譯者按：本文譯自游戲網(wǎng)站DigitalChumps之欄目《nuclear device》，原文于2008年7月19日發(fā)布，原文出處https://digitalchumps.com/2008/07/19/exclusive-interview-command-and-conquer-red-alert-3/? 。因本文篇幅較長，故分為三部分翻譯，本篇是對《紅警3》項目組首席平衡師Greg Black的采訪。

Gentlemen, it’s a nuclear device.

兄弟們，歡迎來到《核反應》欄目。

Going into the show, my younger brother Greg Schardein and myself were quite excited about the prospect of playing the newest installment in the Command & Conquer: Red Alert series, Red Alert 3. Westwood Studios’ Red Alert 2 has always been at the top of our list of favorite real-time strategy games of all time, so you could probably imagine how thrilled we were when we were met with the opportunity to speak with three of the most influential names behind Electronic Arts’ RA3.

本期節(jié)目里，我和我的老弟Greg Schardein將帶來令人興奮的《命令與征服：紅色警戒》系列最新一作——《紅色警戒3》的前瞻。西木工作室出品的《紅色警戒2》在我們最受歡迎的即時戰(zhàn)略游戲排名里一直處于領先地位。因此您可以想象，當我們有機會和紅警3背后最有影響力的三位大人物交流會有多高興。

These names are Greg Black, Unit Designer; Amer Ajami, Senior Producer; and Chris Corry, Executive Producer. Let me tell you straight away that these three know the series like the collective backs of their hands—if ever you were concerned about how RA3 will turn out, this interview should help to set your mind at ease.

這些大佬分別是：單位設計師Greg Black；高級制作人Amer Ajami；還有執(zhí)行制作人Chris Corry。我會跟大家講講他們對這個游戲系列有多了如指掌。如果您對紅警3的成果還有什么擔心的地方，本次采訪定能解開您的心中疑慮。

The DigitalChumps staff member (Steve, Greg) dialogue is in bold to keep things from being confusing (seeing as there are two Gregs in the first part of the interview—one from DigitalChumps and the other from EA)

為避免混淆，DigitalChumps工作人員（Steve和Greg）的發(fā)言以粗體表示（因為本采訪的第一個環(huán)節(jié)有兩個Greg——一個來自DigitalChumps，另外一個來自EA）。

First, we sat down with Greg Black in an interview that was in planning for no longer than two minutes total; no prepared questions, no scripted topics—just dialogue about the C&C universe.

首先，我們與Greg Black坐下來，進行了一場計劃不超過兩分鐘的采訪。沒有準備好的問題，也沒有劇本安排——我們就是聊了聊關于C&C宇宙的東西。

Steve (DC): Greg, first off, thanks for sitting down with us. I know we don’t have a lot of time, but could you introduce yourself quickly for the record?

Steve（DC）：Greg，首先感謝您接受我們的采訪。我知道我們沒有太多的時間，但是，請問您能否簡要介紹一下自己呢？

Greg: Sure; I’m Greg Black. I’m the, like, Lead Unit Balance, you know, Gameplay Guy.

Greg：當然可以，我叫Greg Black。我是……那個……單位首席平衡師，你懂的，就是搞游戲玩法的人。

Steve (DC): Awesome, I love the highly official title there. I’m actually going to call you that in the interview if you don’t mind.

Steve（DC）：牛逼，我喜歡這個官方化的頭銜。如果您不介意的話，我就在采訪里這么稱呼您了。

Greg: Sure, no problem! If you play multiplayer, chances are I’m the one that screwed it up.

Greg：可以，沒毛??！如果你是玩pvp的話，沒準我也會搞砸的。

Steve (DC): Fantastic. Then I’ll be sure to yell at you.

Steve（DC）：太棒了，那到時候我肯定會噴您。

Greg: All right.

Greg：罵，都可以罵。

Steve (DC): Okay, Greg… I don’t really have any questions prepared here, so I figured we’d start with your specialty. Could you tell us a little bit about your philosophy on the balancing for the super-powerful-type stuff we’re going to see in the game for multiplayer?

