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ResultsGrand Auditorium A hush falls over the crowd. It's time to announce the awards for the 2003 Beta-Test Competition! The announcer taps on the mike and clears his throat. "As you know," he begins, "the test subject this year was titled Undersea Adventure. Eight entrants tested the game, wrote up bug reports, and waited for the results. After hours of painstaking review and evaluation, we finally have the results." He coughs, then opens the envelope. He removes a small square of paper from it. "And the winner for Best Organization of A Beta-Test Report goes to... Xander Deubelbeiss!" The crowd cheers. The announcer takes out another square. "The winner for Most Thorough Listing of Missing Synonyms and Good Suggestions goes to... Esa A. Peuha!" The crowd roars. Another square. "And the coveted award for Most Attempts to Flatter a Judge goes to... Jennifer Maddox!" The crowd laughs. "The winner for Best Criticism of the Plot goes to... Mike Jones!" The crowd applauds. "Best Overall Criticism on All Aspects of the Game and Best Comments on Grammar!" the announcer exclaims. "Goes! To! Adam Thornton!" The crowd shouts its approval. "The winner for Best Remarks on Puzzles and Most Bugs Caught..." The crowd gasps. "Quintin Stone!" Cheers erupt from the audience. "The award for Finding the Most Serious Bugs That No One, Yes, No One Else Mentioned, goes to... Søren Løvborg!" The crowd oohs and aahs. "And finally..." A drumroll sounds from behind the curtains. "The winner of the Best Beta-Test Report for the 2003 Beta-Test Competition... "is... "Matthew A. Murray!" The crowd goes wild! --------------------- And now, all of my notes and other comments. If all you wanted to know was who won, well, you've seen it. The rest of this is just fluff. But it's good fluff, and it's my Comp, so I can write however much I want. First of all, thanks to everyone who entered. I can't tell you how hard it was to select a winner, because every report had something really important. The truth of the matter is, a game needs multiple beta-testers! Everyone found different things, and of all the bugs and suggestions that got reported, no one tester reported more than about 50% of them, which was a pretty surprising number. Still, there were a few things that everyone noticed and everyone mentioned, like needing to call the fabric shapes, well, "fabric," the fact that a whole room description was missing, and the fact that the spikes showed up in inventory as "an iron spikes." I admit: I did include some bugs on purpose (like the missing room description). However, the number of things that were NOT intentional rather surprised me. For instance, did you know that you can find the iron bar over and over again? Or that the bowl can be emptied out over and over again, an endless source of weird mushy sand? Anyhow, I included some bugs on purpose because I was writing the mini-game specifically for this comp. I was also worried about taking up too much of the entrants' time, so I didn't want to make the game too long. Because of this, I cut out several ideas for other puzzles and other objects. The consensus from the people who entered seems to be divided: some said the game was a good length for its purpose, while others said they would have preferred a longer, slightly more polished game. I think that if I get to do this again, probably next year same time, I would use a longer game in a more advanced stage of testing. Fair warning! Now, I'll get even more nitty-gritty from here on out, just in case anyone is interested. First some comments about what I was looking for, and then a few comments about each of the different reports. I had mentioned four different criteria for judging in my announcement: Organization, Clarity of points, Thoroughness, and Ability to criticize. As I went over the reports, I realized that the criticism came in several parts, each important in its own right: comments on the plot and back story, comments on the puzzles and their difficulty, and comments on overall game design. Thoroughness is easy enough to judge, since I made a list of all the bugs. Clarity was pretty easy, too, and not a very large range between the highest and lowest entries in this category. Either I had a few questions, or everything was clear (or, in one case, everything was spelled out extra careful). Organization was a little more tricky to judge. After all, even if the report was just laid out in the order that the tester played the game, that's still *some* organization. Better was to separate the bugs into different categories, but best of all was to list them in order of priority, from proofreading items that must be fixed, to programming errors that need to be fixed, to "should be added," and then "could be added." I noticed also I liked when a report had a few general comments or an introduction to the report at the beginning. So that, in a nutshell, is what I was looking for. Now on to specific reports, in reverse alphabetical order.
Entrant: Adam Thornton
One of the few reports to comment on player motivation (or lack thereof). In fact, Mr. Thornton does a great job of commenting on the puzzles, the plot, the overall game design, you name it. At the same time, his report is encouraging while staying very to-the-point and direct. Also, Mr. Thornton doesn't hesitate to attack all parts of spelling and grammar mistakes, and even things that aren't mistakes but could be improved. I had to look up whether he was right about "smokey" being incorrect, but he was right - it's "smoky." So, excellent commentary on lots of important aspects. Mr. Thornton would be a great addition to any beta-testing team.
Entrant: Quintin Stone
Mr. Stone introduces his report quite well, with overall impressions and general coments. He is also one of the most thorough when it comes to finding bugs and problems in the game, from outright problems to suggestions for improvements. The tone of his report is friendly and very helpful, which makes it easier to read :). Not as many comments about the plot as some, but plenty of good commentary about the puzzle difficulty and things that might be changed. An excellent tester to have!
