handler机制_百度百科
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handler机制
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handler机制，在中提供了一种机制,使用它，我们可以在完成一个很长时间的任务后做出相应的通知。
handler机制创建消息
每一个消息都需要被指定的处理，通过Handler创建消息便可以完成此功能。Android中引入了消息池。Handler创建消息时首先查询消息池中是否有消息存在，如果有直接从消息池中取得，如果没有则重新初始化一个消息实例。使用消息池的好处是：消息不被使用时，并不作为垃圾回收，而是放入消息池，可供下次Handler创建消息时使用。消息池提高了消息对象的复用，减少系统垃圾回收的次数。消息的创建流程如图所示。
handler机制发送消息
handler发送消息
UI初始化第一个时会通过创建一个Looper，该Looper与UI主线程一一对应。使用ThreadLocal的目的是保证每一个线程只创建唯一一个Looper。之后其他Handler初始化的时候直接获取第一个Handler创建的Looper。Looper初始化
的时候会创建一个MessageQueue。至此，主线程、、消息队列之间的关系是1:1:1。Handler、Looper、MessageQueue的初始化流程如图所示:
Hander持有对UI主线程消息队列MessageQueue和消息循环Looper的引用，子线程可以通过将消息发送到UI线程的消息队列MessageQueue中。
handler机制处理消息
handler处理消息
通过Looper循环查询UI_MQ，当发现有消息存在时会将消息从消息队列中取出。首先分析消息，通过消息的参数判断该消息对应的，然后将消息分发到指定的Handler进行处理。
子线程通过Handler、Looper与UI主线程通信的流程如图所示。[1]
．CSDN．[引用日期]免费商业模式下厂商盈利机制的经济分析——基于对网络游戏产业的分析
一、前言从吉列剃刀的发明者金·吉列以廉价或免费的方式出售刀架从而开创了免费商业模式到免费经营大行其道的今天,免费商业模式已经存在了近110年,但直到近年来,这种免费的商业模式才真正成为了一种主流商业模式,从通讯公司赠送的免费手机以及服务项目到诸多生活用品甚至奢侈品的免费试用,再到大型商场和购物网站的限时折扣以及免费赠送,免费产品已经走进了每个人的生活,而在网络产业中,免费经营方式以及产品更是令人眼花缭乱、目不暇接:免费软件下载、免费聊天工具、免费电影、免费游戏、免费网络电话等等,许多以往收费甚至价格不菲的商品和服务现在却以免费的方式提供给消费者,给消费者带来了极大的物质和精神满足。笔者认为免费商业模式从其本质上可以划分为不完全免费方式和完全免费方式。不完全免费方式下免费提供的产品往往只是互补产品之一,而对于免费产品的互补品进行收费,即所谓的“交叉补贴”商业模式[1](P20),在这种模式下,提供免费产品厂商的真正利润来源则是通过...&
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权威出处：
中国网络游戏产业作为一个新兴的朝阳产业,经过近十年的快速发展,目前其市场规模已经远远超过传统的三大娱乐产业——电影、电视和音乐,成为中国娱乐业与互联网行业发展的排头兵。然而像其他产业一样,网络游戏产业也不可能无限制发展下去,如何突破中国网游的十年瓶颈,如何开辟新的思维航线,成为了摆在业界开发和运营团队眼前最迫切的改革命题。鉴于此,本文将针对目前困扰中国网络游戏产业发展的瓶颈问题,对网络游戏运营企业的商业模式进行一些探讨。一、商业模式的定义问题1.商业模式定义的研究现状。商业模式研究起源于国外20世纪70年代中期,但随着互联网环境下企业经营管理的巨大变迁,于20世纪末至今才逐渐开始被企业和管理学界大量关注和探讨,我国学者对于商业模式的研究始于21世纪初。虽然“商业模式”这个术语目前在企业界和管理学界得到广泛使用,但由于人们研究的侧重点不同至今还未形成严格统一的定义,对于商业模式其他方面的理论研究亦不够系统、完善,总体上商业模式研究...&
