Nintendo user experience and interactive design

[Core tips] From the game's plot to read the archive, from the cross direction keys to somatosensory control, Nintendo has long been playing a pioneer role in the gaming industry's user experience and interactive design.

If I ask one question: "Which companies have the most lead in user experience and interaction design?"

I guess most people's answers will be so few: Apple, Microsoft, Xerox ... Even companies such as Disney may also be on the list. However, Nintendo, but rarely be mentioned.

However, Nintendo and its legendary designer Miyamoto have done a great deal in user experience and interactive design. Much of the products and designs that we learn today are actually from Nintendo and eventually become the norm in the industry:

To the game a story

"The story of the game is to have a story," sounds like today's "operating a computer using a keyboard and a mouse" for granted. However, in the era of Miyamoto just involved in the game industry, the game industry is still another way.

At that time, home console owners were already able to display colorful images on the screen. However, the design of the game was still stuck in the state where the early hardware level was low and the screen performance was not good: all the games were based on the pursuit of high scores Purpose, which led to the game at that time were thin, the subject matter of a single user viscosity is very low, and to a large extent limited to their own fields, unable to expand the surrounding industries, nor comics, legends, popular TV series and other Industry linkage and integration.

Miyamoto quickly changed all that involved in the game industry, he quickly devised the first game with the plot, and then succeeded. This game tells a story that takes place between carpenters, girls and orangutans: Players control carpenters to rescue the gorilla-dominated girl. This is the famous "Donkey Kong". The first edition of "King Kong" in 1981 is as follows:

Miyamoto later said that the heroic rescue episodes and characters in the "King Kong" originated from the then popular film "King Kong" and the anime "Popeye." Another interesting detail in "The King Kong" is that the carpenter inside turns out to be the protagonist in another series of more widely known games - the plumber Mario. Heroes save the plot, but also in a variety of forms in Nintendo after a variety of game series appear frequently.

"Legend of Zelda" and three pioneers

Although it is the first time that "King Kong" has added a story to the game, it is still not much different in its manifestations from those games that were only for high marks. The unprecedented success of "King Kong" made Nintendo and Miyamoto realize that the game of the future should have a fuller plot of more engaging stories.

So Miyamoto recalled the years spent in Kyoto, Japan when he was young - at that time, young Miyamoto will hang around in the forests, lakes and caves for a long time, imagining himself in a twisting adventure. Drawing inspiration from these experiences, he eventually designed the classic masterpiece "The Legend of Zelda," and since 1986, the legend of Zelda has become one of Nintendo's most enduring collections.

The Legend of Zelda continues the basic plot of "Heroes Save the United States," but this time it has a complete view of the world, full of characters, twists and turns plot and unique play system. The first edition of The Legend of Zelda made an important contribution to the interface design and user experience across the industry in at least three areas:

Plot first, refused to run points

This is the most striking difference between The Legend of Zelda and the previous works. Users are no longer in order to obtain high scores, to gain a place on the leaderboard for the sole purpose, "The Legend of Zelda" for the first time to cancel the simple concept of scores. So users do not have to face the same operation and content again and again to brush the scores of the leaderboard, but immersed in the story, in the process of enjoying one episode after another met.

Save the progress, read the archive

The Legend of Zelda was also the first home console game to have saved progress and read archives. Prior to this, the user must play a round of non-stop game. In order to brush high scores, many players tend to play for a long time at a time so that all night long, but once interrupted, the next time you have to start over. For the first time, the legend of Zelda allows users to save their progress and keep on playing for the next time.

With this initiative, game developers can finally feel free to make plots, long stories, games that are extremely playable, without having to worry about storytelling too long and one-time impossible. In addition, the original design of the archive is stored directly in the game card without binding the host, so players can easily carry their own progress of the game, no matter where, as long as the game card out and plug in any one Host can continue to play.

