Editing Talk:2154: Motivation

<!--Please sign your posts with ~~~~ and don't delete this text. New comments should be added at the bottom.-->
Playtesters procrastinate too? —NT
: Hey, work is work is work. If you have to do it, it's work. :) I remember one time a bunch of us skipped our lunch break from game testing to huddle around a guy's computer to watch the workprint of X-Men Origins: Wolverine. We were laughing our heads off at the missing special effects. :) [[User:NiceGuy1|NiceGuy1]] ([[User talk:NiceGuy1|talk]]) 05:41, 25 May 2019 (UTC)

Weeellll - that's not really accurate Mr Munroe.  I've worked (as a software engineer) in the video game industry for years.  One of the biggest myths is that QA testers get paid to play video games.   In fact, they don't REALLY get to play the game much at all.  For most of the development cycle, there is only one or two working levels - crap graphics and crash-prone software.  So they "play" in a way that is deliberately quirky in order to push the code in directions it wasn't meant to be pushed - so they can see if it crashes.  They have to pay careful attention.  Then they file a bug report (Oooh! Paperwork!  Form filling!) and try to do exactly what they did *again* so they can explain how to make it happen.  Then they go off and hunt for another bug.  Once a bug is marked as "fixed" by the software team - they have to try to make it happen again - to be sure it was fixed - then do other SIMILAR things that might trigger that bug.  Once we all agree that the bug is fixed - it goes on the "regression list" - which means you get to repeat the exact actions you did over and over - maybe once a month - but certainly before each Alpha/Beta/Gold release.   Multiply this by hundreds of bugs - and that's what you do all day.  Sometimes a software guy will pop their head around the door and say "Could someone pick up that weapon and move it through every single doorway in the entire game and see if you get stuck in any of them!  K'Thanks!".

What you DON'T do is play the video game all day...and even if you did - over a typical 3 year development cycle, you'd be SO sick of it.

Hence, it's not at all unreasonable that a play tester would have fun actually playing the game.

No idea whether we should put this into the explanation part.
[[Special:Contributions/172.69.170.112|172.69.170.112]] 23:39, 24 May 2019 (UTC)

:Let's shorten it: Playtesters would likely procrastinate by playing game which is already finished, unlike the games they work on. ... ... of course, sometimes even games already published feel like not being finished, so ... -- [[User:Hkmaly|Hkmaly]] ([[User talk:Hkmaly|talk]]) 04:57, 25 May 2019 (UTC)
:: In online persistent games, new content may be added more or less continuously, so bugtesting & playtesting is ''never'' done. 
::[[User:ProphetZarquon|ProphetZarquon]] ([[User talk:ProphetZarquon|talk]]) 21:53, 25 May 2019 (UTC)


As someone who worked as a game tester for several years, for various companies, testing games for various other companies, I can concur with much of what Mr(s). 172.69 said in the second comment... Though I've often been assigned to a whole level, just play it all morning, see what you can find (I got a rep for finding oddball things, like if you pass this tunnel entry then turn around, there's a see-through patch in the ceiling). At least with a whole level you get SOME playing. Though there's another downside: "Okay, today you're testing My Little Pony's Fashion Bonanza all day. Try on all the dresses.". Just because you're playing games doesn't mean it's a game you LIKE. :) But as to why I'm commenting...

The issue I found is the title text. It's highly unlikely that Ponytail would be able to choose to play an unreleased game (since it's in testing) in her off/procrastination time, which actually rules out both halves of the title text scenario, except in the second half the first game MIGHT have been released by then. [[User:NiceGuy1|NiceGuy1]] ([[User talk:NiceGuy1|talk]]) 05:37, 25 May 2019 (UTC)
: ''Statistically'' unlikely perhaps, but there ''are'' (a relatively small number of) games that become available to the public well before final commercial release. I suspect that availability of such "open" Betas & Alpha dev-builds is increasingly rare, but they used to be quite common in PC gaming. (Arguably) notable modern games I've played while they were still in early development include Minecraft, Robocraft, & Hawken, among many many others. I usually won't buy a game until I've played someone else's copy, or a demo, or an early build of it. NDAs & private dev builds are one way to go, but they're certainly not the ''only'' path to choose when developing a game. 
::Just like Minecraft was, is Factorio now. Almost two million people play it since 2012 like its been released already, while the actual release isn't even in foresight. --[[User:Zom-B|Zom-B]] ([[User talk:Zom-B|talk]]) 15:21, 27 May 2019 (UTC)
::: The thing is, using testers and releasing Alpha / Beta versions are rather mutually exclusive. Testers will give higher quality feedback (being trained on how to analyse, as well as thoroughly explore, describe and report issues, and fully document them in a centralized system, along with Steps To Reproduce. Plus testers can be directed to improve their output, and given tasks: "Drive this racetrack and look for any gaps in the wall"), but need to be paid. Letting the public try the game is more like a shotgun approach to finding problems, but doesn't cost the gamemakers money. As far as I gather, releasing early versions is in an effort to save money, it wouldn't make sense to spend that money. And this comic states outright that this is Ponytail's job. :) [[User:NiceGuy1|NiceGuy1]] ([[User talk:NiceGuy1|talk]]) 04:35, 8 June 2019 (UTC)

This leads me to a related question: 

Isn't there a difference between "bug-testing" a game & "play-testing" a game? I've known people who only evaluated games from a playability & enjoyability perspective, essentially acting as internal reviewers prior to release. Bug-testing was a largely separate activity in those cases. Is the difference usually not so delineated? [[User:ProphetZarquon|ProphetZarquon]] ([[User talk:ProphetZarquon|talk]]) 21:53, 25 May 2019 (UTC)
:From the ''Portal'' dev commentary, I would imagine that there is a significant difference; they often mention things like "without some serious prompting, players will rarely look up" and "our original final battle didn't really fit in with what came before" without talking about bug testing, like, at all. [[1269: Privacy Opinions|Volleo6144]] ([[Talk:1269: Privacy Opinions|talk]]) 17:53, 26 May 2019 (UTC)
::As someone who worked as a game tester for a few years, we tended to be given both as tasks, but the play-testing angle tends to be more subjective so it was less often assigned and reporting issues of that nature was harder to manage and be allowed. Most of our testing was finding problems, thus "bug-testing". I think it might often be the case that "bug-testing" is done by hired minions at the Alpha stage, while "play-testing" is done by insiders in earlier stages and by the public at the Beta and later stages (early versions being to make sure it's a viable game and things make sense, the public version being to polish it up and fix things like those Portal examples). [[User:NiceGuy1|NiceGuy1]] ([[User talk:NiceGuy1|talk]]) 04:48, 8 June 2019 (UTC)