Sean "Ashen Temper" Dahlberg this is the guy who helped Shadowbane out. Good guy, SB was the best MMO EVER

all it was was a test to see how many people would come rushing to the forums to sign up. so yea it was a game test, to see how many suckers thought they were going to sign up and get to "play" the game when bioware allows it.

what i can see testing being of concepts and systems more than anything making sure that each piece can work how they want.  Never expected it to be more than that for now and sadly the idea of beta testing has been so watered down that lost its original meanings (hell look at google who has us all still beta testing their stuff). In past when used to test for EQ and was in 2nd phase of SWG it was much diffrent than it is today where beta testing is just another phase of marketing strategy and not so much for testing systems and  designs.

Originally posted by Schonk31

I have done all types of game testing in the past and the way I look at it is that I am helping out the SW: TOR team in some way.

As clear as mud...

I hate all these people testing before the game comes out because it basically means everyones mastered the game before it's even out and it isn't exciting anymore.

Like I said before, this game is a late 2010 or 2011 release at best.  Getting excited over testing that is at best many months away is silly.  They still are defining classes for this game, so it is not completely fleshed out yet.  Bioware is much like Blizzard, you will not see the game from them until it meets their satisfaction.  Case in point, the way they handled Dragon Age,

Originally posted by Loke666

Originally posted by iank240

Game testing, maybe alpha tests for specific classes/locations.

Beta testing is later on.  Where there is a more rounded product available for testing.  Testing chat/combat/landscape, etc.

A more thorough test of specifics.  I can imagine they will choose a certain group with say Windows Vista with Geforce graphics card and say "test this area for us" with 2x anti aliasing option and resolution min. 1024x768.

I dunno, I am not from Bioware but I can see that as a worthy test.

 

Some years ago did Alpha testing mean internal testing of things like the Ui.

Beta testing meant that some people would test parts of or the whole game for bugs and report them in.

What everyone today call a open beta was just a few free days of gameplay when the game launched and most games had nothing like that whatsoever.  They sometimes tried to fill a server for the last week of the beta, as a stress test.

Many companies have watered down those words now and that is most likely why Bioware cleared things up with the statement.

/agreed

Isn't this called Alpha Testing? 

Originally posted by Ozmodan

Like I said before, this game is a late 2010 or 2011 release at best.  Getting excited over testing that is at best many months away is silly.  They still are defining classes for this game, so it is not completely fleshed out yet.  Bioware is much like Blizzard, you will not see the game from them until it meets their satisfaction.  Case in point, the way they handled Dragon Age,

DA was a marketing decision from EA so they didn't have to have a second ad campaign to cover the console ports like what happened with the Mass Effect launches, at least to my understanding.

LOL

You have been part of a test and you don't even know it.

Someone please tell me when you have seen a major website crash do to numbers of hits? And before you run your fingers (mouth) think about it first. A simple test to see what your, hype, server loads, and lag are.

Just some food for thought.

Originally posted by Varny

I hate all these people testing before the game comes out because it basically means everyones mastered the game before it's even out and it isn't exciting anymore.

Nope

To me it means I'm getting ready to buy a high-end game not a Ford (Fix Or Repaird Daily).

So please test the game for 10 years if thats what it takes.
 

O and a game is exciting to me when I Mastered it, I don't need to be first.

The fact that this is now being differentiated really bothers me.  Why?  Because if people think the results of beta testing are bad now, as in a waste of time because people are using the opportunity to play rather than report bugs and suggestions, I cringe at the thought of these same people being in alpha stages.

BioWare is a smart company. They've probably learned the lesson from Turbine, which showed so well in LoTRO, that a Beta Test is really more of a Marketing tool than a testing tool. Yes testing still happens, but if you've got a defective, boring, unplayable game in the beta test, that word is going to get out to the general community fast -- NDA's be damned.

So what you see here is BioWare controlling the characterization of their process which is smart business.