Wait, wait, wait! So even when you`ve bought everything you still have to buy the Beta?
- Thread starter SeaFireliv
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Frontier needs our help to get their game straight.
And WE must pay THEM, to give that help.
Someone is getting ripped off. [yesnod]
Do you have any idea how creating a game works? Do you know what Beta means? I dont think so.
I want the game to go on and I want to support the work they do. So I buy paint jobs, ship kits and so on. If you dont wanna do that or if you feeling ripped of, fine. But noone IS getting ripped of....you only got the feeling so :/
This is an interesting debate, and one that is not unique to Elite: Dangerous.
Game developers have discovered that players are so keen to get their hands on the latest updates that they are willing to pay for it.
We see this throughout the industry under different names.
Early Access
Game Preview
Pre Release Access
Paid Beta
Paid Alpha
And so on....
So from the point of view of the developer this is a market where they can earn money.
As for the actual testing, this is a double edged sword.
They get revenue from running a public beta test program and the code is pounded into oblivion by the community. So thorough testing, sort of.
But public beta testing in no way replaces internal testing. They have to deliver a coherent and reasonably stable testing environment. So internal testing is required.
They also have to recreate the issues that are dicovered by all the testers internally in order to fix them. This requires them to maintain multiple test branches of the code. Further, internally the most current build can contain stuff that is not to be released in the next public release. There may also be spoilers that they need to hide in the beta test release. Running public test programs also creates a lot of noise and false positives, all of which have to be addressed. So running a public test program is still expensive and requires additional developer resources. So it is not as efficient as one would think. Targeted and closed beta testing, where all testers focus on specific tasks and specific parts of the code and have signed NDA's does have some merit.
Paying for testing and pricing: When a company runs public beta tests, they want committed people that follow through and document what they find. There aren't that many ways to encourage this. Charging for testing does at least mean that the person paying has a vested interest and, I would argue, is more likely to follow through when testing.
Back during the Kickstarter, FDEV charged £200 for alpha access. Thinking about it, that is horrendous. I always wandered why FDEV did that. My theory is that they wanted to ensure that everyone in alpha testing were committed and willing to invest time and effort. They did that by setting a pretty steep price on alpha access. This is pure speculation but, looking back, I think it worked.
So compared to 15 years ago, charging for beta testing (charging people to work for you) does seem unethical. I think the views these days is that people are actually paying for the involvement in a process that interests them. It's almost like paying for entry to an art gallery where all the pictures are for sale, you are paying for an experience, but you have to pay more to bring that experience home.
I understand why some think that charging for beta testing is wrong, especially when they have already bought the game. But reality is, beta testing has become another product in the online store.
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I have question sort of related to this.
I purchased a lifetime pass and I get beta all the time; if it ever stops working does that mean like.... curtains?
I purchased a lifetime pass and I get beta all the time; if it ever stops working does that mean like.... curtains?
This is the reason why people spent money on useless junk. Because something is being considered cheap, the countervalue is not being considered at all. It's even more weird when you consider they are paying to be able to work for FDev, who sell their work in the end. It's like paying 5$ for being eligible to clear Walmart's parking lot from snow. Is this twisted thinking only working for games?
Your still paying to work for the compant - I don't know how you can't see that.
What is the world coming too ey? I don't get this neither but it seems to be the way of the world in this industry though. That said I still got the liftime pass and PC Alpha (and paid extra) - but there again I do have issues
You're still doing it
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If you don't bother to think about it you would come up with an answer like this but as thinking people, we have objections. For instance, why are you paying for S2 and then being denied early access to the content you already paid for! Who the hell does that and who the heck is paying FD, again, to play the DLC they already bought!
Next, this kind of "beta testing" is just about the worst kind you can do. We only need to look back at the massive failures before to see this is NOTHING more than a cash grab by greedy FD. There is no testing going at all. Practically every release is broken and they don't fix ANY of the bugs so how is this beta testing!
Thei shareholders love people like you whilst the game continues to be a bug ridden mess. Honestly, how can anyone here not be annoyed at being literally taken for a ride?
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So it's £10 to beta test - so £40 over the 4 parts to this season so more than the actual season cost to buy? Can you make this up??? [haha][haha][haha]
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LOL yeah maybe I should do that too...
Jex "No paying for beta is a GOOD thing you should ALL do it!"
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Maybe it's time to invest in some FD shares, they are good at making money it seems
No Starbucks wont do that, because someone can get burned and then they will get sued BECAUSE the coffee was HOT (never heard of hot coffee before)
LOL yeah maybe I should do that too...
Jex "No paying for beta is a GOOD thing you should ALL do it!"
Umm.. once bought the beta applies to all of Horizon's releases. So it's 10 once for all the betas.
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Earlly access to content you just paid for
What part of this is so difficult for people to understand here?
That's like buying a sandwich THEN paying for the priviledge of eating it and then saying "Well it's capitalism" or "Well it's only 50p quit complaining!" LOL
No, it's like buying a sandwich and paying an extra 50p to lick the lettuce while it's being made.
How this post missed being picked up by the mods is....
If you didn't pay for Beta access then you clearly don't get access as you haven't paid for it.... if you paid for Horizons you will get exactly what you paid for once it is released.
Did you report it yet? Or are you just ing?
For free???????????
I can't facedesk hard enough here - so Horizons is FREE is it? That's really funny because I thought people had to pay for it.
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Have you seen their financial report? I really wish people understood reading those better
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You're paying for the final, released product, not early access to betas that (let's be honest now) you won't really beta test.
If you're going to actually beta test then you'll have a long list of things that need to be tried, and reports to write up. Actual beta testing is tedious, finicky work.
Stop kidding yourself that you're beta testing. You want early access to fun stuff. And for that you pay.
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