Joe Chung
Monmouth U. Homepage

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====== Game Quality Assurance ======

...also known as, game testing

{{ http://rockhopper.monmouth.edu/~jchung/images/pennyArcadeGameTesting.jpg }}

===== Reading =====

  * **Game Quality Assurance (QA):**
    * [[https://web.archive.org/web/20110124164132/http://archives.igda.org/qa/IGDA_Best_Practices_QA.pdf | QA Best Practices Report from the 2003 International Game Developers Association Conference]]
    * [[http://www.sloperama.com/advice/lesson5.htm | "Testers -- The Unsung Heroes of Games"]]
    * [[https://www.businessinsider.com/what-its-like-to-be-a-video-game-tester-2015-6 | "Inside the 'dream job' of a video game tester"]]
    * https://www.reddit.com/r/playtesters/

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===== Game Testing Common Perceptions: Myths and Facts =====

  * To the general population, being a game tester sounds like a dream job.
  * Testing is //not easy//.
  * Many of the best programmers and engineers started their career as testers.
    * Testing trains you in what to look out for and to not make embarrassing errors.

==== Game Testing Glossary: ====

  * Quality Assurance (QA) - the professional term for testing
  * Bug - A software problem that exists at the implementation-level (i.e., only exists in source code)
  * Flaw - A software problem at a much deeper level, particularly in the design, which likely bleeds into the code level as well
  * System testing - Test the individual game components; primarily done internally, within development team
  * Play testing - Primarily done among development team, product and marketing managers
  * Alpha - Refers to the fact that everything has been implemented, but there are many bugs and gameplay/functionality issues; testing audience widens to senior-level personnel in company
  * Beta - Refers to the fact that everything has been implemented, and many critical gameplay/functionality issues and bugs have been resolved (but there are small bugs still lingering); even wider audience, nearly public

===== The Real World =====

  * No software is perfect.
  * Software is getting more difficult to make and manage due to increasing...
    * Complexity
    * Demand for extensibility
    * Demand for connectivity

  * Testing often done very late in the integration process, right before roll-out.

  * Testing can be a thankless and under-appreciated job.
    * You will likely tick off engineers and programmers when you find bugs, and tell him/her to fix them.
    * Because testing is done so late in the integration process, a lot of known and found bugs will not be resolved in time because the product needs to be shipped.
    * Most "agree" that testing should be tightly incorporated into the development cycle, but testing is often pushed to the very end.

===== Skills Required =====

  * Excellent communication - You will interact with developers. You need to explain things clearly. Developers must to able to comprehend and recreate the problems you describe.
  * Tech and game-savvy - You must be able to play the game, and navigate through the product, largely on your own with minimal instructions.
  * Endurance - You must be able to work on a project for a long time, for many hours at a time, especially during crunch time.
    * There will likely be much repetitive and mundane work consisting of playing an unfinished game over and over again, installing software, adding/removing hardware.
  * A good attitude

===== General Defect Tracking =====

  * Reporting bugs
    * Done through defect tracking systems.
    * Your report must be descriptive and concise for the developers to recreate and fix the problem.

  * The types of bugs that you report (by severity):
    * Showstopper - These bugs must be fixed immediately. (e.g., glaring problems including audio glitches, game crashes, missing features, etc.)
      * Consequences could include: bad press, poor sales, people getting fired, and a black mark on the company's name.
    * Serious - Problems that gamers will likely notice, but does not take away from the gameplay experience (thus, can hold off on fixing immediately)
    * Low - Not so glaring problems that can be fixed in the next revision or patch
    * Suggestion - Changes or feature additions that would be nice to have

  * Other possible fields in a bug report:
    * Reported on date
    * Report by (your name)
    * Assigned to (developer)
    * Feature affected
    * Description
    * Build/version of game affected

  * Response to bug report:
    * The assigned-to developer will look into the problem and will add to the report:
      * A status: {Open, Closed, Resolved, Not a bug, Cannot replicate}
      * Resolved on date
      * Resolution method
      * Assigned to (another developer)

  * After bug has been resolved, tester must verify the fix.

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===== Types of Testing =====

==== Regression Testing ====

  * If you have a plan to test a set of features, and changes and bugfixes are made, you have to go back and retest everything (the set of features) from the start.
  * Important if you have a patch to be released for the game.
  * Bugfixes and changes can introduce new bugs.

==== Usability Testing ====

  * Very different from QA testing
  * Not necessarily trying to find bugs

  * What you are testing in usability testing:
    * Ease of use
    * Interface design
    * Can you perform a certain task in a game?
    * Is the game actually fun?

  * Evaluation
    * Usability testing should be conducted by someone who is not a developer (no knowledge of the game, thus no influence on testing).
    * Subjects should also have no prior knowledge of the game.
    * Subjects must be carefully monitored, and all actions documented by evaluator/interviewer (e.g., note where the subject was confused, monitor repeated mouse button and keyboard presses).
    * Subjects are encouraged to think aloud.

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===== Game QA Best Practices =====

==== Integrate QA ====

    * Integrate testing into the development process.
    * Instead of testing everything at the end, test at certain milestones.

==== QA Automation ====

    * A lot of QA work is mundane.
    * Write scripts, where possible, to do repeated and mundane tasks.
      * Scripted testing can be very efficient and save a lot of person-hours.

==== Have a test plan ====

    * Define what needs to be tested.
    * Provide a list of expectations for testers.
    * Prioritize:
      * You do not necessarily want to test everything, but you do want to test the critical game features.
    * Identify the classes of problems to be tested for a feature (e.g. kicking a soccer ball), and test the classes a number of times in different game settings:
      * Kick the ball out-of-bounds.
      * Kick the ball to another player.
      * Kick the ball into the goal.
      * Run and kick the ball.
      * Kick the ball while it is stationary (free-kick or corner kick).

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