Among the games that recently opened the public beta, "Back to the Future 1999" is definitely one of the biggest stars. As the top stream, since the launch of the game on May 31, it has rushed to the top of the list at a very fast speed on mainstream platforms such as Haoyou Kuaibo, TapTap and bilibili Game Center, and has also ranked first on the iOS platform game list, and the free list has won the first place, and its popularity can be described as hot.
Good swim fast burst
TapTap
But as an absolute hit in recent two-dimensional mobile games, "Back to the Future 1999" is very special.
Since the birth of "Genshin", the entire second tour has attracted a huge change. With the successful practice of 3D action + open world, next, a large number of second-game projects are also moving towards the development of 3D, especially the top masterpieces, open maps have almost become standard, no matter how bad it is also a beautiful box court assembly of a huge space, its purpose is to make the entire 3D world rich, providing players with enough room to explore.
Live2d, once popular in the traditional second game, no longer seems to be mainstream. But interestingly, "Back to the Future 1999" is a game featuring Live2D performances, which is particularly "old-fashioned" compared to other top streams.
What's more interesting is that the gameplay of "Back to the Future 1999" is also relatively simple, it is the most traditional card draw turn-based game, each battle begins with a random card combination, players rely on card draw, order adjustment and other ways to attack random card sets, increase the level of cards, gain themselves and other operations, and rely on the accumulation of card points to release the kill; In addition to these process mechanisms, the game also adds common attribute restraint, buff overlay debuffs and other designs, which can be seen more or less on many games, which are not new.
Then here's the problem! Why can this non-3D looking and traditional gameplay become the top of the game?
Because it's a game that goes the wrong way. Its selling point is not in the gameplay, but in the expressiveness based on new quirks. This kind of expression includes the improvement of Live2d, powerful sound and color painting, stable new weird text, and the ingenious use of various modern elements and culture, making the game very atmospheric and exquisite in this piece of expression, with a very high selling and eye-catching.
So, how does Back to the Future 1999 turn decay into magic and maximize expressiveness?
What problems will the sword-walking "Back to the Future 1999" eventually encounter? And where will it go?
Why is the sound and atmosphere of "Back to the Future 1999" so strong
In terms of constructing the entire audiovisual language, "Back to the Future 1999" chooses a different approach from most second tours in order to highlight the sense of immersion.
To put it simply, the core difference is that the choice of traditional second-game often pursues breadth and inclusiveness, hoping to find more aspects under a style to construct the image of the game. This is conducive to the long-term operation of the game, allowing the game to continuously introduce various differentiated characters, forces and plots without violating the peace.
The mainstream second tour is very rich in art materials, and the basic cultural symbols and forms are readily available
"Back to the Future 1999" is more focused on unity, all the characters, colors, visual elements taken from the material and the music are closely related to the core narrative, when these details are neat, complete and deep enough, then players will have a strong sense of immersion in the main experience of the game.
So, what's at the heart of Back to the Future 1999 immersion? It is a set of aesthetics that traverse modern times, urban strangeness, and have a sense of British urbanity. The game focuses on modern culture around the first 100 years, not only the dawn of rock in the 60s, but also the roaring era around 1920 in the United States, although the country of the stage seems to be changing, but the visual elements have always been based on low luxury, classical, and stable styles, with this set of vision to connect the era very well, and grasp the essence of that era in the elements.
On the color scheme:
If you were to find a base color on the game Back to the Future 1999, it would undoubtedly be coffee. We can see that most of the art design of the game, from character standing painting to the landscape of the scene, furniture, and even the ambient light and UI design, are based on coffee color to diverge colors.
In particular, the main interface is almost surrounded by the brown color system
Even the prologue of the burning hull screen, the game is covered with a heavy coffee-colored mask
Why coffee as a base? Because the basic color sense of coffee color is easy to give people an elegant, simple, solemn temperament, it is a more subtle color matching. Therefore, the use of coffee color is very common in the aesthetic with classical and elegant taste led by British style, such as the use of high-end furniture coffee color, which is exactly the atmosphere that the game wants.
