[翻译]《质量效应》系列关卡设计师访谈录（无剧透放心看XD）

Echoness

仅供学习交流，转载请注明原帖和译帖出处，谢谢。翻译：Echoness
原帖来源：http://blog.bioware.com/2012/02/06/interview-with-raylene-deck/

Who are you and what is your role at BioWare?
My name is Raylene Deck and I’m a Level Designer on the Mass Effect franchise.

你是谁，你在bioware的角色是什么？
我的名字叫Raylene Deck，我是《质量效应》系列的关卡设计师。

What is the best part about your job?
I think the best thing about being a level designer is being able to help drive the creative process of making a level. The level starts as just a brief description on a piece of paper, then it’s just a bunch of boxes to represent rooms and cover, and pop-up box messages to tell the player what is happening. But eventually, everything comes together and it transforms into something amazing by the time we ship. The great thing about this process is that I get to work closely with a lot of different departments during various stages of development. Working in a creative environment, people come up with so many ideas that almost every day something is improved, changed or newly discovered, and that what makes it exciting.

你工作最棒的地方是什么？
我觉得作为一个关卡设计师最棒的地方是能够帮助弄出有创造性的关卡设计流程。关卡是从一张只有简短描述的文档开始的，然后堆一堆盒子当作房间和掩体，弹出消息框告诉玩家发生了什么。不过最终，所有东西归集到一起并且我们完成的那一刻它就变成令人惊叹的东西了。这个流程最强大的是我要在各种开发阶段中跟很多不同的部门紧密合作。在一个有创造力的环境中，人们会有超多点子以致每天都会提升，改变或者新发现一些东西，这就是最令人激动的地方。

What does an average day look like for you?
As a level designer, I think an average day really depends on which stage of development we’re working on. If it’s the beginning of the project, I will be in a lot of meetings to discuss what kind of level we want to make. We’ll figure out the overall story, setting and gameplay, and from there, I will start making the level layout. If it’s mid-production, we have the bones of the level figured out and so now I would be doing tasks such as combat layouts, boss fight mechanics or exploration puzzles. At this time, I’m working very closely with my artist, writer, gameplay designer and cinematic designer to figure out all the details of the level and most importantly, make the level fun. If it’s getting close to the time of shipping the game, the level is already fun so now it’s time to fix all the bugs. I switch gears and work with the QA team. Some of the bugs I’ll be fixing range from logic errors, memory and frame rate issues or collision problems.

你的每一天都是怎样的呢？
作为一个关卡设计师，我想每一天都取决于我们工作的开发阶段。如果是工程的初始，我会被埋在一堆会议中讨论我们想要做出什么样的关卡。我们会想出整体故事，设定和游戏性，从这入手，我会开始做关卡布局。如果在是产品中期，我们已经有了关卡的框架所以现在我会做像战斗布局、BOSS战或者探索迷题的任务。这个时候我与我的艺术设计师、故事作者、游戏性设计师和动画设计师紧密合作来搞清楚关卡的细节，还有最重要的一点，让关卡更有趣。如果是接近完成游戏的时候，关卡已经非常有趣了所以现在就是修所有bug的时候了。我转换一下自己的状态和质量保障团队合作。有些我要修的bug有逻辑错误、内存和帧率问题或者碰撞问题。（译者：开发游戏的时候确实这些琐碎的问题很烦人，深有体会lol）

Can you tell us about one of your proudest moments working in game development?
Mass Effect 2 was my first critically acclaimed game that I’ve worked on. Walking into my local game store, and seeing Mass Effect 2 sitting on the shelf was an amazing feeling, especially being new to the gaming industry. Everyone I work with puts so much heart into their work. Seeing the fans so excited to play the game is humbling and makes all those long working hours worth it.

