Game Breaker Article: Test Servers for GW2.
A PTR would be impractical with an event per month, just not enough time for them to fulfill their purpose and finish the release. It would be good for the game to cancel the monthly events for now. They are a great idea on paper, but don’t work in real life.
A PTR would be impractical with an event per month, just not enough time for them to fulfill their purpose and finish the release. It would be good for the game to cancel the monthly events for now. They are a great idea on paper, but don’t work in real life.
I don’t know about that though. Rift had a fair amount of content releases and events etc and I think they had a PTR – I might be wrong on that though. Been a while since I logged on.
I’m not going to agree or disagree but I will lay out some important factors to consider:
My first priority would be too eliminate one time events .
A public test from would mean people uploading videos of new content onto youtude and spoiling it for others. Of course I don’t have the discipline to keep myself from watching the video. I would rather not content be spoiled.
I don’t want to go on the public test from either because I don’t want to feel like a tester. I want to feel like a customer who is being served the event as gracefully as possible. Being on the public test realm simply has a drastically different atmosphere than being on a live server.
But I admit that creates the problem of developers having to go back and fix bugs to the previous event rather than moving on and working on the next event. Rather than working on winters they, the developers would be a busy fixing bugs on the repeatable lost shores event. That would not be good either
There is a tremendous of matched excitement to the in a group of players who are experiencing content for the first time. This was how I felt with the lost shores event. A public test from would mean some players will have already experienced the content and there would be no more feeling has lost as everyone else. Feeling lost can be a great thing when it’s accompanied by a sense of wonder and exploration.
What I did not like however was that these were one time events. If the event is buggy, I’m OK with that, as long as I will get to do a less buggy version of the event in the future. As long as the event is repeatable, and have its bugs fixed in future versions, I would be complacent with a initial version that had bugs due to a lack of a public test from.
If the events were not one time, then there would be less need for a public test Realm. Furthermore if there was a public test realm, it could be for fixing profession box and imbalances by testing buffs and nerfs. It could also be used for testing user interface changes. Just don’t use the public test realm to spoil storyline events.
One time events just makes players feel not included. BUT it’s free and they can get away with it.
Would love a PTR for dungeons. If not just for the extra help squashing bugs, but the feedback on how the dungeon is designed would go a long way.
There was not one part of last month that wasn’t bug-ridden, and except for FotM (which could really have used better testing), it was crippled by bugs and poor performance.
Whether they can make good use of a test server remains to be seen, but the way they’ve been doing things was stinking it up so bad, they had to try something else.
A PTR in which all characters have the option to immediately be set to maximum level and maximum gear, may be a wise compromise.
November 15, 2012 – The day a dream died.
p.s. I find the gamebreaker crew to be fun
And they were what turned me on to Planetside 2, which is a lot of fun, too.
I kind of feel there should be a PTR for everything (dungeons, events, etc.) If people are worried about the surprise being ruined, don’t participate and don’t read spoilers. I would personally rather a nice, smooth event than having a minor surprise ruined somehow.
@mulch – Yeah, I’m new to the gamebreaker site. Makes for a good watch/read.
Maybe they can sell gem store item to provide a few days of access to PTR. Anything on PTR can be broken so you pay for the rights at your own risk. Everything has a price.
private test server tho. :P and like, no relation to chars in their original account. like dummy chars all level 80, all stuff available, etc. :P
People playing on a PTR are players not on live servers buying gems for gold.
Players would also experience an economy where RMT and gems don’t exist. Then they might decide which is preferable.
So a PTR will never happen.
I watched that segment. It was just Richie Pinocchio hypothesizing, and I guess ArenaNet hasn’t mentioned anything about doing a bigger, more public test server.
PTR´s are basically an industry standard.
Customers do beta testing for free, voluntarily.
By the Kitten use them already for your normal everyday patches, bugfixes and balance ideas!
Also divorce your normal bugfixes from introductions of new content.
I have a bad feeling about the beginning of Wintersday + bugfix megapatch.
A PTR would be impractical with an event per month, just not enough time for them to fulfill their purpose and finish the release. It would be good for the game to cancel the monthly events for now. They are a great idea on paper, but don’t work in real life.
