What a beta tester really should be focusing on.

Gibbler · October 3

The most common issues to be identified:

Collision Issues- is it discrete or continuous:

Discrete collision detection - movement in the game environment in the typical sense in and around npc non npc's

and or game asset objects

Continuous collision detection - fast moving objects passing through and or around play may include whats called "pathing' point

to point movement" how assets A.I move through the game environment.

===========================================================================================

Artificial intelligence - Primary, secondary conditional game dynamic function, may include text prompts, progression condition resolution.

Sound sound prompts/ques, phasing/reverb/pitch frequency clashes, or missing completely,

How npc non npc powers interact in combination in combat and passively/idle.

Are npc's too powerful does the damage potential done and received met the intended parameters - balance

Are text prompts appearing when conditions are correctly met, Are related sound ques working,

Are additional game dynamics such as secondary completion options working correctly when conditions are met.

Are any powers blocking buff stacking, are de-buffs working on balance vs damage potential vs damage within set

parameters as intended.

Making in game items- Trade skills/inventions the availability of game assets to produce items,

Drop rates - Are in game items dropping within the parameters met typically common uncommon rare ,very rare ,ultra rare.

percentage based drop rates can be difficult to data mine without a huge sample of data.

===========================================================================================

Load Testing - how many players can the server realistically handle before ghosting/ rubber banding/ data lag becomes an issue.

how many threads/particles/sprites are running in the game to the point of performance peak potential.

Are hardware requirement limitations restricting further development as DX/net fameworks etc evolve.

===========================================================================================

SDET - Software Development Engineer in Test - Advanced and out of context here, but to offer insight what an actual technical tester

is responsible for building automated test cases (focused complex test issues) may pertain to overall game performance

game security in a sense its reverse compiling i.e headers,library files,code within the source code -Bootstrapping.

===========================================================================================

NDA's: "Time wasters" beta testing should be avoided if your intent is too simply get a head start on new content.

Not adhering to non disclosure agreements in most contexts may be enforceable in a court of law

Don't think because i didn't sign anything I am not under contract - See *conditional acceptance.

===========================================================================================

Feedback & communication Play-ablilty:

In my experience communication and feedback are really the most important aspect for a developer.

'I don't like this power it sucks' !! is not feedback

" i don't like caves , caves suck' !! is not feedback.

Being critical without context, without encompassing all aspects in any given context is worthless

Being critical without offering realistic solutions are of no benefit and is not feedback.

Communicating in a positive manner with concise and clear identification of issues/suggestions is best practice

Why it should be considered, what are the benefits for everybody, will it allow further development to progess

without handcuffing the game into limitation as hardware develops so must everything else.

Are you offering realistic feedback i.e i want a 100000k nuke for my blaster is a waste of pixels.

Take the time to consider the over view of the game development direction and focus on that.

===========================================================================================

Play-ability: Ultimately the players experience is key to engagement, Community quality is a reflection of the game

content and quality without fail, happy campers hang out and drink beers unhappy campers steal your beers

and throw empty cans all over the show.

The ability for the development team to decide where to focus is only as good as the quality of feedback.

Developers do not have a crystal ball, - nor do they have time to sift through nonsense.

You can please some people some of the time,but you cant please all the people all of the time,-Regardless !!

golstat2003 · October 3

???

MagicalAct · October 3

Okay.

lemming · October 4

Collision Issues: I have seen people do that, though often it's more checking geometry of zones, etc...

Artificial intelligence: Seems like an odd heading, since I don't think all of the subheading would be AI (or how the game is programmed that way...) Now if you want to say game responses, maybe. I think for drop rate evaluation, it might be possible for the dev team to make a drop test, depending on how the underlying code is done.

Load Testing: I think if the devs make a call for "Hey, let's stress test X by getting as many people on at XXXX time EST and do X"

SDET: That's not beta, that's alpha IMO. Case tests if the build environment supports it is a great idea and is part of most build processes I have been part of. Out of scope for Open Beta I think.

NDAs: Pretty sure that's Closed Beta talk. By the time things are in Open, it's being discussed by the rest of the player base.

Feedback: "In my experience communication and feedback are really the most important aspect for a developer. " Yes. And testers should be able to convey what they find is wrong and if it's a bug, as much detail on how to reproduce it is needed. And not all developers are great at the communication parts. Usually having someone to help moderate Developer and User conversations is very helpful. I used to have a developer that we didn't have talk to our Beta testers, but it worked well having someone to bring the feedback to them and point out why the UI wasn't as intuitive as they thought. (as one example)

Playability: Having players explain why an experience is not as fun after a change can be challenging, but sometimes you can gauge based on just unhappy reactions even if the details are not as helpful in some cases.