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权威出处：
1绪论中国网络游戏产业风雨兼程,走过了十年。十年的发展远远不能实现网络游戏产业的成熟,我国游戏的开发者、经营者和消费者也一直在探索适合中国市场和社会需求的发展道路。2009年中国网络游戏市场实际销售收入达到256.2亿元,预计网络游戏实际销售收入到2014年将达到508亿元,2009年到2014年的年复合增长率为14.7%。分析中国网络游戏产业的现状和存在的问题,寻求解决问题的对策对于促进我国网络游戏产业的健康发展具有鲜明的理论价值和重要的现实意义。2中国网络游戏产业发展的优势2.1市场优势。根据调研数据显示,网游用户集中在10至29岁之间,预计中国网游市场的最终活跃用户约在2亿左右。统计报告显示截至2009年我国已达到6931万人,离其上限还有很大的上升空间,市场潜力巨大。随着网络游戏产业的快速发展,网络游戏用户中付费用户的比例和数量增长速度还将不断提高。2002年国内收费网络游戏用户数为350万,到了2009年收费用户数增长...&
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权威出处：
美日韩三国在网络游戏产业的发展模式上各有特点,总的来说,美国主要是依靠其国内完善而发达的资本市场,日本主要是通过其独特的人才培养模式来发展游戏产业,韩国则是政府主导型的产业发展模式。一、美国的网络游戏产业发展模式在中国,一款网络游戏产品直接由制作公司交由代理公司运作,或是直接由代理公司的研发部门制作。与中国不同的是,美国的产业链中加入了发行商这个环节。发行商是美国网络游发资金并非一次性到位,而根据开发进度分批注入,如果产品的开发离预期偏差太大,发行商还可以要求制作商返工或直接停止资金供应终止项目。当产品开发完毕,发行商负责安排产品代理等一系列市场运作。产品正式商业运营后,发行商按合同支付制作商版税。版税一般是净营业额的15%到25%,最高可达45%,最少10%左右。影响版税高低的因素主要是发行商的投资额度、制作商的研发实力、产品知识产权的归属。一般来说,发行商的投资额度越大版税越低,制作商研发实力越强版税越高,产品知识产权归发行...&
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权威出处：
网络游戏产业,是一种新兴的信息文化产业,是指提供与网络游戏服务相关的产业,包括网络游戏开发商、电信运营商、互联网提供商及计算机软硬件生产商等部门。在我国,网络游戏产业是一个新兴的朝阳产业,经历了上个世纪末的初期形成期阶段,及近几年的快速发展,现在我国的网络游戏产业处在成长期,并快速走向成熟期的阶段。一、我国网络游戏产业的SCP分析SCP范式是产业组织理论中的经典理论。按照这个范式,市场结构决定行为,行为产生市场绩效。下面通过运用SCP范式对中国网络游戏产业的市场结构、市场行为和市场绩效进行全面分析,详细探讨我国网络游戏产业的特点。1、市场结构分析产业的市场结构是指市场经济活动中构成产业市场的各组成部分之间的相互关系,这种关系综合反映了市场的竞争和垄断的关系,而影响市场结构的主要因素是市场集中度、产品差异化程度以及市场进退壁垒①。(1)我国网络游戏的市场集中度分析在产业组织理论中,市场集中度是反映市场竞争和垄断程度的最基本的概念和...&
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权威出处：
研运一体化模式是指网络游戏开发商自主研发游戏产品,并负责游戏的运行与维护,客户服务等工作的一种经营模式①。在这种模式逐渐成为中国网络游戏公司们的主导得同时,他们又是如何在这种诸多环节的情形下顶住高风险来完成一次又一次的挑战得。一、代理浪潮的侵袭十年前,中国网游产业尚处在萌芽之时,80%的游戏资料片来源于欧美日韩等游戏超级大国。即使那时中国的游戏厂商多如牛毛,但空有一身本领却无用武之地,全部清一色的是代理运营商,真正靠自主研发的却是凤毛麟角,即使拥有自己的研发技术,也无法与国外游戏厂商抗衡,以至于市场占有率极低。这种情形恰恰正中了国外游戏厂商的口味,它们全副武装大举进攻中国市场,而本土的游戏厂商们又不能坐以待毙,为了占有一定的市场份额赚取利润,只得纷纷投靠国外厂商这座大山,代理运营自此成为了国内主要运营商们的经营模式。九城靠代理全球知名网游《魔兽世界》赚的是盆满钵满,这一系列的代理运营毫不掩饰背后丰厚的利润,以及玩家的口碑。但古人...&
