Distribution Is it wise to share a beta program?

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PHL

Guest
Is it wise to share a beta program?

I read about how people can test the beta of a game online. But can people not "pirate" it by having access to it?

Also, if people play the game as a beta, why would they want to buy the finished game, since they know what it is like?
 
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MatthewL019

Guest
If your game is small-time, then I suggest releasing a beta to a select amount of friends or a small group of people that you can trust.
 

Yal

🐧 *penguin noises*
GMC Elder
A lot of open betas (aka "tested by random online people you can't trust") I've seen footage of have a splash screen that reads something along the lines of "this is an unfinished buggy beta version not for public use, if you got this somewhere else than the beta program you have been ripped off, here's a link to the official site and social media if you want a proper version". Perhaps having something like that could make it safer to have a beta version? Even if it gets pirated it could hopefully help spreading awareness of your real product.

Also, many betas has some sort of watermark in the GUI that points out it's a beta or unfinished release (e.g. Yandere Simulator, A Hat In Time) so that even if the player forgets what the splash screen read, they have an omnipresent reminder.
 

sylvain_l

Member
Is it wise to share a beta program?

I read about how people can test the beta of a game online. But can people not "pirate" it by having access to it?

Also, if people play the game as a beta, why would they want to buy the finished game, since they know what it is like?
going to give my point as more of a beta tester, not a dev.

1. if you can't answer the question: why am I doing a beta? NO.
Else, well you know why ;)

2. It's as safe as releasing a game^^. AAA with top notch protection get pirated, so there is no absolute protection against that (except never releasing your game :p)

3. For me, demo and beta tends to kill my willingness to buy. (exception if your product is damn good and lot of replayability/or I find a regular usage for it)
Yeh, be wise enough to not put "the full game" in the beta if it's possible.
It depend a lot of the genra. I mean for a F2P with IAP, beta is just fine. For a Visual Novel, from my perspective thing are not going to end well (I mean with a buy).
But don't forget that having a limited number of beta players that get enough through the beta and don't buy, isnt much of a loss. It can still really worth it if it helps polish and get a quality game/app that many more players/users are going to buy.

Alternate way is to get some way to have paying beta (like kickstarter campaign).(*)

One of my last beta test install for
http://nevercenter.com/pixelmash/
honestly beta 2 and 3 were deciving for me; tool's interesting and has much potential, but lack of feature to make it usable standalone AS IS. next beta 4 with the new dynamic layer transform is exciting, (and there are also other feature in the pipeline that are coming that are also exciting).

p.s.
(*) honestly on 3 items I've backed on KS, they are all over due date. I dunno if it tells how unreliable they are... or overconfident they where with their time prediction. Perhaps more how betas and taking into account feedback of beta testers can lead to additionnal time required to refactor feature/polish, etc...
 

Yal

🐧 *penguin noises*
GMC Elder
(*) honestly on 3 items I've backed on KS, they are all over due date. I dunno if it tells how unreliable they are... or overconfident they where with their time prediction. Perhaps more how betas and taking into account feedback of beta testers can lead to additionnal time required to refactor feature/polish, etc...
The most famous Kickstarter failures I've seen so far all had issues because of scope creep, so from that we can learn that as a dev you shouldn't promise console ports. That seems to be the least common denominator of where Yooka-Laylee and Mighty No.9 failed, at least (especially the latter having disastrous console ports), and A Hat in Time's page has a big notice that basically says "we know having more than one code base is gonna be a bad idea so we won't".
 
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GenaCtoto

Guest
Well, if people wanna to pirate your game, it almost impossible to prevent them from doing this. But look, if someone want to pirate your game it means, that your game in interesting enough to make people want to play it. Cause nobody would spend time to pirate a boring bull***t. And beta testing is a really helpful thing.
 
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