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MMO10 The failure of the beta defense

By: Eliot Lefebvre 2010-01-22T23:00:00 News Item: 10805

Filed under: Betas, Bugs, MMORPG industry, belief

There are always citizens willing to defend a game, no matter what its flaws. You could have a game where the fundamental means of communication was broken for two months straight, and it would still have fans piping up and explaining why that isn't such a big deal. But with one high-profile game (Star Trek Online) finishing its beta, and several others slated to finish or start theirs, one of the classic defenses for a game's problems is losing much of its strengths: "well, it's still in beta."

Some of you may well recall our recent feature on betas, in which several creators alternately lamented and stated that the "open beta" is now essentially nothing more than a preview. Bio Break expounds on this point, noting that more often than not the defense of "it's just a beta" would only be valid if there was some large commence-day patch on deck torepaireverything. Those patches, it'sworthy ofnoting, occupy the same space as unicorns and fairies.

Broken parts of a game in open beta, more often than not, now mean that there will be something broken in the game at commence. That doesn't mean that the creators aren't working on fixing things, but it does mean that defending the beta as sacrosanct is lacking validity.

The failure of the beta defense originally appeared on on Fri, 22 Jan 2010 23:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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