Few platforms have stood the test of time quite like RPG Maker. With the recent release of RPG Maker MZ on PS4 and Nintendo Switch, let’s take a look back at how it happened.
很少有平台像RPG Maker一样经受时间的考验。 随着最近在PS4和Nintendo Switch上发布的RPG Maker MZ，让我们回顾一下它是如何发生的。
By K. Thor Jensen
由K.Thor Jensen
Game-creation kits have been around nearly as long as personal computers. Broderbund’s The Arcade Machine let Apple II owners build simple shoot ’em ups in 1982, and Garry Kitchen’s GameMaker let Commodore 64 fans build arcade experiences in a number of genres.
游戏创作工具包的历史与个人计算机差不多。 Broderbund的The Arcade Machine让Apple II使用者在1982年建立了简单的射击游戏，而Garry Kitchen的GameMaker让Commodore 64粉丝建立了许多类型的街机体验。
Through the decades, these titles have come and gone, but few platforms have stood the test of time quite like RPG Maker. Japanese developer Enterbrain released the first installment, RPG Tsukūru Dante 98, in 1992, but they were simply continuations of other products made by developer ASCII. Over more than a quarter of a century, RPG Maker has been used to create hundreds of thousands of games and built a devoted fan community, most recently with RPG Maker MZ. Let’s explore how it happened.
在过去的几十年中，这些游戏的兴起和消失，但是很少有平台像RPG Maker一样经受时间的考验。 日本开发人员Enterbrain在1992年发布了第一批RPGTsukūruDante 98，但它们只是开发人员ASCII所生产其他产品的延续。 在超过25年的时间里，RPG Maker被用于创建成千上万的游戏并建立了一个忠实的粉丝社区，最近一次是与RPG Maker MZ一起使用的 。 让我们探讨一下它是如何发生的。
早些年 (Early Days)
The history of role-playing computer games in Japan was sparked by one extremely influential Western import: Wizardry, the 1981 dungeon crawl created by a pair of CalTech students. Taking the basic rules of Dungeons & Dragons and transplanting them into a rudimentary first-person view, it was a massive success in the United States and even bigger abroad. ASCII was the company tasked with translating the games for its MSX computer, and by the early 1990s, it was also developing spin-offs specifically for the Japanese market.
日本角色扮演计算机游戏的历史是由一个极具影响力的西方进口产品引发的：巫术，1981年由一对加州理工学院的学生创建的地下城爬行游戏。 借鉴《龙与地下城》的基本规则，并将其移植到基本的第一人称视角中，这在美国乃至海外都取得了巨大的成功。 ASCII是公司为其MSX计算机翻译游戏的公司，到1990年代初期，它还专门为日本市场开发了衍生产品。
Native developers were deeply inspired by the game. Yuji Hori’s Dragon Quest, for example, takes the first-person battle view directly from Wizardry but fuses a top-down field screen to make exploring more accessible, taken from the equally popular Ultima. The entire genre can trace its DNA back to those original games, and it wasn’t long before a wealth of knockoffs started to hit the market. The basic programming of most of these games was pretty simple, with much of the appeal coming from the storytelling.
本机开发人员深受游戏启发。 例如，尤吉·霍里(Yuji Hori)的《勇者斗恶龙(Dragon Quest)》直接从巫师那里获得了第一人称视角的战斗视图，但融合了自上而下的野外画面，使探索更加容易，取自同样受欢迎的《创世纪》。 整个类型都可以将其DNA追溯到那些原始游戏，不久之后，大量仿制产品开始投放市场。 这些游戏大多数的基本编程都非常简单，讲故事的吸引力很大。
RPG Maker allowed prospective designers to tell those stories, hanging them on the basic frameworks of exploration and combat that propelled other games in the genre. The games quickly built up a community of creators who started releasing projects to appreciative audiences. And people in the Western world started to get a little jealous.
