The Not-so-glamorous Life of the Video Game Tester
By Shawn on Monday, July 16th, 2007 at 4:07 PM PST In Gamer Life
Many people have dreamed of a job playing video games all day as a video game tester. They imagine having bragging rights for getting to test games before shipping and playing all day to their heart’s content while getting paid. What fun would that be right?
The LAtimes will shatter all these illusions in a expose on the actual experience of being a video game playtester. From the low pay, about $8.75/hr, and uncertain shifts, play testing as a full time job is hard to pull off. The turn over rate is horrendous and you never know when you will be dismissed without reason. Being female in a male dominated field helps but all testers still have frequent lengthy lay offs at the end of and between projects. Testers are submitted to cast iron non-disclosure contracts and often hours of mind numbing boredom. There is no guarantee that testers will actually be playing either.
This article makes being a gold farmer seem glamorous in comparison. Anyone who has imagined this to be a fun or easy job should really take a look at this piece before interviewing for a position.
One of my buddies did QA for Sony and hated it.
For 8.75/hr, thats chump change. and im sure games are fun, but repetitive tests and looking for bugs must get tiredsome. Also if you dont like the game you are testing u are stuck with that. What is the worst game you ever played? imagine testing that all day. Ya i cannot see it being glamerous. Games are for fun. I think any game I ever played liked or not, to have to play 8 hours a day, 5 days a week for months, ya id go mental.
I hear they have sweat shops for gold farming in Asia.
Im a video game tester for a year and its awesome!!!!
Bullshit, I tested one year and a half and i was tired at the end. Once I was testing a frogger-like game, at the end of the day I came out of the office and I tried to walk through the traffic, I almost got killed.
Personally, I think it’s all a matter of interest.
trust me, its boring as shit. i play tested gears of war (guess how many drooling fanboys wish they couldve done that?) but it sucked. i played the same section of the game in a pre-beta state. the same poorly textured hallway, over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over. testing that same hallway on every possible resolution, hardware, software, detail setting, drivers, os, monitor brand, audio cable brand got old REALLY fast. trust me by the end of the day you realize just what youre doing – testing broken software, because thats what it really is until it is finished and by that time you dont even want to touch it. you wont know til you actually do it so i (partially) cant blame the little kids for their drooling obsession, but once you do youll never EVER want to do it again. not to mention the pathetic pay, which considering gas prices these days is almost a crime. driving to redmond or LA from whatever suburb you live in to make $8 an hour replaying the same 5 minute segment of broken game makes you want to rip your eyes out. think about it – every other job you have to apply to them, convince the COMPANY they should hire you. game testing is (pretty much) the only job where a company actively recruits people and pays them to play a game – because NOBODY who knows what its about would volunteer to do it. Do you see those game devs playtesting? no, because theyve been staring at it for weeks, months or years and are tired of it. just as you will be once youve done it.
I get payed $120 an hour for 4 hours a day to do what i love to do no matter if the game sucks or not, even if i hate the game, i only have to play it for 4 hours and thats a good $480. If i love the game ill play all day and by the end of the day i am one rich mother. I’m not working here for the rest of my life, i just need to save money so i can start my own arcade and game arena.i started 8 months ago and make enough to make my dreams cum true. some advice, dont do drugs cuz u will be tested.
hey Hackler
what company do you work for that sounds like it wouldn’t be to bad. and it does sound fun to do game testing, but that pay is horrible.
I test for nintendo and i make 14 dollars an hour starting salary its just a summer job tho
Well that would explain why quality control on games these days sucks.