Steve（DC）：好的，Greg。老實說我今天沒準備任何問題，所以我們就從您最擅長的地方開始吧，您能跟我們講講您對未來在對戰(zhàn)中會遇到的超強單位有什么平衡上的思路嗎？

Greg: Yeah, so, we’re basically trying to continue the trend from Red Alert 2, which is the feeling that, you know, everything is sort of overpowered. For example, “Oh my God, this Kirov (blimp) or this Apocalypse tank is way too powerful,” but in context, it just sort of works out. We’ve carried that over into the Japanese faction. The big gameplay change this time is that this is the first time in a Command & Conquer game that every unit has its own special ability. So there aren’t any caster units like in a game that just has a bunch of them, but every single unit has just one. There are three types: there’s instantaneous abilities, which—you remember the spy from Red Alert 2? It does the same thing it did before, being that it can disguise itself as anything, go infiltrate buildings… but it’s got this secondary ability now which is Bribe, which costs money to use; it’s like $1,000… it’s like one of two powers in the game that actually costs money. And so you can disguise yourself as whatever, sneak up to the enemy units, hit the Bribe button, and everything within a radius is basically going to transfer over to your side.

Greg：可以，我們基本上是在嘗試延續(xù)《紅色警戒2》的風格，就是那種感覺，你懂的，壓倒一切的氣場。比如說“我超，這個基洛夫（飛艇）或者這個天啟太牛逼了”，但在大環(huán)境里，它只是有點強而已，我們已經(jīng)引入了日本陣營。這次最大的游戲玩法變化是，每個單位都有了自己的特殊能力，這在《命令與征服》系列中還是頭一次。所以（紅警3）并沒有學其他游戲那樣整了一堆法師型單位，而是給每個單位整了一個（特殊能力）。這種（能力）一共有三個類型：首先是瞬發(fā)能力——還記得紅警2里的間諜嗎？他做的事情和以前一樣：偽裝成任何東西，然后潛入建筑物......但他現(xiàn)在有了第二種能力，也就是「賄賂」，使用它是需要花錢的，大概是一千塊來著.....就像游戲中另外兩種需要花錢的元素那樣。所以你可以偽裝成任何東西，潛入敵方單位，按下賄賂按鈕，半徑內的所有玩意基本上都會歸你控制。

Greg (DC): Nice.

Greg (DC)：不錯嘛。

Greg: So, it costs $1,000, right? So if you get a conscript, you got ripped off. But if you manage to get three Apocalypse tanks, you’re pretty stoked.

Greg：那么，這東西要花一千塊，對吧？所以如果你偷到了動員兵，那就虧了。但是如果你想辦法偷到了三輛天啟坦克，那您就偷著樂吧。

Also, one of the things that I really wanted to do was give the units abilities to help them deal with things that are normally their hard counters in the combat chain—help units do what they normally do better. So an example of that is the Japanese cruiser, it’s just this torpedo boat… but if you hit the secondary ability, it fires off this spread of like five dumb-fire torpedoes that go in every direction, and they just keep going until they hit the shore, or a boat, or whatever.

還有就是，我非常希望通過賦予單位技能，幫助他們處理打硬仗的狀況——讓單位超常發(fā)揮。日本的巡洋艦就是這樣一個例子，它只是一艘魚雷艦......但如果你啟用它的第二種模式，它就會向四周發(fā)射五枚魚雷，它們會持續(xù)前進，直到命中岸邊或一條船，或者別的什么玩意。

And then there are abilities that help the player maneuver around in the combat chain a little bit. So normally, this thing would kill me, but if I’m smart and I use my special ability, maybe I’ll have a chance to escape or counterattack or something of that nature. The Japanese have a couple of those units—you were playing with them. When they’re on the ground, they’re going to murder infantry, but the second a tank rolls up, you want to transform those bad boys into their airborne form to either get away or to fight back.