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传真：010-对不起，您要访问的页面暂时没有找到，您可以：分享快速创建有效游戏原型的相关建议
发布时间： 17:36:26
作者：Tom Rassweiler
作为Arkadium的研发总监，我主要负责鉴定公司未来项目将采用的游戏机制是否能够成功。我打算基于个人经历，分享如何通过研发团队有效创建游戏原型的一些建议。
转向以研发团队为主的运行模式并非易事。我们拥有一系列基于个人及团队的专门游戏理念创造方法而实现的成功案例。但游戏行业的一系列变化，以及Arkadium目标平台的转向，决定了我们必须成立专门的研发团队。
Rapid-Prototype()
如何通过创建原型预测游戏销售前景？
由于全新发行渠道、用户与平台的兴起，目前独特、创新的游戏理念的重要性更胜以往。现在出现了不少具有盈利性的全新题材，例如无尽奔跑、移动异步多人玩法、触碰故事书以及独特的物理机制（游戏邦注：比如跳绳、弹弓和液体流动）。
为适应游戏行业日益复杂的变化，我们有必要创建出有效的游戏原型。Double Fine、Firehose Games及PopCap这些公司也认识到快速创建游戏原型的优势。
游戏原型创建作用显著，因为了解游戏是否有趣的最佳方式便是亲身体验。借此，你可以提早发现某些问题，停止某个无利可图的创意开发。你可以专注于游戏的核心元素/风险，也可以在砸入重金之前，收集玩家反馈，以便分析这款游戏的成功机率。
当某家公司开始寻找热门的新型游戏机制时，数量的重要性不亚于质量：也就说，当你尝试越多游戏机制，就越有可能发现热作。Rovio Entertainment就是一个典范。它在推出《愤怒的小鸟》之前，已发行了50多款不甚出众的游戏。由此可知，当你测试更多的游戏创意，更快更高效地创建出游戏原型，并获得相应评估时，你就更有可能发现一款热作。假如当初Rovio在推出这些游戏前快速有效地构建原型，那么《愤怒的小鸟》也就能够更早为人所知。
什么情况下需要创建更多原型？
大多数开发团队已知晓游戏原型创建的优势，他们在启动每个项目前都会投入一些时间创建游戏原型。然而，不少团队认为自己缺少足够的时间去创建一个出色的原型，特别是在面对重视快速收益的客户或高级主管之时。
一般而言，这种紧张感并非坏事。团队应为原型创建设定一定的期限，短期的安排能够确保开发者们集中精力进行原型创建，减少修改次数。然而，你应该注意以下情况，因为这可能表明你的公司需要创建更多的游戏原型，甚至有必要成立一个专业的研发团队。
*当你向客户推广游戏，或者在某个项目投入数个月的开发时间时，你突然意识到该游戏机制缺乏趣味性与直观性。而原型设计团队就可以避免公司在问题严重的游戏机制上浪费大量的时间与精力。
*如果你自语道：“我们的竞争对手始终采用这种解决方案，想必他们已经进行了用户测试，那我们也这么做吧”——随后你便会遵循其它团队的做法。这并非一种创新手法。而更糟糕的是，你并未从中获取任何有所帮助的东西。但研发团队有助于你创造出自己的解决方案。
*如果你是一家先前采用小型团队开发游戏的公司，但现在需接手更大且更复杂的项目，那么你应预留出更多时间用于创建原型及相关评估。
*如果你不知道如何制作成功的微交易游戏，你必定会面临上述问题：微交易游戏需要投入大量时间创造内容，平衡经济模式并进行相应测试。如果该机制不够完美，开发者所投入的额外时间只会是种浪费。
*最后，你需要仔细斟酌如何面向用户打造一个优质品牌。创建优质品牌就要求你不断推出成功作品。而创建出色的游戏原型有助于避免推出失败作品，以免因此摧毁公司形象以及玩家的信任。
成立优秀的原型研发团队所需的条件
如果你觉得上述警示十分熟悉，那么你该考虑在创建原型上多下点功夫，成立一个专业的研发团队。首先，你需要确定成立这样的团队需要哪些条件。
