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Distopia
 Drifter
Joined: 11/22/05
If it contains the words video and game, it must be a WOW clone. |
5/11/06 7:11:33 PM#21
Essentially a lot of people do pay to play a beta , Through frontier like pre orders .
For every minute you are angry , you lose 60 seconds of happiness."-Emerson If you can't argue the point don't say anything at all. |
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5/11/06 7:17:00 PM#22
how exactly does people being beta and knowing where stuff is hurt you or your gameplay? you'll eventually figure it out yourself or they'll be able to help you if you get stuck. and how does paying to play a beta solve that problem? does paying magically erase all memories of the game from their brains or something? you just sound like one of those little brats who cries because Joe got the Uber Leet Sword of Uber Leetness +20 and you didn't. |
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Jorev
 Novice Member
Joined: 11/15/04
If you are not part of the solution, you are part of the problem. |
5/11/06 9:41:45 PM#24
If a company is relying on volunteer players to beta test a product in order to actually find bugs and flaws, then that explains why so many games are crap when first released. Using free labor to stress test a game for a couple days prior to release and to give players a taste, is the only acceptable exploit of free labor. Players don't volunteer their time to a profit company for free unless they are motivated by selfish reasons. As stated before, those reasons are to learn the mechanics of the game prior to retail to gain an advantage, not to test a product for the game developers. Beneficial bugs and flaws will go unreported. You actually need to hire dedicated staff for proper beta testing. What a concept.
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5/11/06 10:34:39 PM#25
Someone hasn't paid attention to D+D Online which had a free trial offer like a week or 2 after launch :P |
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5/12/06 12:36:37 AM#26
paying to get into beta it's called pre-ordering the game and getting a code, a lot of mmorpg makers now days are doing that as a sure way of getting into beta along with their randomly selected people. charge for beta, i dun't think so not many people are willing to pay for something thats not complete that they might not necessarily get if the project shuts down in beta.
Ex: WoW player |
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5/12/06 3:24:09 AM#27
A Beta is supposed to be play testing and bug finding, gameplay balance that sort of thing. Unfortunately the way it has turned out, betas are usually a way for people to find exploits that they do not report(so they can use them in retail), and for little kiddies so they can play the game a couple of months before it's out. Your post confirms this trend.... You want to pay so you can get ahead of the pack so to speak. There is no question that people WANT to pay for betas. BUT: do you actually want the people who are willing to pay to beta your game? I know I wouldn't. It's a payoff: sure, you can make money on the beta, but then you will attract sub-par testers like yourself, and people with motives other than actually testing and improving the game. Besides, and I speak from experience here, it's ALLWAYS less fun to play the released game when you've played the beta. You allways hear whining beta players who complain after a week that it's less fun than the beta, etc, that the beta times were the good times, etc... That's because these people have burned themselves out on the beta. So they find a new beta, and play an unfinished game for a bit, then jump to the next. Why pay to play unfinished games? I'd rather wait for the release, and have fun with a less buggy game. |
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Vilendl
Apprentice Member
Joined: 1/19/06
Im like a rat in a maze that says, watch me choose my own direction. - Neil Peart |
5/12/06 7:43:00 AM#28
Um, Maybe if that 20 bucks was a deposit on the actual game. Also should be refundable if you dont like it. I would go maybe 5 bucks if it was a game I was really looking forward to. Other than that you are just setting yourself up to be ridiculed by every person who payed and didnt like it. Word spreads quick over the inter-thingy. |
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5/12/06 7:47:34 AM#29
Paying money to help a company test and 'perfect' there game realy doesnt appeal to me, now if they payed me £20 to test a game in beta it would be another story :D
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5/12/06 10:57:41 AM#30
The problem with paying for beta is that people will no longer play it to help fix the bugs but actually expect a game they paid for. Beta is a testing of the game, not a playing of it. The first time that the devs decided to restart the server because they discovered something wrong, you'd be hearing nothing but complaints about that game for the rest of eternity.
Companies are lucky to have people playing their betas. It creates hype for the game itself. If their game sucks, it creates a marketplace response to their suckage. Games should never be charged for until the game is released and you're starting to get service instead of being the one providing service to the company in the first place. Otherwise, don't even have a beta. Just release the game with bugs and charge people to play it as you fix it. Lets see how well your game does after that. My blog: |
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