Has play testing gone away?

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Onyxia2016

Onyxia2016

Well-known member
I have to say that with this latest release and the subsequent bugs it has caused should not have made it past testing.
This leads me to believe play testing is not really being done.
Just because it compiles does not mean it is working properly.

In just the past year I have gone from, giving the SSG team the benefit of the doubt to shocked at what is being produced to OMG what have they screwed up now.
I hate feeling that way by i see the same thing happening over and over. Solutioned to bugs that result in the entire player base being punished for something that was out of their control.

Where does this end?
 
Ahpuch

Ahpuch

Well-known member
There is a bad habit of jamming in some extra changes between the final Lam preview and the full release. That means a bunch of changes never play tested by the largest "QA group". In this case there was 3 weeks of changes between the final beta and release including a lot of significant changes beyond number tweaking.
 
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Fallout47

Fallout47

Well-known member
Onyxia2016 said:
I have to say that with this latest release and the subsequent bugs it has caused should not have made it past testing.
This leads me to believe play testing is not really being done.
Just because it compiles does not mean it is working properly.

In just the past year I have gone from, giving the SSG team the benefit of the doubt to shocked at what is being produced to OMG what have they screwed up now.
I hate feeling that way by i see the same thing happening over and over. Solutioned to bugs that result in the entire player base being punished for something that was out of their control.

Where does this end?
Click to expand...
I am embarassed to admit that I have played this game for going on 10 years. I quickly came to the conclusion that they do no QA, in the last 6+ years I realized that they don't listen to the players that do QA for them on Lama. Finally, when they moved to virtual servers (time frame?) I came to the conclusion that they break everything that they touch.

I'm not sure how long you've been in the game, but I would say that you have been giving them the benefit of the doubt too long if your answer is greater than a couple years.

When will this end? When they drive enough vets away. For those of us still here, we are shocked it hasn't happened yet.
 
CherryBomb

CherryBomb

Well-known member
I would think that the budgets are so tight and the development team is so small that the variety of computers/installations is also much smaller now. This might allow problems that were previously found with a wider test base are now slipping through QA. I am thinking this since not all players find the same problems.

As an example. my DDO installation started crashing when tabbing between DDO and other windows as soon as the Feb 21 update/reboot came back. This was not a problem even minutes prior to the DDO reboot, but manifested itself as soon as DDO came back online. This problem still has not been resolved.
 
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V

Vua

Well-known member
Fallout47 said:
I am embarassed to admit that I have played this game for going on 10 years. I quickly came to the conclusion that they do no QA, in the last 6+ years I realized that they don't listen to the players that do QA for them on Lama. Finally, when they moved to virtual servers (time frame?) I came to the conclusion that they break everything that they touch.

I'm not sure how long you've been in the game, but I would say that you have been giving them the benefit of the doubt too long if your answer is greater than a couple years.

When will this end? When they drive enough vets away. For those of us still here, we are shocked it hasn't happened yet.
Click to expand...
Lama is not and never was a test server, it's a preview server. Once it gets to Lama it's nearly a finished product that gets tuned a bit, but the decisions have already been made.
 
Onyxia2016

Onyxia2016

Well-known member
Fallout47 said:
I am embarassed to admit that I have played this game for going on 10 years. I quickly came to the conclusion that they do no QA, in the last 6+ years I realized that they don't listen to the players that do QA for them on Lama. Finally, when they moved to virtual servers (time frame?) I came to the conclusion that they break everything that they touch.

I'm not sure how long you've been in the game, but I would say that you have been giving them the benefit of the doubt too long if your answer is greater than a couple years.

When will this end? When they drive enough vets away. For those of us still here, we are shocked it hasn't happened yet.
Click to expand...

My wife and I got selected by Turbine for early testing long before the final launch date. Worked through issues, helped with some of the early dungeon designs, triggers, etc.. There was many of us and we could interact with the devs at the time explaining what we were seeing and talking through the issues. It was a great time. It was a lot of work, taking detailed note an submitting the reports but it was for the love of the game. About a year or so after launch life got in the way so we stopped playing. Fast forward and we have only really started play again in the last few years.

It is very disheartening to see how things are now. Sad really. Having an army of people willing to do QA testing and share there experiences and to have to fall on deaf ears.

Vua said:
Lama is not and never was a test server, it's a preview server. Once it gets to Lama it's nearly a finished product that gets tuned a bit, but the decisions have already been made.
Click to expand...