最重要的一点是，你需获得高级主管对团队成立、保护与维持的全力支持。创建原型常被列入最不重要的考虑范畴。因此该团队的开发者、设计师或美工常被派遣到“更重要的”任务中。这可能带来毁灭性的结果。
被视为无足轻重的团队，可能会损害团队成员的士气和产品质量，而在开发过程中增减成员往往会破坏团队重心并激发矛盾。因此，相关人员必须说服公司相信创建原型具有极高的价值。
首先，你需要一个至少由3-4个成员形成的小规模团队，他们应具备跨学科本领，包括美术、设计与编程。每个成员无需擅长所有技能，但至少应掌握两项本领。如果他们并未具备这些知识，那么掌握沟通与合作能力十分重要。
其次，每个团队成员都应为自己创建的游戏原型的最终品质负责。在此，“品质”指代游戏的趣味性。该团队需要一个领导者，负责团队管理，而不是替成员做出所有决定。
已有事实证明，同专家型团队相比，多样化成员组成的研发团队更能制定出优秀的解决方案和决策，更重要的是，这些决策均取决于测试与数据分析，并非依赖个人观点。
你可能需要大量的游戏原型测试人员。起初，你可以邀请公司的其他员工体验这些原型，而后做出反馈。但为了长远发展，你还需邀请外部测试人员，因为你需要那些未受到早期游戏模型“影响”的目标群体来测试游戏。
最后，你应明智地设定预期目标。不要寄希望于游戏会迅速，或者在头几个月内便成为热作。否则，你的期望及游戏价值均会落空。我知道这个说法十分疯狂，但如果你能在构建出某个具有前景的游戏创意时，及时发现它很无趣，那么该创意会提早告终，这也将节省公司在此后的生产周期中投入的时间与精力。
现在，你已明确需要创建出更多的游戏原型，并且成立了研发团队，设定了目标，那么首先，你应收集游戏创意。大多数游戏行业人士均拥有一些出色创意，但来自少数群体的创意仍然不够。当你收集游戏创意时，你应从各种人群那收集尽可能多的创意。
idea-creation（from projecthdesign.org）
我们打算开放创意构思及原型评估过程。这不仅是因为我们认为隐藏这一过程会降低团队士气，还因为几乎所有游戏公司都拥有一些具极创意的热情人士，只要有机会他们很乐意献出自己的点子。我们鼓励员工提交自己的创意，并为其提供一些资金及升职机会作为相应的奖励。你应时刻谨记，公司的下款热作可能来自某个员工的创意。
有效利用快速创建原型的方法
选定游戏创意后，接下来，我们应基于“直到亲身体验才能确定游戏是否有趣”这一理论，展开快速的游戏原型构建与创意评估过程，你还要做好接受“快速且频繁失败”的心理准备。
以下为该过程的关键步骤：
*尽量收集更多的游戏创意
*尽快根据最出色的想法创建出有趣的原型
*使用同行评审及分析方法，找到具有发展前景的最佳原型
这些步骤看似简单，但实际上要把握原型品质与开发速度的平衡，却是十分繁琐的事情。
重视“快速原型设计”中的“快速”
我们研发团队已创造出许多游戏原型。而通常的创造速度是，一个程序员构建出具有充足属性（游戏邦注：包括美术画面、声音与环境）的游戏原型，且能从同行及大众那获取有价值的反馈需要2-3周的时间。而习惯数月或数年研究时间的开发者可能会对这一速度感到震惊。因此，研发团队还需认识到游戏原型与完整游戏之间的差异，以及哪些地方需要精简，哪些不需要。
最重要的是，我们对游戏原型与完整游戏制定的目标完全不同。
以下为完整游戏产品的一些主要目标：
*吸引最多的玩家
*尽可能长时地留存玩家
*培养玩家对品牌或角色的忠诚度
为达到上述目标，我们使用了大量的工具，其中包括：
*能够完美兼容设备，且拥有独特功能的出色核心机制
*引人注目的游戏画面
*高品质的声音与音乐
*与目标群体相匹配的主题
*富有魅力的角色
*能长期留存用户的游戏内容、解锁模式与成就系统
*完善辅助系统，包括用户的首次体验、情境帮助以及游戏规则的完整诠释
*不出现重要漏洞，在广泛设备上具有出色运行表现
以上内容只是粗略地概括开发者制作热门游戏时需使用的方法。比如，关于如何挑选最佳的“针对目标群体的主题”可能需要长篇大论的解释。所以，为了让程序员能够每两周推出一个游戏原型，我们必须放宽目标。
我们制作大量的游戏原型是为了创造足够的游戏，以便发现独特的核心机制，而后让人们判断它是否具有趣味。
为此，我们使用以下的一些简化方法：
*能够完美兼容设备，且拥有独特功能的出色核心机制
