Upon Temtem’s announcement, it felt like a dream had come true. A new monster-catching game with a significant focus on overall development and quality had dropped. It had everything Pokémon lacked and new features that would excite any Monster-catching enthusiast. No HMs, reusable movesets, Temtem (the game’s version of Pokémon/monsters), unique designs, new monster types, and much more. It was just perfect, I was already itching to play a monster-catcher game after my disappointment with the latest Pokémon titles, and the timing couldn’t have been better. But then I came to know it was still in development. I seethed that Crema had teased a game with 4+ years still left to its release, only to rile and excite the potential fans of the genre. But then something caught my eye, “We are happy to announce that Temtem is gonna release on steam in a beta release.” I was overjoyed. I didn’t have to wait years to try this game out; I could just buy it on steam and follow along with the development process. Quite a while has passed since that incident, and Temtem itself has gone through ups and downs, but it is still enjoyable to me, and I can’t wait for its official release later this year. You must be wondering why I stated such an insignificant detail to all the readers. Whatever I said above references today’s subject of why we need more public beta releases of games.
Video games, as we know them, have changed rapidly over the years. We are talking about more powerful engines which produce visuals close to reality, in-depth character models, smooth voice engines, etc. They have made our games better in every aspect, be it gameplay, in-game music, or visuals. While I do appreciate and respect this fact, not everything has changed. The most important part of video games, i.e., their development up until their market release, is still conducted behind closed doors, and for good reasons, too. You do not want to make a circus out of a job, nor do you want other competitors plagiarizing your ideas. It makes a lot of sense. But what doesn’t make sense is video game companies assume the audience’s taste on their own and release pathetic projects on the market with various bugs and gameplay issues. The major problem plaguing the video game industry is the launch of half-arsed projects, which are a joke to their respective developers. They also threw away all the fans they had garnered. Yes, I am looking at you, Battlefield 2042!
What’s the solution to this, You may ask? Well, duh, get good at programming and bug testing. At the same time, that is true in most cases. But that isn’t always the case; these games lack live feedback from the audience on different hardware and configurations. We need game companies to launch their video games in a public beta. There are several advantages of establishing a game in beta.
Live Feedback: As a developer, the most critical thing around your mind is how the audience will react to the game. By launching your video game in beta, you won’t be getting on the wild side of the audience. Instead, you’d be testing the waters. Live Feedback can mold your game into a masterpiece. It can drastically improve the game, and that’s the biggest giveaway from launching your game in beta. It is not possible any other way.
Minimal Bugs: Another advantage is that by the time the developers release their game to the entire public on various storefronts, you’d get a game with minimal bugs. That is because if you read my previous point, by receiving feedback, the developers can weed out all the bugs and errors, and thus, you get a game with zero to no bugs.
Further gameplay suggestions: supposedly, if a level was too easy or too hard can only be adequately conveyed by the player, in this case, leaving the room open for developers to address and sufficiently correct the problem. Players can also make other suggestions that can also further improve the game.
Another important point I would like to mention, which is not directly beneficial to the developers, is that all video game fans can enjoy the game together. Additionally, it makes them happy to be able to participate in the development of their favorite video game. Furthermore, it’s free labor since people invest their time and efforts to play your game. Video games that are in public beta have several advantages over those that are in closed beta. You can acquire more data collectively by participating in a public beta test. It will be played by people on a wide range of hardware, from high-end to mid-range and even low-end; this gives you a feedback model that you won’t find in a closed beta test, where there are fewer testers.
All of this points us toward the main topic of the conversation; game developers must launch their games in public beta after seeing recent upsets from major gaming industry players. It is not so easy for me to spend from my pocket on a game that will fail to deliver, and I am sure that is not just me, but everyone is finding it difficult to do so. Not long ago, developing a video game was a project of secrecy, and we’d know if anything about the game just 2-4 days before its imminent launch. But times are changing, and the video game industry needs to change too. If you have read my previous articles around the topics on video quality, you would know how rigorous the process is, and with new game engines out in the mix with too many platforms to target, it’s not getting any easier for developers. In such cases, it is essential to conduct public beta testing.
I would like to conclude by saying that public beta testing is the way to go for all the future developers who are reading this. This method has several advantages over in-house testing, except for a few disadvantages, such as the fact that your game is public before release and you receive constant criticism. Constructively examining the weaknesses will help you to improve your project. There is no better feeling than your gaming project to be the best out there; you should use every tool in your arsenal to achieve that. And of course, you always have a choice of opting for professional QA services of dedicated game testing agencies. That helps especially if you intend to maintain confidentiality for your content and surprise your players with a bug-free and fresh concept.
