Look at Ms Fancy pants here-- I’ll have you know the cola I drink has ‘DRINK’ on it, I can’t afford this high class store brand.
And pasta and sauce is amazing. Especially since I can get away with not having to drain every last drop of water!
And I have edited the post to make it more correctful
And hey in any situation wherein you give someone something only you can give (access to the game to beta) in exchange for something most people can give (adequate feedback) I’ve learned some people will adopt a fearful or quiet stance so that they do not lose their privilege. Perhaps if we were all psychopaths that’d be better, but I believe that makes it harder to draw amazing art and write amazing words
Would you be kind enough to explain the reasoning behind the mail address thing?
It’s really unclear to me, and I don’t want to draw conclusions without basis.
It’s of course, completely fine if you for some reason won’t.
I think you might be misunderstanding me? (Sorry, that’s a badly phrased line. I’m not saying it’s somehow your fault.)
It’s not stricter guidelines for the actual beta-testing I’m talking about. I think that would be a detriment to the process, as it would restrict the feedback to a template, and the author could lose valuable input.
The problem for me is the lack of guidelines as to what is (un)acceptable behaviour as a beta-tester.
It might seem like it should be obvious, but unspoken rules like “don’t post spoilers from the game” or the things I have read in this thread, makes it feel like there might be other unspoken rules I haven’t perceived.
And that makes the idea of beta-testing seem a bit like walking down a narrow road next to an abyss with my eyes closed. To use a colourful, and wildly exagerated analogy.
It’s not a problem for me anymore, I got over the feeling (this thread was a great help).
I’m also not saying that it is something that neccesarily needs to be changed, but I think it’s important to be aware that it can be perceived like that.
I hope I make sense.
And I appreciate you spending your time answering my questions.
Beta testers should be detail oriented. A reasonably detail oriented user should be able to figure out how to apply based on that information. Hundreds of people have navigated that small hurdle, so it’s a very low bar to entry, and just shows that you’ve got your eye on the ball from the get-go.
*Do give feedback if you sign up! If you can’t give feedback for some reason or really don’t like the game, please send an email saying why. Try to make it more than “I hate [genre.]” You knew the genre going in, so… tell us why you don’t like it. If you don’t like the choices, say why! If you don’t like the prose, say why! as long as you’re communicative about it, I don’t think it’s an issue regarding further testing. (This feels obvious, but maybe it’s unspoken.)
*Make sure it’s the low and high level feedback, not mid-level. (Not really an unspoken rule.)
*Do only beta one game at a time. (Also not unspoken.)
I’m honestly scratching my head to come up with any “unspoken rules” about our process. As I said above, I think people are really unduly intimidated/afraid of being banned/whatever. We’re not sitting around scheming about whose feedback we like and don’t like and who gets to and who doesn’t. We don’t always have a lot of open slots for betas, so sure, sometimes you might not get to test a game. But worrying about why without talking to the staff gets us all nowhere.
My guess would be that the lack of specification as to what will get you banned (which has been clarified in this thread, but could still be unclear to people who haven’t read it) makes the more neurotic/anxious (which unfortunately is fairly common in detail-oriented people, if I recall correctly) people feel like any small little thing could get them banned. it would often be the same people who would feel intimidated by having to ask the staff.
I understand that taking steps to remedy this would be extra work, for very little gain.
In relation to the unspoken rules thing, I should be one of the worst cases of that, with my autism and anxiety issues, so me getting over it probably means most other people will too, if they really want to beta-test.
EDIT: Clarification: When there are none or few spoken rules, it’s easy to expect there to be unspoken ones, even if there aren’t any.
The “dot com” bit is because I want to foil webcrawlers as best I can. It is generally advisable to not post your email address (as an email address) on the interwebz, as webcrawlers will pick it up and add it to spam mailing lists. The leap from what I write in the beta threads to my actual address is the sort of thing that a human should be able to do but that a robot can’t.
And the fifth “rule” is a clarification of rules two and three: provide actionable, substantive feedback. If you provide a book report in the style of a middle-schooler, you won’t be accepted back into a beta.
Examples of feedback that gets you black marks:
I didnt found some bugs or errors myself lol
I really loved the game it was a lot of fun! I liked experimenting with all the stats and skills and I also like all the characters. I really liked the plot with the mind control and the superpowers! I didn’t find any grammatical mistakes. But all in all it was a great game I loved it!!!
Do you see how those are entirely unhelpful from our perspective? Those are example of feedback that I’ve received (and frequently do receive) on games. If that’s the level of feedback you provide, we don’t need you in the beta. If you can provide anything more substantive than that–even just a single typo–then you’ll be invited back.
Because believe me, none of our games are perfect. Not when they go into beta, and not even when they’re published.
Beta testing seems very fair. I gave a good amount of critical feedback when I last tested one, and I never feared being blacklisted or anything. You all just want honest assessments; that’s a hell of a lot more useful for quality control than is a chorus of “everything is awesome!”
^^There’s only one thing on the record about what results in folx not being included in future betas. Feedback that isn’t feedback. One liners that don’t actually comment on the game, stuff that can’t really be construed as feedback because it isn’t actionable in any way. “I liked it.” End of email. That’s not useful. And that or flaking out and sending in nothing is the main criterion by which we decide whether to allow folx to participate in a beta again. Really.
We give examples of useful and not useful feedback. As long as your responses don’t look like that, it’s probably at least moderately useful.
My inability to communicate in a clear enough manner to get my actual point across is frustrating me too much, so I will leave this thread for a while, and go calm down by doing some actual beta-testing, instead of talking about it.
Not just a lot of betas, but some highly anticipated games.