RPG Maker允许潜在设计师讲述这些故事，并将它们挂在推动其他游戏类型的探索和战斗的基本框架上。 这些游戏Swift建立了一个创造者社区，他们开始向欣赏观众的人群发布项目。 西方世界的人开始有点嫉妒。
越过 (Crossing Over)
演示地址
It’s a well-known issue that translating RPGs for foreign audiences is a lot of work. Enterbrain had no intentions of porting RPG Maker to Western markets, feeling that the user base was too small and niche to justify the expense. But otaku had already started playing games created with the tool, and they wanted to get their hands on it themselves. It just took one fan to make it happen.
一个众所周知的问题是，为外国观众翻译RPG的工作量很大。 Enterbrain无意将RPG Maker移植到西方市场，因为它认为用户群太小且没有足够的利基 ，无法证明这笔费用是合理的。 但是宅男已经开始玩用该工具创建的游戏，他们想亲自尝试使用它。 只需要一个粉丝就可以实现。
In 2000, a Russian student who went by the pseudonym “Don Miguel” released Don Miguel’s Sample Game, a brief adventure made with RPG Maker 2000. But the game was in English, because he’d taken the time to translate the entire platform. Shortly afterwards, Don Miguel uploaded his translations of RPG Maker 2000 and RPG Maker 1995 to the internet, making them available to English-speaking audiences for the first time.
2000年，一个用笔名“ Don Miguel”去过的俄罗斯学生发布了Don Miguel的“示例游戏”，这是RPG Maker 2000的简短冒险。但是该游戏是英文的，因为他花了时间翻译整个平台。 此后不久，唐·米格尔(Don Miguel)将他的RPG Maker 2000和RPG Maker 1995的翻译版本上载到了互联网，第一次使讲英语的观众可以使用它们。
For a generation that had grown up on Super NES classics like Chrono Trigger and Final Fantasy VI, getting their hands on RPG Maker was a way to finally make the games they’d been dreaming of their whole lives. Don Miguel’s wonky translations, filled with broken English, spread like wildfire over the next few years. There were few other game-creation kits on the market at the time, so RPG Maker became go-to software for a generation of creatives.
对于像Chrono Trigger和Final Fantasy VI这样的超级NES经典游戏成长的一代来说，接触RPG Maker是最终使他们梦whole以求的游戏的一种方式。 唐·米格尔(Don Miguel)的古怪翻译，充斥着残破的英语，在接下来的几年中像野火一样蔓延开来。 当时市场上几乎没有其他游戏创作工具包，因此RPG Maker成为一代创意者的必备软件。
Eventually, Enterbrain took notice, and even though it didn’t have any plans to localize the software itself, it certainly didn’t want people doing it without its permission. Don Miguel’s site was taken down, but by then RPG Maker was in the wild. Enterbrain contracted with American company Protexis to release a legit version of the program in English, but few people wanted to pay for software they’d previously been able to get for free.
最终，Enterbrain注意到了这一点，尽管它没有任何计划来本地化该软件本身，但它当然不希望人们在未经其许可的情况下进行操作。 唐·米格尔(Don Miguel)的网站被拆除了，但那时RPG Maker疯狂了。 Enterbrain与美国Protexis公司签约，以英语发布该程序的合法版本，但是很少有人愿意为他们以前免费获得的软件付费。
American gamers had already built a network of coders, translators, and other people to delve into Enterbrain’s code, and this fan community felt a sense of ownership over their work. With no way to sell the games, they were all labors of love.
美国游戏玩家已经建立了编码人员，翻译人员和其他人员的网络，以研究Enterbrain的代码，这个粉丝社区对他们的作品感到拥有主人翁感。 没有办法出售游戏，它们全都是爱的劳动。
在一起 (Coming Together)
演示地址
On sites like RPG Maker Database, RPG Maker Web, and dozens of others, people posted their games in progress, exchanged tips for modifying the game’s systems, and mods to add new functionality. Bits of news about Enterbrain’s Japanese releases were eagerly passed around, even though it still took a while for them to make their way here.