還有一些技能可以幫助玩家在戰(zhàn)斗中進行一些微操。一般來說，這個單位可以干掉我，但如果我明智地使用了我的特殊技能，那我也就有了逃脫或者反擊的可能。日本就有幾個這樣的單位——你可以玩玩看。當他們在地面上的時候，他們會屠殺步兵，但如果坦克一出現(xiàn)，你就可以讓這些小鬼變成空中形態(tài)，然后逃離或者反擊。

So there’s lots of skill differential in the game. Players that can really use their special abilities and micromanage really well, they’re going to be able to stomp players that can’t. And we’ve gone with a lot of hard counters and specialized units, so there’s a lot of unit mixing. One of the design problems we had in C&C 3 is that there is a lot of single-unit spam, but there’ll be none of that in Red Alert 3. If you’re spamming nothing but tanks, the other player’s gonna scout it, he’s gonna see it, and he’s gonna murder you hard.

游戲中（玩家之間）的水平差異是很大的，真正精通使用技能和微操的玩家能夠擊敗那些不善運用的玩家。而且我們也做了很多硬相克和特殊單位的機制，能夠帶來多種多樣的單位搭配組合。我們在《命令與征服3》中就遇到過只暴一種單位的設計問題，但在《紅警3》里不會有（這樣的事），如果你只暴坦克的話，其他玩家偵察到，就會狠狠地吊打你。

Greg (DC): That’s exactly how Red Alert 2 was. If you’re just pumping out Kirovs, you’re going to get destroyed.

Greg (DC)：紅警2里就是這樣的，如果你只出基洛夫的話，你肯定會輸。

Steve (DC): And people did that, too. And they did indeed get destroyed.

Steve (DC)：很多人也是這樣做的，他們也真的輸?shù)煤軕K。

Greg: Yeah.

Greg：對啊。

Steve (DC): So all the other stuff’s still intact, then? For instance, units can still gain levels/ranks (veterancy)?

Steve (DC)：那其他方面還是老樣子嗎？比如說，單位還能升星嗎？

Greg: Yeah, the veterancy’s still there, and we’ve incorporated a sort of player power system that you’ve seen in other games like C&C Generals, Company of Heroes, etc., where you gain points, and as the battle becomes more intense, you gain them more quickly. But what we’re doing that’s interesting and unique is that we’ve built in this negative feedback loop on the player power points, so that if you’re losing the battle, you’re actually going to gain powers a little bit faster than the guy who’s winning the battle. That’s to help counter the slippery slope problem. So, you know, “I’m losing, I’m losing… but oh, I’m starting to get my powers a little bit faster!”, so if I use it just right, maybe I can come back.

Greg：對，老兵機制還在的。我們還整合了一種你在其他游戲里也能見到的玩家能力機制，比如說《命令與征服將軍》、《英雄連》之類的。你可以在這里獲得點數(shù)，而且隨著戰(zhàn)斗越來越激烈的時候，你就能更快地獲得它們（譯者注：這里是指游戲中左下角機密協(xié)議按鈕旁的威脅計量器，威脅指數(shù)越高，你獲得協(xié)議點數(shù)及單位升級的速度就會越快）。但我們在這里做的最有趣而且最獨特的設計是，我們在這個玩家能力點數(shù)上建立了負反饋的循環(huán)，所以如果你輸?shù)袅艘淮螒?zhàn)斗，實際上你就會比以前更快地獲得戰(zhàn)勝對手的力量。這有助于解決滑坡的問題。所以，你懂的，“我輸了，但是，哦，我獲取能力的速度比以前快了一點！”所以如果我利用得當?shù)脑?，也許我能夠翻盤。

Steve (DC): So that doesn’t translate into cheapness over the internet then, does it?

Steve (DC)：所以這些東西也不是從網(wǎng)上找來的廉價點子，對吧？

Greg: We haven’t seen anything like that yet.

Greg：我們還沒看到過類似的東西。

Steve (DC): Okay, good; so you can still destroy people if you’re really good then?