你能告诉我们你的游戏开发过程中最得意的时候是什么？
《质量效应2》是我做的第一个广受好评的游戏。走进我当地的游戏店，看见货架上放着的《质量效应2》感觉很赞，特别是作为新人进入游戏行业。和我合作的每个人都在他们的工作中投入了巨多心血。看着粉丝们激动地玩这游戏非常震撼人心，也让那所有长时间的工作有所值得。

What’s a geeky thing about you?
Oh boy, where do I start?  If I had to choose one thing that’s out of the ordinary, I’d pick my love of making costumes. I used to dress up as favourite anime characters and perform skits at Animethon (a local anime convention in Edmonton) when I was younger. I can’t believe I just admitted that! But I still try and go over the top for any event that requires a costume. At BioWare, there is a Halloween costume contest each year and I’ve been lucky enough to win a few times. It’s always a competitive contest with so many creative people working here. This past year, I dressed up as Chell from Portal 2.

你的癖好是什么呢？
哦，兄弟，我要从哪说起呢？ 如果我得选点特殊的话，我会说我喜欢设计服饰。我小时候就穿成我最喜欢的动漫人物，在Animethon（Edmonton的本土说法）演短剧（译者：就是COSPLAY么）。我真不敢相信我居然承认那点了！但是我仍然尝试着去接触要求扮装的事。在BioWare，每年都有万圣节扮装大赛，我也有幸赢过几回。这一直是有竞争性的大赛，有众多富有创造力的人在这里。去年，我就扮装成《传送门2》里的Chell。

Do you have any advice for those wishing to get into the video game industry?
In my department, level designers come from a lot of different backgrounds. For me, I have a degree in Computing Science, but there are people that have art or even music backgrounds. So I don’t think the important part is where you come from, but instead, your drive to make games. So make something! Grab a copy of a toolset like Unreal Editor or even the Neverwinter Nights toolset, and try your hand at scripting and learning what is fun. And don’t be discouraged if your idea fails. For every idea that works, there were 10 past ideas that didn’t work. Also, get your friends to try out your game. Being able to take feedback and iterate on it is an extremely helpful skill in making games.

你对想进入视频游戏行业的人有什么建议么？
在我的部门里面，关卡设计者来自不同的背景。对于我来说，我有计算机科学专业的学位，但是有些人是艺术生或者学音乐的背景。所以我觉得最重要的不是你背景如何，而是，你希望去做游戏。所以要有所作为！搞起一份像虚幻编辑器那样的工具包拷贝或者甚至是《无冬之夜》工具包，试着用你的双手编辑学习兴趣所在。如果你失败了不要气馁。每一个成功的点子背后，都有10个失败的点子。而且，让你的朋友试玩你的游戏。可以收到反馈，如此往复是做游戏的一个非常有帮助的技巧。

If you weren’t working in the industry, what would you be doing?
Hard question! I’d probably be doing something completely different. For instance, I’m a big Japan-nerd so I’d possibly become a Japanese-English translator and translate games in Japan.

如果你不在这个行业工作，你会去干嘛呢？
有难度的问题！我很可能会去做完全不同的事。比如说，我会是个日本大书呆而我可能是个日英翻译，把游戏日化（译者：我受汉化这个词的启发= =）。

What are you currently playing, reading, or listening to?
The last few months have been tough since we’ve been pushing really hard to get Mass Effect 3 finished, so I’m behind on my stack of games. But I managed to find time to play Skyrim and I’m just starting up on Uncharted 3. I got a Kobo E-reader for Christmas so I downloaded my first book, Ender’s Game, and I’m really enjoying it. I also bought tickets for Coachella for the first time so I’ve been listening to a lot of the bands who will be there and getting really excited for the show!

你现在在玩、读或者听什么？
近几个月相当艰难因为我们都在很努力去完成《质量效应3》，所以我落下了一堆游戏没玩。但是我会抽时间出来玩《天际》也才开始玩《神秘海域3》。我圣诞得了电子书阅读器作为礼物所以我下载了我第一本书，《Ender的游戏》，我蛮喜欢读这本书。我也第一次买了Coachella的入场券这样我可以听很多乐队表演也真心有激情！

nicole-fan

这么好的文章居然没人顶。太没人性了！