Difference between revisions of "Diablo 3 Beta"

Revision as of 05:06, 26 September 2008

There is not yet any official word on a beta test for Diablo III. It's quite likely they'll conduct one though, during the months before the game's release.

This page has all the info you'd want to know about the Diablo III beta test, in a Q&A style.

Will there be a Diablo III beta test?

It's not been confirmed, but Blizzard has run large scale public beta tests for every one of their games thus far. It's hard to imagine that Diablo III won't follow that successful path.

What's a Beta Test?

Beta tests are large scale tests of a near-finished video game. To date, all Blizzard beta tests have been semi-public, with website signups drawing in thousands of public testers, who join Blizzard employees, their friends and family, fansite invitees, members of the media, employees at other gaming companies, and others. Beta tests generally scale up in size as they progress; starting with a few dozen testers, then gradually expanding to hundreds and then thousands of testers. In the old days this meant physically mailing out beta CDs; these days with the beta clients being shared via bit torrent, it means passing out more valid beta CD keys.

What's an Alpha Test?

An Alpha test is run before the beta test, and is usually much smaller. The Alpha client is less finalized than the beta client, and is usually the first game build that's semi-complete and playable. Alpha tests are almost always private, and limited to employees, friends, and family.

What's the purpose of a Beta Test?

Beta tests serve multiple purposes, depending on the game.

The original Diablo beta test was called the "Battle.net Beta Test" since it was largely made to test Blizzard's new online gaming service. That the software contained the beta client of Diablo I was almost beside the point, since the game was small enough to be tested internally. The hard part was getting the online matchmaking of Battle.net functional.

All computer game beta tests are chiefly used to fix technical problems. Public beta testers have an enormously wide variety of computer systems, and ironing out all of the hardware and software issues keeps Blizzard's technical crew very busy. Numerous game bugs are fixed as well, as the influx of new players invariably find ways to break the game that the company's QA department didn't discover.

Beta tests are very useful to companies as they work to streamline the early player experience as well. Beta tests seldom include the entire game, but they always have the early portions of the game, including character creation and other opening content, since it's essential (especially for Blizzard games) that their games are immediately involving and enjoyable. This is one reason companies like to pull in a wide variety of testers; noobs and dedicated fans alike. Experienced players will skip past minor glitches or confusing

How much actual game testing goes on in a beta test varies from title to title. RTS games like Starcraft 2 generally feature the entire game, but only the multiplayer portion. They can run for many months, as countless tweaks and changes are made to the unit stats as players find new ways to exploit units, and one race or another seems too powerful, or grows too weak as new techniques are developed.

RPGs sometimes include the entire game client, but are usually more limited. Diablo II's beta only included Act One, and only the character skills up to level 18. The D2 team knew they'd need to make changes and tweaks and balances to items and character skills and monsters post-release, but they knew players would need longer than they wanted the beta test to run to get deeply enough into the game to offer valuable input on overall game/item/spell balance. The D2 beta was chiefly used to test out the new Battle.net features, and to test the early aspects of D2 itself. They wanted to perfect the fun factor and leveling speed and early items and skills and monsters and quests. Larger game balance changes were made in post-release patches and were based on the input and play choices of hundreds of thousands of players, rather than just a few hundred beta testers.

How long will the beta test run?

How long a beta test runs depends on what they're using it to test out. Blizzard might include all of Diablo III in the beta client and run a long and exhaustive test of the entire game. Or they might only include the first Act and the low level skills, much as they did in Diablo II's beta. The latter type of test would obviously not take as long as the former. It does seem likely that they'll be testing out all of the Battle.net features, such as (potentially) shared stashes, trading via email, friends lists, special rare quests, not to mention the entire basic online gaming infrastructure.

Battle.net 2.0 is scheduled to launch with Starcraft 2, which is scheduled to be released before Diablo III. In theory, SC2 will guinea pig the new service and find all the bugs, which should streamline the Diablo III testing process.

When will they announce the beta test?

No dates have been given yet, nor will they until much closer to the game's release. Blizzard typically announces their upcoming beta tests some months in advance. They also give at least a month's notice on the date they'll start allowing interested parties to sign up for the test. Their sign up periods usually run about a week, and there's no preference given to people who sign up first, though you'd never know this from the massive crush of fans who flood the site the instant the sign up forms go live.

