In November, Allen, who was in New York, was already sitting in front of his TV, and in the TV screen in front of him, under the white steam, the game interface of "Steam Daming" had been slowly opened.

He is a game fan, and his favorite game in his life is the previous work of Dimension Entertainment, "Taiwu Picture Scroll 2".

At the beginning, when "Taigo 2" was released, he played that game for the first time. At that time, he had just graduated from high school, and he had a chance to travel, but he chose to play.

After playing, he has no regrets at all.

Travel or something, can you have fun with "Taiwu 2"?

After this game, he has a good impression of China, an ancient country. After going to university, he even went to Chang'an, China, once, and felt very good.

Later, when Wedo Entertainment was preparing to do the movie script activity of "Taiwu Picture Scroll 2", his archive was also selected, and it became the archive that made the last movie.

At that time, he was crazy with joy, and when the movie was released, he even called friends and found a lot of people to watch it together.

This sense of accomplishment is simply overwhelming.

Originally, after playing Taiwu Picture Scroll 2, he was already a fan of Dimension Entertainment, and this time, he has become a loyal fan of them.

If so, when Wedo Entertainment launches a new work, that is, "Steam Daming", of course he wants to buy it!

And I don't know how to buy it myself, and I buy it everywhere.

However, it is difficult to say how well his Amway worked.

Whenever he talks about this work with other players who also play the game, the other party will always make a very surprised expression, saying that he has been looking forward to this work for a long time.

Alan didn't think there was any big surprise either.

In the past nearly half a year, as the date of the launch of the work "Steam Daming" is getting closer and closer, they can always see publicity about this work in various places.

On TV, they were always able to see commercials for the work; Shopping on the road, you can also see the eye-catching logo of "Steam Daming" in many iconic locations; There are also many advertisements on various websites.

In addition to these publicity, which can be directly advertised in front of a large audience, the name of "Steam Ming" can always be seen on social media, on some professional game websites and media.

Players are probably not very professional publicity practitioners. In their feelings, this work seems to be everywhere, and it is very hot.

Herd mentality, which is a very common and very common psychological phenomenon. In this circle, when everyone shows a sense of anticipation for a game work, many people who may not be too interested in it will choose to at least try it.

Regardless, Alan is still very proud that he was able to play this game for the first time, become a starter, and buy the most exclusive collector's edition game.

He took out his phone to take a few photos and hurriedly posted them on his social media accounts, and he immediately couldn't wait to get into the game.

……

The beginning of the game is a teaching level.

This teaching level is still designed to be very interesting. From here, Alan probably learned the operation outline of "Steam Ming", and also understood the gameplay and upgrade system of this game, and also understood what story it was about.

The main character is a member of the brocade guard. In Allen's understanding, this is a spy organization directly under the central government of the Ming Dynasty, but it is a little different from the spy organization in the usual impression.

And his first task was a 'raid' job, arresting a dismissed court official.

The teaching level is not long, and in the second half, you can basically move freely.

However, this story made Allen, who had just started playing the game and was still in a state of excitement, as if he had been poured a basin of cold water.

Because the story is brutal.

The protagonist of this brocade guard doesn't seem to be playing a positive role. In the information revealed in the story, the minister who was raided and sent to prison does not seem to be a bad person. And what the protagonist has to do is also cruel, the minister's daughter, that cute little girl, is going to be sent to the Department of Teaching - in Allen's understanding, this is like an official brothel.

It's a fucked thing, at least it doesn't make Alan feel very beautiful.

But in the game, the mood of the protagonist is obviously also struggling.

At the end of the teaching level, he has a chance to let the girl go.

However, here's where the choice is made.

In the previous promotion, Alan understood that this work of Dimension Entertainment, they called it 'Free Line***', which is also a huge selling point of the game.

The so-called line *** is a game mode that is directly opposed to the 'sandbox game' and 'open world'.

There are many masterpieces of open world games, such as the famous "GTA" series, "The Elder Scrolls", and the "Taiwu Picture Scroll 2" before Dimension Entertainment, all of which are serious open worlds.

The biggest selling point of this kind of game is that it creates a virtual world for players to explore freely. Players can do what they want in this world, and there is a high degree of freedom to explore.

The line *** is based on a main plot line, one level after another, designed gameplay to let players pass, and narrate a story. Among them, the representative works include the "Uncharted" series and the "The Last of Us" (American Doomsday) series. Strictly speaking, "God of War 4" is also a linear plot.

Some people may think that God of War is a semi-open world game, but it is not, God of War 4 is a typical linear narrative game from beginning to end.

It has the law of line ***, that is, the plot from A to B is unchanged, and the monsters in the middle and the process of fighting are also unchanged. It just adds a few side plots between A and B. But the great thing about Santa Monica is that you can leave it without playing it, because it doesn't affect your story experience.

And if you don't hit the back of the map, then the new map obviously won't go.

These two types of games, the game experience of playing, of course, is completely different.

