长度限定在了511个字母,"他说 "这很方便数据记录,你们程序员都应该很清楚为什么不是512(为什么不是419?)

　　当然有些任务设计师也会要求给他们更多的余地,"为什么只能有511个字母?来多点不行么?我们打破这个规矩算了"。

　　Kaplan情愿看到WOW的任务内容能朝另一个方向发展。

　　"我确实希望字数能少一点,我觉得限制任务文本长度更容易让你把你想表达的东西传达给玩家.认真的来说.. 你看看实际情况,孩子们玩游戏的时候只知道戳那个接任务的按键,他们才不想读任何东西."。

　　(简单的说他认为过分在任务说明添加不必要的文字, 还不如设计精巧的任务让玩家自行感觉气氛)

　　3. 心有余,力不足

　　我对这一点一直感到愧疚,我们在创作的东西不仅仅是艺术品,它同时也是互动体验的革命,但是同时我们也能看到很多游戏想努力把自己扮演成不属于它们的角色, WOW也在此之列.我们确实可以用多种不同的方式来表现一个故事..比如绘画,文学,电影,歌曲,他们都能把故事表现的很好.而同时他们也都有自己独特的表达方式.

　　我觉得我们需要让电子游戏有他独特的展现故事的手法.我们需要让我们的的受众参与到我们企图描述的东西里来.比方让他们成为英雄,成为恶棍,甚至成为受害者.

　　所有的表现手法(艺术,电影,文学)虽然都是我们可借鉴的,因为我们需要我们的受众因此而得到某种令人鼓舞的,振奋人心的体验.但是我们不得不承认的是,我们确实不是莎士比亚、托尔斯泰、斯科塞斯、或者披头四,我们越早清醒的认识到这一点就越好。

　　"如果说有什么东西对于我们来说是个安慰,那么就说莎士比亚不能用一个纸袋进行3D建模好了" Kaplan总结到。

　　"所以说,我建议暴雪的人老老实实的面对你们的现状:别他喵的在游戏里傻写书了,根本就没人去看"。

　　(这一段的大意是他认为,过分利用其他艺术的效果为游戏增色而忽略游戏性,是舍本逐末的行为)

　　4. 神秘感

　　这一段开始之前,播放了一些有关福尔摩斯的片段

　　Kaplan开玩笑说福尔摩斯正在试着找到曼科里克的妻子

　　"在试图创造神秘感的任务里，我们绝对不能只是简单的说 '啊 艾尔文森林出大事了 乃去解决一下,'但是令我们不爽的是,即便你编好了一整段神秘的故事,在你完成任务的那一天,任务列表里还是得写 '把那谁谁谁给我宰了,然后把那啥啥啥给我拿来' 这把整个故事的神秘感都搞砸了, 神秘故事最忌讳的就是过程中(任务过程中)你就已经知道了你要做什么"。

　　"我们想让WOW的任务更有进行感,而不是一开始你就知道你要做什么"。

　　(恩. 违和感在WOW的任务里太普遍)

　　5. 完全不合理的任务链

　　Kaplan解释着屏幕上显示的东西 WOW中的大地公主任务。

　　"一个从30级开始的任务跨越了14级,结尾的时候你要杀了大地公主,但那居然是个50级的精英,这等于是按着玩家的脑袋往墙上撞,所以你们看,现在大家可以对着这堵墙撞一会儿了"。

　　"之所以说这个任务很糟糕的缘故就是 -- 把一个任务编的让玩家完成以后有极大成就感,并且觉得自己确实做了件非常了不起的事,这是很棒的念头,但是这个任务之所以搞砸了就是因为它会让玩家感到非常绝望,并且开始觉得无法再明确哪些任务自己完成的了,哪些完成不了"。

　　Kaplan继续说到,玩家会因为类似的超级不合理的任务而开始对游戏丧失信任,他们之后可能不再会尝试着挑战这种任务了。

　　(这一段很明白了,开始很简单然后忽然很难的任务会让修仙玩家失去对任务的信任)