The indoor scenes of the game, especially the rooms of ladies like Soufflby, are also coffee-colored full of screens, which looks low-luxury and high-end
In addition, the yellowish texture of the film color is also similar to the coffee color, and the burnt yellow feeling of the old movie also coincides with the setting of the game traveling through the past, which is very suitable for the era atmosphere of the old era.
If you add a little noise effect on the basis of the coffee-colored mask, the texture of old photos and old film will be more obvious, and the sense of age will come out
With coffee color as stable, using a color bias to darker colors as the base, the game's color for lighting and characters is also handy, and there is no need to highlight with a particularly bright color. For example, in the game, many characters' color matching is mainly low-key colors, using relatively low-key colors such as wine red, dark green, and lake blue as the color matching of clothing, which can not only meet the needs of the theme, but also stand out because of the coffee color. Not only that, but the game also uses the centered-theatrical lighting to strengthen the presence of the standing painting, making the layering of the picture more obvious.
In addition to the use of low color tones, the central lighting allows the light source to surround the central character, which is also the reason why the color of the character is not bright, but the look and feel is still particularly prominent
In addition, compared with other games, the lighting of "Back to the Future 1999" is also in line with the classical and stable temperament, and does not use dazzling strong light to highlight the light source, which makes the lighting of the scene have an approximate matte effect, in the same way, the character's skill lighting effect and card surface can also be highlighted with lower brightness.
The soft light is like light yarn, making the picture become elegant
The skill card surface does not need to be particularly bright, and it can be set off by a dark background, and the soft color matching and special effects also make the vision of the battle not too disconnected from the plot picture
With coffee as the base, the game is very strategic to grasp the balance of colors and make a unified effect around the modern classical style. In the use of elements, the game needs some epochal potential.
element:
Due to the game's modern setting, as well as the stage frame with Britain as the center diffusion, the overall costume design and various visual elements also revolve around the British style, but because the stage is not limited to the British Isles, for example, the first chapter came to the roaring era of the United States in 1920, so it is necessary to take into account some international vision in the costume design, so it also has the following characteristics:
(1) The accuracy of clothing shape is very high
The core "British flavor" of the costumes is very well done, and you can see in the early stages that the costume design of the game has changed over the centuries from the Victorian period to the 1960s, and this precision allows you to be highly immersed.
For example, in order to reflect the temperament of the aristocratic lady, the game makes the eldest lady wear a very standard Victorian style dress, the whole big skirt includes a large number of lace, ruffles and ribbons of multi-layered cake-like skirt, the hat is also extremely pompous and extravagant, decorated with exaggerated top hats, lace, wool and flower decorations are also enlarged to become eye-catching, so that the sense of nobility and the times can be seen through the clothing.
Even the butler's suit underwear is an old suit vest and the like, with badges, pocket watches, monocles and other decorations
For example, the costumes surrounding the Roaring era capture the two major characteristics of this era, 1 is the pearlescence of the drunken gold age, and the simple dress has a large number of jewelry embellishments; 2 is the characteristics of the workwear of women in the new era into professional production, this kind of workwear is lighter than the traditional aristocratic dress, the hat, tie and satin decoration are no longer pompous, and do not emphasize the body curve with excessive corset, but seek loose ship age and V-neck dresses as a standard, so that women look slender, these two styles of the game have two representatives, 1 is the character Snyder, 2 is the character parasitism.
This style of thin dress covered with pendants and jewelry can also be seen in movies such as "The Great Gatsby"
In the dawn of rock and roll in the prologue, the whole set of visuals around the concept of pirate radio is more consumerist and rebellious, and elements such as sunglasses, square scarves, shopping bags and red leather jackets are more modern and commercial, which matches the obvious sense of the times made decades ago in the first chapter, and the taste of crossing the script matches.
