无法重现一些战利品_命运比战利品箱还糟

无法重现一些战利品

I finally quit playing Marvel Strike Force this week, after about two years with the game. Two years is the longest I’ve ever spent playing a mobile game. And because of this, I had the opportunity to closely examine the game’s monetization practices and systems. In this piece, I want to discuss some of the subtler ways that mobile games can (and have) hooked players into staying onboard and spending money.

在玩了大约两年的游戏之后， 我 终于在本周退出了《漫威打击部队》。 两年是我玩手机游戏最长的一年。 因此，我有机会仔细研究了游戏的货币化实践和系统。 在本文中，我想讨论一些手机游戏可以(并且已经)吸引玩家留在机上并花钱的微妙方式。

Kong雀鱼效应 (The Guppy Effect)

Over the two years I’ve been playing Marvel Strike Force, I spent about $4.65 in total on the game. I live relatively frugally, and as a result, I do my best not to spend money on in-game purchases. In addition, my brain automatically tunes out the “great deals” or “best value” offers that are often fiercely advertised in these games.

在过去两年中，我一直在玩Marvel Strike Force ，我在游戏上总共花了$ 4.65。 我过着节俭的生活，因此，我尽最大努力不花钱购买游戏内商品。 另外，我的大脑会自动调整出在这些游戏中经常激烈宣传的“超值交易”或“最有价值”的报价。

Although I tend to ignore these offers, they are a common technique that mobile developers use to encourage players to spend money. These “targeted deals” generally involve a limited time deal that opens up after a certain condition has been met. In Marvel Contest of Champions, a deal will be pushed to you every time you pull a new hero or get something rare — this is designed to capitalize on the event the moment it happens.

尽管我倾向于忽略这些优惠，但它们是移动开发人员用来鼓励玩家花钱的常用技术。 这些“目标交易”通常涉及在满足一定条件后才开放的限时交易。 在“ 漫威冠军竞赛”中 ，每当您选择一位新英雄或获得稀有物品时，交易都会被推给您-这是为了利用事件发生时的优势。

Why do techniques like this even exist? They are really designed around two major goals:

为什么甚至存在这样的技术？ 它们实际上是围绕两个主要目标设计的：

1. Keep the consumer playing and hope they will spend money.
   保持消费者的利益，并希望他们会花钱。
2. Get the consumer to spend money so that they will keep playing.
   让消费者花钱，以便他们继续玩。

Straight away, you can see that these two goals are closely intertwined and are self-buttressing. And even for me, the developers at least partially achieved one of these goals: I held out playing Marvel Strike Force for so long in part because I did spend money (despite it being a small amount).

立刻，您可以看到这两个目标紧密地交织在一起，并且相互支持。 甚至对我来说，开发人员至少部分实现了这些目标之一：我之所以坚持玩Marvel Strike Force这么长时间，部分原因是我确实花了钱(尽管这笔钱很小)。

Although what I’m describing here is a deliberate attempt to manipulate the player, there’s actually an even more manipulative tactic out there that I don’t see people talking about often.

虽然什么我描述这里是一个蓄意操纵球员，实际上是一个更加操控战术在那里，我没有看到人们谈论频繁。

朋友陷阱 (The Friend Trap)

Anyone who has played a multiplayer game (whether MMOG or not) knows the value of having friends to play with. Being surrounded by a group of like-minded players makes the game itself more enjoyable and tends to add to the experience. However, some mobile games have found clever ways to subvert this concept, turning it into a kind of player trap.

任何玩过多人游戏(无论是否为MMOG)的人都知道与朋友一起玩的价值。 被一群志趣相投的玩家所包围，会使游戏本身变得更加有趣，并会增加游戏体验。 但是，一些手机游戏已经找到了巧妙的方法来颠覆这一概念，将其转变为一种玩家陷阱。

In a conversation with Ramin Shokrizade, we spoke about retaining players in F2P and mobile games. During the chat, we discussed “player-generated content”; this doesn’t have to mean players are physically creating artifacts. In this case, I’m referring to the idea that the player becomes part of the product due to their interaction with the game (and through elements like PvP features, leaderboard rankings, and guilds).

在与Ramin Shokrizade的对话中 ，我们谈到了留住F2P和手机游戏中的玩家。 在聊天期间，我们讨论了“玩家生成的内容”； 这并不一定意味着玩家实际上是在制造人工制品。 在这种情况下，我指的是玩家由于与游戏的互动(以及通过PvP功能，排行榜排名和行会等元素)而成为产品一部分的想法。

Many mobile games these days feature a guild system (or equivalent) and they generally work the same way. First, the game needs to get you to join a guild. It may place you in one automatically, or it might offer quests and rewards that are only accessible via a guild. Once you’re in, the guild provides additional resources and usually makes the game a little easier to play. In Marvel Strike Force, you can’t make progress at all without a guild — that, or spending tons of money — especially as you get into the end game. The guild provides substantial resources, which is the only valid alternative to spending real money.

