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MMOGames.com presents: Beta Blues

posted by: Serpentius Tue 27th Jul 2010

Beta Blues

by Daniel Ball and Cody Hargreaves

Dan: The word Beta can have a lot of connotations for many different people. Lovers of language will describe to you its Greek roots. A physicist will have his own spiel about just what the word Beta means to him. The same goes for medicine, electronics, and even psychology.

However, we gamers tend to have our own understanding of the word, or, indeed, multiple. It can be the beginning of something beautiful or, more commonly, an indicator of a really poor quality game.

You might download a ridiculously large installer (which for me and my middle-of-nowhere Internet is anything larger than 500MB. Go Australia!) only to play for five minutes and realise that all that lurking on forums, and all those trailers you religiously watched in anticipation were completely misleading.

During beta phase, you would be hard-pressed to find any legitimate reviews on the game so early online, and trying to decipher forum posts looking for an indication of the quality of the game is like trying to translate the foreign language of a society whose frontal lobe decided evolution just wasn’t for them (and who nervously exclaim ‘WoW Clone!’ in every conversation).

What Beta means for the company is testing. Games journalists and players then have the role of playing the game, evaluating it, and hopefully improving it (depending on the stubbornness of the developers).

What Beta means for me right now is experiencing a new game, so I’m going to let Cody take over for a while.

Cody: For me, the term ‘beta’ roughly translates into the word ‘beginning’. I know that in reality these two words have about as much in common as Toy Story 3 does with the latest Tarantino film, but to me, it becomes a matter of symbology. Working for so many years as a game critic, hearing the word beta informs me that I’ll be beginning a new game; that I’ll be beginning a new job; that I’ll be beginning writing another review or preview or article; that I’ll be beginning another day at work.

And too, like Dan mentioned, it means that I’ll be beginning to download a new game on an Internet connection that was rumoured to have been used by the first Dinosaurs on Earth, and that, should the past have an indication on the future, I’ll be beginning to uninstall said game approximately 48 seconds after beginning to play it.

But that’s not what it really means. I’m a cynic both by nature, and by trade. I cast all words that play a part in removing me from WoW to work in a negative light. But really, the term ‘beta’, in the video game world at least, (you’ll need to ask Dan about what it means to a psychologist; etymology ain’t my thang) testing a new game to ensure that it’s as bug free as possible before it is officially released. A process that in my opinion, is as important as developing the game itself. Thoughts, Dan?

Dan: It’s amazing what can be achieved in those 48 seconds of playtime before you get rid of the game like it’s a super virus.

My thoughts tend to flow something like this:

‘What the hell is this HUD about? Where’s the inventory? I’ll just press this button and— I died. Dear God, this game is terrible. Oh! It just crashed. Perfect. Saves me having to close it.’ And then it’s deleted at the speed of light. I wish I could say it was quick and painless. But it so very rarely is.

That said, not all betas I’ve played are terrible, but even so, there are still a few problems to face. Mainly, these vicious, vicious, soul-devouring betas insist on toying with our very emotions, mainly: hope.

Say you really like a game; you play it day in and day out, and... Oh, yeah. The game is only in beta for 2 days, and you’re going to have to wait another year or so until it actually comes out. Terrific! Flash forward, and the game’s out tomorrow. Awesome! You’ve been waiting forever for the damn thing to come out. You check the site. Your heart drops as the ‘news’ sections flashes a headline: ‘Monthly subscription fee!’

As Cody said, the bottom line is that beta testing is a necessary thing. A lot of games wouldn’t be what they are now if they hadn’t been beta tested. We gamers and critics just have to accept that fact that we’re the industry’s little guinea pigs. Can I get an amen!

Cody: Amen, brother. Amen. Such scenarios are commonplace in the world of beta testing, and especially so when in the realm of the MMO. Personally, I believe that a lot of these issues come down to a lack of real testing prior to the beta.

The vast majority of MMO developers appear to be of the impression that their MMO beta period should be used as some form of ‘sneak peak’ experience, allowing gamers and critics alike a chance to get in and give their new game a try before the release, and hopefully, score some points in the review section of a few websites in the process. In other words, they’re trying to score a slice of free advertising, and hype up their release before it arrives. But there are other methods available.

Developers like Blizzard (World of Warcraft) submit their games to an intensive and rigorous testing phase months before they even come close to releasing a beta build for the public eye, and even when they do, spots are limited and given away not at random or as a prize in some cliché ‘submit your favourite pic’ competition, but to those who have properly submitted their computer details; to those who meet the needs of the testing phase entirely.

And the results are… well, we’ve all played World of Warcraft. The results are amazing. I don’t think this is a coincidence. Bottom line: there’s a reason we have a beta phase in video games. A good one. Of that much, we’re sure. We just need to let our developers in on the secret.