Entrant: Esa A E Peuha This entry doesn't have as many comments on puzzles, but it is an invaluable tool in trying to figure out which synonyms to add. And I'm not talking about just "need more synonyms for this," either. Here's a sample of words that should be referrable in one of the rooms: Largest Room [rock] - should be referrable as "room" "doorway" "opening" "passage" "tunnel" "doorways" "openings" "passages" "tunnels" "cavern" And in addition to all of these lists, the entry still manages to comment on other bugs! Quite a feat. This sort of thing comes in very handy when testing a game for real. And last but not least, a lot of suggestions are included that some testers wouldn't mention, such as including an online map, replacing the standard compass objects with "directions," a call for a list of amusing things to do, and a request for hints instead of just a walkthrough. These are great suggestions.
Entrant: Matthew A. Murray
This is a very helpful report, from beginning to end. Mr. Murray doesn't skimp on words and explanations of what he thinks, nor does he mind sharing suggestions for how to change it.For instance, where some might just say, "Add a response for xyzzy," Mr. Murray spends a short paragraph explaining why it would be a good thing. But don't think that this report bought its first-place prize with verbage. There's lots to like :). The tone is friendly and chatty, which makes it all go down easier, and there's quite a lot of grammar help. While it doesn't have as many different bugs as some of the other reports, the ones it does mention are basic, important ones to bring up. A very solid beta-test report.
Entrant: Jennifer Maddox Ms. Maddox doesn't have a lot in the way of introductory comments, which is okay. By the way, I should mention that Ms. Maddox was the only real beta-tester of my entry into the 2002 Annual Comp. I strong-armed her into entering this competition because I wasn't sure how many people I'd have, and I wanted at least two entries. Anyway, while the report was organized fine, there was a bit of confusion as to what some of the comments meant. In a real beta-testing situation, the author would of course write back and ask for clarification, but since this is a comp, all I had to go on was the initial report. As an example, the comment from the Heat room says "It's an oven! I've got a bowl!" That's it. From this I assume that she wanted to be able to put the bowl in the oven, or cook other items in the oven using the bowl, but nothing is spelled out. Most of the report is much more clear than that. There are some good comments on the different puzzles and puzzle difficulty, and a few about the plot. My favorite aspect of this report was Ms. Maddox's light-hearted tone, attempts to flatter the judge notwithstanding.
Entrant: Søren Løvborg This report starts with a nice intro, and then dives into the bugs and problems in tidy categories. In fact, it does well in each criteria of judging, making it a very solid bug report. And, in addition to that, I was completely floored by two or three rather bad bugs mentioned, bugs that no one else said a word about. For instance, you can successfully "empty bowl onto cliff" when the bowl is empty," or you can "empty bowl onto cliff" repeatedly. It doesn't actually register in the code as emptied. The other biggie was that you can repeatedly search the ledges, and repeatedly get the iron bar. I'd like to say these were intentional oversights, but, um, I'd be lying. Anyhow, the bottom line is that this would be a very valuable tester to have on your team.
Entrant: Mike Jones Mr. Jones has a very straightforward way of laying out bugs and problems, and is critical in all the right places. He explained what he thought was wrong with the plot and the story, and listed out the questions he would have liked answers to in the game (some of which I'd considered and had answers to, but some I didn't!). Another strong point of this report was the friendly way Mr. Jones had of mentioning things that were right, as well as things that needed to be fixed. Overall, great suggestions for changes. Entrant: Xander Deubelbeiss An excellent report, very easy to read. Mr. Deubelbeiss highlights a great many of the bugs and problems that others found, and explains why it's bad or what he would change when appropriate. In addition, he's not afraid to comment on grammar or weak writing, which is highly valued in a beta-tester. He draws a line between things that should be added, and things that could be, to help the author in managing her time. In addition, comments and thoughts on the puzzles and the character's view of things are quite good, and it's always nice to hear what you've done well. I have no doubt Mr. Deubelbeiss would be a great help for any game he beta-tested. This concludes the announcement of the results of the 2003 Beta-Test Competition. Tune in next year for the next edition. Original AnnouncementDownload the original game here. Finally: the interactive fiction competition that you don't have to write a game to enter! Yes, the All-New Beta-Test Competition will pit your skills at evaluating a not-yet-finished game of IF against other players! How well can *you* beta-test? IF you have ever wanted to enter a Comp but never managed to get a game done (or started!), then this is the Comp for you. Note that by being part of this Comp, your name/online identity will be released to the IF Community as a possible beta-tester. Don't let that scare you - authors need you! Here's how the Beta-Test Comp works: First, you have until 11:59pm EST on 15 August, 2003, to let the organizer (that's me) know of your desire to enter the Beta-Test Comp. At that time the .z5 file will be ready for download. Then entrants will have two weeks to test the game, make notes of any problems, and compile all bugs/comments into a report which will be their entry. I must receive all reports by 11:59pm EST on the 30th of August, 2003. The length of the judging period will then depend on the number of entries, but I'm expecting not more than a week or so. The results will be announced on this website as well as on the newsgroup rec.games.int-fiction. Note: I don't expect anyone to spend an entire two weeks on just testing a short game like this. On the contrary - I would expect the total time required for people who enter to be more like two evenings' worth, max. Of course, this is the first time I've run a Comp, even just a Beta-Test one, and I could be way off. There may even be prizes*. The beta-test reports shall be judged on the following criteria:
Remember, if you think this sounds interesting, send me an email at jessicaknoch@mindspring.com and let me know! And email me if you have any questions about the Beta-Test Comp, also. * - This statement has not been evaluated by the FDA. Use of the word "prizes" is not meant to imply that prizes will actually be awarded.
Last updated: 20030806.
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