Testing is a standard but extremely important stage of game development that affects the commercial success of a game. After all, if it constantly crashes or has other problems in the first few hours, it greatly reduces interest. A tester helps to get rid of all the bugs and bring the product to perfection. If you love playing games and would also like to get money for it, this is the profession for you! Let’s find out how to master it and why it is very promising today.
Otherwise, testers are called “beta testers” or “game testers”. A tester checks the functionality of future computer games by testing them on all possible platforms and devices, and identifying bugs in them that could affect the gameplay (game QA testing).
Generally, testing games boils down to the following:
- find anything that falls out of the game’s given algorithm.
- check if the game server can handle the load.
- test for OS and hardware compatibility.
- check localization – the quality of translation into other languages.
So, the main task of a tester is to play a lot. But it can hardly be called entertainment. And here is where the job of a game tester lies: a specialist has not just to pass all the levels, but to “break the game” – to make it work in a non-standard way. This is exactly what allows you to find flaws and shortcomings and fix them.
The main goal of the tester is to break the game. To do this, the tester: performs every possible action in the game. He clicks all the buttons and links, fills in all the forms, plays all the levels, and clicks all the menus. The tester walks the game up and down and twists it in every direction. In this way, the tester tries to anticipate all possible actions of the players, both those provided by the storyline and those just inspired by the desire to fool around (https://kevurugames.com/).
The game has 20 different characters and 20 different levels. When testing, the specialist must play for each character against each of the characters. And that includes the character himself against himself on all 20 levels of the game. That makes a total of 8000 different matches.
Repeatedly passing the same level. If a gamer passed a level and never returns to it, the tester should pass the same scenario over and over again, trying on different situations. Uses the game in different ways. Even in ways that few users can imagine. The more non-standard ways the tester tries, the more bottlenecks he will discover.
By “bugs” in game development we mean exactly those bugs in the code that cause something to go wrong in the game: the player gets stuck or animation doesn’t work properly. Of course, testers don’t do all these things on instinct or out of the goodness of their hearts. He or she usually has clearly stated requirements for the product. He or she compares the expected result with the one they received and draws conclusions based on it.
The tester prepares a bug report that he finds and gives it to the developers.
A bug report is a document in which the tester records bugs found. He then submits the report to the developers so that they can fix it. In the document, the tester proposes a potential solution to the problem and steps to implement it.
A tester can spend months playing different versions of a game. Often an employee is “assigned” to a particular part of the game that needs to be examined in great detail. Some check for bugs story missions, and some – mini-games.
Specialists can check purely technical aspects – voice acting, display, and functionality of the interface elements on different screens. And in-game moments – the actions of characters, the actions of artifacts, the accrual of Achievements and bonuses, the correctness of login-exit to the game, the transition between levels, etc.
