As I have touched on in previous posts, in recent years, consumers
have had increasing options for obtaining games and the pre-order system seems
to exist in its present form only to line the pockets of the publisher. In an
effort to incentivize pre-ordering, publishers/developers have taken to
offering beta access in exchange for pre-ordering. While I feel that, in
general, providing beta access to the broader community could lead to a better
overall product, I suspect that the scheme will ultimately be a losing deal for
all parties.
When a game hits beta stages, it generally means that the
primary content has been implemented and most development resources are now
spent identifying and fixing bugs as well as generally glossing up the game for
proper release. Before the prevalence of high speed internet, the beta phase
was sometimes the last development that would ever take place on a title and
any bugs found post-release were very difficult to fix. This makes sense as the
difficulty in disseminating a patch presented a logistical nightmare; good
companies would generally offer some sort of snail-mail option to obtain a
patch, okay companies would offer the patch online where, depending on size, a
14.4 modem could take hours or days to download, and other companies (most
commonly for console games) would either only release the patch in subsequent
retail versions or simply not patch the game at all. It should be obvious that,
provided the developer is actually working, more people testing over a longer
period of beta time generally leads to higher quality (less buggy) finished
product. As such, it is generally a positive trend that developers have started
to bring in the broader community to beta test rather than keeping things
strictly in house.
Until recently, the privilege of playing in a beta was not
one you had to pay for. While a plethora of models exist, hitherto, access to a
beta was usually provided through some form of selection process (i.e. lottery)
and often necessitated the signing of a non-disclosure agreement. Later beta
phases might be opened to everyone but typically blocked off large portions of
content and often functioned as a glorified demo. These models provided
positives for consumers, publishers, and developers. For the consumer, they
would have the opportunity to play something before everyone else and establish
some initial impressions to aid in the decision to purchase the final product,
publishers could generate buzz for an upcoming title, and developers could get
crucial feedback for squashing the worst bugs. More recently, the practice of
monetizing beta access has been taking place by offering early access to those
who pre-order the game. While, theoretically, the benefits for the three
aforementioned parties still exist, some serious pitfalls can be foreseen if
this trend starts to become the standard.
Consumer Conundrums
To start, as beta-access is usually tied into pre-ordering,
I think all the standard consumer negatives of purchasing a product
sight-unseen still apply; the pre-order system gives the publisher money with
little incentive to subsequently provide value for that money. I suppose that
beta access now provides a little bit more justification for the pre-order in
the first place, but it does not change the fact that the consumer is paying for
something that was previously available for free (albeit not guaranteed).
Perhaps guaranteed beta access is worth it to some, but I feel that the
rational consumer should not be ponying up full value for something that is
overtly incomplete. In cases where less than full value is charged, this
concern is proportionally mitigated (but never fully). A further negative for
the consumer is that reputable journalists (a major source for reliable
purchase information) will typically not give a final score until a product is
fully released. The trap here is that any negative press published in
‘previews’ can be easily dismissed by the developer/publisher by stating that
it will be rectified in the final release (while not actually beholden to these
claims). The result is a slew of extra coverage for the savvy consumer to wade
through with contradictory claims that could lead to confusion and diminished
genuine information to facilitate making a purchase.
Developer Dystopia
The above point can also be used as a negative for the
publisher/developer. If beta previews are negative, it may be impossible for
the well-meaning publisher/developer to put out all the fires and, even if the
product is fantastic in the end, they may lose out on sales due to initial
negative reaction to an unfinished product. Of further concern, for the
developer, is that the quality of beta tester they recruit through a pay system
may be substandard. Part of the reasoning for the selection process is so that
a broad cross-section of players can be sampled including those who may not be heavily
invested in the game. Further on this point, those who have already effectively
purchased the game may enter into the sunk-cost fallacy whereby they fail to
perceive flaws in order to justify their investment (this, of course, dilutes
the value of the beta process). Of further concern for the developer,
especially in the long term if pay-for-beta becomes the standard, is that
consumer expectations may hold that a beta is in a playable and in a polished
state. While this consumer expectation is unreasonable (an unfinished product
by definition will have some rough edges) it is easily foreseeable. Concurrent
to this is the legal tangle when it comes to refunds, should a consumer be
refunded the cost of a product sold ‘as-is and unfinished’ because they
perceive it is low quality?
Publisher Perils
For the publisher, while undoubtedly okay with an influx of guaranteed
money pre-orders, beta-access sales can make a revenue stream unpredictable in
the short term as data models for this scheme are in their infancy. In short,
an uncertain model will no doubt lead to some publishers making bad decisions. With
time, the modelling problem will be resolved and likely the spreading out of
sales from the beta period to release will yield a smoother revenue stream.
That said, the inherent incomplete nature of the beta product opens up many
more opportunities for risk of interruption of revenue. For example, it is
conceivable that the latest patch breaks the game for a large portion of users,
this would undoubtedly negatively impact sales until the issue is resolved.
Assuming overall sales remain about the same, publishers will have to prepare
for small day-to-day revenue instead of lump sum revenue at release and any
interruption to this day-to-day revenue could be catastrophic to operations.
Again this problem can be rectified with smart planning but my cynical side
believes that smaller publishers won’t save for the rainy day (larger
publishers will likely have enough products on the go at the same time to
insulate themselves).
Conclusions and Some Talking Points
Beta testing is a crucial part of the development process
and opening it to a broader community is generally a good thing. However, a
pay-for-beta model is ultimately to the detriment of all parties. Consumers
should flat out not accept such a bad deal, developers end up diluting the
quality of the testers, and publishers expose themselves to a riskier revenue
stream.
- I think the allure of beta access stems from a general impatience in the gaming community. This “me-first-now” attitude is generally troubling.
- MMORPG’s seem to have wholly endorsed the pay-for-beta approach. It is accepted by consumers that some features are not available at launch. In many cases, the unimplemented features used to be considered fundamental.
- Most of the pay-for-beta trend has been restricted to PC games. Certification processes have aided in mitigating this for console games.
- My points on publishers are probably the points I am least informed on. I would not be surprised if they came across as unintelligible to some.