The color palette around the cutscenes of the rock era was also brightened and youthful
(2) International vision on elements
Not only the various styles that match the British fan and the stage, but the game also has an international perspective, incorporating other styles from the same period of each era, so as to achieve a unified visual style, there can be more design space. The design of the standing painting has references to various other cultures, such as Ingres' "Spring", which is an absorption of elements from French neoclassicism.
The only problem is that the characters are sometimes not in tune with the narrative, such as Viking elements, which obviously do not fit well with the modern style
Other UI and scene elements also have a variety of graphic design retro, such as Dadaist collages, such as avant-garde graphic design features, such as the reproduction of album covers in the rock era, and these designs, like Ingres' "Spring", most of them belong to the early stages of the game through several eras, the style is also with the theme of the color scheme and low-luxury British style is not obtrusive, providing richness without destroying the overall atmosphere, at the same time, because of the coffee color base, whether it is these design elements, or simple UI , can be clearly highlighted.
A set of rock cover styles inspired by the Beatles' famous rock album "Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band" was also restored in the game
(3) The scene design does not seek reaction, but it seeks nothing
Due to the game's very strong central character narrative style, the scene is not very prominent, but most of the various street scenes can find the characteristics of the times, and will not let the player play, especially the interior scene, especially the interior design and layout of the house on the main interface, but also focus on the characteristics of British furniture design, including wooden roof, straight furniture style, lattice or straight stripe curtains and a little vegetation embellishment effect, and then with the deep space to give people a feeling of atmosphere and nature.
The depressed industrial city and the calm, stately interior both make style and personality
With these customized graphics is not enough, in the choice of sound, the game also opened a precedent, using English as the main language, the purpose of this choice is still to match the characteristics of the game's highly customized style. But the atmosphere is right, but the use of English dubbing has become one of the biggest controversies in the game right now. The core of this controversy is the discomfort with English, and the characters' emotional expression and flashpoints are not very consistent with the style of the mainstream second game, and it is difficult for players to grasp the emotional output points of the characters, so that it seems a bit good to read.
While the choice of voice acting is slightly controversial, the choice of the game's soundtrack is just right for the appetite. Classical jazz, as a style that originated at the end of the 19th century, covers the part of the plot of the early game well, and more importantly, as one of the biggest undertones of modern pop music, jazz has a strong tandem in many eras, such as jazz and rock, blues and other post-era mainstream music styles have obvious inheritance relationships.
With this layer of musical blessing and a brilliant and unified visual style, the immersion of the game is also made. On top of that, the game also uses Live2d's animation details for the final touch.
Details of Live2d:
In terms of the performance effect of Live2d, "Back to the Future 1999" is more complex than the action of the character standing drawing in a place that the player can perceive.
For example, first reduce the common piece sloshing in the past games, so that the character stabilizes first.
The game first stabilizes the character's body, then even the slightest movement can be noticed by the player
Secondly, the actions will not be too rich, but they will be extra careful about some action details that reflect the differences of the characters. For example, the details of the movements around the character's head, including nodding and greeting, turning, eye and mouth shape nuances are all nuanced, and even the small avatar of the dialog box in the dialogue has also made a subtle split of expression and lip shape; More importantly, these details will react according to different information in the process of dialogue, which is a reason why the game does not seem to be deep in Live2d, but it gives people a very stable and immersive reason.
After being taught by the housekeeper, the eldest lady's eyes skimmed to the left, and it was this "reaction" that made the character come alive without much movement
At the same time, some plots and dialogue interfaces will also make some special effects that are not obvious, but quite enhance the sense of substitution. For example, the text effect has the effect of shaking with the burning background, such as the text and the design of the size and font adapted according to the volume and the skills of the characters; There are also some sports effects that enhance the effect of static images, such as raindrops, shaking vehicles, etc.
Text that turns into ripples as the scene burns
Shot scheduling is also relatively rich, especially in the battle screen, skill release and switching characters will do lens adjustments, such as selecting lenses or stretching lenses to refocus on the character and other designs, the game will also use some scenes, such as flying confetti and other things to put in the front, so that the depth of field of the battle scene is enhanced.
