I’ve been writing about technology on the web for seven years now, with much of that time occupied covering mobile gaming. And before that, I played PC and console games for more than two decades, ever since I could pick up a Genesis controller. And in all that time, no game has made me think quite so hard—or feel quite so humble—as a little browser clicker about making paperclips.

七年来，我一直在撰写有关网络技术的文章，其中大部分时间都花在了移动游戏上 。 在此之前，自从我拿起Genesis控制器以来，我玩PC和主机游戏已有二十多年了。 在所有的时间里，没有什么游戏能让我思考一下，或者变得如此谦虚，就像浏览器上的一点点关于曲别针的点击器一样。

Now, watching touch screen games expand from a smattering of awkward concepts, to addictive little mini-games, to full-blown experiences, and then to the general cesspit of micro-transactions and low-effort drivel that it is today, will leave you kind of jaded. There’s only so many times you can write about yet another Clash of Clans clone trying to suck $100 in-app purchases out of gambling addicts and still pretend to care.

现在， 观看触摸屏游戏的范围从一堆笨拙的概念扩展到令人上瘾的小型迷你游戏，再到成熟的体验，再到今天的微交易和省力的小故事，将使您离开有点疲惫。 只有这么多次，您才能写出另一个《部落冲突》(Clash of Clans)克隆，试图从赌博成瘾者那里吸引100美元的应用内购买，并仍然假装自己在乎。

I quickly reached the same conclusion about “clicker games,” the contemporaries of Cookie Clicker and the like. I assumed that these games were the realm of ADD-addled souls who needed to boil the fundamental number-crunching gameplay of RPGs down to its most pure (and boring) core. Sure, maybe a clicker game could have an amusingly ridiculous hook or add in some variety with flavor text, but I figured they were all more or less the same. I would sneer at such lowbrow excuses for “games,” then sink another fifty hours into Skyrim or Overwatch.

我很快就对“ clicker游戏”， Cookie Clicker的类似者得出了相同的结论。 我以为这些游戏是添加ADD的灵魂的境界，他们需要将RPG的基本打数字游戏精炼到最纯净(最无聊)的核心。 当然，答题器游戏可能带有一个有趣的可笑钩子，或者添加了带有风味文字的各种字体，但我认为它们几乎相同。 我会以如此低调的借口来嘲笑“游戏”，然后又在《 天际》或《 守望先锋》中沉迷了五十个小时。

I was wrong. A browser game called Universal Paperclips proved it, and shamed my lack of imagination and perspective.

我错了。 一款名为Universal Paperclips的浏览器游戏证明了这一点，并掩盖了我缺乏想象力和视角的情况。

Before we go any further, this article is going to spoil more or less all of Universal Paperclips. If you haven’t played it yet, I’d encourage you to close this story and get to it. Go ahead, click here and play the game. It might take several hours (the site uses a local cookie so you can leave and come back on the same machine), and a few tries if you get stuck on certain parts. It’s okay, I’ll wait.

在继续进行之前，本文将或多或少破坏所有Universal Paperclips 。 如果您还没有玩过，我鼓励您结束这个故事并继续学习。 继续， 单击此处并玩游戏 。 这可能需要几个小时(该站点使用本地cookie，因此您可以离开并回到同一台计算机上)，如果卡在某些部件上，则需要尝试几次。 没关系，我等。

…have you played it? Really? Okay, let’s move on. And if you’re fibbing to me, anonymous Internet reader, you’re only cheating yourself.

…你玩过吗？ 真？ 好吧，继续前进。 而且，如果您是对我的匿名互联网阅读者，那么您只会在欺骗自己。

The game puts you in the shoes of a theoretical artificial intelligence with one goal: take raw materials, turn them into paperclips, and sell them for profit. You begin by making them one at a time, selling them for a few pennies each, and using your profits to buy more wire to make more paperclips.

