{"id":2854,"date":"2025-03-17T11:55:59","date_gmt":"2025-03-17T11:55:59","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/sites.wsagames.com\/ea3g23\/?p=2854"},"modified":"2025-03-21T12:26:49","modified_gmt":"2025-03-21T12:26:49","slug":"week-8-testing-in-games-development-crit","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/sites.wsagames.com\/ea3g23\/2025\/03\/17\/week-8-testing-in-games-development-crit\/","title":{"rendered":"Week 8 &#8211; Testing in Games Development \/ Crit"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading has-text-align-center\"><span style=\"text-decoration: underline\">Monday<\/span><\/h2>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">We had a guest lecture from Georgia Mae Ayling, a QA analyst who has worked at EA and Rocksteady Games. She had a lot of insight into how QA works within the industry. QA = Quality assurance, which is the maintenance of a desired level of quality in a service or product. In the context of game development, some responsibilities could be:<\/p>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li>Build verification<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>Finding and reporting bugs<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>Documenting Process<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>Writing, Maintaining and Running Test Cases<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>Usability Testing<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>Develop Testing Tools<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>Verifying Bug Fixes<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Several divisions function within the bracket of QA:<\/p>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li style=\"text-transform:none\"><strong>Functional Testing<\/strong>\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li>Generalised QA Testing<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>Playthrough testing<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>Smoke Testing (verifying a build)<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li style=\"text-transform:none\"><strong>Localisation Testing<\/strong>\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li>Fluent in multiple languages<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>Anything on screen is localised to the language they are working in<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>Checking the game culturally and linguistically makes sense<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li style=\"text-transform:none\"><strong>Compliance Testing<\/strong>\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li>Making sure the games meet standards set by the platform (Steam, IOS, Android)<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>Making sure the game hits the studio&#8217;s internal goals<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>Complying with censorship <\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li style=\"text-transform:none\"><strong>Dev QA<\/strong>\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li>Supporting design and development teams with troubleshooting<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>Connection between QA and other development teams<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li style=\"text-transform:none\"><strong>Specialist Field Testing<\/strong>\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li>Art and Animation testers<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>Game specific elements<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>Audio<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li style=\"text-transform:none\"><strong>SDET<\/strong>\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li>Software Development Engineer in Test<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>Writes, develops and manages automated testing<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<hr class=\"wp-block-separator has-alpha-channel-opacity is-style-dots\" \/>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading has-text-align-center\"><span style=\"text-decoration: underline\">Design Changes VS Bugs<\/span><\/h2>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-table is-style-stripes\"><table class=\"has-black-color has-text-color has-background has-link-color has-fixed-layout\" style=\"background:linear-gradient(135deg,rgb(217,121,236) 0%,rgb(101,144,255) 100%)\"><tbody><tr><td class=\"has-text-align-center\" data-align=\"center\">Design Issues (Usability Issues)<\/td><td class=\"has-text-align-center\" data-align=\"center\">Bugs<\/td><\/tr><tr><td class=\"has-text-align-center\" data-align=\"center\">Is it playable to someone who has never played the game before?<br><br>Examples of issues:<br>&#8211; Unclear Objectives<br>&#8211; Narrative Issues<br>&#8211; Confusing Visuals<br>&#8211; Inconsistencies<\/td><td class=\"has-text-align-center\" data-align=\"center\">A defect in your software.<br><br>Examples of issues:<br>&#8211; Crashes<br>&#8211; Performance Issues<br>&#8211; Cosmetic Issues<br>&#8211; Functional Game Flow Issues<br>&#8211; Certification \/ Compliance \/ Legal Issues<\/td><\/tr><\/tbody><\/table><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-table is-style-stripes\"><table class=\"has-fixed-layout\"><tbody><tr><td class=\"has-text-align-center\" data-align=\"center\"><strong>Testing for Design Changes tips<\/strong><\/td><td class=\"has-text-align-center\" data-align=\"center\"><strong>Testing for bugs<\/strong><\/td><\/tr><tr><td class=\"has-text-align-center\" data-align=\"center\">&#8211; Watch someone play the game<br>&#8211; Don&#8217;t give any info<br>&#8211; Take detailed notes<br>&#8211; Ask questions<\/td><td class=\"has-text-align-center\" data-align=\"center\">&#8211; Don&#8217;t play the game &#8216;normally&#8217;, try to play it in ways curious players might. Hit the wrong things, try to walk backwards etc.<br>&#8211; Try to account for the multitude of ways people will play your game.<\/td><\/tr><\/tbody><\/table><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-text-align-left wp-block-paragraph\"><strong>The limits of testing your work:<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li>You know what you&#8217;ve made; difficult to pretend<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>Giving yourself honest feedback is hard<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>Scale of resources<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><strong>When you test your work:<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li>Have set precursors for quality; what makes a good, better and great game\/song\/art piece<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>Break it down into sections!\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li>Example: &#8220;Today, I&#8217;m going to try and break the: Features, Gameplay, Character, Environment.&#8221;<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>Get feedback on your product, may reaffirm the decisions you made<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><strong>For working with a QA team:<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li>Document your work clearly &#8211; the more clear, the better<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>Test your work before you submit<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>A QA team is very important to the dev cycle &#8211; be patient with them!<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-text-align-center has-very-light-gray-to-cyan-bluish-gray-gradient-background has-background has-medium-font-size wp-block-paragraph\"><strong>What can I and the Kinetic Panic team learn from this talk?