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Why should anyone have to pay to play a companies open beta test?
Dafong
Member Posts: 224
Beta Tests Tied to IGN/Fileplanet Subscriptions.
Isn't that expecting customers to pay to try the Beta Test? Isn't that the opposite of what a open Beta Test should be? Aren't these companies trying to entice us to part with our money to play their game, and they think the best way of doing this is tying their Beta Test to a service that you have to pay for access to? Is it only me that tends to turn two fingers up at these companies?
I will never buy nor play a game that expects potential customers to pay for a Open Beta Test.
To me it is akin to turning up at a Ford Dealership and asking for a test drive of one of their cars and they suggesting that you join the AA before you can take a Test Drive.
Isn't going to happen. What is going to happen is that I am going to walk out of the Dealership and go buy a car from a rival. Which translates to me walking away from one MMORPG and going to play the game of a rival.
Comments
I know exactly what you mean. The whole point of a open beta is to test the servers not have it just so certain people can do it but everyone can.
Beta is for testing, its not a free trial.
You also do not have to buy anything, you can simply not test it. Whats with this thinking that they owe you anything? You are not entitled. Sorry.
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This is simply trying to catch greedy people. People who want a free trial, a preview of the game before its released. You really think the Closed Beta testers couldn't test the Open Beta? Test it better than a wave of people who just want to play the game for free? This is a gimmick, for people who can't wait. Any company is smart to cash in on something like this by going through Fileplanet.
Wait, I am not entitled to test a product that the company wants me to buy?
Then surely there can be no expectation of me buying it.
Which is what I said in the OP.
So your point is?
Well unfortunately the car industry & software industries are far different ball games :P
I've heard this brought up before, and I agree (as an educated software tester) that nobody should have to pay to test a game & open tests should really be done by the standard invites, history, computer spec, etc...Personally I feel its far to hard to get quality testers into game testing without a resume of insane forum usage.
The reason they do it is easy - they know that fans of the game will pre-order and be happy and even if they utterly fail at knowing how to report a bug, in their disjointed QQ they can usually run about a fix. They want to cater to people who enjoy their game, and know about it (people very active on their forums) - as basically free labor
Instead of just letting anyone see the game, they would rather risk fanboys as they are guaranteed to better hype a title pre-release and worse come to worse, they will know -how- to beta test & give viable feedback.
Regardless & somewhat unfortunate, it will only get worse & more business focused...and less quality testing focused, but unfortunately its hard to prove ability with just a few questions & a simple resume of sorts. My best advice is to bite the bullet & hope your upcoming game will offer the same style of thing...or you get very lucky getting that lucky email.
Most people use betas as a trial, but really even if they don't know how or do not report bugs (as is the beta intention) - at the least you can derive good PR and if you can handle the server load, let them test it...but these days its all business.
Bull.
You can take single player games back to the store you bought them from and have them either replaced with another game, a credit note...or in some stores....your money back.
You cannot do that with an Online game, because the key is tied to your account, hence the Open Beta Test as a means of showing customers what you have on offer and giving them an opportunity to see if they should buy it. It also allows for you to do stress testing while the customers do this.
To try and make money out of that by pushing your open beta test through Fileplanet subscriptions, is basically saying you don't want customers to test what you have before you release it....which says to me, that your product is not worth buying.
Thing is you are talking a LOT more about closed Beta. Closed beta's are very seldom done to subscribers of Fileplanet. They are as you suggest usually held much closer to home based on history with the game...etc etc including the many reasons you have given.
This conversation isn't about closed Beta though, it is about Open Beta. The part that is done pre-launch, and is less about the recording of minor bugs and issues within the game and a lot more to do with the servers load testing and showing the game to the public so that they can get a taste for the game and feel compelled to buy it.
Bull.
You can take single player games back to the store you bought them from and have them either replaced with another game, a credit note...or in some stores....your money back.
You cannot do that with an Online game, because the key is tied to your account, hence the Open Beta Test as a means of showing customers what you have on offer and giving them an opportunity to see if they should buy it. It also allows for you to do stress testing while the customers do this.
To try and make money out of that by pushing your open beta test through Fileplanet subscriptions, is basically saying you don't want customers to test what you have before you release it....which says to me, that your product is not worth buying.
No, the Open Beta is not a preview. That's the point. If they wanted to let people try before they buy, they'd offer a free trial. Does it suck? Yeah, but that's the way MMOs work. They're not single-player games, obviously.
Cryptic has let people test the game - in Closed Beta. There were many opportunities to get in Closed Beta, ranging from being accepted based on specs/testing history to getting a key from Gamerzines (which is what I did, though that was near the end of CB and into OB). You think the CB testers are magically banned from OB because they haven't gone through Fileplanet? If that were the case, then I'd agree with you more.
The differences between a CB and an OB is that the NDA is lifted and that the OB is considerably shorter. Yes, that's because it's a better time for stress testing and whatnot. Like I said, they have plenty of CB testers already available for that. Making new people who only want in the OB because they want to try the game before they buy go through Fileplanet is smart.