　　6. 噱头任务

　　屏幕上显示的是一些WOW中的载具任务。

　　我觉得这一点很有趣,我想如果我打开GOOGLE图片,输入'史上最无聊的噱头任务' 我可能有天会看到这个任务的截图出现在搜索结果里。

　　我们并没有在载具里加上其他复杂的内容,所以我就拿它来做个典型例子。

　　我们现在开着的是喷喷车(这是啥?),这喷喷车太他喵的好玩了.. 接着我们发现这个东西的操作的感觉根本就只是个噱头而已.你根本不知道你的人在拿这东西做虾米.整个看起来就象在飘,并且你永远打不中你想打的地方.WOW也犯了类似的错误。

　　很多很多的类似这种载具的小任务,设计师设计它们的时候简直开心的要死,但是玩家的感觉却完全是另一回事。

　　(很多WLK的载具任务, 要不就是设计非常简单, 按2-3个键, 要不就要求很复杂的转换视角, 没有熟悉时间等问题, 对于很多的玩家来说, 噱头效果一过, 很多人对不少这类任务都甚感厌恶, 以ULDUAR为例, 不少人就反对第一个BOSS需要用载具打--- BY WWWDDD)

　　7. 游戏体验不流畅

　　屏幕上显示的是一张洛克摸蛋地区的任务流程图。

　　"这是洛克摸蛋地区的任务流程图,它用来解释你如何完成在这个区域里的游戏体验,红色的是击杀任务,绿色的是搜集任务,蓝色的是杂项任务(找人 闲扯 之类)"。

　　"问题就在于玩家在洛克摸蛋里没什么选择的余地,但是任务又被设计的太密集... 你先得到一堆击杀任务,然后又是一堆搜集任务.这让玩家的游戏体验非常不流畅(反复在一个区域来回 没新鲜事 总去去过的地方 等等) 这也是可能造成"圣诞树效应"的做法之一”。

　　然后Kaplan展示了一些清晰简单的任务流程图。

　　"所以你们看,这里有几条完全不同的任务线.并且他们都是相互不关联的,所以玩家在这里可以得到有选择的,不重复的体验"。

　　(联盟都知道乌鸦岭美... 很需要精打细算 部落参考地点 贫瘠之地的鹰身人 从找任务到做任务都是折磨)

　　8. 失误的采集任务

　　"你可以在WOW里找到各种各样的这种形式的例子,但是我专门挑出了采集任务就是因为很多玩家看起来非常痛恨它们.我不觉得采集任务本身是个失败的任务,但是我们确实在设计的过程中有很多失误"。

　　Kaplan接下来所指出的问题是怪物比例:怪物太少 怪物太分散 怪物种类太复杂(劳资X厄运那里的树人任务以及豺狼人任务以及猩猩任务 典型中的典型)。

　　"如果这里有太多的怪出现,那么也就是说我不的不在这里花大量的时间战斗以穿过此区域"。

　　有关太多怪物种类混淆这个问题,Kaplan以贫瘠之地的迅猛龙任务为例。

　　"每当我杀一个我应该杀掉的怪时,我也必须同时费力干掉其他3~4种完全不相关的同类"。

　　接着Kaplan自爆荆棘谷的青山是魔兽世界中最糟糕的任务，而他就是设计该任务的蠢蛋。

　　"这是WOW里最泥马糟糕的任务,并且正好就是我做的.. 荆棘谷的青山.我相信它确实教会了你使用拍卖行,或者教会了你使用删除物品页面"。

　　(要么一遍一遍的摧毁 要么全丢进AH)

　　"我就是那个写了这个任务的白痴.我当时的理念本来是,我要把这些东西遍及荆棘谷的每个角落.结果这东西到最后自己发展成了一种经济产业... 太可怕了"。

　　"这是我犯的最糟糕的错误...这个任务简直就是用来考察一个玩家在WOW里的物品管理能力(而非普通的游戏体验).你的基础背包只有16格,玩家无时无刻不在为这些空间精打细算,但是那区区一个小任务居然要占用19格空间,我承认我脑有些残"。

　　"所以这是个极糟糕的任务,并且我要对此负全责任,然后呢..我今天又得拿它给你们做例子来讲 '什么是失败的采集任务' "。

　　(伐木机手册好歹能叠.. 不过确实 由一个任务能发展成 '经济产业' 而任务设计本意并非如此 可称异常失败)

　　9. 我拣这些破烂干喵?