It can be said that from the perspective of visual, sound and animation, the resources of the game are almost used under the blessing of immersion around the main control style, so what kind of experience difference will be brought by designing the game in this way?
The game of sword walking is a different experience
The experience of Back to the Future 1999 is very different, with three main differences:
(1) High threshold
The game has a relatively high threshold because of the main new strange narrative and supporting aesthetics, and has a strong main line in the narrative, rather than focusing on daily and fragmented character narratives, and does not use simple terms to simplify the output in the setting, resulting in players accepting information The threshold is not low.
After the first chapter of the game, the organization behind the protagonist meets the headquarters and other characters other than the protagonist for the first time, and the story is very long
Not only is the narrative threshold not low, the gameplay mechanism of the game is also seemingly simple, but the cost of experience and learning is relatively large, players to be in random cards, within a few rounds to consider combination upgrades, attribute restraint, defense and attack and other command objectives, which allows players to have a complete set of calculations every game, plus the cost of character development is not low, it is not easy to play.
In the second game, it is rare to pop up teaching levels for several hours
(2) The experience is specialized and not routine enough
No matter what game mechanics and graphics style the second game uses, the ultimate goal of the game is to operate longer and rely on more updates to retain players. As a result, most of the second game will spend a lot of attention on the task mechanics and daily work, and will do some lightweight processing on the gameplay, such as automatic combat and simplified restraint relationships, so that players can more quickly complete daily indicators.
Even, in order to survive, some second games will also open up lighter sub-gameplay on the main gameplay, which are not the main points of force in "Return to the Future 1999", on the contrary, "Back to the Future 1999" puts the power on the main line-related supporting body, which makes the game have a more relaxed game experience than many second games, because even players who like this set of aesthetics do not seem to have such an urgent need, every day like "part-time work", as usual into the game to do daily life, Even finding a stable long time to push the plot is more in line with the positioning of the game.
However, because "Back to the Future 1999" has physical limitations, players who want to quickly experience the narrative either buy physical strength or find strategies to accelerate the recovery of physical strength, and the game actually uses this method to drag down the player's progress and buy time for their main experience.
(3) The operational dilemma of high-quality immersion
Orchestrating an experience built around the main style is not sustainable. For example, the length of the main line currently disclosed is about 10 hours of experience content, which is also one of the reasons for the physical strength of the game card, to play this set of immersive experience, every point must be done deep enough. This requires the game to spend more time piling up material, otherwise the immersion can easily be destroyed. For example, the characters spread out by Kachi do not match the tone of the main narrative very well, resulting in a stronger sense of incompatibility.
At present, many of the characters that Kachi can draw are much worse than the era style of the main line, resulting in the immersion that has been stable here a little broken
Therefore, "Back to the Future 1999" is easy to fall into a dilemma, on the one hand, the player's progress is too fast, and the core content is not enough to play; On the other hand, the updated content is demanding, and it is not good to update the version faster.
So looking at a long-term operation of the second game, "Back to the Future 1999" may be more special than most of the unique second games on the market. Its special feature is that its design direction is completely different from the mainstream second game, its game experience is more like a whole than other second games, and both the battle mode and the aesthetic setting have high preferences and thresholds, is it a question about whether the mainstream preference is fragmented players? At the same time, the style of "Back to the Future 1999" is also refined without volume, can the new content updated in future versions maintain the refinement of the previous stage? Whether the amount of content will not be enough is also a question.
Therefore, this development experiment of "Back to the Future 1999" can be said to be very bold, with a bit of a gambling element. However, customization also has the advantage of customization, which is different from the mainstream personality style and makes the game usher in a popularity. However, how many players can accept this kind of personalized customization depends on the later operational results to decide. If "Back to the Future 1999" can usher in success in the future, it may also cause a new wave of enthusiasm, after all, the small and precise style of play is more practical for small and medium-sized manufacturers. (Text/Maruko)