The time frame for everything varies from test to test, but a hypothetical time line runs something like this:

• January: Upcoming beta test announced. No time frame given.
• March: Beta sign up date announced for next month.
• April: Beta sign up runs for one week. Several hundred thousand fans sign up.
• May: Beta start date announced for next month.
• June 1: Beta test begins with the client being made accessible via bit torrent. A small number of beta keys are sent out, chiefly to friends and family and media.
• June 10-30: More beta keys are sent out, dozens or hundreds every few days, depending on the stability of the hosting servers, how many hours the testers are logging, how far behind the programmers are running on their bug fix lists, etc.
• July: Many more beta keys are sent out as the test scales up in size.
• August-?: More testers are added, the game is constantly tweaked with patches and fixes, rinse and repeat.

Will there be an open beta test?

Beta tests with valid beta keys required to play are referred to as closed or private betas. (Most games run truly private betas before they get to the closed public beta, in which only company employees and some of their family members participate.)

Open betas are often referred to as "stress tests," since the goal is not to test the game, but to test the game hosting software and hardware. The game client is usually about the size of a demo, but it can only be played online. Open betas are usually freely available to anyone who wants to download them. Beta keys may or may not be required, but if they are they're made very widely available, in numbers that scale up as the test continues.

Diablo II ran such a stress test for several weeks after the closed beta test, since they needed to see how the Battle.net servers would hold up with tens of thousands of simultaneous connections. There's no telling if Diablo III will run such a test. World of Warcraft did not, possibly because that game's server architecture only allows for a few thousand players per realm, and Blizzard knew they'd be adding more realms as the game grew in popularity. Diablo III's Battle.net set up is going to be similar to Diablo II's, with just a few realms worldwide, and millions of players on each. Blizzard may therefore feel it necessary to run such a stress test for D3, though they've said nothing about that publicly. They might also run an open beta because it's good publicity for their title.

How are Beta Testers Selected?

Blizzard passes out beta keys to their friends and family, to media, to fansites, and to others in the industry. They've also taken to including a redeemable beta code on a card in the gift packs they give out at BlizzCon and other conventions. Everyone who attended the 2008 WWI in Paris got a code to enter the WoW Lich King beta, for instance.

Will there be a public Diablo III beta sign up?

Possibly, but nothing is definite until Blizzard announces it. All previous Blizzard beta tests had public signups, but that changed with the World of Warcraft expansion, Wrath of the Lich King. There was no public beta signup for that game; a beta code was given to all of the 6000+ attendees at the 2008 Paris WWI show, and the hundreds more added through fansites and Blizzard's friends list.

It's expected that the 15,000 fans attending the 2008 BlizzCon convention will get a beta code for an upcoming Blizzard beta, but that's not for sure. (Those codes could be for Starcraft 2 rather than Diablo III.) If they do, that might be all Blizzard thinks they need to test Diablo III, once they add in friends and family and hundreds more gathered from fansite contests.

It's likely that Diablo III will have a public signup, but it's not for sure.

What makes a good beta tester?

It depends on what the test is trying to measure.

Many would-be testers like to stress (in hotly-debated forum posts) that they would be great testers since they play a ton, are very experienced gamers, etc. That may be true, but the mistake such players make is thinking beta tests are primarily about game balance. That's an aspect of such tests, but far from the only one. Blizzard wants a wide variety of testers: varied computer systems, varied locations, varied play experience, and varied game interest. They know rabid D3 fans will play endless hours, and probably find some bugs. They also know that such players will learn how to control the game very quickly, and will not be slowed by unclear help guides, cumbersome controls, and other such minor difficulties that can stymie new players.

Beta tests, especially those (like D2's) that do not include the entire game are largely about optimizing the early game experience. Seeing what players find helpful or confusing about character creation, early game quests, NPC interactions, using the interface, etc. And for that, total noobs are as or more useful than experienced players. In fact, since Blizzard usually distributes hundreds of beta slots to their fansites, and they know those slots will be distributed predominately to rabid fans, they might actually favor more newbie testers amongst those who sign up from their public website form.

What countries are included in the Beta Test?

This isn't known in advance. Past Blizzard tests have initially been US or North America only, since they usually start with just some hosting servers in the US. As greater server stability is achieved, more testers, from more locations, are allowed in. Blizzard has also been known to run beta servers in other countries where they expect a lot of players. It's quite likely they'll run a Korean Stacraft 2 beta, for instance.