如今，许多手机游戏具有公会系统(或同等功能)，并且它们通常以相同的方式工作。 首先，游戏需要让您加入行会。 它可能会自动将您置于一个位置，或者可能提供只能通过公会访问的任务和奖励。 一旦进入，公会会提供更多资源，通常会使游戏更容易玩。 在Marvel Strike Force中 ，没有公会-或花费大量金钱-根本无法取得进步，尤其是在进入最终游戏时。 行会提供大量资源，这是花费真钱的唯一有效选择。

On the surface, that might sound fairly simple/reasonable given that the guild provides an alternative to spending large sums of money. But there is a cost involved: your time. Guild-related events and options require you to login more often in order to assist. Games that feature guild versus guild content can easily pressure players into spending a great deal of extra time in the game (or spending extra money) in order to support the guild. Top-tier guilds often force you to play consistently or keep yourself at a certain power level to aid the guild.

从表面上看，这听起来很简单/合理，因为公会提供了一种替代大笔支出的方式。 但是，这涉及成本：您的时间。 与公会相关的事件和选项要求您更频繁地登录才能提供帮助。 具有行会内容与行会内容的游戏可以轻松地迫使玩家花费大量额外时间(或花费额外的金钱)来支持行会。 顶级公会通常会迫使您保持一致的游戏状态或将自己保持在一定的力量水平上，以帮助公会。

So why, then, did I stop playing Marvel Strike Force? Simple: I was kicked out of my guild and lost the motivation to keep playing. In the last few weeks, work has picked up and I had to cut back on playing the game — this meant missing out on daily events that had to be done. And because I wasn’t “doing enough” for the guild, I got kicked out; it’s certainly fair, but it’s a clear example of how this design attempts to trap players (and then punishes them if they can’t keep up).

那么，为什么我停止玩Marvel Strike Force ？ 很简单：我被踢出了公会，失去了继续比赛的动力。 在过去的几周中，工作量有所增加，我不得不减少玩游戏的次数–这意味着错过了必须做的日常活动。 而且因为我没有为公会做“足够的事情”，所以我被踢了出去。 这当然是公平的，但是这是这种设计如何试图诱捕玩家(然后如果他们跟不上他们就惩罚他们)的一个明显例子。

The sunk cost fallacy is hard at work here. Once you have made friends and participated in guild activities, you have to keep playing and helping out your guildmates. This makes it much tougher to quit, because you feel like you’re letting your friends down. It’s the same approach we’ve seen historically in MMOs, where top-level guilds would demand your time and attention or they’ll effectively cast you out. In this case, though, developers are actively designing and building the model into the core game experience.

沉没的成本谬误在这里很难奏效。 结交朋友并参加公会活动后，您必须继续玩耍并帮助公会。 这使退出变得更加困难，因为您感觉自己在让朋友失望。 这与我们在MMO中​​历来所见的方法相同，顶级公会会要求您花费时间和精力，否则它们会有效地将您赶出去。 但是，在这种情况下，开发人员正在积极设计模型并将其构建到核心游戏体验中。

Taking one of the greatest aspects of online games and then perverting it in this way leaves a bad taste in my mouth. And not just because of my personal experience; I know there are people who will utterly fall for this trap and let it consume them. For my part, I’m committed to the idea now that I won’t join another F2P or multiplayer mobile game unless I’m playing with people I already know from somewhere else.

以网络游戏的最大方面之一为例，然后以这种方式对其进行变形，这在我的口中留下了不好的味道。 不仅仅是因为我的亲身经历； 我知道有些人会完全落入这个陷阱，让它消耗掉它们。 就我自己而言，我承诺现在不会加入其他F2P或多人移动游戏，除非我与其他地方已经认识的人一起玩。

Selfishly demanding your time and attention in this way takes me to a final point I want to raise — it’s something I loathe in video games.

用这种自私的方式要求您的时间和注意力将我带到了我想提出的最后一个观点上-这是我在视频游戏中讨厌的东西。

Aysha Begum. Aysha Begum提供 。

实时痛苦 (Suffering in Real Time)

Of all the mechanics and systems, there’s one I hate the most — even beyond pay to win elements. Many games will abstract work into time that the player must wait before a task is completed. But there are games that explicitly don’t do this. These games operate on real-world time — they set up tasks or events that occur whether or not the player is actually playing the game, requiring them to “check-in” to perform the task.

在所有的机制和系统中，我最讨厌的一种-甚至超出了赢得要素的薪酬。 许多游戏会将工作抽象为时间，玩家必须等待一段时间才能完成任务。 但是有些游戏显然不这样做。 这些游戏在现实世界上运行-他们设置任务或事件，无论玩家是否实际在玩游戏，这些事件或事件都需要他们“签到”以执行任务。

This is not the same as having a daily login (where the player is rewarded for signing on every 24 hours). The elements I’m talking about here require the player to actively engage with the game on unrealistic timescales or be penalized. So, let’s go back to Marvel Strike Force as an example. Near the end of my time with it, I had to sign on daily for raids, daily for competitions, daily for PvP, and daily for group PvP battles. Not only that, but to get the most “energy” daily, you must sign on at three specific times during the day or you’ll miss out.