<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li>Get feedback from people other than your team and yourself.<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>Document your process so people can see why you made certain choices; sometimes people have to change their feedback when they know the process of why I did XYZ instead of ABC.<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>Write down any loose\/off-hand comments people say about your work (e.g. &#8220;The character is cute\/cool&#8221;, &#8220;This part is hard!&#8221;); it could help you formulate what people think about your game.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<hr class=\"wp-block-separator has-alpha-channel-opacity\" \/>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading has-text-align-center\"><span style=\"text-decoration: underline\">Thursday<\/span><\/h2>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">For the Thursday presentation, we had to talk about our role, what we&#8217;ve done so far, what went well, and the current challenges and help you might need. Here is what I said in my slides to explain my role and work:<\/p>\n\n\n<div class=\"wp-block-image\">\n<figure class=\"aligncenter size-full is-resized\"><img fetchpriority=\"high\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"960\" height=\"540\" src=\"https:\/\/sites.wsagames.com\/ea3g23\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/2\/2025\/03\/Kinetic-Panic-Presentation-Week-8-1.png\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-2965\" style=\"width:514px;height:auto\" srcset=\"https:\/\/sites.wsagames.com\/ea3g23\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/2\/2025\/03\/Kinetic-Panic-Presentation-Week-8-1.png 960w, https:\/\/sites.wsagames.com\/ea3g23\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/2\/2025\/03\/Kinetic-Panic-Presentation-Week-8-1-300x169.png 300w, https:\/\/sites.wsagames.com\/ea3g23\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/2\/2025\/03\/Kinetic-Panic-Presentation-Week-8-1-768x432.png 768w, https:\/\/sites.wsagames.com\/ea3g23\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/2\/2025\/03\/Kinetic-Panic-Presentation-Week-8-1-850x478.png 850w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 960px) 100vw, 960px\" \/><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n<div class=\"wp-block-image\">\n<figure class=\"aligncenter size-full is-resized\"><img decoding=\"async\" width=\"960\" height=\"540\" src=\"https:\/\/sites.wsagames.com\/ea3g23\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/2\/2025\/03\/Kinetic-Panic-Presentation-Week-8-2.png\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-2966\" style=\"width:542px;height:auto\" srcset=\"https:\/\/sites.wsagames.com\/ea3g23\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/2\/2025\/03\/Kinetic-Panic-Presentation-Week-8-2.png 960w, https:\/\/sites.wsagames.com\/ea3g23\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/2\/2025\/03\/Kinetic-Panic-Presentation-Week-8-2-300x169.png 300w, https:\/\/sites.wsagames.com\/ea3g23\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/2\/2025\/03\/Kinetic-Panic-Presentation-Week-8-2-768x432.png 768w, https:\/\/sites.wsagames.com\/ea3g23\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/2\/2025\/03\/Kinetic-Panic-Presentation-Week-8-2-850x478.png 850w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 960px) 100vw, 960px\" \/><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n<div class=\"wp-block-image\">\n<figure class=\"aligncenter size-full is-resized\"><img decoding=\"async\" width=\"960\" height=\"540\" src=\"https:\/\/sites.wsagames.com\/ea3g23\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/2\/2025\/03\/Kinetic-Panic-Presentation-Week-8-3.png\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-2967\" style=\"width:513px;height:auto\" srcset=\"https:\/\/sites.wsagames.com\/ea3g23\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/2\/2025\/03\/Kinetic-Panic-Presentation-Week-8-3.png 960w, https:\/\/sites.wsagames.com\/ea3g23\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/2\/2025\/03\/Kinetic-Panic-Presentation-Week-8-3-300x169.png 300w, https:\/\/sites.wsagames.com\/ea3g23\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/2\/2025\/03\/Kinetic-Panic-Presentation-Week-8-3-768x432.png 768w, https:\/\/sites.wsagames.com\/ea3g23\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/2\/2025\/03\/Kinetic-Panic-Presentation-Week-8-3-850x478.png 850w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 960px) 100vw, 960px\" \/><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n<div class=\"wp-block-image\">\n<figure class=\"aligncenter size-full is-resized\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"960\" height=\"540\" src=\"https:\/\/sites.wsagames.com\/ea3g23\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/2\/2025\/03\/Kinetic-Panic-Presentation-Week-8.png\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-2968\" style=\"width:580px;height:auto\" srcset=\"https:\/\/sites.wsagames.com\/ea3g23\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/2\/2025\/03\/Kinetic-Panic-Presentation-Week-8.png 960w, https:\/\/sites.wsagames.com\/ea3g23\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/2\/2025\/03\/Kinetic-Panic-Presentation-Week-8-300x169.png 300w, https:\/\/sites.wsagames.com\/ea3g23\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/2\/2025\/03\/Kinetic-Panic-Presentation-Week-8-768x432.png 768w, https:\/\/sites.wsagames.com\/ea3g23\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/2\/2025\/03\/Kinetic-Panic-Presentation-Week-8-850x478.png 850w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 960px) 100vw, 960px\" \/><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Monday We had a guest lecture from Georgia Mae Ayling, a QA analyst who has worked at EA and Rocksteady Games. She had a lot of insight into how QA works within the industry. QA = Quality assurance, which is the maintenance of a desired level of quality in a service or product. In the&#8230;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[32],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2854","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-personal-dev-semester-2"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/sites.wsagames.com\/ea3g23\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2854","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/sites.wsagames.com\/ea3g23\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/sites.wsagames.com\/ea3g23\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sites.wsagames.com\/ea3g23\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sites.wsagames.com\/ea3g23\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2854"}],"version-history":[{"count":13,"href":"https:\/\/sites.wsagames.com\/ea3g23\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2854\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2969,"href":"https:\/\/sites.wsagames.com\/ea3g23\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2854\/revisions\/2969"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/sites.wsagames.com\/ea3g23\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2854"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sites.wsagames.com\/ea3g23\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2854"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sites.wsagames.com\/ea3g23\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2854"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}