How to Become a Playtester
Games are an entertainment medium full of choices, freedom and interaction! Unlike watching movies, every play-through of a game results in a different experience each time and for each individual player. Many challenges in game development can only be overcome through a lot of constant playtesting. Not only to spot technical issues and bugs, but mostly to learn how players are actually experiencing these games. Game developers rely on your opinions and feedback as a player to make their games better. If you’re interested in becoming a playtester, here are 3 key tips on how to become a playtester:
1. You don’t need to be an expert gamer
Every player regardless of skill, experience and background can offer a unique perspective on games. Whether you’re a seasoned gamer or only casually sometimes play games, your opinion matters. Diversity in playtesting can be incredibly valuable for game developers as it gives different insights in how their games are being played by different people. For example an expert player may have a lot of references in mind of similar games and genres they’ve played before, whenever they playtest and will have different expectations, compared to somehow who’s new to the game or genre altogether. It helps developers like Gazingy to better balance the games and to make the gameplay more engaging for players of different skill levels.
2. How to prepare for playtesting
Playtesting is something we and many other game development studios take very seriously. We always compensate our playtesters (based on the type and length of the testing sessions) and test many different aspects of our games with actual players. When you sign up to become a playtester at Gazingy, you’ll get notified on future testing opportunities you can be part of. These playtesting sessions can range from extensive on-side play sessions at our studio. Or more simple sessions you can do from home or even questionnaires in which we pitch new gameplay ideas to you and ask for your opinion. Testing can vary from very specific features and technical topics to other types of more generic research. In most cases no preperation or prior knowledge is required, and we always want our playtesters to come in as ‘unbiased’ as possible.
3. Be honest and don’t hold back on your opinion
With playtesting, the more honest the feedback, the better! We rely on playtesters to make our games and ideas better, ahead of new game launches. It really helps to have those honest opinions on things that we can do better in our games. When providing feedback during playtests, be honest, constructive and open minded. Always over-explain or over communicate to let us know what issues you ran into or what ideas you have, and describe those in as much detail as possible. There’s is no right or wrong in playtesting, and you really cannot make mistakes while testing. All feedback matters and can provide meaningful insights for the game development teams. Often times the negative points are way more important than the positive feedback, since the game is still under development during playtesting session, there will be things that don’t function well or aren’t ‘fun’ just yet. This is where your opinion as a playtester comes in.
At Gazingy we greatly value the opinions and experience of the gaming community. Our newly launched Playtesting Program will give gamers an opportunity to influence our game development and contribute to better games for everyone. Playtesters participating in the program will receive rewards and exclusive sneak peaks into future and ‘in development’ content. It’s also a great way as a playtester to add experience to your resume and to meet some of the developers behind the games. Sign up to become a playtester!
Sign up Here