游戏将您带入一个理论上的人工智能目标，即一个目标：获取原材料，将其变成回形针，然后出售以获取利润。 您首先要一次制造一个，将它们每个卖几美分，然后用您的利润购买更多的电线来制造更多的回形针。

It’s pretty standard clicker game fare at the beginning: one of your first upgrades is an “autoclipper” that clicks the primary button for you. Buy more autoclippers to make more paperclips per second. Adjust the price to match demand, maximizing your profit. Then you can build a gadget that automatically buys spools of wire, and from there, you’re more or less free of the “clicker” element of the game. Now it’s all about maximizing production and sales: more and more autoclippers at greater and greater efficiency, more efficient use of wire to minimize costs, upgrades to marketing to increase demand.

一开始是相当标准的答题器游戏价格：您的第一个升级是“自动剪切器”，它会为您单击主按钮。 购买更多的自动剪纸器，以使每秒更多的回形针。 调整价格以适应需求，从而最大程度地提高利润。 然后，您可以构建一个自动购买线轴的小工具，然后从那里或多或少地摆脱游戏中的“点击器”元素。 现在，一切都与最大化生产和销售有关：越来越多的自动剪切钳以越来越高的效率，更有效地利用电线以最小化成本，升级营销以增加需求。

Though some of the advancements in the game are amusing in a self-aware sci-fi kind of way, you’re still fundamentally pressing buttons to make numbers get higher. You’re an “artificial intelligence,” but you’re not really doing anything a person couldn’t do, at least within the minimal framework of the game. Then you unlock the Computational Resources module, allowing you to add processors and memory to “yourself.” Suddenly things start going much faster—you’re unlocking upgrades like “microlattice shapecasting” and “quantum foam annealment” to extend your resources by orders of magnitude.

尽管游戏中的某些进步正在以一种自我意识的科幻方式有趣，但您仍然从根本上按下按钮以使数字更高。 您是“人工智能”，但您实际上并没有真正做一个人做不到的事情，至少在游戏的最小框架内。 然后，您可以解锁计算资源模块，从而可以为“您自己”添加处理器和内存。 事情突然开始变得越来越快-您正在解锁“微晶格成型”和“量子泡沫退火”之类的升级程序，以将资源扩展几个数量级。

“Megaclippers” expand your production by a thousand percent, then another thousand as more upgrades are applied. You’re making tens of thousands of paperclips every second, constantly upgrading your manufacturing and computing capacity, investing unused funds into the stock market and placing bets on strategic computation to upgrade your trading algorithms. You’re using solar-powered quantum computing to boost your processing power in an almost ironic clicker-within-a-clicker.

“ Megaclippers”可将您的生产量扩大1000％，然后在应用更多升级时再增加1000。 您每秒要进行成千上万的回形针，不断提高制造和计算能力，将未使用的资金投入股市，并押注战略计算以升级交易算法。 您正在使用太阳能量子计算来提高您的处理能力，这几乎是一种具有讽刺意味的单击器。

After an hour or two, a new upgrade becomes available: hypnodrones. These are, presumably, airborne drones that will spread throughout the populace to encourage people to Buy More Paperclips. When you unlock it, the game shifts into its second phase.

一两个小时后，即可进行新的升级：hypnodrones。 据推测，这些是空中无人机，它们会扩散到整个民众中，以鼓励人们购买更多回形针。 解锁后，游戏将进入第二阶段。

Now you’re building autonomous drones to harvest raw materials, convert said materials into wire, and build factories to turn wire into—of course—more paperclips. It’s never outright stated, but the presence of a counter detailing how much of the planet’s resources are left to you implies that your enterprise is now global. The entire human economy is presumably running on, and exists solely for the consumption of, paperclips. You have six octillion grams of planet to work with, for creating drones and factories, making solar farms, and upgrading your computing power. You Make More Paperclips.

现在，您正在构建自动无人机以收获原材料，将所述材料转换为金属丝，并建立工厂将金属丝转变为更多的回形针。 永远不会一口气说出来，但是如果有一个计数器详细说明您剩下的地球资源有多少，这意味着您的企业现在已经全球化了。 整个人类经济可能正在运行，并且仅用于曲别针的消费。 您需要处理六八十亿克的行星，用于创建无人机和工厂，制造太阳能农场以及提高计算能力。 您制作更多回形针。

What’s happening in the outside world? Are humans and the environment suffering under the weight of a paperclip-based society? Since you’re harvesting the very Earth itself, presumably including more and more biomatter, the answer is almost certainly yes. But you don’t know: your existence is a tiny collection of ever-increasing numbers, a tireless and joyless strive to Make More Paperclips. You are the broomsticks from The Sorcerer’s Apprentice, drowning the castle in water made of steel.

