Originally posted by Yamota

This is completely non responsive. You didnt refute one of my points I made but just said "oh my friend is this and that and you are wrong". For your information I have 5 years experience in software developing and, even though I am not a primary SW tester myself, I have worked and attended classes of the best SW testers out there. So if you want to refute my points then please come up with rational reasons for it rather than nonsensical BS.

I want the game to be good as well but fanboys already have decided that the game is good so they will be much less likely to find bugs because in their mind the game is already great. A tester should not have that mindset, he must be critical of what he is testing and try to break it.

Also, what has your friends rotten work eithics got to do with anything? If a tester fails at this job then for sure he will, or should be, fired. So if your "friend" doesn't care if what he is doing results in the product becoming more stable and more bug free then he should lucky that he still has a job and whoeever is hiring him unlucky that they have a tester that doesnt care of he if is improving the product he is testing.

Btw you are contradicting yourself because I said you should not have too much invested interest when testing a game because that could cloud your judgement and that apparently is wrong according to you (no reasons given). Yet in your last paragraph you said your friend does not care about the product. So what is it? Should you or should you not care about it?

Its not non responsive at all. He responded to what you said and you did not succinctly phrase your rant for a point by point retort. To paraphrase you: "games are crap because beta testers are amateurs." He responded by saying "well at least an amateur is more likely to be motivated, otherwise they wouldn't be doing it". A good retort, and one you are yet to refute adequately.

aion isnt unfinished poc its actully a decent mmo

Indeed they are unfinnished , in some way or another.

But think of how much a game cost to devolope,

say 5 years  and 30 employed earning 3500 dollar a month

5 Years times 30 employed+ social expense + equipment , making a very raw calc

Raw calc = around 50 milion dollar

When money runs out , you need to release it.

Noone is forcing anyone to do anything.

I think its great for fans to be able to play as soon as possible. And if you are not interested, then dont pay any money.

Originally posted by rounner

Originally posted by Yamota

This is completely non responsive. You didnt refute one of my points I made but just said "oh my friend is this and that and you are wrong". For your information I have 5 years experience in software developing and, even though I am not a primary SW tester myself, I have worked and attended classes of the best SW testers out there. So if you want to refute my points then please come up with rational reasons for it rather than nonsensical BS.

I want the game to be good as well but fanboys already have decided that the game is good so they will be much less likely to find bugs because in their mind the game is already great. A tester should not have that mindset, he must be critical of what he is testing and try to break it.

Also, what has your friends rotten work eithics got to do with anything? If a tester fails at this job then for sure he will, or should be, fired. So if your "friend" doesn't care if what he is doing results in the product becoming more stable and more bug free then he should lucky that he still has a job and whoeever is hiring him unlucky that they have a tester that doesnt care of he if is improving the product he is testing.

Btw you are contradicting yourself because I said you should not have too much invested interest when testing a game because that could cloud your judgement and that apparently is wrong according to you (no reasons given). Yet in your last paragraph you said your friend does not care about the product. So what is it? Should you or should you not care about it?

Its not non responsive at all. He responded to what you said and you did not succinctly phrase your rant for a point by point retort. To paraphrase you: "games are crap because beta testers are amateurs." He responded by saying "well at least an amateur is more likely to be motivated, otherwise they wouldn't be doing it". A good retort, and one you are yet to refute adequately.

Haha, nice strawman argument there.

What I said and the the BS line "games are crap because beta testers are amateurs." is completely different. You must have serious reading acomprehesion issues if what I said is anything remotely similar to what you said, more likely you are just trying to (grossly) distort what I said.

I said that fanboys, that are typically, too much emotionally invested in a game would not be a suitable to test said game because they would be less likely to see flaws in the game because in their mind the game is already great. Nowhere in that statement did I said that amature testers are crap, that is entirely your construct.

Your, made up, argument is about amateurs vs professional and how an amateure is motivated because he likes the game(since he does it for free I assume?). This touches on something else I said where I claim that SW companies hire professional testers (which they do). That being said does not mean that amature testers are crap, fanboy testers are crap and that is the previous argument, not this one.

A classical strawman argument (by replacing one argument with a complete other one in a way to make it appear that you are right) and a good one because it touches on something else I said. But np, I can shoot down your strawman argument with the simple fact that professional testers get paid, usually alot, and that if any is a better motivation than "liking the game". And if they do not properly test the SW then that will, under most circumstances, be discovered and said tester will get fired or at the very least get the reputation of not being a good tester. That is a much heavier motivation then "liking the game".

Originally posted by daarco

Noone is forcing anyone to do anything.

I think its great for fans to be able to play as soon as possible. And if you are not interested, then dont pay any money.

 

you have completely missed the point as usual (although, i will grant you it was difficult to pinpoint it in the OP)

and WTH!!! - - - i could have sworn i had you blocked

Originally posted by BadMedicine

 You are making several assumptions here:

1. You  assume that the customers, paying from 100 to 50ish [the aim is for digitial download to be cheaper than DF], will forever love the game and not care if their quite considerable amount of money is wasted on a poor product. That is a giant leap of faith right there. There's a  lot of people very passionate about the game, but not because of some specific features, but rather because of the idea of it. Since this is likely to be the last shot at a true sandbox MMO for a while, you can be damn sure at least some of them will properly beta-test it.

Please dont confuse with me saying fanboys = customers. I am a Mortal Online customer but not a fanboy and I would wager most potential customers are noth fanboys either. However, I assume that alot (not all) of the ones paying 70-120 $/€ for a game not released for another 6 months and in early phase, will be fanboys.

