The Business of Video Games: Part 6

And at last we come to the unsung (and often unwashed) heroes of game production: the Testers. Testers, well, test. They play the game in its various stages, looking for bugs and reporting them via some painfully obtuse bug tracking system. Sounds like fun, does it not? Surprisingly, no.

Take your favorite game and play it through 100 times. Randomly unplug your game system every so often. That is what being a tester is like. Now do that again, except with your least favorite game. Rinse, repeat. Insane yet? Do not worry, you will be soon.

Now I have been accused of being cynical about the games industry. It is true. I have spent a lot of years making games and it can be an amazingly frustrating occupation. Yet for all that, I keep plugging away. Why? Because with all that is wrong with the games industry, you still get to work with a diverse group of intelligent, talented people on something amazing. You get to make video games.

Cheers,
-Jason