I don’t know about that though. Rift had a fair amount of content releases and events etc and I think they had a PTR – I might be wrong on that though. Been a while since I logged on.
yep it’s called the calendar folks, people use it all the time. one could actually schedule a limited PTR test with required silence for the next events while the current one is happening.
100x this thread. This game needs a PTR badly. Look at the last update. They broke jumping. They broke the very boss they were fixing in Fractals. It could have taken 1 dev to run through that fight after initiating the “fix” to make sure it ran smoothly. They didn’t and it didn’t.
I’m not even blaming Anet really. Either you’re understaffed, overworked, or both. Get a PTR going before the insane amount of bugs in this game continue to push players out.
Even with a PTR server anet can keep there one time events internal.
But when they are doing a major patch for balancing it would be good to see what you’re going to be getting. Especially in a competitive pvp E sport environment like GW2 wants to build.
so you want a PTR… and no more 1-time Events… you basically want to play a typical MMO
lets consider some things:
1st. so far GW2 events have been awesome, save the karka event, that was bad
2nd. the game is like 4(?) months old whe have had 3 big events and 2 have been total success
3rd. Anet is learning with every event, let them do their magic
4th. after playing wow for a couple of years, GW2 events are WAAAAAY better
so considering that, don’t complain just yet, feedback is good, but keep it positive!
i’ve liked the 1-time stuff, beisdes, is just some silly cinematics, so dont feel too left out if you miss one, and even if they give away shinys like in the karka event, is just that, missing 2 or 3 shinys won’t break your game
As much as I like to have a PTR, I’m pretty sure there are some things that ArenaNet would like to keep within themselves and private testers, as opposed to letting it loose to open testers. With that regard, the testers themselves would have to be extremely trustworthy not to leak out any information to the general public to minimize the chances of the finer details being leaked thus creating some kind of unwanted chaos should it involve certain parts of the game. In most cases, the tester would have to some prior experience in testing other games and/or sign some form of Non-Disclosure Agreement. Unfortunately, open testers aren’t always great in keeping secrets, which might be what’s preventing a PTR from being launched at this time.
On the other hand, I’m sure the PTR could be used for focus-testing of content for a given weekend (like the Beta Weekend events months before the game launched), while the private testers could test whatever seems appropriate whenever they please.
I am Fleeting Flash, in-game dungeon cosplayer of Reddit Refugees [RR] .
i dont find it necessary at all, we arent their supervisor
I made this suggestion about a month ago, and while I said that things like one time events don’t need to be spoiled, certain aspects of them (such as loot tables, difficulty, game-breaking bugs, etc) can be tested by players. The main purpose I see in a public testing server in GW2’s current state (in terms of PvP) would be for mass testing of balance patches to get things rolling sooner. We all know Anet prefers to make small patches over time, so speeding up that process through massive testing would be nice. Especially if they want to get this game in esports.
Fyi, the invisible karka is the same thing that has plagued the game in wvw (or anywhere really) since the beginning. The game simply doesn’t render characters fast enough and has a limit to how many can be rendered at once. When your allies hit that cap, rendering enemies means that allies need to disappear. This takes time. What this game needs is a slider that controls rendering. I’d set my allies render distance fairly close and enemy render distance fairly far. Also a cap on allies rendered would be nice so that we always have room to render enemies.
no PTR please, imho it’d be waste of time and money.
What would be a better idea going forward with events and content releases of new areas like these, is too have made the area into an instanced zone, similar to the beginning of the game, allowing for smaller groups of players to work through the event(s). Doing this during the event period (or even initial release of any new area) would allow for a better experience overall, as the number of players per “instance” could be limited to a number that doesn’t overpopulate and overrun the area.
I kind of think that GW2 would not be better with a PTR. I’m all for less bugs but the lack of raids as the major draw for the game seems to mean that there is not as great of a need for a PTR.
In WoW, the PTR was just another way for players to not “earn” a victory over content and avoid figuring things out for themselves. WoW seemed like as close as gaming can get to watching a movie as entertainment.
I don’t think it’s fun to follow a guide or watch a video before doing something dozens of times.