Custom protagonist name

Although it now looks like the slightest, but "Zelda" another big initiative is to allow players to customize the protagonist's name. Such an approach effectively motivates players to put themselves into the game, immersing themselves in each and every story, walking through every episode and getting every accomplishment. Since then, as technology has progressed, in addition to custom names, the game began to allow players to customize the protagonist from clothing to hairstyles and other aspects. It all started with the first generation of Zelda in 1986.

Gamepad evolution

Miyamoto's game design and content on the success of the Nintendo have greater freedom to do all kinds of hardware experiments on their own host. The various attempts at the gamepad are an important part of it:

Cross direction keys

The D-Pad may be Nintendo's most famous pioneering gamepad. Almost every game controller today can see the presence of the cross arrow keys. The history of the cross arrow keys goes back to Miyamoto, Yokoi Jun and the handheld version of "King Kong."

The early eighties, it is the age of handheld games just emerging. In order to enter the handheld market, Nintendo decided to launch the "King Kong" handheld version. When designing hardware interactions, Nintendo faced the challenge of using a joystick device like a home console that would not only make the overall look clumsy and the cost of equipment high. Nintendo hardware designer Yokoi Jun flat cross arrow keys to solve this problem. This concise and efficient design was officially launched at the first G & W version of Nintendo's handheld version of "King Kong", and then quickly became popular as the standard for all handhelds.

Interestingly, most game consoles with a cross-key design, just like the original G & W handhelds, have the cross-shaped keys on the left side of the control area. Regardless of the ever-changing set of buttons on the right, the cross-arrow keys are arranged on the left almost unchanged. This amazing "tacit agreement" also triggered the researchers curiosity. As early as 1987, some scholars published a paper titled "The Study of Left-Right Asymmetry in Man's Two-handed Operation" and tried to demonstrate that Nintendo's design of the cross-directional key on the left is because humans are accustomed to controlling general directions by non-dominant hands. To do more accurate use of dominant hand operation. For example, when a human is signing a sign, it is customary to sign the paper by controlling the paper with a non-dominant hand. Because most people are right-handed people, so the direction of the cross-key set on the left. A variety of such far-fetched explanations, the classic position of the cross-direction keys is actually self-evident.

Wireless handle

In addition to the cross arrow keys such a classic innovation, Nintendo is also one of the earliest manufacturers of experimental wireless handle. As early as 1989, they first tried the wireless handle design on the NES mainframe. The device at the time was called NES Satellite, which allowed up to four players to connect their handles to one transmitter, while a receiver was added to the NES mainframe, which sent a signal to the receiver to reach the host with the handle The purpose of the game.

Although 1989 was really early, this structure is not strictly a true wireless handle control either, as the handle-to-emitter needs to be wire-connected as well. In 2002, Nintendo unveiled the true wireless grip that WaveBird, the Best Peripherals winner at the 2002 E3 show. The WaveBird handles the connection to the NGC host via wireless frequency pairing, which is the true wireless handle. Nintendo's approach led to other manufacturers have followed suit, the next year almost every family have introduced their own wireless handle. Until now, we could barely see which console product was forced to use a wired handle.

Introduce the somatosensory operation into the game console

In 2006, Nintendo released a new generation of game console Wii, Wii supporting the new gamepad for the first time the somatosensory action into the video game console. Wii's internal codenamed "The Revolution" (Revolution), but it is also true to the truth: for the first time users found that in addition to the original control of the traditional handle buttons, they can also directly use the body movements to control the game on screen characters .

This practice quickly aroused fellow followers. And many of them peer control products somatosensory really do better than the Wii. For example, four years after the 2010 Microsoft officially released Kinect somatosensory kit.

Conclusion

From gameplay to archiving, from cross keys to somatosensory control, Nintendo has long played a pioneering role in the gaming industry's user experience and interactive design. Nintendo will be held in New York conference allows users to preview Wii U more information. We look forward to Nintendo will bring us more surprises.