Is there an age limit for beta testers?

Yes, in accordance with the game's age limit ratings, or expected ratings.

Can I sign up multiple times?

Blizzard usually limits the sign ups to one per household. They want a wide variety of players to try out the beta, and have no way to know if there are ten people with different computers in the same house or not.

Are there minimum system specs for the Beta Test?

Usually there is some minimum cut off point, but since the whole point of such a test is to see how wide a variety of systems the game will run on, Blizzard tries to keep it fairly generous.

How many testers will there be?

Early Blizzard beta tests were limited to just the 1000 beta CDs they pressed and mailed out. More recent tests with downloadable clients have grown far larger, and there will likely be many thousands or even tens of thousands of testers for Diablo III. Not everyone starts on the first day, of course. Tests start small and scale up, with more testers added over time as the server stability improves.

If I was a previous beta tester for Blizzard, will I have a better chance of being a tester this time?

Only if you are already on the Blizzard's friends list. They do keep a list of good testers from past games, and add people to it when they reliably report numerous bugs, but the names on this list are kept private.

Is there a way to increase my chances of getting in the Closed Beta?

Aside from marrying a Blizzard employee or becoming one yourself, you could try attending BlizzCon or other such conventions, since they've been giving out cards good for future beta test slots at such events. Admins of popular fansites and employees of major gaming info sites usually get beta slots as well; sometimes they even have extras to give out to site regulars. There's no way to increase your odds of being chosen from the public sign up period though, since the criteria Blizzard uses to pick such people varies, and is largely random.

How long after the sign up period will those selected be notified?

This varies greatly. There's usually at least a month or two between sign up and the start of the test, and selected testers only find out when they get their beta key emails. Since these notifications are sent out in waves, some testers will necessarily find out long before others.

Will I have to pay for the Beta?

Blizzard has never charged for players to Beta test their products.

Will the Beta be downloadable?

Yes. The days of mailed out CDs are long past, since Blizzard runs such large tests and the game clients are huge. Beta test clients these days are usually several gigs in size, and can take quite a while to download via torrent, even for fast connections.

What's a Beta Test like?

Generally, just like playing the game, albeit online only and with more bugs and server downtimes. There's no special procedure to follow, once you've got the client downloaded and your beta key working. You just start it up and play.

How do I report bugs?

Beta tests always have bug reporting mechanisms built in. There is usually an ingame command to send a message about a bug, and log files are compiled as you play, recording the game state and hardware/software issues. There are usually private beta testing forums on the official site, where testers can discuss the test and post technical issues.

Will the beta change as I participate?

Constantly. Beta tests usually have a new patch almost every day, with minor and major changes, bug fixes, and more.

How much of the whole game will be in the beta?

Unknown. The D2 beta included Act One, and all 5 characters, but only half of their skills.

Will I be able to talk about the beta test?

Beta testers are usually limited by an NDA, at least initially. Beta clients are, by definition, not final and not perfect, and companies don't want testers complaining publicly, posting screenshots of the non-final game, or giving out secrets and surprises in advance. The NDA is usually lifted towards the end of a beta, but not always.

Does Blizzard expect testers to play a certain number of hours?

No, though they'd appreciate it if you played enough to find some bugs and give some useful feedback. Players who can't play, for technical or other reasons, are useful as well, since Blizzard wants to know what's stopping you.

How long will the Beta Test last?

Unknown. It depends on how much of the game Blizzard is testing, how well Battle.net 2.0 is running with Starcraft 2 before the D3 beta begins, etc. At least two or three months is a conservative estimate. Some betas run for half a year or longer.

Will beta testers be given notice before the testing ends?

Usually the end of a test is announced some weeks in advance.

How soon after the Beta closes will the game be on store shelves?

This also depends. Some beta tests run right up until the release date, with the information from them being used for post-release patches. Others end weeks earlier, or are replaced by open beta/stress tests.

Will I get a free game for being a beta tester? Are there any other rewards?

No free game. Sometimes top testers are credited in the game manual or online credits, and you might earn your way onto Blizzard's beta tester friends/family list, but the sneak peek at the game is the reward for most.

Do I get keep my beta character in the final release?

No, beta characters are always wiped from the servers before the final game. The clients are incompatible, items and skills change, it's not fair to give some players a headstart, etc.