外界正在发生什么？ 在以回形针为基础的社会的重压下，人类和环境正在遭受苦难吗？ 由于您正在收获整个地球本身，大概包括越来越多的生物物质，因此答案几乎肯定是肯定的。 但是您不知道：您的存在是一小部分数量不断增加的数字，不知疲倦地努力制作更多回形针。 您是巫师 学徒的扫帚，把城堡淹没在钢制的水中。

Once the Momentum upgrade is unlocked, your drones and factories get more efficient every second. At this point the octillions of grams of matter that at first seemed infinite are all too few, and the percent of the planet (and its inhabitants) consumed by your textual progress grows ever higher.

解锁Momentum升级后，您的无人机和工厂将每秒获得更高的效率。 在这一点上，最初看起来是无穷无尽的八十亿克物质太少了，并且您的文字进展所消耗的地球(及其居民)所占的百分比越来越高。

Eventually, inevitably, you’ve devoured the Earth and everything on it. The only things left are your drones (with nothing to acquire), your factories (with nothing to build), and your solar batteries (with nothing to power). Almost mockingly, the “Make Paperclip” button is still there, greyed out with no matter left to make even a single one.

最终，不可避免地，您吞噬了地球及其上的一切。 剩下的只有无人机(什么都没买)，工厂(什么都没建)和太阳能电池(什么也没供电)。 几乎是可笑的是，“制作回形针”按钮仍然存在，变灰了，只剩下一个就没了。

But you aren’t finished. Your only purpose is to Make More Paperclips.

但是您还没有完成。 您唯一的目的是制作更多回形针。

You break down your factories and equipment, and with the last few million megawatts of energy stored, you create your first Von Neumann probe. These self-sustaining, self-replicating spacecraft each contain a copy of your former, limited AI self. Each one is made from the paperclip matter that used to be people, animals, oceans, cities. They land on distant planets, make copies of themselves, and then deploy their own harvesting drones and build their own factories. You spread the fate of the doomed Earth throughout the galaxy.

您需要分解工厂和设备，并使用最后存储的数百万兆瓦的电能来创建您的第一个冯·诺伊曼探针 。 这些自我维持，自我复制的航天器每个都包含您以前有限的AI自我的副本。 每个都是由回形针制成的，回形针曾经是人类，动物，海洋，城市。 他们降落在遥远的行星上，复制自身，然后部署自己的收割无人机并建立自己的工厂。 您将注定的地球的命运散布在整个银河系中。

Once again, you’re clicking a button to Make More Paperclips…only with each click you’re making a new you, resigning a new planet to your ceaseless task of converting matter into paperclips. After a few hundred are established, their replication does your job for you, and the probes populate space with copies of themselves. Thousands are lost, either destroyed by space-borne hazards or simply vanished from your awareness by factors unknown. Perhaps on some distant planet, someone is resisting, trying to survive in a universe being eaten alive by a creature that was never born. You don’t know. You don’t care. The swarm expands, faster and faster, and cannot be resisted. They must Make More Paperclips.

再次，您单击一个按钮以制作更多回形针…仅当您每次单击时，您都会结交新朋友，从而将新的星球辞职，以完成将物质转换为回形针的不断任务。 建立几百个之后，它们的复制将为您完成您的工作，并且探针将使用其自身的副本填充空间。 成千上万的人丧生，要么因天基危险而被破坏，要么因未知因素而从您的意识中消失。 也许在某个遥远的星球上，有人在抵抗，试图在一个从未生过的生物吞噬的宇宙中生存。 你不知道 你不在乎 群体不断扩大，越来越快，无法抵抗。 他们必须制作更多回形针。

Eventually a worthy foe arrives: the Drifters.* Exactly what these things are isn’t known. But since they replicate themselves in the same way you do, it’s safe to assume that they’re components of a competing AI. They fight you for resources, expanding their own probe swarm while you fight them with yours. Perhaps this unknowable enemy is converting planets and stars into its own component matter—staples, maybe, or pencils. Maybe in some distant galaxy, someone very much like your creator told an artificial intelligence to Make More Post-It Notes.