　　Kaplan 以某人给你任务要你杀8个豺狼人为例。

　　"你说可能么?,山边上那个人要我去杀强盗,然后我不用带任何东西就能回复他?" kaplan点头说 "恩所以我就开始试图想一个好的'带爪子回去'的方式，但是接着我就陷入了一些逻辑思考的怪圈,是不是每杀死一个豺狼人我都会得到一个他的爪子? 或者我是不是需要做一些很残忍的事才能拿下他们的爪子?..等等"。

　　"最后我想的东西就成了:'难道那些强盗不应该是每人两个爪子么' 诸如此类 "。

　　(其实贫瘠之地的野猪牙很有临场感 不过多数这种需要带东西回去的任务都有各种 '体验不足'的瑕疵, 设计师花了大量精力考虑某物品应该如何入手 应该是什么样子 玩家经过如何步骤才能获得 等等. 但是对玩家来说 这些细节要么不被注意 要么造成困扰)

小树

这说的是缺点还是优点

zealot2002

大概、也许、应该、差不多、可能是缺点吧。

khan

关于第一个问题。怎么说呢。从游戏性本身来讲，有了感叹号，探索趣味当然会降低。其实这一点对于中国来说，基本都是无视的，因为为什么呢？因为我们还做到了更夸张的地步：就是可以自动搜索筛选当前可以接的任务，然后点击自动寻路过去。暴雪也没有把这个做出来吧。暴雪不做这个是因为他们是一个点卡型游戏，玩家在游戏里花费的研究时间越长，他们的收益越高。而我们国内的游戏则不同，我们是收道具费用，所以没有必要在这里让玩家为了游戏趣味性或者说探索性而折腾。经过了4-5年的国内游戏研发测试发现，我们国内的游戏公司更愿意采用让玩家用道具直接飞到目标点，甚至间接收费换特殊任务（比如买个牌子去酒店换经验高的任务接），能让游戏在短时间内达到迅速压榨的程度。

很显然，短期收益和游戏性，我们选择了前者。

2-4的问题明显是网络游戏的硬伤，网络游戏没法让任务成为像单机游戏一样的主题核心来做。就算任务占了网络游戏的主，也仅仅是主要用于升级而已。

5 很显然，即便是暴雪也没法做到任务背景去指导游戏架构，而是先有大致游戏架构，游戏发展更新到一定程度，然后任务设计者们再去附会。这是网络游戏工程的普遍现象。从目前来看，没有更好的解决途径或者方法。因为人力问题以及进度问题。所以当有所谓循环或者链式任务的所谓“需求”冒出来之时，就会产生这样那样的怪异的任务，要么是断档得厉害，要么是莫名其妙。这可不能怪做任务的人。谁叫你前期已经把怪物放上去了呢，但不放又不行。

6 多点花样还是有用的。

7 和5一样。架构都建好了，再去模拟任务，做任务的人没法指导路线，自然不流畅。不过相对来说，WOW的架构还算是很不错了，升级流程相对其他游戏来说，还算是流畅了。暴雪的人显然没玩过多少中国的游戏。

8 不做评价

9 ....有其它物品掉意味着策划要指导美术画什么图标出来。相信业内还有很多公司，这一条都还做不到。

spy

Lead Blizzard Dev Outlines 9 WoW Quest Problems, Admits to Designing Stranglethorn Quest
by Nick Breckon and Chris Faylor Mar 26, 2009 6:42pm CST
With a scant 40 minutes to address the gathered masses, former World of Warcraft director Jeffery Kaplan had a lot to cover in his "The Cruise Director of Azeroth" lecture.
The presentation saw an extremely candid Kaplan, now working on Blizzard's next-gen MMO, recognize and address the nine major problems with World of Warcraft.


