Vol.
2, Issue 7
December 23, 1999
Pad
Happy:
Everything You Ever Wanted to Know About Game Testing
by
Nick Ferguson
Nick
F tells it like it is to all you wannabe testers...
had a slight problem coming up with a topic for this weeks
column, as I havent played a console game for a few weeks
now (believe it or not, this is supposed to be a column about
the console scene). I could blame this bizarre and ungodly situation
on a number of things, but a burgeoning number of Half-Life:
Counterstrike sessions after hours at Creature Labs would
be chief among them. Mmmm, Counterstrike... So in an attempt
to come up with some alternative copy, I got to thinking about
RadPipes
Down The Pipe from a few weeks back (where he pondered working
in games), and decided I might as well share my experience of
getting my foot in the door of the games industry.
My job
at Creature Labs is
actually my second industry job my first was as a tester
at a major UK developer, which, I'm, sure, would prefer to remain
nameless (thats a big clue in itself). I got the job straight
from university: I went for an interview during April, and was
offered a job in the testing department a month before my finals,
which was great but I cannot tell you how hard that made it to
revise properly! So, after a number of months vacation to ponder
my good fortune I was officially a games tester. Cool! I think
the best way to explain the realities of testing would be to list
a few of the commonly accepted facts about testing
and then comment on their accuracy (or lack thereof). Yes, lets
do that...
Testers
play games all day
One of the first things people will ask if you tell them youre
a games tester is Wow! You mean you play video games all
day long and get paid for it? Admittedly the honest answer
is Yes, but therein lies an assumption that playing
games all day is actually fun. People outside the industry
often fail to realise that testing is not really playing
games as you and I would normally play them my experience
is that its more the sort of thing you might do when youve
played a game to death and want to eke a few more hours worth
of entertainment out of it (i.e. trying to climb the castle in
Mario 64 without using the cannon). It is also important
to remember that testers do not get to choose the games they test
for every lucky soul playtesting Perfect Dark or
Shenmue, there are thousands of others lumbered with much
less exciting fare during their 9-to-5 (in the spirit of Christmas,
I wont be mean and single out any game in particular).
One way
to imagine playtesting is to think about a recent
game you played not one that was outstanding or excessively
awful, just a game mediocre in its fun quotient and middle-of-the-road
in terms of replay value. Now imagine playing that game for four
or five months in a row, ten hours a day, every day. Not only
that, but it is most likely your own testing schedule will focus
on only two or three levels in that game (although eventually
you will be expected to know the entire game inside-out). If you
are still thinking Hey, thats OK, its still
playing a game... trust me - you are not in the correct
mindset! Dont get me wrong - testing could be quite a lot
of fun, but at its core it involves mucho repetitive and painstakingly
slow, methodical work.
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