Glacier Peak · October 4

Wow, I originally thought this was spam when I read it this morning. After reading @lemming reply, I guess it makes a little more sense. The formatting doesn't do the reader any favors. It's hard to follow, especially on mobile devices. It reads like a ChatGPT output if the user wrote a prompt about how to beta test.

macskull · October 4

What in the fever dream did I just read

lemming · October 4

15 hours ago, Glacier Peak said:

Wow, I originally thought this was spam when I read it this morning. After reading @lemming reply, I guess it makes a little more sense. The formatting doesn't do the reader any favors. It's hard to follow, especially on mobile devices. It reads like a ChatGPT output if the user wrote a prompt about how to beta test.

Honestly, I suspected ChatGPT or similar and just went with an answer anyway. It could be a translation. Hard to say since the OP doesn't have much history to check.

Edited October 4 by lemming
where did that word go

Lines · October 4

Everyone knows the best way to beta test is to not open the game. Just go straight to the forums, switch on caps lock and go ham.

Edited October 4 by Lines

biostem · October 4

Nothing like seemingly AI-generated advice from a newly-minted account to set us old timers straight, amirite!?

Gibbler · October 6

My apologies if this is too technical, Its very straight forward and from "actual real world experience".

Currently the large language models people think is artificial general intelligence is akin to me coding machine code and Basic the 80's

on the amazing Sinclair ZX81 with a whopping 1kb memory up-gradable to a massive 16k expansion.

Large language models at this stage are just the beginning and are "Not" true A.I. - A.G.I

Personally my days of testing are over its a cheap way for studios to test and develop, there is no production deadline in CoX

No content producer is standing over the Dev team here on strict content release dates a pre-order etc etc.

Oh this must be A.I , oh the formatting i don't like.. okay this is about what I expected.

Many games never enjoy the luxury of still being "online" many of the games I tested in the true sense are no longer with us

such as Free realms , the first free 2 play, pay to win market place model irrc out there as studios moved to Digital downloads

which saved huge amounts of distribution and marketing costs, the potential player base was tiny globally compared to Today.

Take care be excellent to yourself, knowledge requires comprehension, wisdom comes from applying knowledge its called learning.

https://bigthink.com/the-future/artificial-general-intelligence-true-ai/

Gibbler - compTIA, M.S.C.E

Glacier Peak · October 6

22 minutes ago, Gibbler said:

My apologies if this is too technical, Its very straight forward and from "actual real world experience".

Currently the large language models people think is artificial general intelligence is akin to me coding machine code and Basic the 80's

on the amazing Sinclair ZX81 with a whopping 1kb memory up-gradable to a massive 16k expansion.

Large language models at this stage are just the beginning and are "Not" true A.I. - A.G.I

   Personally my days of testing are over its a cheap way for studios to test and develop, there is no production deadline in CoX

   No content producer is standing over the Dev team here on strict content release dates a pre-order etc etc.

   Oh this must be A.I , oh the formatting i don't like.. okay this is about what I expected.

    Many games never enjoy the luxury of still being "online" many of the games I tested in the true sense are no longer with us

    such as Free realms , the first free 2 play, pay to win market place model irrc out there as studios moved to Digital downloads

which saved huge amounts of distribution and marketing costs, the potential player base was tiny globally compared to Today.

    Take care be excellent to yourself, knowledge requires comprehension, wisdom comes from applying knowledge its called learning.

   https://bigthink.com/the-future/artificial-general-intelligence-true-ai/



    Gibbler - compTIA, M.S.C.E

You're listing qualifications, but anyone can beta test here. In fact, anyone can closed beta test also now. There is no need for anything but time and interest.

lemming · October 7

4 hours ago, Glacier Peak said:

You're listing qualifications, but anyone can beta test here. In fact, anyone can closed beta test also now. There is no need for anything but time and interest.

Ah Ok, I see where he's coming from now. It did remind me of some stuff from my years of QA. (project management, dev, qa automation, etc...)

I mean sure, it's a technical post, but a lot of it wasn't that applicable to the players who are testing. Bits of it sure, but some are more in the dev test area and most of the useful stuff, the devs have already given us those instructions.

Would it be cool if we got some better testing guidelines beyond the patch notes? Sure. I feel we do more adhoc testing that anything else.

seebs · October 7

it's not "too technical", it's just not particularly sensical or useful. it reads like an abstract theoretical list of things people might check for in video games written by someone unfamiliar with this game or its current state of development.

High_Beam · November 22

Videra · November 23

Ayo I've been out for awhile and just tabbed back in to check on the forums.

Y'all okay over here?

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What a beta tester really should be focusing on.

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