Steve (DC)：那好吧，所以說如果你真的厲害的話，還是能打贏別人的吧？

Greg: Oh, yeah, absolutely. The delta between the guy who is losing and winning is not that wide; it’s just a little bit. And in the powers, something that we’ve tried to do is to give players powers that you can, you know, use against yourself or the enemy. For instance, the Iron Curtain’s really cool, because, you know—“Oh, I’ve got a commando in my base, I’m going to use the Iron Curtain to kill it.” But other times you are going to use it on your own stuff to make it invulnerable.

Greg：對，當然是這樣。其實輸家與贏家之間的區(qū)別并不大，只有一點點而已。我們試著賦予玩家「能力」，把它用在自己或者敵人的身上。比如說，鐵幕真的很酷，“哦，我基地里有一個英雄，我要用鐵幕干掉她”，但有的時候你也會在自己的單位上面套上它變成無敵狀態(tài)。

So, for instance, one of the Japanese superweapons is like that as well. It’s kind of hard to describe. You sort of just launch it down an area, so you could cast that on your own base right before a superweapon hits to protect a bunch of your own units.

還有比如說，日本的一種超級武器也是這樣的，有點不太好描述。你只需要把它發(fā)射到一個區(qū)域，這樣你就可以在（對面的）超級武器擊中之前把它投放到自己的基地里，保護你自己的一堆單位。

One of the Allied units is called the Cryocopter, and it’s the only pure support unit in the game. Anywhere that I wanted something that, in the previous game, you would only be able to build one of them, I just made that a secondary ability on one of your normal units. So the Cryocopter is the only pure support unit, and its main weapon is this freeze beam. Thus, it’ll target a vehicle or an infantry or whatever, and it’ll basically just slow the thing down—you know, its rate of fire and all will slow—until it’s completely frozen. And then any unit, pretty much, can just run up to it and one-shot it. It’s like a big block of ice—boom, it explodes. And then its secondary ability is a shrink ray, so it will shrink a unit, and that unit now moves faster (you know, cartoon physics… and we pitch up their voice; it’s really funny… [laughs]).

盟軍有一個單位叫冷凍直升機，它是游戲里唯一的純支援型單位。如果我想要這種玩意的話，在以前的游戲里，你只能造一個。我所做的只是把它變成了普通單位的第二種能力。所以說冷凍直升機是唯一的純支援單位，它的主要武器就是這個凍結光束。它能夠瞄準車輛或者步兵以及其他的東西，但它基本上只會減慢速度——你知道的，它（目標單位）的射速和別的都會變慢——直到它完全凍結，然后幾乎是個單位都可以跑到它面前一槍打爆它，就像一大塊冰那樣嘭的一聲爆開。它的第二種能力是縮小光線，能夠縮小一個單位，讓這個單位跑得更快，你懂的，就是動畫片里那種物理效果.....我們還提高了它們（被縮小單位）的語音音調，真的挺好玩的。（笑）

Steve, Greg (DC): [laughs]

Steve, Greg (DC): （笑出聲）

They move faster, they shoot faster, but their damage is lower, so again, it’s the type of thing that—if you had an Apoc tank in your base, you could shrink ray it and then use one of your tanks to run over it. It’s awesome. So, you know, if you want to get your MCV all the way across the map really fast, you can shrink it, zip it across the map, and hopefully by the time it gets to where it wants to go it’ll wear off.

Greg：它們（被縮小單位）跑得更快了，射速也更快了，但它們的傷害降低了。所以說，它（縮小光線）是這種類型的玩意——比如說你的基地里有個（對面的）天啟坦克，你可以把它縮小了，然后用自己坦克碾爆它，這非常炫酷。如果你想讓你的MCV快速穿越地圖的話，你可以把它縮小了（再跑路），祈禱它在花光作用時間之前就到達指定地點。

So we’ve tried to do a lot of that stuff, and have a lot of wacky, crazy unit interactions. [Greg then began to describe to us a maniacally brilliant analogy, but before he could finish explaining, Chris Corry came to retrieve him for booth work].

所以我們已經(jīng)嘗試過很多這樣的事情，而且還有很多古怪、瘋狂的單位交互設計。（然后Greg開始描述一個非常精彩的類似事情，但Chris Corry走過來打斷了他，找他去展臺干活）