在RPG Maker数据库，RPG Maker Web等网站上，人们发布了他们进行中的游戏，交换了修改游戏系统的提示，并通过mods添加了新功能。 关于Enterbrain日语发行的一些消息急切地流传开来，尽管他们花了一些时间才来到这里。
It wasn’t long before this fan community started to get attention. Danny Ledonne’s controversial 2005 game Super Columbine Massacre RPG! put players in the shoes of Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold as they shot their Colorado high school classmates. Intended as a critique of the media’s response to the teen’s actions, it quickly drew the ire of Columbine survivors and the press, while others appreciated Ledonne’s desire to push the envelope of what was acceptable for games to address.
不久之后，这个粉丝社区就开始受到关注。 丹尼·莱多纳(Danny Ledonne)有争议的2005年游戏《超级哥伦拜恩大屠杀RPG》！ 在射击科罗拉多高中同学的时候，让球员们穿上Eric Harris和Dylan Klebold的鞋。 出于对媒体对青少年行为的回应的批评，它很快引起了哥伦拜恩幸存者和媒体的愤怒，而其他人则赞赏莱多纳(Ledonne)希望突破游戏解决方案的极限。
Enterbrain started working with other companies to officially license newer versions of the software to the West, and with each new release new features were added. Sometimes popular features were even removed, to the ire of franchise fans. Still, the user base grew. Because it didn’t require any coding knowledge, RPG Maker was a perfect entry point into development from people across a diverse variety of backgrounds.
Enterbrain开始与其他公司合作，以正式向西方授权该软件的更新版本，并且在每个新发行版中都添加了新功能。 有时，甚至流行的功能也被删除，令特许经营者感到不满。 尽管如此，用户群仍在增长。 由于不需要任何编码知识，因此RPG Maker是来自不同背景的人们开发的完美切入点。
The release of RPG Maker VX Ace in 2012 saw the franchise hit Steam for the first time. Valve’s massive marketplace was a godsend to indie developers, and RPG Maker, which could package games into standalone executables, found a home there.
RPG制造商VX Ace在2012年发布，这是该系列游戏首次在Steam平台上大受好评 。 Valve庞大的市场对独立开发者来说是天赐之物，而RPG Maker可以将游戏打包成独立的可执行文件，因此在那里找到了家。
Previously, RPG Maker developers had been releasing their games as freeware. But now they could charge for their creations—and, even better, charge before they were finished with Steam Early Access. Because the vast majority of RPG Maker titles were created by amateurs with no real experience, this rapidly created a glut of games that were knocked out quickly.
以前，RPG Maker开发人员一直以免费软件发布其游戏。 但是现在，他们可以为自己的作品付费-甚至更好的是，在他们完成Steam抢先体验后可以收费。 由于绝大多数RPG Maker游戏都是由没有实际经验的业余爱好者创建的，因此Swift产生了过多的游戏，因此很快被淘汰。
What was formerly a niche group of passionate creatives was exposed to the greater gaming world at large, and it didn’t go well. One user on the RPGMaker subreddit compared it to the “Eternal September,” when AOL began offering Usenet access in 1993 and unleashed a torrent of newbies onto an online culture that had been established for decades.
以前是一群充满激情的创意人士的利基市场，但在整个游戏世界中，他们都处于暴露状态，但进展并不顺利。 RPGMaker subreddit上的一个用户将其与“永恒的九月”进行了比较，当时AOL于1993年开始提供Usenet访问，并释放了许多新手，涌入了已经建立了数十年的在线文化。
That swell has thankfully abated, and although there are still a few not-ready-for-primetime RPG Maker games put up on Steam every week, it’s not overwhelming. People have also used the software to create unusual genres, like games designed to help teach mathematics or historical events.