I have a question. Is it not a nusisaance to send many different reports/notes. Cause I want to send it after one play through, but i wonder if you want a report that’s had a few play throughs.
I’m think this has happened before here, but I can’t remember any specific instances because stuff like this happens to me all the time. Being a highly analytical person, I’ve come to expect people to be offended by my observations. When those people have absolute power over your continued participation in a community you enjoy (or at the very least a direct line of communication and more influence over those who have that power than you do) that’s always a threat no matter what.
I’m not sure what you mean by this. I don’t have an obligation to continue testing for them? I mean, the threat of losing the ability to test future games I might actually enjoy due to not providing feedback that’s considered useful is there. If I don’t at least provide QA testing, and I feel like there’s no point in providing any more high level feedback because the author’s intentions with the story are clearly so far outside my area of interest or comfort then I’m basically just flaking out. I have a reason, but does that matter?
I think you added emphasis to the wrong word here, and that itself is worrying because most of the problems I have with people are based on misunderstanding what I said and then getting offended about it. I know the point of beta testing is to test the game, but closed beta testing is closed. If you just want people to test the game the easiest and quickest way to do it is to have an open test. That way as many people as want to can test it. If you’re actively screening the testers then you’re inherently putting a barrier to entry to testing, and there seems like there would be a reason for that.
I still see people mentioning “unpaid” as if I’m asking for money to test. By “unpaid” I mean “not receiving anything of value in exchange for work.” Getting to play a game you enjoy for free is valuable and therefore payment. Getting to play a game you don’t enjoy for free is not payment because there’s no value in it. Therefore, testing a game you enjoy is paid labor. I’m saying all of this from the understanding that money is nothing more a social construct. It only has value because we agreed it does for the said of facilitating trade.
No! You don’t! And I think that’s the lesson here. As I’ve been trying to say all day.
Let’s say you sign up for a beta, you play it once, and don’t like the game. Send us an email saying you don’t like it. Try to be substantive about why. You’re fine, you’re still in line to test again. Things that get people banned from testing again:
“I really liked it!” (End of email.)
“I hated it.” (End of email.)
From what I’m hearing from you, you’re not comfortable with the possibility that you will not like a game and if you don’t like a game you don’t want to send the “I didn’t like it and here’s why” email.
Yes, it does matter! And having a reason counts as feedback to us! And as long as you provide usable feedback you are welcome to apply for more betas.
As I said, we’re going to discuss providing a free sample of beta games, but it’s unlikely we’d ever hold open betas.
Sure, agreed.
Well, unfortunately…yes. If the most substantive thing a user can say about a game is “This was good. Thanks, can’t wait for it to come out” then that’s not helpful for the author.
I’ve tried to explain throughout this thread, in answer to other people’s questions, that there’s really no complex set of mechanics around people been “banned” or “blacklisted” or just more plainly stated, not invited in future betas. It just comes down to whether you responded with actual feedback. It could still be a small amount of feedback but it has to be real feedback. “I didn’t like X because when Y happened it didn’t make sense.” “My weapon kept disappearing for no reason.”
Based on your posts here I think it’s probably pretty unlikely that the only thing you’d come up with to say about a game is “I liked it” or “I hated it,” namely, unusable feedback. (P.S. that’s a compliment.)
Whatever works for you. If you make a set of notes on multiple playthroughs you can send that when you’ve done a few, or you can send notes after each individual playthrough. Screenshots and context on choices are always welcome if you spot something buggy, but not required.
Customer: Hey, so you’re going to give me free steak, right? Waitstaff: Pardon? Is that a new promotion I haven’t heard of?
Customer: Free steak. I want free steak. Waitstaff: We don’t serve free steak here.
Customer: Then how are you going to compensate me for my time? I drove all the way here and spent gas. Waitstaff: I’m sorry, we can’t do that, the prices are clearly listed on the menu.
Customer: Alright so here’s what you’re going to do. You’re going to give me some free steak. And if I don’t like it, you’re going to take it back and get your manager to explain to me why I didn’t like it. Waitstaff: Ok, so, how is management supposed to be able to read your mind?
Customer: You’re being rude. And you clearly still owe me for the gas it took to drive here.
About this whole ‘new member’ thing, say if I meanly interested in one topic, but I can only reply a handful of replies. and not be able to post any more like for 2 or 3 days now, when will thie ‘new guy’ thing finish? anyone knows this? thanks.
WOWOW that is FAST… I just posted this request, just 1 min after it I get basic level… whoever did that, thanks a lot.
I have been beta tester for 2 of your games. I,cyborg and magic tower ones. I wanted to send you screen shots of what i want to be changed by what. But it is not possible to send you attachment* by email.
I really wanted to enjoy magic tower one. I love knights,magic, medieval games. But i was disappointed. I was worried you might not like my feedback. I can suggest something here. If you will look here or Mary can send to you.
Thank you very much for taking the time to explain all this over what turned out to be a surprisingly long thread for just being about a site administration function. Hopefully this helped resolve some concerns for people who had similar ones to mine. I know it did for me.
@Carlos.R The issue isn’t that we’re demanding free steak. They’re offering free steak with the caveat that it’s an experimental preparation method that we are being tapped to provide feedback on that may be vastly different from what we expect based on the short description. If we can just give feedback on why we really dislike the preparation method and thus don’t want to finish the steak and that won’t then preclude us from being able to test future experimental steak preparation methods that we might really like, (which is what Mary has explained is the case) then that’s not really a major problem. Also the steak is being mailed to us, the issue of time doesn’t really work with a food metaphor.
(Sorry, that’s a badly phrased line. I’m not saying it’s somehow your fault.)