But before getting into the nitty-gritty details, Kaplan made one thing abundantly clear: the WoW team is aware of the problems, and is actively working to fix them.

1. "The Christmas Tree Effect"

What this means, and this is kind of a weird one, but you show up to a quest hub, and your minimap is lit up like a Christmas tree with quest exclamation marks.
The weird thing is, if you ask our fans, they love this. This is to them a good quest hub... They go in and vacuum up the quests. But we've lost all control to guide them to a really fun experience.

Kaplan noted that this leads to users not reading the quests, not bothering to remember which quest giver gave what, and forgetting the order in which to do the quests.

"It's much better to have a slow, guided experience," he said. "I think if you go to [Lich King zones] Borean Tundra or Howling Fjord, you'll always have a ton of quests to do, but you'll never have more than 6 or 7 quests in your quest log."

Kaplan amusingly revealed that some WoW quest designers try to get around the problem by stacking quests onto a single NPC. He showed one NPC that was stuffed with eight quests.

"It should just say 'Do Elwin Forest' at that point," he said, laughing. "'Come back to me at 60.'"

2. Too Long, Didn't Read

Kaplan explained the age-old internet phrase, relating it to WoW quests that are simply too wordy.

"World of Warcraft quest designers are limited to 511 characters," he said. "That's all that will fit into the data entry. And all you programmers know why it's not 512."

Some quest designers ask for more space, Kaplan said, saying, "Why are there only 511 characters? We gotta have more, let's blow that out."

But Kaplan would prefer to see WoW quests go in the other direction.

"I actually wish that the number was smaller. I think it's great to limit people in how much pure text they can force on the player. Because honestly... if you ever want a case study, just watch kids play it, and they're just mashing the button. They don't want to read anything."

3. Medium Envy

Kaplan prepared the crowd for a rant at this point.

I'm as guilty of this as anyone else. We're so fortunate and privileged to work in a medium that is not only an art, but a revolutionary interactive form of entertainment. It's unfortunate to see so many games try to be what they're not, including our game at times. Of course we should embrace the concept of story... art, literature, film, song, they've all embraced story as well. But they all tell it in their own unique way.
I feel like we need to deliver our story in a way that is uniquely video game. We need to engage our audience by letting them be the hero or the villain or the victim. [Art, film, literature], they're tools. But we need to engage our players in sort of an inspiring experience, and the sooner we accept that we are not Shakespeare, Scorsese, Tolstoy or the Beatles, the better off we are.

"If it makes us feel better, Shakespeare couldn't 3D model his way out of a paper bag," concluded Kaplan.

"Basically, and I'm speaking to the Blizzard guys in the back: we need to stop writing a ****ing book in our game, because nobody wants to read it."

4. Mystery

This section began with a slide showing Sherlock Holmes.

"Sherlock Holmes is basically looking for Mankirk's wife there," joked Kaplan.

"We should never say something's wrong in Elwin forest, go figure it out," he elaborated. "We can unveil a mystery story, but at the end of the day, in the quest log it needs to say, 'Go kill this dude, go get me this item.' The mystery can't be what to do [on the quest]."

"We wanted the action in WoW quests to be in the gameplay, not in figuring out what am I supposed to do."

5. Poorly Paced Quest Chains.

On the screen was a shot of the Myzrael quest from World of Warcraft, which Kaplan quickly explained.

"It's a quest that starts at level 30, it spans 14 levels," he said. "And it ends with you having to kill Myzrael there, who's a level 40 elite mob. So it's basically like putting ab rick wall in front of a player. Here you go, just bang your head against the wall for a while..."

"The reason that this is bad--it's cool to have quest chains that span a lot of content, and feel kind of expansive and far-reaching. But the reason that this particular case is bad is because the player [loses trust] in the game."

Kaplan continued to say that players begin to distrust the game when being tasked with such elaborate quests, and are less likely to take on longer quests in the future.

6. Gimmick Quests

The slide on screen showed one of the World of Warcraft's vehicle-based quests.