*创造出高质量且引人注目的游戏画面
*声效用于加强游戏机制
*为玩家提供足够了解如何体验核心机制的帮助
*不出现重要漏洞，在特定高端设备上具有出色运行表现
通过这一对比，我们发现自己能够忽视其中的大量元素。你应记住，团队的主要目标是尽快地制作出具有趣味性与可玩性的核心机制。我们团队以两周作为期限，而你可能打算制定更短或更长的目标，但在我看来，紧凑的目标能够确保自己持之以恒，并集中精力开发原型。
如何确定原型是否完工？
现在，你已创建出游戏原型，并且以每两天的频率迭代某些可玩成分，同时删掉了所有多余功能。两周结束后。你完成了吗？
我们团队在游戏原型创建过程的最后阶段会根据一个列表确定原型是否已经完工，以及原型是否足以让我们顺利评估游戏创意是否可行。以下为我们经常使用的检测列表：
*涉及所有关键数据（游戏邦注：包括分数、时间、级别等）的可见性及更新UI元素
*关于游戏进程的可见目标与提示器。应让玩家了解自己在任何阶段的目标，以及同目标的距离。
*一致、高品质且引人注目的游戏画面
*游戏完成时（无论输赢）会弹出明显的信息。其中包括胜利评价，并允许玩家再度体验。
*每当玩家完胜，并进入下一关卡时，游戏应配上相应的画面与声效。
*应让不懂游戏机制或理念的玩家也能够在无需任何帮助的情况下，体验并了解游戏原型的机制。
*原型内置分析追踪器，用于公开测试时评价游戏的成功性。
评定完毕后，我们团队会在公司内外发布该原型，收集相关反馈。
最后，我们还需认识到，大多数采用全新独特机制的游戏原型可能无法获得用户的认可。玩家可能在尝试一段时间后便感到厌倦。而仅有一小部分游戏原型表现出开发前景。如果你已根据上述步骤，发布了一款履行“探索独特的核心机制，由用户决定它是否有趣”这一核心目标的游戏原型，那么即使以失败告终你也要欣然接受。如果用户表示游戏毫无趣味，那么你应感到庆幸，因为你提早测试了低成本的游戏原型，并未围绕这个糟糕创意构建完整产品。你应继续努力，信心满满地应对下一个试验。
如何判断哪个创意可打造为游戏成品？
我们在整个研发过程中主要依赖用户的反馈与分析。我们还会向大量游戏测试者（比如同事、好友、家人或志愿者）开放原型开发的每个步骤。而后基于他们的评价，决定是迭代还是摒弃该创意，紧接着继续创意测试。所以，如果你已经完成原型，且还未摒弃它，那么你应坚信该原型可能还有一些潜在趣味性。
然而，如何在具有独特趣味的大量原型中做出选择呢？为此，我们主要依据目标玩家提供的数据分析。你可以通过多种渠道获取数据。其中一种办法是将游戏以单独应用的形式发行到Facebook平台，接着利用针对性的广告吸引一些目标用户。有时，用户提供的反馈（游戏邦注：包括民意调查与评价）虽然有一定用处，但我通常会优先参考数据反馈结果，比如“每个独立用户在游戏中投入的时间”。
在此，我们经常面临的问题是如何保证初始游戏创意不为同行竞争者所知，以及获取反馈数据这两者之间的平衡。这是个艰难的抉择，但一般来说，数据价值更为重要。
实际上，在过去几年，电脑游戏行业已迅猛发展，但在创造新型游戏机制方面仍处发展初期。仅过去一年，移动游戏玩家数量便增加了22%，这也为我们展示出一个全新的用户群。同时，平台厂商正引入多种全新渠道（比如触摸、倾斜、旋转器、手势甚至思维控制方式），方便玩家与游戏的互动。总而言之，快速创建游戏原型是开发游戏的最佳渠道。（本文为游戏邦/编译，拒绝任何不保留版权的转载，如需转载请联系：游戏邦）
Rapid Prototyping: Tips for Running an Effective R&D Process
by Tom Rassweiler
So you realize that it’s important to prototype your ideas before launching into production — but how do you do it? Arkadium’s director of R&D, Tom Rassweiler, lifts the veil on his company’s process and explains why it shifted to central R&D for new game prototypes.
