《看火人》已于近期发布,这款备受期待的游戏怎么样呢?下面我们就带来一篇《看火人》点评,看看《看火人》的画面、剧情及游戏设定是否令人满意。
These days I tend to enjoy games that are similar to a good book: a solitary, escapist experience I can get completely lost in without any interruptions from the outside world. Firewatch, then – on the strength of its gripping story, brilliant branching script, wholly convincing voice-acting performances, and stunning art direction – is easily one of my favorite and most memorable game experiences of this decade.
这些天来我都倾向于玩一些像好书一样的游戏:就像你能成为一名隐士,能够完全沉浸在其中,切断一切和外界联系的游戏。看火人以其扣人心弦的故事情节,出色的故事分支,令人身临其境的配音以及令人吃惊的艺术设计轻而易举的成为这十年里我最难忘也是最青睐的游戏之一。
Firewatch quickly lets you know that it’s not going to pull any emotional punches over its four to five–hour runtime, opening with a series of text-based choices that call back to adventure genre forebears like Zork. I dare not spoil this potent sequence, but I will say that it masterfully bounces between being funny and heart-wrenching and plausibly establishes just why protagonist Henry ends up in the Wyoming woods as a solitary fire lookout.
在看火人四到五个小时的流程里面,并没有强烈的情感冲击,而且以一系列文字组成的选择作为开场,让人能回想起冒险类游戏的先行者魔域。整个游戏很巧妙地在有趣和令人心痛之间转换,并且游戏似真的讲述了为什么戏主角Henry 最终选择在怀俄明州的深林之中,当一名火警了望员。
Morning Glory
清晨的曙光
Once you arrive there, Firewatch’s powerful ambiance takes hold. The story takes place over the course of an entire summer, with different “days” – which are treated as chapters of the story – playing out at different hours of the day and night. That allows bold reds, yellows, and oranges to color this fictional Wyoming forest’s beautifully painted scenery (a contribution by renowned illustrator Olly Moss) – all in a comfortable and immersive first-person perspective. It is a testament to both Moss and Firewatch’s level designers that, even despite the stylized look, the Two Forks Woods sticks in my mind like a real place: the narrow passage through Thunder Canyon, the serene calm of Jonesy Lake, the comically small size of Pork Pond, and the unexplained mystery of the Medicine Wheel. In fact, only the strange absence of almost any wildlife whatsoever betrays the convincing setting.
当你进入游戏的时候,你就会被游戏的环境吸引。整个故事发生在一个夏天中不过是不同的日子,也是游戏中不同的章节,而且每天的时间也大抵不同,有白天也有夜晚。游戏中的第一人称体验让人觉得舒服,并沉浸其中,你能领略到游戏中大胆地使用红色,黄色以及橙色构成了怀俄明州森林的美景。不过这也确实证明了看火人的关卡设计师以及插画师Moss的高明之处——双叉森林就像一个真的地方在你的脑海中挥之不去:窄窄的小路传过雷电峡谷,平静的乔纳斯湖,小到诙谐的波尔克池塘以及Medicine Wheel之中无法解释的神秘。不过我觉得,只是游戏中没有任何野生动物的设计些许给整个森林的设定扣了分。
Firewatch sounds as good as it looks, thanks to a world-class script acted to perfection by its two leads. Rookie lookout Henry is given a playful vulnerability; you can choose to play him serious or funny, and the performance is up to the task either way. Henry’s boss – and primary point of human contact for the entire summer – is Delilah.
多亏了几乎完美的世界级剧本,看火人的故事就像它的画面一样棒。在游戏中你扮演新手了望消防员Henry,你可以选择走严肃路线或是诙谐幽默的路线,并且随着任务的不同,结果也会因路线呈现出不同的结果。Henry的主管Deliah,也是Henry与外界仅有的接触。
He Said, She Said
他说,她说
Right from the jump, their relationship feels real, despite the fact that they’re communicating entirely via radio, with no faces on screen to lend emotional cues. Henry – or Hank, as she sometimes defiantly calls him – comes across as a good man at heart, but a flawed one – a man not sure about whether or not to go back to the life he left behind in Boulder, Colorado. He is fully capable of matching wits with Delilah, who uses humor as a shield for the personal life she doesn’t like discussing as they get to know each other over the course of the summer.
从跳跃的那一刻起,Henry以及Deliah关系就像真的一样,不过他们仅是在用对讲机交流,也没有在屏幕上体现出任何的情感暗示。Henry,或是Hank,有时候Deliah会这样叫他,让玩家觉得他是一个好人——不过是个有缺点的好人,一个不知道应不应该回到科罗拉多州的博尔德继续过从前的生活的好人。不过他和Delilah一样机智,两人在相互了解的过程中,Delilah经常用幽默来带过个人生活,只字不提,Henry也选择保持沉默。
It’s a pair of firework-launching teenage girls that set Firewatch’s story in motion, and you can choose to talk to Delilah at almost any time by bringing up your two-way radio. She’s got something to say about almost everything, whether you need advice on how to handle a given situation or you’re just reporting your progress on a task she’s given you, and she’s so engaging that I found myself eager to call about every little thing I came across. Things get darker – in a figurative as well as a sometimes literal sense – when the teens go missing, and you and Delilah try to piece together the puzzle of their whereabouts while making your own critical (sometimes difficult) decisions. The writing here is simply head and shoulders above nearly every other game I’ve ever played. In fact, Firewatch’s script, unlike most video games, would also make a fantastic novella that’s every bit as gripping as the game is. It’s tense, scary, and funny – sometimes all within a few minutes of each other. Not a lot of games can successfully claim that.