And Wedo Entertainment's "Steam Daming" is a serious line***. Players are in such a main story at the beginning of the game, starting from the tutorial level, and there are basically not many exploration elements.

A game is an act or activity that takes place in a defined time and space. It is carried out according to the rules of spontaneous acceptance. Such rules, once accepted, are absolutely binding. The purpose of the game lies in the act of the game itself. It is accompanied by feelings of tension and joy that are different from everyday life.

This is the same as playing chess, that is, during the time of the game, the chess pieces fall on the chessboard, the rook runs rampantly, and the horse walks the Japanese character. If someone puts a piece on the outside of the board, or walks around blindly, your reaction will definitely be to pick up the board and slap it hard at the brainless head.

For video games, linear, sandbox, and open world are actually a combination of "time", "space", and "rules" of the game, but the proportions of the three are different, creating different styles.

If we simply and rudely divide these three types, the line that focuses on "time" and "rules" is the line, while the open world focuses on "space" and "rules", and the so-called sandbox game focuses on "space" and "time".

Line *** As the name suggests, you play this game and feel like you take a line, although there are occasional forks in the road, but there is always only one road that can lead to the end.

This kind of game is the typical template of the earliest video games, whether it is a top-down or side-scrolling, action game or RPG, there is always no escape the routine of defeating the boss and finally saving the world after a lot of hardships.

Of course, it's not that a single routine is not good to play, in fact, it is precisely because of this traditional and simple structure that the line has produced countless classics. In addition, this type of game has a long history, so almost all gamers will have a line in their childhood memories.

The line *** mode itself is actually a very stable and mature game system, which can be said to have tended to perfection. But it is precisely because of perfection that it is difficult for current games to make greater innovations based on the mode of line ***.

Although later, with the release of "Dragon Age", the game was released with a multi-ending mode, which enriched the player experience.

However, with the improvement of players' game IQ and the emergence of game products, the final line *** still fell into an awkward position: that is, most games, when players get their hands on it, they can already guess the mode of the game, and it is difficult for players to get amazing feelings in the process of playing. In this case, a line *** will inevitably make players feel unfree to be bound.

As said at the beginning, the line *** only has "time" and "rules", players can choose to do things at different times, but in the end what you have to do is still that, you can't avoid it or change it.

In fact, in terms of gameplay, there are no shortcomings in the line***, because even if it is a single mode, as human beings, we still have countless stories to tell. In fact, most of the stories throughout the ages are similar routines, but there are still generations of people who enjoy it.

Stories, this kind of thing itself is the most fascinating. And generations of game designers can also play online ***. The innovation in gameplay and the improvement of visual effects......

If the open world is like a designer building a stage for players to play on it, then the line *** is like a beautiful stage play, with directors and actors, and players are entering the plot and experiencing it firsthand.

It's hard to say, which model is better.

But the banner of Wedo Entertainment to make this "Steam Daming" is that they want to play the mode of line ***.

This is actually what Allen, as a player, is most looking forward to before playing this game.

Dimension Entertainment: "It's a completely free line***, there are countless endings here. ”

The so-called completely free line ***, the concept of attention is like the line *** general gameplay, the game process is step by step forward, players will not have too many opportunities to explore freely, but immerse themselves in the main plot of the game, and play an ending.

But the embodiment of the point of 'freedom' lies in the fact that the player can do almost everything he wants within this linear story.

This seems to be in direct conflict with the definition of linear narrative, but it is not.

In "Steam Daming", one of the most important 'selling points' lies in the butterfly effect. At present, in this story line, the protagonist can only act according to the development of the story, but how to act and what the purpose is, it is up to the player to decide. At the same time, every decision will have a change in the following plot, forming the so-called 'butterfly effect', so that it affects the entire game world.

Once, there were also some works that used this selling point to do publicity. For example, "Until Dawn" is promoted with this selling point, which is called the 'butterfly effect', every decision affects the ending, and the game has hundreds of different endings.

In fact, although this game is a high-quality game, it is well-made, and the atmosphere of horror and horror is also okay, and as an interactive movie game, it is definitely qualified. However, in terms of the so-called 'butterfly effect', what they have done is quite disappointing.

The so-called choices have different endings, and in the final analysis, it's just a multi-ending game. The hundreds of different endings that are claimed to be only within such a short game flow, different people survive or die. It is roughly divided into three categories, the ending of all deaths, the normal ending (some people died, some did not), and the ending of all survivors.

But Steam is a very different game.

What is the real butterfly effect? Once you've made a decision, there's a good chance that the whole game will be different.

Moreover, this decision is not just about giving an option, as in some games. Sometimes, what the player does in the game, how they play, and what they experience can be a key factor in triggering a story.

For example, Allen's gameplay, at the end of the teaching level, he couldn't bear it, and chose to let the minister's daughter go privately. As a result, during the operation, his skills were not perfect, and he was discovered by his colleagues, and then the girl was not only arrested, but he was also charged with a crime on his head, saying that he had something to do with this political case and was thrown into prison.

He thought he was going to end up in a losing position, but he found that he didn't.

。 m.