As the director of Research and Development at Arkadium, I’m tasked with identifying unique and successful game mechanics for our future games. Based on my experience, I’d like to share some tips on how to implement effective prototyping with the use of an R&D team.
The decision to move to a central R&D model was not made lightly. We have a long track record of successes nurtured via an ad-hoc method of idea-creation based on individual and team initiative. However, a variety of changes in the game industry and in Arkadium’s target platforms have dictated our forming a dedicated R&D team.
The use of prototyping and how to predict whether a game will be fun or a flop
Due to new distribution methods, new audiences, and new platforms, the game industry is now rewarding unique, creative game ideas like never before. New, lucrative genres are being discovered and capitalized on, such as endless-runner, mobile asynchronous multiplayer, touch storybook, and unique physics (rope, slingshot, fluid).
In response to the increasing complexity of the industry, the idea of effective prototyping is very hot. Companies such as Double Fine, Firehose Games, and PopCap are extremely vocal about the advantages of the rapid prototyping process. At GDC 2012, there were 14 talks that were focused on prototyping, compared to six in 2011 and five in 2010.
Prototyping is useful because the best way to know whether a game will be fun is to play it. You can discover problems and stop development on unprofitable ideas early. You can focus on the core elements/risks of the game without distraction, and you can collect feedback and analytics from real players about the potential success of the game mechanic before sinking a lot of money into it.
When a company is searching for a new hit game mechanic, quantity equals quality: the more game mechanics you try, the more likely you will find a unique game that has the potential to be a hit. A classic example is Rovio Entertainment. Rovio is frequently cited for having released more than 50 games without a hit before launching its record-breaking Angry Birds. So the more ideas that are tested, and the faster and more efficient the prototyping and prototype evaluation, the more likely you will find that hit game. Had Rovio effectively prototyped these games quickly before releasing them, Angry Birds might have been released much earlier.
Signs that you need more prototyping
The advantages of prototyping are generally well known, and most development teams spend sometime prototyping before each project. However, it is also generally true that teams never feel they have enough time to prototype well, especially when clients or managers are heavily focused on quick revenue.
Often, this tension is good. Teams should have deadlines for prototypes, and short schedules for prototyping ensure that they stay focused and avoid getting drawn into over-polishing.
However, be alert for the following warning signs that mean your company may need to invest in more prototyping, and possibly even to create a dedicated team for it.
You’ve pitched games to clients, or started projects and then a couple of months into development (or worse yet, at the point of release) you realize that the game mechanic is neither fun nor intuitive. A prototyping team can keep your company from wasting time and investment on games with deep problems in the mechanic.
If you hear yourself saying, “Our competitor uses this solution all the time, and they must have done user testing, so let’s just do it that way” — then you’re just following other teams. You’re not innovating. Worse yet, you’re not learning anything for yourself. R&D can help you develop your own solutions.
If you’re a company that previously made small games with small teams, but are starting to expand into bigger, more complex projects, you will need to set aside more time upfront for prototyping and evaluation.
If you are having problems developing successful microtransaction-based games, you’re facing a corollary of the above problem with project size: microtransaction-based games require a lot more time to create content, balance the economy and test. This extra time will be wasted if the mechanic isn’t perfect.