It's funny, I think I went to Google Images and typed in 'gimmick quests without polish' and this screenshot came up.
We didn't build the engine around vehicles, is what I'm using in this particular example.

You've played that shooter, that shooter that is ****ing awesome... and then it's got the one gimmick vehicle level, which you can tell they didn't know what they were doing with vehicles, and it felt all floaty and things didn't shoot right. The same mistake happened in World of Warcraft.

Lots of these vehicle quests, they're more fun for the designer than they are for the player.

7. Bad Flow

On screen, a rather messy flow chart for the Loch Modan zone appeared.

"This was a flow chart of how Loch Modan works," began Kaplan. "The red quests are kill quests, the green quests are collection, and the blues are bread crumb quests."

"The problem with Loch Modan is the player didn't have a lot of choice, and the quests were clustered up... you get a cluster of lets say four, five kill quests right away, and then you get into a cluster of collection quests. Has a very bad flow. It's a side effect also of the Christmas Tree."

Kaplan then changed the slide to show a less confused flow chart of the same zone.

"As you can see, there's more than one progression path. They're all sort of broken up, so the player is getting a very diverse experience. "

8. Collection Quest Mistakes

"I think you could do this with any type of quest in WoW. But I picked on collection quests because lots of people seem to hate [them]. I don't think collection quests are broken, but lots of times we do a ****ty job [with collection quests]."

Kaplan pointed to obvious problems with creature density: areas with too few creatures, creatures that are too spaced apart, and too much creature variety.

"If I have too many creatures in an area, it's going to take my longer to get through the combat."

As an example of too much creature variety, Kaplan looked to a familiar raptor collection quest in Barrens zone.

"For every raptor that I have to kill, I've got to wade through like three or four other creature types," he said.

Then Kaplan dropped a real bomb: he was responsible for the infamous Green Hills of Stranglethorn collection quest.

"This is the worst quest in World of Warcraft," he said. "I made it. It's the Green Hills of Strangelthorn. Yeah, it teaches you to use the auction house. Or the cancellation page."

"So I'm the asshole that wrote this quest. My philosophy was, I'm going to drop all these things around Stranglethorn, and it's going to be a whole economy unto itself... It was horrible."

"It was utterly stupid of me. The worst part... one of the things that taxes a player in a game like WOW is inventory management. Your base backpack that the game shipped with only has 16 slots in it. But basically at all times, players are making decisions. For a single quest to consume 19 spaces in your bags is just ridiculous."

"So it's a horrible quest, and I'm the only who made it, and somehow I am talking to you guys today."

9. Why Am I Collecting This Shit?

Kaplan used an example of a quest where a captain asks you to kill eight gnolls.

"What the eff, the guy down at the hill asked me to kill bandits and I didn't need to bring anything back to him," mocked Kaplan. "So 'A' I'm asking why I need to bring the paws back. But then I get into this philosophical thing where I say, 'Shouldn't the gnoll have a paw every time I kill him?' Or am I so brutally massacring the gnoll every time that..?"

"And then I'm like, 'Shouldn't he have two paws?'"

suquan77

做个记号
感觉对我还是很大收益的

灰原

好搞笑哦。。喵泥马

HalfLife

草踏马，青山任务4年前就在blz论坛上群骂过了，blz几个设计师就是一群混蛋，现在还好意思拿出来说。
看吧，blz的下一个网游将会和我天朝网游越来越像。

事情到了这个地步终于完成一个轮回，一直被模仿，但是永不被超越的原来是我天朝！

6228016xk

话说武汉司门口“BT烤翅”就是用“一直被模仿，从未被超越”做宣传语，引得大家一边惊叹这名字，一边尝试。2年后居然开了N多分店。。。。。。

天朝当然有自己的优势，面对那么烂的网络和那么烂的机器配置，做出那么多符合市场的游戏，有效缓解的进城务工人员的精神压力，促进了现实中的和谐。。。。。。

sarturn

BT烤翅貌似已经蔓延到魔都鸟。。。