Very true. This is happening with one of the games I am soon to test. The testers are more worried about getting the beta than thinking if it is even ready to be tested. Is that true? If so then that makes me sad. There are a handful of good testers for Minigore and there are those that give no feedback that I am sure only want to try out the episodes early.
yeah, its sad that there are so many wasted UDID spots and others have to find other means to install the beta, when there are people who sit log on, download, play, leave. it gets so frustrating.
We have a wider, internet beta group and then a friends-n-family beta group. The fun part about the internet beta group, besides it generally only having one feature to test at a time, is that we can "brick" it whenever we want. Heads up!
This really sickens me. Considering people like myself (who are minors) take time away to beta test these games that you wonderful developers develop, only to be stomped on by some lousy asshole who doesn't appreciate the time and money that goes into these games. I just hope that this doesn't effect my relationship with AppStore Developers in the future. Because I actually enjoy doing this. It's something that makes me feel helpful. For someone to just come along and rain on everyone's parade is pretty sad.
For the guy who said he's a minor, wait one year. Also, you should look around on websites to see who's helpful and contributes good feedback. Basically, anyone who has more than a 1,000 posts is generally helpful.
I cant believe someone would do something like this, it really ruins, not only the developers chances of making alot of money, but also ruins us, beta testers reputations in general. Like someone said earlier there were about 100 beta spots for minigore, and they all got filled in, but theres only about 10-15 of us who actually give feedback. Many people see beta testing as just a way to get a free copy earlier than anyone else, which is just sad.
Does acts of this guy affect developers' opinion about hired beta testers in general? I believe - yes. It is very unfair of this guy runing reputations of all hired beta testers, more acts like this and we'll never be able to test beta games anymore.
Not a dev, but this is really pissing me off. I think someone should go over to his twitter and give him some verbal abuse . But even then, knowing teenagers (I am one too yaknow ) He would probably be like, "Psh. haha, so what." Then continue to pirate more apps. Maybe you could petition to some politician who might propose a new law beign able to charge minors for something like this? Who knows, i know of people who've gotten weird random laws passed by petitioning a politician before.
We've had a team of beta testers that we've worked with for several years. We add to it with new platforms when needed, but often our wonderful dedicated testers will buy newer devices themselves, just so they can try different titles. We've always had an NDA in place, which means no-one under 18 can be included. We also require a copy of a photo ID like a drivers license or passport. Over the years we've had a couple of people sign up and then pirate stuff, but we've caught them and removed them from the list. It will cut down the number of people who can beta for you, but a select group of 10 people, who are really dedicated to helping you make the game as good as you can, is better than a 100 people who mainly sign up just for early versions. When we've done a game that was aimed at kids, like StarPop, we offer it out to the testers who have kids and get feedback that way - the parents will often give useful feedback, like they were able to play together, or the kids found it too difficult, when often the child can't express exactly what they do or don't like. Anyway, I'm drifting off topic a bit, but if you want beta testers you can trust - get NDAs in place. It requires a bit more effort from both you and the tester, but someone who is willing to go through the effort of getting an NDA and ID to you in the post, is also willing to put effort into testing!
Same exact thing happened to me, I have some 40+ "beta testers" and only two of them do the job that I asked them to do, and they do it well. There was very little gray area on this. Then the week before last, my beta got pirated too, when it was very incomplete. Did anyone start a thread for trusted beta-testers yet?
I don't think you need to generalize all teenagers as Pirates. Many good beta testers on this site are teenagers. I don't think you can form the assumption that all teenagers are pirates based on the actions on one suppoes teenager. He might not even be a teenager, I don't know very many teenagers who have the know-how (or time) to crack apps. You can do whatever you want but I still think it's not a good idea to leave out this site as a whole just because of one asshole. EDIT: Just realized how redundant this post was.
I've started a new thread for developers called Loyal, Hard Working Beta Testers That You Can Trust Hopefully this makes finding trusted testers easier for us developers...
There is a certain app I believe made by the same company that makes the app that is a little green arrow. I think that app can easily be used to crack apps. No idea though.
i think you mean gameloft games? But i dont understand how this jackass can give other people a beta, and then it automatically installs on their idevice. So whats the whole point on the udid thing?
Sorry, you misunderstood me - I wasn't talking about pirates, but about beta testers who do not intend to beta test at all, just want to get your game for free. And I'm definitely not leaving this site, I like it a lot, I'm just saying that for beta testers I'll look elsewhere, unless there will be a list of awesome beta testers to share.
