利用不對稱溝通概念的實驗性遊戲

Abstract

不對等溝通像是某種語言的流利度不夠可能會是種尷尬的經驗在現實生活中。然而，就遊戲而言，不對等溝通的機制能夠使遊戲變得更具挑戰性與趣味性。比手畫腳是一個典型的例子，遊戲方式是其中一個玩家嘗試透過肢體語言表達其意思，而其他玩家嘗試去猜謎底。不同於現今大多數的電子合作遊戲，它們採納的大都為對等溝通的機制，而我們想嘗試加入不對等溝通機制於電子合作遊戲中。因此，我們設計了一款遊戲，角色為一個人與一隻狗，在不對等溝通的狀況下去解決一連串的謎題。最終，我們執行了一個實驗來評估我們的遊戲。從觀察中，我們發現了許多有趣的溝通模式以及提出了一些潛在的設計議題供未來作參考。

Inequality of communication capabilities may cause an awkward experience in real life. However, in terms of gaming, this can be a challenging and interesting mechanic. Charades, where one player tries to express a word via body language while others try to guess it, is a good example of such cases. Different from most digital co-op games, which equal communication mechanics have been widely used, we experiment with this unequal communication mechanic. Thus, we have designed a digital co-op game called Human and Dog, in which 2 avatars, a human and a dog, communicate to solve a series of puzzles with unequal communication capabilities. Ultimately, we conducted an experiment to evaluate our game. Several interesting patterns were discovered from our observation. We then concluded some design suggestions from our collected data for future reference.