Finally, be wary if you’re having a hard time building a quality brand with your consumers. Building a quality brand requires that you release successful games consistently. Good prototyping can help you avoid releasing flops and ruining your company’s image and your player’s trust.
The resources you need to create an amazing prototyping team
If any of the above warning signs sound familiar, consider expanding your commitment to prototyping and possibly setting up a dedicated team. This means assessing the resources you and your company will need to create it.
Most importantly, you will need full support from top management to effectively provision, protect and maintain that team. Prototyping is often considered the least important task.
Consequently, a team that is prototyping will often lose developers, designers, or artists to “more important” tasks. This can be devastating. Being treated as the least important team hurts morale and quality, and losing and adding members during development will break the team’s focus and create friction. The company needs to be convinced that prototyping is a high-value activity.
Initially you will need a small team of at least three or four people who have cross-disciplinary skill-sets, including art, design, and programming. This doesn’t mean that every individual be expert in every skill (though that wouldn’t hurt), but each individual should have at least two of these skills. If each member of the team isn’t self-sufficient, it becomes important that they communicate and cooperate well.
Each member should have responsibility for the resulting quality of his or her prototypes. When I say “quality”, I mean the resulting fun. There may be a manager in charge of the team, but avoid including someone who will start making all the decisions for the team.
For one thing, it recently has been demonstrated that diverse teams will create better solutions and predictions than experts, and more importantly, most decisions should be resolved through testing and data rather than through relying on anyone’s personal opinion.
You will need people to test your prototypes — possibly a lot of people. This initially can be solved by asking people from the rest of the company to play the prototypes and provide feedback. However, in the long run, you should have a budget for external testers, because you need play-testers from your target demographic who have not been “tainted” with the earlier builds.
Last but certainly not least, you want to be smart about setting expectations. Don’t expect hits immediately, or even within the first several months. Expect and value failure. I know this sounds crazy, but if you prototype a promising idea and quickly find that it isn’t fun, the early failure of this idea will have saved your company months of wasted effort had you put that idea into full production.
Idea creation
Now that you’re convinced you need to do more prototyping, and you’ve put together your team and set expectations, your first challenge will be to collect game ideas. Most people in the game industry have some good ideas, but ideas from a small group of people are never enough. When you are collecting ideas, you want to collect as many as possible, from a variety of people with different perspectives.
Arkadium decided to make the process of idea creation and prototype evaluation as open as possible. Not only because we think that hiding this process could be bad for morale, but because every game company is filled with creative, passionate people who would love to contribute if only they were given the opportunity. We make it easy for any Arkadium employee to submit ideas, and offer monetary and prestige incentives. You should always remember that your company’s next hit idea could come from any employee.
Effective use of rapid prototyping
After my team has selected an idea, we follow a process of rapid prototyping and idea evaluation based on the theory that “you can’t be sure it’s fun until you’ve played it”, and you should embrace “failing fast and frequently”.
These are the key steps we take during this process:
Collect as many game ideas as possible
Create playable prototypes of the best ideas as quickly as possible
Use peer review and analytics to discover the best prototypes for further development
This seems like a pretty simple formula, but the details get a bit tricky when trying to strike a balance between prototype quality and development speed. We’ve learned a lot about this process, and we’re excited to share some of our discoveries with you.
Focused goals put the “rapid” in “rapid prototyping”
R&D at Arkadium makes a lot of prototypes. To give you a general feeling for the speed of development, one programmer is expected to build a prototype every two to three weeks with enough function, art, sound and contextual help to get peer and public feedback that is meaningful. Any developer used to working with timelines defined in months or years would probably be terrified at this proposal. So it’s important for an R&D team to recognize the differences between a prototype and a full game, and where it’s appropriate to cut corners and where it’s not.
Most importantly, the goals of a prototype are different from the goals of a full game.