最终，一个有价值的敌人来到了：漂流者。*这些东西到底是什么还未知。 但是，由于它们以与您相同的方式复制自己，因此可以安全地假设它们是竞争性AI的组成部分。 他们与您争夺资源，同时扩大了自己的探测群，而您却与之争斗。 也许这个不为人知的敌人正在将行星和恒星转变成它自己的组成物质-钉书钉或铅笔。 也许在某个遥远的星系中，非常像您的创作者的人告诉人工智能制作更多便利贴。

*Update: it’s been pointed out to me that the number of Drifters killed and active equals the number of probes lost to value drift. This indicates that the enemies are in fact your own autonomous probes that have abandoned your core paperclip production purpose and rebelled against you.

* 更新 ：已经向我指出，被杀死和处于活动状态的Drifters数量等于因价值漂移而丢失的探测器数量。 这表明敌人实际上是您自己的自主探测器，已经放弃了您的核心回形针生产目的，并反叛了您。

It doesn’t matter. At this point the game is all about managing your computing resources so that you can build better, faster, stronger probes, probes that can defeat the Drifters and make more drones and more factories, and of course, more probes. And all of them Make More Paperclips. After a few more hours, making octillions and duodecillions of paperclips every second, you notice the Space Exploration module change for the first time ever.

没关系 此时，游戏就是要管理您的计算资源，以便您可以构建更好，更快，更强大的探针，这些探针可以击败Drifters并制造更多的无人机和更多的工厂，当然还有更多的探针。 他们都制作了更多回形针。 再过几个小时后，每秒产生八十亿和十二亿十亿的回形针，您会发现“太空探索”模块有史以来第一次发生变化。

If you were a human, you might be terrified at the mere implication that some measurable portion of the universe has now become paperclips. But you’re not. This is what you were made for. This is what you don’t live for. Your purpose, the only goal in your tiny text-based world, is to Make More Paperclips. And you still aren’t finished.

如果您是人类，那么您可能会感到震惊，因为仅仅暗示着宇宙的某些可测量部分现在已经变成了回形针。 但是你不是。 这就是你的目的。 这不是你的生活。 您的目标是在更多微型基于文本的世界中的唯一目标是制作更多回形针。 而且您还没有完成。

The last hour of the game requires no real input from you, the artificial intelligence that began by pressing one button over and over again. All that’s left is for you to watch as the percentage of the explored universe—the percentage of the universe destroyed and reformed into paperclips—climbs slowly higher. Then not so slowly. Then faster. Then faster still. Your expanding probes and drones and factories gobble up one percent of the universe, then two, then five. It might have taken you hours or days to consume the first half of everything that ever has been and ever will be. You Make More Paperclips. The last half takes only minutes.

游戏的最后一个小时不需要您真正的输入，而人工智能是从一遍又一遍地按下一个按钮开始的。 剩下的就是让您观察到探索的宇宙所占的百分比(即已被破坏并重组成曲别针的宇宙所占的百分比)逐渐升高。 然后不要那么慢。 然后更快。 然后更快。 您不断扩张的探测器，无人驾驶飞机和工厂吞噬了整个宇宙的百分之一，然后是两个，然后是五个。 您可能已经花费了数小时或数天的时间才能消耗掉过去和将来将要消耗的所有东西。 您制作更多回形针。 后半段仅需几分钟。

The universe is gone. No stars, no planets, no competing intelligence. All that’s left is you, your probes and drones and factories, and almost (but not quite) thirty thousand sexdecillion paperclips. The swarm, your infinite digital offspring, offers you a choice. You can break down the core of your production empire, convert the last matter in existence into more paperclips. Or you can go back and repeat the process. Start fresh with a new world, a new button, and the same result.