Wait, I am not entitled to test a product that the company wants me to buy?
Then surely there can be no expectation of me buying it.
Which is what I said in the OP.
So your point is?
The Open Beta is for testing as in testing the servers not for us to try the game out and see if we like it or not and want to buy it. That is what the free trials are for later on.
The game companies do this so to protect themselves from the people who get into beta to see if they will buy the game or not. I know it sucks and Ive been burned a few times and wish there was like a month free trial for some games but that what we as consumers have to deal with.
But the 5 bucks makes sense, if people aren't going to test for bugs and use it as a trial, its just like going to the video store and renting a game to see if its worth buying. If you don't like it then you just saved 45 bucks and if you don't ,the company is still making some money so that the ones who do like the game can still play it.
Bull.
You can take single player games back to the store you bought them from and have them either replaced with another game, a credit note...or in some stores....your money back.
I know for a fact that no store will give you money back if you bought a game. Ive tried it, the game sucked and I wanted money back. They told me I can't even get a different game it had to be the same one.
The reason why they do this with PC games especially is to try and keep people from pirating games. If I could do what you said in the post above, I could spend 50 bucks and have unlimited games. All I would need to do is install them on my computer get a no cd crack for the game then return it and get a different game and do it all over again.
Edit: Oh there was this one time at Gamestop where I got a used game and it kept freezing up on my 360 at the same point. I was able to get a different game only because they didn't have another one in stock. That is the only time ive ever traded a game for a different one at a store.
Well, few things your not really noticing.
#1 they arent charging you a dime, they are simply giving distribution to fileplanet. Fileplanet then limits access.
Why do companies do this? Well simple. Open betas arent meant to be completely open, there would be more users than there would be at launch. They have to restrict access somehow... this is a good way to give it a wide amount of players, yet keep it restricted to something reasonable.
Going with fileplanet makes sure that your users get the ability to play at good download rates, well publicized, and profesional. Allowing you to focus on the game.
I disagree with the idea that Open Beta is anything more then simply a way in which a company tries to entice customers to look at their product. There is NO ingame testing going on at this stage, at the most the company may be stress testing the servers but there is no ingame testing happening during the Open Beta test.
It is also not really an "open" beta test if you still limit the people who have access to that test....surely it is still a closed beta test, the only thing that has changed is the manner by which you choose people?
Game used to run a 10 day return policy I don't know if they still do though.
Walk into a BMW dealership looking scruffy and not having showered for a few days. Now tell the salesman that you want to take a test drive. I'm guessing that you don't have much shot.
Dealers are not obligated to let you drive their cars for free either. If you don't fit a profile of a prospective car buyer, you don't get to drive it around. They'll tell you thank you for the interest, but no. Or they'll ask to see a pre qualified loan. Something that says that you are at least nominally committed.
Now bring it back to this game. If you are Cryptic and want to stress test your servers with X number of people. X is a limited number since you know that this is a niche game. So do you want to reward the people who are going to buy your game anyway? Or the guy who's already bashing you on the forums and wouldn't buy your game if it turned yarn into gold thread?
If you only need a limited number of people it makes a lot of sense to target the people that will be playing your game or are preetty sure they are going to play your game and are willing to part with $5 for the chance to see it. Those are the people I want taking my limited slots.
Isn't that a self-fulfilling prophecy?
A niche game marketed to a select group only, will be a niche game, because everyone else will avoid it.
Now I suggest that if you go to a Ford dealership, looking scruffy, they will still let you drive one of their cars, if you went to a Lamboughini or an Aston Martin dealership then you might get a different response. Is Champions Online marketing itself as an exclusive game only to be played by the few? Is that the idea behind Fallen Earth too? Two games that are currently "open" beta testing to subscribers of Fileplanet only.
Well if that is the case, then they have no problem with people like myself, who might have bought and played their product, saying well if it isn't for me, then I won't bother buying it. I believe that this is NOT the intention of either of those games and that they don't in fact want to limit the people that buy their game or play their game and if their games had subscribers equal to World of Warcraft, they would have a fit of ecstasy .
So I think you are wrong. I think you have plucked something out of thin air that you thought sounded good, but on further inspection turns out to be utter rubbish.
I don't think there is an MMORPG out there that is AIMING for the Niche market, aiming for only a few subscribers. I think they are ALL aiming for the mass market appeal of WoW and the millions of dollars in revenue that it creates each month and most of them fail miserably and end up with a niche game that works to a niche market.
My suggestion in this thread is that maybe if they didn't try and make money out of a supposedly Open Beta test then maybe they wouldn't keep ending up with niche market games.
I've actually been wondering this myself, seems they want to squeeze a little bit of cash from people to test their game, i'm not sure when this became ok, but i won't ever pay to beta test a game, they either offer me a chance to get in or i'll just wait.
While i may be one of the few out there that enjoys actually finding bugs and such to help a game out, i won't pay to do it.