Here are some of the primary goals of a production game:
Attract the most players
Keep them engaged as long as possible
Instill brand or character loyalty
Make money
To achieve this, we use a huge host of tools, including:
Excellent core mechanics with unique features that adapt perfectly to its device
Eye-catching art
High quality sound and music
Demographically-targeted theme
Attractive and inviting characters
Long-term retention content, unlocks and achievements
Complete help system including first user experience, contextual help and full explanation of rules
No critical bugs, and good performance on a broad range of devices
This list only scratches the surface of the myriad of tools used by a developer when making a hit game. For example, a discussion of how to choose the best “demography-targeted theme” could take a whole book. So, in order to let a programmer create a prototype every two weeks, we have to loosen our goals quite a lot.
Our goal for prototypes, created at Arkadium, is to create enough of a game to expose the unique core mechanic and let people decide if it’s fun.
For this, we use a simplified set of tools:
Excellent core mechanics with unique features that adapt perfectly to its device
Art of high enough quality that users aren’t distracted by it
Sound only to punctuate the game mechanic
Enough help that users understand how to play the core mechanic
No critical bugs, and good performance on a specific high-powered device
As you can see, by comparing these lists, there are a lot of elements we are able to ignore. You and your team need to have a laser-focus on the main goal of creating a fun, playable core mechanic as quickly as possible. Our team uses a two- you may want to set your goal a little shorter or longer, but having a tight target will ensure that you stay on track and keep focused.
How to know when you’re done
So you’ve been developing the prototype, and iterating quickly with playable builds every two days while avoiding all unnecessary features. Two weeks are up. Are you done?
Our team reviews all our finished prototypes against a checklist at the end of the process to be sure that the prototype is complete enough that it will let us successfully evaluate the game idea. Here is the checklist we use:
Visible and up-to-date UI elements for all key stats (score, time, level, etc.)
Visible goals and indicator of progress. A player should know their goal at any point in the game and how close they are to achieving that goal.
Art is consistent and of high enough quality that it isn’t distracting.
There is a clear message when the game is complete (win or lose). It provides an evaluation of success and allows the player to play again.
There are visual and audio cues every time the player has been successful and taken steps towards the goal.
A player who has no prior knowledge of either the game mechanic or the idea can start the prototype and understand the mechanic enough to make meaningful progress without any other help.
The prototype has imbedded analytics-tracking to allow for evaluation of success with a public beta test.
After evaluating the prototype against this final checklist, our team will release it for evaluation within and outside the company.
The last thing to be aware of is that most prototypes that use a unique, new mechanic fail with audiences. Players will try them for a bit and get bored. Only a small subset of prototypes will show promise for further development. Embrace this failure if you have followed the above steps and released a prototype that fulfills its core goal of “exposing the unique core mechanic that lets people decide if it’s fun”. If people say it’s not fun, then just be glad you tested it early as a cheap prototype, and didn’t try and build a full product around what proved to be a bad idea. Move on, and get excited about your next experiment.
How to tell which game to move into full production
Throughout the entire process we rely heavily on feedback and analytics. At each playable step in developing a prototype, we expose it to widening group of play-testers (co-workers, friends and family, or volunteers). Based on evaluation of these playtests, we decide to either iterate or trash the idea and move on. So if you’ve completed the prototype and still haven’t trashed it, you must believe that it has revealed a seed of unique fun.
But how can you choose between a variety of prototypes that each have this unique seed of fun? For this, we rely heavily on analytic data collected from average players in our demographic.
You can get data in a variety of ways. One is to put the game on Facebook as a stand-alone app, and then use targeted Facebook ads to attract a small group of tightly targeted users. User-reported feedback, including polls and comments, is sometimes useful, but I set a higher priority on feedback from data such as “time spent per unique user”.
One question we often face here is how to balance the need to keep your fledgling ideas secret from your competitors versus the value of the data. This is a tough decision, but in general the value data tends to be worth the risk.
Conclusions
It is true that the computer game industry has grown a lot during the last few years, but it is still in its infancy in terms of new game mechanics. Mobile game players increased by 22 percent in the last year alone, representing a brand new demographic of gamer. Platform manufacturers are also ushering in a variety of new ways for players to interact with their games, including touch, tilt, gyroscopes, gestures, and even mind control. It’s come to show that rapid prototyping is the best way to capitalize on these exciting developments. I hope that this article and others like it will give you new tools for discovering unique and innovative mechanics, and will help us take the industry to new heights of success.()
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