GAMES TESTERS

Doodee

satchmo wrote: »

Not all testing jobs are created equal. We take on some in-house testers over the course of a project (towards the end of Prototype we ramped up to around 8 contract QA in addition to our fulltime QA lead ). While a large majority of their time was spent testing the game which can be very repetitious, a few of them were also given other jobs (tuning rumble, prop placement, scripting, asset creation etc). They also got to be part of the team for the better part of a year, got to work closely with designers, artists & programmers. This experience is quite different from working for a publisher's QA department, where the only interaction with a game team is through bug reporting software.

It is also definitely an opportunity to move further in the industry; I know one of them then continued on to a junior artist position, and another who's working now as a game designer.

Bingo.

Not all Q.A. positions are the same.
A large portion of game testing involves playing stuff over and over, but to say that it destroys your love of gaming is nonsense.
If anything game testing will give you more appreciation for properly developed games. You become more analytical and critical when you approach a game and just find faults easier.
I would also argue with people saying that it is very boring. I've been doing both development and porting testing and the latter can be boring at times but often it is down to the issues you have been assigned in reproducing.
If it's simple graphical truncations or text string stuff then yeah, it is not the best. However, when dev testing you can find some very interesting stuff. Often there is a great challenge in finding issues. You can often baffle the Engineers but also help them plug holes. No piece of software is 100% bug free, and to assume so is dangerous.

In Popcap we are given some extra duties apart from traditional consumer experience testing. We often get asked to help in the balancing, scoring, flowchart creation, UI mock-ups and other design and development stuff. One of the former Q.A. members from my team is now in the design team as a result.

I would not dismiss all Q.A. positions as being soul destroying but do be apprehensive towards the company you are applying for. Short Term contracts are often for the more monotonous work. If you are considering a long term Q.A. position then you would want to have some previous software testing experience under your belt. A love for gaming and it's development are also essential. Try and go for a position in smaller development studios rather than larger more well established ones as you will find yourself learning far more as the studio grows and finds its feet.

the_syco

Doodee wrote: »

If you are considering a long term Q.A. position then you would want to have some previous software testing experience under your belt.

Does "previous software testing experience" include beta testing games coming out, and also would your "love of gaming" have to be cross console (have gamed on PC's since forever )?

Helix

the_syco wrote: »

Does "previous software testing experience" include beta testing games coming out,

i wouldnt imagine so no, since you need no qualifications or training to beta test

jimi_t2

Any such work in Dublin? I had a good look but it all appears to be localisation

Doodee

the_syco wrote: »

Does "previous software testing experience" include beta testing games coming out, and also would your "love of gaming" have to be cross console (have gamed on PC's since forever )?

anything is an advantage tbh.
If you could prove that you help to locate bugs or logged any yourself during the testing then it would be very beneficial.


A lot of positions are mixed Loc and Testing, hence why they require more than one language.

docdolittle

jimi_t2 wrote: »

Any such work in Dublin? I had a good look but it all appears to be localisation

I've looked, couldn't find much apart from localisation with Activision, Gala and others... All I've found in the area I'm looking for is 3d modeling and the like in the digital hub. I applied for 4 game tester jobs in England last Wednesday, haven't heard anything back yet, but really hope I do! All I can do is keep looking, but I'm prob going to give up looking for a job after this week in the games business and just get any job over here to finally move out of the parents house

B0jangles

Activision in Ireland does localization testing, not pure functional testing, which means you don't get stuck trying 1001 ways to climb the same set of stairs for 6 months, and they work on fairly complete versions of games.

They always have a few people to test the UK versions of games so you don't have to speak 2 languages, but you do stand a better chance of being hired there if you have another language.

btw Hi CombatCow!

-Bojangles (AKA Col Hapablap)