"The great thing about human language is that it prevents us from sticking to the matter at hand."
- Lewis Thomas
I don't disagree with you really but I certainly don't have the passion that you do about the subject for that matter I don't even see it as a huge problem one reason may be that I have never beta tested a game before but I imagine that (to take some of the companies sides for a second) that you are going to have players who simply want a free shot at the game and don't provide any assistance to the company at all, I fear I may fall into the same category at times I would try to be vocal but I certainly wouldn't feel obligated to. I think a bigger issue anyway is the games that release in a state no better than a game in beta such as Darkfall and Age of Conan and until that problem becomes less prevelant in mmo's I just can't really have any passion tied into this particular issue because it is a companies prerogative and it is also a players to either test it or not, now when you release a game as devoid of content as DF or with advertised features missing like AOC then I think we have a problem.
but yeah, to call this game Fantastic is like calling Twilight the Godfather of vampire movies....
You dont HAVE to do anything you dont WANT to do... Its that simple... If you dont want to pay to play a beta then dont.
The way I see it though is that in the older days people would SELL their beta accounts on Ebay and people would still spend money to get into a game they anticipated.
Just more of the same from todays gaming community though with a thread like this everyone expects things just to be given to them.. Personally I think that Companies should only do Direct invites from their fanbase for their betas. Then rotate those people out about once a month to invite other people (once again fans) to get a fresh perspective.. Then if they want a OPEN beta keep it to Pre Orders alone. And a NON refundable one at that.
Are you really complaining about a 5 dollar fee? Somone has to pay to manage the beta, its not free you know.
Plenty of players willing to pony up the cash, othewise feel free to wait for the free trial.
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"This is the most intelligent, well qualified and articulate response to a post I have ever seen on these forums. It's a shame most people here won't have the attention span to read past the second line." - Anon
Real Betas are for testing, the 2-3 week "open betas" most companies have been doing are marketing devices and nothing more. (Maybe a hardware stresstest at best)
This is an absolutely terrible analogy.
Test drive = Trial version. The vast majority of MMORPGs have trial versions.
Test driving a prototype car = Open beta. It's a capitalist market, so it's not surprising that when a company has limited slots it wants to fill in its open beta, they go to players who are very willing to pay money to get into a game early. (especially when bandwidth costs money and you could end up sending your fat client out to thousands of players.)
Raging over people paying to have access to betas seems silly.
"What is truly revealing is his implication that believing something to be true is the same as it being true. [continue]" -John Oliver
A couple of misconceptions.
1. Even though the open beta right before launch does serve more of a marketing purpose than testing, you have no right to participate. If you do, great, if you don't, no one has done you wrong.
2. You do not have to play an MMO at launch. In fact I recommend you don't. If you're concerned about previewing or losing money on a crappy game (a higher likelihood nowadays than it should be) wait till at least 6 months after launch and only play MMO's with a free trial.
I support most complaints about MMO's but complaining about beta is just immature, impatient whining.
Betas have turned into previews, where have you been? I can't remember the last true beta... WoW maybe?
Do you work on a farm? Just your ability to set up a strawman argument is awe inspiring.
Who said it was a right? No one, except you and a few other people who have made the same argument.
The argument is not that it is a right, it is that as a company is it wise? Should we as a community condone it, accept it and continue on as if nothing has changed or should we generally as MMORPG players say no we are not interested in this concept of paying to Open Beta test a game.
As to your point 2, yes I agree, but I am sure the companies making these games would not agree and my argument is that by forcing people to pay to take part in a supposedly OPEN beta test then they are making a rod for their own back as several people like myself will simply NOT pay to Beta test a game and by excluding people like us from the Open Beta test you simply make it in our interests to sit back and wait 6 months for the free trial instead.
Now ask yourself a simple question. Do you want these people to buy the game at release, when everyone is watching and seeing how your game performs, or in 6 months when some other new MMORPG is being released and everyone is watching that game instead?
From a companies point of view I would hazard a guess they want people to buy their game at release. Yet you agree with me that by stopping people who refuse to pay for the priviledge from taking part they can be pretty sure that we won't be buying the game at release.
Every beta is both a "true beta" and a preview. It'd be dumb to assume a beta could have just one purpose.
Every beta, someone's out there posting that the crap's borked on their system. It's how devs uncover bugs they might normally miss without ridiculously extensive hardware testing.
"What is truly revealing is his implication that believing something to be true is the same as it being true. [continue]" -John Oliver
Every beta is both a "true beta" and a preview. It'd be dumb to assume a beta could have just one purpose.
Every beta, someone's out there posting that the crap's borked on their system. It's how devs uncover bugs they might normally miss without ridiculously extensive hardware testing.
You leep saying this in an effort to muddy the waters to suit your argument, but even the Title of the thread states....Open Beta.
An open beta is NOT a place where developers gain insight to the bugs and problems of their games, they have said as much in the past. It is simply a place to stress test the servers and to showcase their game.