Yes, Lam is a preview server but if someone points out a very bad issue you would think there would be some appreciation and it would be address before the final release. If anything Lam should be a test server more so than a preview, you get what you get and like it server.
 
dur

dur

aka Cybersquirt
Onyxia2016 said:
I have to say that with this latest release and the subsequent bugs it has caused should not have made it past testing.
This leads me to believe play testing is not really being done.
Just because it compiles does not mean it is working properly.

In just the past year I have gone from, giving the SSG team the benefit of the doubt to shocked at what is being produced to OMG what have they screwed up now.
I hate feeling that way by i see the same thing happening over and over. Solutioned to bugs that result in the entire player base being punished for something that was out of their control.

Where does this end?
Click to expand...
Thought that was what Lamania was for.. ? Otherwise, IDK, it's an MMO :coffee:
 
J

Jummby

Well-known member
Onyxia2016 said:
I have to say that with this latest release and the subsequent bugs it has caused should not have made it past testing.
This leads me to believe play testing is not really being done.
Just because it compiles does not mean it is working properly.

In just the past year I have gone from, giving the SSG team the benefit of the doubt to shocked at what is being produced to OMG what have they screwed up now.
I hate feeling that way by i see the same thing happening over and over. Solutioned to bugs that result in the entire player base being punished for something that was out of their control.

Where does this end?
Click to expand...
Would play testing have to existed for it to go away?

Do you really think that's air your breathing right now?

*chuckles
 
Memnir

Memnir

Well-known member
dur said:
Thought that was what Lamania was for.. ? Otherwise, IDK, it's an MMO :coffee:
Click to expand...
Lama is only a preview server. It's never been a playtest server.
Yeah, we can report as many bugs or problems as we want - many have. But, SSG is not beholden to fix or change anything reported on or complained about. Because they are only giving us the option of previewing... not the ability to test and report so they will fix or change.

IMHO, Lama is just a way to get frustrated with content before it's really even content.
 
Lag4Ever

Lag4Ever

Active member
Selected internet-enabled business models in a nutshell:
  • Adobe: Users are a recurring revenue stream, let's make products with best-in-class features, mandatory subscriptions and high switching costs!
  • Facebook: Users are the product, let's make our sites ubiquitous & addictive, then sell their data regardless of privacy settings!
  • SSG: Users are an annoyance, let's ignore their extensive and free feedback, blame them for poor game performance, and shove endless beta-level software releases down their throats!
I must be some kind of masochist to still be here at all.
 
J

Jummby

Well-known member
Memnir said:
Lama is only a preview server. It's never been a playtest server.
Yeah, we can report as many bugs or problems as we want - many have. But, SSG is not beholden to fix or change anything reported on or complained about. Because they are only giving us the option of previewing... not the ability to test and report so they will fix or change.

IMHO, Lama is just a way to get frustrated with content before it's really even content.
Click to expand...
You have no idea how many people come to our Baatezu Discod server after testing stuff on Lamania to report on it. Those that have access to the server thank you for doing so.

They tell people in voice chat what they like and don't like. They then mention what looks bugged.

With regards to what's bugged, players say: "I am sure that will get fixed before release someone will report it"....

What the devs hope will be a server for free info and play testing are just people looking for a free sneak peak.
 
seph1roth5

seph1roth5

Well-known member
Playtesting is the day the update is released. That day, any pro-player issues are "fixed," such as quest closures. In the following weeks they're actually fixed. After a month or 2 the playtesting is done.
 
droid327

droid327

Well-known member
Lama might actually be able to prevent a bug from making it to Live once in a while, if previews werent only 48 hours long...in the middle of the work week...and if they actually communicated well enough during the whole process that people would actually spend their time on Lama testing the new features and content, instead of just figuring out how bad the new nerf is actually going to be
 
V

Vua

Well-known member
droid327 said:
Lama might actually be able to prevent a bug from making it to Live once in a while, if previews werent only 48 hours long...in the middle of the work week...and if they actually communicated well enough during the whole process that people would actually spend their time on Lama testing the new features and content, instead of just figuring out how bad the new nerf is actually going to be
Click to expand...
That is why it's a preview server and not a test server. They adjust or fix the low hanging fruit and let everything else go live regardless.
 
O

Orchidblossomwasgutted

Well-known member
Vua said:
That is why it's a preview server and not a test server. They adjust or fix the low hanging fruit and let everything else go live regardless.
Click to expand...
actually... it is a TEST server. it is theyre own "Testing environment" for us it is why we are able to grab tools like named items... Sentient XP... DDO Points every minute or buying access to packs and simply leveling up
 
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