Open Betatesting 1.4

[unmerged(106255)]

Should be two tiered, IMO.

Professional beta testing comes first to solve all the technical problems and make sure the game mechanics do what they are supposed to do. Resolve crashes and harware incompatiblities. Actually show up for work.

Community testing comes later on for playtesting, game balance, polishing, and overall experience. Judging by what I've read on this forum, the company dropped the ball in their selection of testers for community testing. Should have only gone with modders and helpful posters with high post count, instead of including "whingers" and other posters of low quality.

 

[Buladelu]

It's strange PI has started to use "professional" (bleh!) QA. My company has a pack of those guys and they polish products while we programmers blindfold ourselfs. "Man, it's not a bug, it's a feature!" - says cool programmer while treacherous testers write their bug-reports.

There's another danger. Some russian studio just made Disciples 3. Decent game tested by NVidia. BUT! NVidia tested technical part of game. And with, er, NVidia. So when the game was published gamers found many balance and scenario errors. Some patches were released. Ba-a-ad patches. Now game is pretty much balanced but regulary crashes to desktop and meeeemory leaks. So-o-o testing is a tricky and complex thing.

 

[PkK]

IMO the public is good at finding bugs (since they are many and thus will try every little feature), however most of them are not good at writing bug reports. And good bug reports help a lot with fixing bugs.

Philipp

 

[vertinox]

Maybe if you pre-order the game and promise not to ask for a refund, they let you in an open beta 2 months before release?

 

[Kallocain]

Should be two tiered, IMO.

Professional beta testing comes first to solve all the technical problems and make sure the game mechanics do what they are supposed to do. Resolve crashes and harware incompatiblities. Actually show up for work.

Community testing comes later on for playtesting, game balance, polishing, and overall experience. ...

This is the way to go imho. Use both, and be aware of the strength/weakness of both are.

 

[ok2useLane]

Should be two tiered, IMO.

Professional beta testing comes first to solve all the technical problems and make sure the game mechanics do what they are supposed to do. Resolve crashes and harware incompatiblities. Actually show up for work.

Community testing comes later on for playtesting, game balance, polishing, and overall experience...

I wholly agree with this. It's the best way to find the problems and the needs.