这不同于每天登录(玩家每24小时签名一次即可获得奖励)。 我在这里谈论的元素要求玩家在不切实际的时间尺度上积极参与游戏或受到惩罚。 因此，让我们以“ 惊奇打击部队 ”为例。 在快要结束的时候，我不得不每天签收突袭，每天参加比赛，每天参加PvP，每天参加小组PvP战斗。 不仅如此，而且每天要获取最大的“能量”，您必须在一天中的三个特定时间登录，否则您会错过机会。

These issues are greatly exacerbated by the fact that the timers aren’t controlled by you — they’re governed by the game itself. So, if an event happens to end at 4:30am in the morning…well, I hope you’re a night owl. One of the first mobile games I played as Marvel Puzzle Quest, which routinely had events that end early in the morning. On a practical level, this meant you either had to play the game at these times or you had to spend money to protect your team.

计时器不受您的控制，这使问题更加严重，因为计时器由游戏本身控制。 因此，如果某个事件恰好在凌晨4:30结束……那么，我希望您是夜猫子。 我以Marvel Puzzle Quest玩过的第一批手机游戏之一，该游戏通常会在清晨结束。 在实践层面上，这意味着你要么不得不玩的游戏在这些时候， 或者你不得不花钱来保护你的团队。

Obviously, these timers aren’t intended to be a fun mechanic. They are a punishment system that actively attempts to drive players to spend money (especially if it’s easier to spend a few bucks rather than dive into the game at inconvenient times on a regular basis).

显然，这些计时器并不是一个有趣的机制。 它们是一种惩罚系统，它积极地试图驱使玩家花钱(特别是如果花一些钱比定期地在不方便的时间潜入游戏更容易)。

Like many people, I have a busy schedule and it often leaves me with very specific times where I can focus on playing a game. I outright refuse to play a game that “demands” I play at set times that are beyond my control. It’s why I had trouble with games like State of Decay (to a slightly lesser extent), because various activities would happen while you’re not actively playing (e.g. you’d need to protect your base and followers) — despite the praise for this series, I can’t play it due to that system.

像许多人一样，我的日程安排很忙，这常常使我处于非常特定的时间，可以专注于玩游戏。 我完全拒绝玩在我无法控制的设定时间“要求”我玩的游戏。 这就是为什么我在诸如《腐烂国度》这样的游戏上遇到麻烦的原因(程度较小)，因为在您不积极玩游戏的情况下会发生各种活动(例如，您需要保护自己的基地和追随者)，尽管对此表示赞赏系列，由于该系统，我无法播放。

To be clear, I’m fine with seasonal play, where events are set up for weeks or even months at a time. At least set a broad enough (and reasonable enough) timespan for an event so that people can join on their own terms.

需要明确的是，我对季节性比赛没事，每次比赛设置为数周甚至数月。 至少为活动设置足够宽(足够合理)的时间跨度，以便人们可以按照自己的条件参加。

挟持 (Held Hostage)

It’s understandable that people discuss elements like loot boxes, pay to win, and so on as being the worst parts of mobile and free to play design. Despite how anti-consumer those systems are, I’d argue that the points I discussed in this article are worse.

可以理解的是，人们讨论诸如战利品，支付胜利等元素是移动和免费游戏中最糟糕的部分。 尽管这些系统是反消费者的，但我认为我在本文中讨论的观点更糟 。

These are systems that actively cultivate a mindset of addiction: the player is conditioned to have to play these games on the developer’s terms. Failure to do so results in some form of active and deliberate punishment. What’s really sad about this, too, is that concepts like season play and guilds can (and often are) designed in ways that are genuinely — and fairly — engaging and enjoyable. Perhaps these implementations simply don’t bring in as much money, sadly.

这些系统会积极地培养成瘾的心态：玩家必须以开发商的条件玩这些游戏。 不这样做会导致某种形式的积极和故意的惩罚。 对此，也让我真正感到难过的是，可以(而且经常)以一种真正且公平地参与和愉悦的方式设计诸如季节比赛和行会之类的概念。 不幸的是，这些实现可能并没有带来太多的收益。

Let’s end on a question! Can you think of other mechanics and systems that hurt the consumer that people don’t often talk about in F2P and mobile games?

让我们结束一个问题！ 您能想到其他伤害消费者的机制和系统吗？人们在F2P和手机游戏中很少谈论这种机制和系统？

If you enjoyed this article, consider joining the Game-Wisdom Discord channel. It’s open to everyone.

如果您喜欢本文，请考虑加入 Game-Wisdom Discord频道 。 它向所有人开放。

Game-Wisdom. It has been revised and published at SUPERJUMP with permission. Cover image by Game-Wisdom上 。 经许可，已在SUPERJUMP上进行了修订和发布。 封面图片由 Paweł Czerwiński. PawełCzerwiński撰写 。

翻译自: https://medium.com/super-jump/a-fate-worse-than-loot-boxes-9908d000f858

无法重现一些战利品