That’s really interesting. I’ve never really had to beta test anything but ‘open betas’ where feedback was more on mechanics and the like. I’m not a numbers person; I’m more inclined to pay attention to story than battles. And I love that you had something to say on dealing with situations where there’s all these options to hit the enemy and none that’s non-combatant. I love great fight scenes and I’m here for non-gratuitous violence, but I really love creative use of powers in ways that aren’t combat oriented and I feel a lot of games should implement something like that for players who don’t like taking a violent stand. MGS comes to mind on a few occasions just because I’m pretty sure there’s an achievement in one of the games centered on getting through the entire story without killing anyone/sneaking through it. Undertale also comes to mind with it’s entirely Pacifist run.
It’s good to get insight on what beta testers do, especially in games like this where it’s a lot to do with story and I can’t help but think that’s it’s hard to please everyone, even with a diverse beta tester pool. And it’s hard to try to please everyone while staying true to your story. I commend Zachary for being able to make a story that’s staid true to who he is as a person (and how incredibly inclusive he is; it’s not an easy feat and I hate that it’s such a big risk in today’s society to even think about including non-binaries and non-binary pronouns. Heroes Rise actually was the first time I’ve ever seen the pronouns even used). He’s a great writer, even if our vocal minority in this thread have put in a lot of criticism for this latest installment in the series.
When you beta test do some of the producers/authors ever reply to any feedback that you give them? Do some of them set up some kind of rapport with their testers, provided they don’t have like a hundred or even twenty? Or has your experience noted that most of them don’t and you kind of have to find out if they took your feedback or not in the next build of the game?