游戏由一对放烟花的年轻女孩来进行故事的推动,并且如果你带了你的双向对讲机,你几乎能和Delilah一直聊。她基本对所有东西都有的说,无论是你需要建议的时候,或是不知道怎样解决眼前的难题,还是向她汇报你目前的工作进展。游戏中Delilah深深地吸引着我,使得我每次遇上什么事情都要和她联系。事情变得糟糕起来,当这对女孩走失的时候,你和Delilah试着去拼凑出谜题的答案,试着去了解她们的行踪,而且你也需要做出许多关键的决定(有的时候真的很难)。游戏的情节已经让我觉得看火人这款游戏比我玩过的其他游戏要更加出色。事实上,看火人的剧本不像大多数的游戏一样,它更像是一部精彩的小说,故事的一点一滴都能让人全神贯注。整个游戏有些紧张,也有些许恐怖,不过也能在接下来的几分钟之内保持有趣,很少游戏能够成功地做到这一点。
Wood You Kindly…
亲切的树啊
Like other so-called “walking simulators,” the gameplay in Firewatch is the story, though at least there’s more to actually do here than in most games within the genre. A substantial swath of Two Forks Woods is explorable, with supply caches, unique sights, and even a hidden turtle you can adopt (you’re gonna live with me now, Shelly Duvall!). You’ll rappel down cliffsides, climb up rock formations, explore the lookout tower that doubles as your home for the summer, and more. And yet, these same simple actions that are a delightful exploration of your new surroundings at the beginning of the game become almost terrifying as the plot progresses, leading to points where, playing in Henry’s first-person perspective,I was afraid to turn around in the vast, lonely woods.
和其他被叫做“走路模拟器”的游戏一样,看火人整个游戏中最重要的就是这个故事,尽管相比于其他同类型的游戏来说,游戏中能够干的事情更多。游戏中并不缺乏探索元素,不同的物资贮藏点,独一无二的风景或是偶然找到藏起来的乌龟并把它带回家饲养。游戏里你可以从悬崖边上垂降,或是攀上岩石,探索了望塔。不仅如此,这些看似相同的动作是对你周围新环境的探索,从游戏的一开始令人愉悦慢慢变得让人害怕,以至于后来我在操控着第一人称模式下Henry的时候,我甚至不敢在广阔的森林之中回头。
Speaking of navigation: though I’m thankful there’s no giant arrow at the top of the screen pointing me exactly to where I need to go at any given moment, I did find getting around the Two Forks Woods a bit cumbersome at times, particularly near the end. While I was never hung up for too long, translating the map to the actual trail in front of you had me occasionally taking a wrong fork in the path. Henry’s compass helps a lot, however, so I was never hung up for too long.
另外要提到的就是游戏之中的导航,尽管开发者没有在屏幕的上方加入一个巨大的箭头来时时刻刻告诉我我应该去哪,不过我觉得有些时候在双叉森林之中也会迷路,特别是游戏接近尾声的时候。游戏中当你试着去用地图找到尼眼前路的时候,很容易就走错了岔路,这时候Henry的指南针会帮上大忙,所以整个游戏之中我也没有迷路很久。
As for the ending, it’s the only other part of Firewatch I wasn’t crazy about. I want to be very careful not to spoil anything, so I’ll just say that I didn’t quite find the revelation I had hoped for when I reached the end of what the story had been building up to. At the same time, however, I didn’t dislike the ending either. In fact, I find myself still thinking about it, trying to think of missed clues or other small cues that might yet give me the “Ah-ha!” moment I’m after. I’ll be very interested to hear other people’s take on the conclusion – this is the kind of game where the discussions that will arise afterwards are an important extension of the experience itself.
游戏的结尾是可能是我整个游戏中唯一没有让我觉得特别喜欢的地方。我只能说游戏的结尾和我所期望的故事不一样。但是同时我也不讨厌这个结局。事实上我在写这篇测评的时候还在想游戏的结局,试着去思考我可能遗漏的或者是一些细小的线索,也许我想着想着就能茅塞顿开了呢。我很乐意听到别人谈论游戏的结局——对于游戏来说,结局之后的讨论也是对于游戏体验的一个升华。
The Verdict
总结
Firewatch is amazing for many reasons, but above all because it’s an adult game that deals with serious issues, with realistic adult dialogue to match. And it deals with those issues just like actual adults would: sometimes with humor, sometimes with anger, and sometimes with sadness. It is among the very best of the first-person narrative genre, and it reminds us what video game storytelling is capable of in the right hands. It’s a game I can see coming back to every year or two just to revisit its beautiful sights and memorable characters – just like a good book.
看火人这款游戏有许多原因让我觉得很棒,不过最重要的是游戏中许多比较严肃的事件以及就像现实之中的对话说明这款游戏可能更适合于成年人进行游玩。另外游戏与现实中解决一些问题的方式一模一样,有时可能是幽默的,有时是愤怒的,也有些时候是悲伤的。游戏在第一人称叙事游戏中属于顶尖水平,它也提醒了我们只有在对的人手里,叙事类的游戏才会这么棒。也许一年后或是两年后,我还会打开这款游戏,只是为了其中美丽的风景以及令人难忘的角色,就像读一本好书一样。
+++++++++ 出色的故事情节
+++++++++ 优秀的配音
+++++++++ 精美的画面
+++++++++ 令人沉浸的世界
--------- 结局过于仓促