So again make the distinction about people wanting it to suceed (like me) and the people that has already decided that this game is the best thing since sliced bread and will jump on anyone who is remotely criticizing the game. Those latter ones are abundant on the official forums, and some have even come here, will not be suitable testers because, in their mind, this game is so good that it cant possibly have any major flaws. Hence they may find and report minor bugs but other features like how PvP notoriety system, full loot, AI  and so on actually works in practice is nothing they will have negative opinions about since they have already decided that this game is great and hence could not possibly have any major flaws right?

This is evident with their posting where they always claim how great MO is, even though they have never actually played it.

2. You assume that a 'paid' beta like this will be inherently inferior, at the same time suggesting a classic beta that so many MMOs use. But just look at recent and not so recent releases. Vanguard, Age of Conan,  WAR, WoW [despite what some people think, damn near unplayable at launch, with servers constatly down the first weeks], Darkfall. In all those games, even DF with its horde of adolescent, rabid fans, bugs WERE reported, possible exploits WERE pointed out, the devs had plenty of feedback. They just chose to ignore it.  Is it so hard to believe that with this rather large number of beta-testers [out of which, as in EVERY beta test, most will of course be useless apart from stress-testing], with devs that genuinely seem to welcome feedback and interaction with their community, could actually bring a half-decent result?

I dont disagree with these statements, except that I do think a classical beta would be better because one would assume that for a classical beta they would chose the beta testers based on their merits and not the size of their wallets.

3. You assume that a free beta test brings in people without a lot of interest in the said game, but willing to beta test it properly. I'm sorry but that seems like nonsense to me. Beta testing is not much fun, especially in early stages. Any testers without a strong interest in the game are likely to be just after a free try-out rather than opportunity to help the devs. While some of those freeloaders are sure to submit *some* meaningful feedback in a moment of weakness, I don't think that's a great loss in the grand scheme of things.

 What? No, I dont think a free beta test brings in people with alot of interest in the said game but I do think that the beta testers that the devs choose, rather than beta tester that pay to get in, are more suitable to testing the game because they would be picked, as I said above, on their merits rather than their willingness to pay to be in beta.

 In the end that's the model SV went for, and I think most of us realise that financial concerns were a good part of that decision. The beta invitation was likely what made a lot of people preorder this early. I would like to see more indie studios trying their luck with the MMO genre, and I'm willing to give them a bit of a benefit of a doubt as to how they get their funds to do that. That's of course irrelevant to the main point, the quality of the beta, but I still think it's a good point to touch on - would you rather that the beta was free, and the game had to be released early and unfinished [see DF]?

No doubt fincancial concerns were the major part of their decision however, financial concerns aside, I do not think a paid beta is for the benefit of the game and I have explained why I think so.

As for your question, ofcourse not. And if the two only choices are an expensive beta with later release than a free beta with too early release then ofcourse the former would be better. However I do think there are other options, such as a properly done free beta test with a proper release. If Starvault dont have the finances for that then one would wonder if their product is good enough to attract enough good investers that believe in their product.

That being said I do know the SW industry is a hard one and it is dificult for indie companies to make it. However I am not sure that getting your potential customers to pay to beta test your game is the right way to go.

 Pardon me for not answering you point-by-point but frankly, we could go round and round in circles here. We just assume different things about people who bought the preorder and beta testers in general. Who is right will be shown in time, there's no way for either of us to actually prove his position.

 I'd just like to add, how closely do you think each potential beta tester would be scrutinised, anyway, was it a free beta? With a limited number of staff availible and 10k spots [so probably tens of thousands of beta requests at very very least]. Judging by the quality of your average MMO beta-tester, not very closely. They are mostly chosen on their system specs to get a range of technical feedback from low-end to high-end system - or that's my guess, at least.

OP:  Spell-check is your friend.

Originally posted by BadMedicine

 Pardon me for not answering you point-by-point but frankly, we could go round and round in circles here. We just assume different things about people who bought the preorder and beta testers in general. Who is right will be shown in time, there's no way for either of us to actually prove his position.

 I'd just like to add, how closely do you think each potential beta tester would be scrutinised, anyway, was it a free beta? With a limited number of staff availible and 10k spots [so probably tens of thousands of beta requests at very very least]. Judging by the quality of your average MMO beta-tester, not very closely. They are mostly chosen on their system specs to get a range of technical feedback from low-end to high-end system - or that's my guess, at least.

I don't think they would be closely scrutinised at all but the % of fanboys would be random which would not be the case for a paid beta that costs 70-120 $/€, which is my point rather than the high quality of free beta.

Flipside is ofcourse that the ones that paid would probably be more dedicated but still I think the cons outweigh the pros. It is never good to let fanboys shape a game because they have lost their sense of objectivity.

IMHO, plenty of beta testers give little to no feedback as they use beta as a demo and to leak info. That said when they do companies often ignore because the beta is nothing more than a formality and a release date already set with little to no time to correct anything beyond cosmetic.

Also many companies are simply not interested in the games long term life span. In fact I get the impression many want initial box sales and might prefer this. Of course many desperate MMO types will buy shit for an inflated price, simply to be "first". Some fanbots will never admit mistake. So were an easy market to exploit really.

Will MO be like this ? Who knows but in this climate they won't see a penny of my money and I hope MO gets a decent amount of intial box sales which promises more,  if the game gets good reviews/community reception.

In reality the intial box sales will be liberally shat through mailboxes.