Starbound bugs don't stand a chance

I was just thinking, that with the amount of pent up desire borderlining anxiety there is for the player base to get their paws on Starbound ...

once beta releases, those bugs are going to get discovered, classified, categorized, re-defined and lovingly gift wrapped and handed back to Chucklefish in the outside of a hot New York minute.

Will the headlines read: "Starbound: The Cleanest Launch Ever" ?

 

Maybe, but before the release and before those positive headlines show up, I'm worried early headlines will say "Starbound: A Buggy Disappointment".
Fans are so hyped for this beta, that they've forgotten a beta is mostly a bug-test/balance-test. There's gonna be a lot of complaints...

 

We should make a beta focus group, to test every aspect of the game in sections, to insure thoroughness.

Hey that sounds like fun ...

Is anyone else feeling OCD enough to start planning such a thing?

 

I've never done a proper beta test of a game (I usually either wait for full release, or I've gotten roped into playing with a friend who has more investment in it than me and I know nothing about the game previously, lol). This time though I genuinely want to help. Despite never beta testing, I AM rather OCD about some things in games... grammer issues/mispellings, skills that don't work exactly as they should or efficiently as they should, difficulty spikes that are just way too much, items spawning inside the ground... to name a few.

So I really hope that the beta goes smoothly and people will be responsible and concise with their reports so the team can work efficiently.

 

Bugs will always leak through either through updates or just rarity but the beta should allow us to squash any game breaking bugs and make the release stable.

 

People will find bugs as quickly as you say.

Sadly however, a lot of people don't get beta testing and either flood the forums with, "OMFG Chucklefish fix this, not good enough!!" Or the another popular one, "I found this bug and I think you need to remap the whoflabba-jim-jam-I have no clue what I am talking about".
Or my all time favourite, "I found a bug..." ........................... Ok but what bug?!?!

(God I have been in such a glass half not helpful mood since I quit the death sticks)

 

It's possible that bugs might be found which resist any and all efforts to find and fix, and/or a minor bug is deemed too disruptive to fix (like if fixing it would require a rewrite of the entire game engine.) I've seen both of these situations occur in other games. Hopefully there won't be any in Starbound, but the possibility exists.

 

Congratulations, cigarettes are the worst tobacco available.

 

Or people are going to whine that there are bugs and come QQing on the forum that this is unacceptable and that they want a refund.

 

Yeah that's true but those people don't matter.

Alright I'm not seeing any support for it, but after Beta goes live, that's what I'm going to do: rally some determined bug testers together and do a comprehensive sweep of every game function in a systematic manner.

 

Suddenly I feel terrible about my plan of play normally and report and bugs I happen to find.

 

one day after beta releases, all the bugs that chucklefish hasn't found already will be found and reported in the blink of a eye by the many crazy obsessed starbound fans who will stay up all night on the day of beta launch which will most likely be at midnight on that day. and those fans will be waiting at their computers up to the last second until the beta completely downloads, then the devs will end the beta in the blink of a eye before hardly any of us have a chance to even play it because all the major super obsessed fans will find all the bugs within one day of game play after beta launches at midnight on the day of beta launch.

Eric Cartman says: "Beta ended already?!? NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!"

 

I'm all in... debugging is a part of my daily life, it's what I do for a living, among other things. :alien:

I offered my assistance to the Starbound team, but they sadly haven't called on me; so, count me in as far as anything to be done on a more serious note for the beta.

 

Whoever is interested, I'll contact you after beta releases, and I'll go by this thread ... so if you want to do this, say so here.

 

I, for one, plan to test the crap out of this beta. Hope there will be some interface, either in-game or forum-based or whatever else, to report bugs with ease.

 

A guideline for documenting bugs for people who haven't done much bug documenting in the past might be helpful.

e.g. (And this is by no means comprehensive)

• Description of the bug
• effects of the bug
• Steps to reproduce the bug (if possible)

Someone's sure to have a way better list than I, but one thing to keep in mind when trying to get one fixed is that the development team will have an easier time squashing it if one can tell them how to cause it to happen, rather than just saying 'OMG THIS HAPPENED FIX IT'

 

Complaining is gonna happen. Be prepared!
Sorry if i sound so negative to you guys but.. It will happen cause i lost hope in humanity a long time ago.

Certain people atleast know what to do!

 

Yeah, a lot of beta's in the past have been more publicity stunts that actual betas, so people expect the game to be a fully working version of the actual release but without a few items or modes. The starbound team seems to be putting a lot of work into getting the beta ready to go, because first impressions are SO important, but I wouldn't be surprised if there were some smaller bugs left. People always freak out and have negative reactions to just about everything on the internet though, but I'm sure the overwhelming majority will be happy to have the game and and try to work on problems.

^ This.

As somebody who does programming, I can't tell you how many "mystery bug reports" I've gotten. If people don't properly explain exactly how to reproduce the bug (how to make it happen again), it doesn't really help the programmers much, except to let them know something's wrong.

 

I am ready