令人欣慰的是，这种增长势头有所减弱，尽管每周仍在Steam上发布一些尚未准备好黄金时段的RPG Maker游戏，但这并没有使人感到压倒。 人们还使用该软件创建了不同类型的游戏，例如旨在帮助教授数学或历史事件的游戏。
With this week’s release of RPG Maker MV for the PS4 and Nintendo Switch, the franchise is going to reach a whole new group of gamers.
随着本周为PS4和Nintendo Switch发布的RPG Maker MV，该系列游戏将迎来全新的游戏玩家群体。
堆的顶部 (Top of the Heap)
演示地址
Getting into RPG Maker games can be a daunting task; there are a lot out there, and sifting through the junk to find treasures is more than most people have time for. Here are a handful of must-play games from the franchise’s history.
进入RPG Maker游戏可能是一项艰巨的任务。 那里有很多东西，筛选垃圾来寻找宝物比大多数人有时间的更多。 以下是球队历史上的一些必玩游戏。
The Amber Throne: Ambition is a common component of many RPG Maker projects, but few games manage to make good on it. With gorgeous hand-painted art and an epic storyline, The Amber Throne might be the most professional game ever made with the software. A customized battle system where monsters take different stances in reaction to the player and an incredible soundtrack just round out the package.
琥珀王座 ：野心是许多RPG Maker项目的常见组成部分，但很少有游戏能在其中取得成功。 凭借华丽的手绘艺术和史诗般的故事情节，《琥珀王座》可能是使用该软件制作的最专业的游戏。 一个定制的战斗系统，怪物会根据玩家的React采取不同的姿势，并以令人难以置信的音效完善整个游戏包。
Yume Nikki: One of the most beloved RPG Maker games of all time, this Japanese dream adventure stars a young shut-in who traipses through a series of surreal and disturbing landscapes created by her subconscious minds. Dispensing with any combat or statistics, Yume Nikki was an early proof of the platform’s potential when it was released in 2004. Because the game had no dialogue, it was also embraced by Western gamers.
Yume Nikki ：这是有史以来最受人喜爱的RPG Maker游戏之一，这部日本梦冒险片中饰演了一位年轻的闭路电视台，她潜入了由她的潜意识所创造的一系列超现实和令人不安的风景。 Yume Nikki消除了任何战斗或统计数据，于2004年发布时便是该平台潜力的早期证明。由于该游戏没有对话，因此西方玩家也喜欢它。
Hylics: Another game that employs a unique visual style, all of the character art in Hylics was sculpted out of clay by creator Mason Lindroth. Set in a bizarre post-human world, the player must battle Gibby, the Moon King, to save their world. Dialogue is peppered with procedurally generated verbiage and the soundtrack is wailing, distorted guitars. The whole package is obtuse but strangely compelling.
Hylics ：另一款采用独特视觉风格的游戏， Hylics中的所有角色艺术都是由创造者Mason Lindroth用粘土雕刻而成的。 在一个离奇的后人类世界中，玩家必须与月亮之王吉比(Gibby)作战，以拯救他们的世界。 对话充满了程序产生的语言动听，配乐则是哭泣而失真的吉他。 整个程序包是钝的，但很奇怪。
Ara Fell: Another traditional JRPG won rave reviews in 2016 when it was released. With detailed anime-style art, it’s a deliberate throwback to the 16-bit era. Exploration is a big draw here, with a massive open world gated by enemies of different strengths, as well as excellent character writing that makes interacting a pleasure. In 2020, a new version of the game was created using the Unity engine.
Ara Fell：另一种传统的JRPG在2016年发布时赢得了好评。 带有详细的动漫风格的艺术，这是故意回溯到16位时代。 探索是这里的一大吸引人，广阔的开放世界被不同实力的敌人所围堵，以及出色的角色写作，使互动变得愉快。 2020年，使用Unity引擎创建了游戏的新版本。
Originally published at https://www.pcmag.com.
最初发布在 https://www.pcmag.com 。
翻译自: https://medium.com/pcmag-access/rpg-maker-how-a-niche-game-maker-created-a-vibrant-community-of-developers-a2271a6a296e