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Details Of May 2 Game Update Issues


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I'm happy you guys are placing invested time to making this game better and better! As they say, in non-curse land, "Poop happens!"  😛

I cannot wait to see what is to come with the game health, performance and new graphic features are coming!

 

IT'S LIKE DOING A PIPI DANCE!

 

/hugs to the ArenaNet staff!

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I used to be a manual QA tester for a software development company, and these kinds of things happen.  I appreciate the open communication and especially the skill with which software development concepts were translated into relatable context.

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6 hours ago, Mild Disaster.2596 said:

Thanks for the update.  I'm sure a lot of angst comes from folks not understanding how things work behind the scenes, communication like this helps.  And for those of us who are familiar with these types of environments; I'm sure a lot of 'been there done that' and sympathetic sentiments came up while reading the synopsis.

But considering the nature of this bug, I have to wonder about your QA tests.  This seems like a pretty fundamental functionality that could have probably been caught with simple automated tests ( although I will plead ignorance )

Also have to temper this against the ongoing issues plaguing wvw that never seem to get attention/communication ( think recent reset night crash fests ).  Maybe some communication there would help the community.

While I don't work in the industry, I know folks who do and I know someone who performed QA testing for Luigi's Mansion. I figure it's still very different from the process for an MMORPG, but if anything I would infer that the latter requires more QA testing to ensure adequate functionality and minimal severe bugs. 

 

My interpretation from the update was that they seem to have a QA system, but that a large portion of updates/content do not go through the QA process due to not having enough QA testers to run everything through QA. 

 

I agree that communication could be better (and has been in the past). Patch notes seem to have become more and more sparse as time goes on, with many smaller changes not being included in the patch notes. Even smaller games have much more exhaustive patch notes. 

 

My frustration lies more with the organization of ArenaNet and recurring issues with staffing, overworked devs and other staff, etc. (which is common in the industry from what I gather, sadly). The devs and staff have my sympathies. 

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3 hours ago, Wonderra.3469 said:

While I don't work in the industry, I know folks who do and I know someone who performed QA testing for Luigi's Mansion. I figure it's still very different from the process for an MMORPG, but if anything I would infer that the latter requires more QA testing to ensure adequate functionality and minimal severe bugs. 

 

My interpretation from the update was that they seem to have a QA system, but that a large portion of updates/content do not go through the QA process due to not having enough QA testers to run everything through QA.

QA testing isn't what it used to be. Live services fly by the seat of their pants more. There should be UTs and in many cases integration testing, but code isn't quite beaten up the same way it used to be because fixes can ship faster than in early phases of the industry. 

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I'm sorry to say this but your management of the development process is at fault here. Yes handling merges and branches in various states is challenging, and yes refactoring legacy code is walking through a mine field. I get it I really do. I have to deal with it on a smaller scale myself every day.

However, anything you're shipping to live should have been thoroughly tested weeks before release. But you can't because you don't have a Test Server that we know of. Why not? The shift you guys made to cloud hosting should make this possible to do.

If bugs of this magnitude are slipping through your own developers testing, your internal testing department and your Q&A department then there's a serious problem.

I have no doubt that should you open a public Test Server, many of your players would gladly take the time to assist you in testing and help alleviate the pressure in the studio. For free.

I think it's time you guys lifted the shroud of secrecy you're so comfortable hiding under and look at better processes to support what you stated.

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