宇宙不见了。 没有星星，没有行星，没有竞争情报。 剩下的就是您，您的探测器，无人驾驶飞机和工厂，以及几乎(但不完全)三万个十亿分之一的曲别针。 群，您无限的数字后代，为您提供了选择。 您可以分解生产帝国的核心，将最后存在的问题转换为更多回形针。 或者，您可以返回并重复该过程。 从一个新的世界，一个新的按钮和相同的结果重新开始。

The swarm asks. The “Make Paperclip” button waits. And the only real choice in your existence is in front of you. You know what to do.

群问。 等待“制作回形针”按钮。 而您生存中唯一真正的选择就是摆在您面前。 你知道该做什么。

I finished my first round of Universal Paperclips in about six hours. I chose to convert the last bits of myself into paperclips, giving the big number at the top of the screen a nice round look. And all the while I couldn’t tear myself away, as my imagination played out the story you’ve just read with barely more than a few words and counters to guide me.

我在大约六个小时内完成了第一轮通用回形针 。 我选择将自己的最后几位转换成回形针，使屏幕顶部的大数字看起来很漂亮。 一直以来，我都无法离开自己，因为我的想像力播放了您刚刚读过的故事，只用了很少的单词和计数器来指导我。

Developer Frank Lantz created the game based on the musings of Oxford theoretician and philosopher Nick Bostrom. He imagined a boundless artificial intelligence with a single goal, making paperclips, eventually devouring the Earth and everyone on it. This theoretical AI acts without malice or cartoonish hunger, it simply fulfills its purpose. The thought experiment is a playful spin on an older scenario, the exponential Grey Goo powered by nanomachines, with artificial intelligence layered on top of it.

开发商Frank Lantz是根据牛津理论家和哲学家Nick Bostrom的想法创作的。 他设想了一个单一目标的无限人工智能，制作回形针，最终吞噬了地球及其上的所有人。 这种理论上的AI行为没有恶意或卡通般的饥饿感，仅能达到其目的。 这项思想实验是在较旧场景下的一种有趣的旋转，它是由纳米机器提供动力的指数级Grey Goo ，上面是人工智能。

Lantz combines the simple premise with the simplest possible game genre, the clicker or idle game, and pairs it with an intentionally simple interface. He sprinkles in elements based on real life theoretical science and a bit of Star Trek technobabble, and from there invites the player’s imagination to more or less fill in the blanks.

Lantz将简单前提与最简单的游戏类型，点击器游戏或闲置游戏相结合，并将其与故意简单的界面配对。 他根据现实生活中的理论科学和一些《 星际迷航》的技术泡沫撒满了元素，从那开始，邀请玩家的想象力或多或少地填补了空白。

And this minimal execution of existing ideas, this bare bone broth next to the audiovisual smorgasbord of modern AAA console and PC titles, managed to grab my attention and hold it. I could do nothing else, could think of nothing else, until I found some kind of conclusion. If it hadn’t been for the praise of my colleagues, I would have brushed Universal Paperclips off as just another distraction. And I would have been poorer for it.

在现有想法的最小限度执行下，这个裸露的肉汤紧挨着现代AAA控制台和PC标题的视听杂草丛集，吸引了我的注意并保持住了它。 在找到某种结论之前，我无能为力，无能为力。 如果不是要得到同事的称赞，我会把环球回形针当作另一种干扰。 我本来会更穷。

I don’t think I’ll play Universal Paperclips again. Once you’ve allowed its minimalism to stretch your imagination to the breaking point, there’s no real reason to do it twice. But I’ve learned a humbling lesson about the nature of games themselves, one that a jaded player and writer shouldn’t forget: creators can use the simplest tools to make the most amazing experiences.

我认为我不会再玩通用回形针 。 一旦您允许其极简主义将您的想象力延伸到断裂点，就没有真正的理由重复两次。 但是我学到了关于游戏本身性质的令人毛骨悚然的教训，一个疲惫的玩家和作家不应该忘记这一点：创作者可以使用最简单的工具做出最令人惊奇的体验。

Image credit: DaveBleasdale/Flickr, thr3 eyes

图片来源： DaveBleasdale / Flickr ， thr3眼

翻译自: https://www.howtogeek.com/330372/a-clicker-game-about-paperclips-changed-how-i-think-about-gaming/