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This topic has moved here: Subject: Work at Bungie! Testers!
  • Subject: Work at Bungie! Testers!
Subject: Work at Bungie! Testers!

We start a long, lingering look at job positions and careers at video game companies like Bungie. Today, we start with Test, one of the toughest, yet most rewarding jobs in the business. It's not as easy at sounds, as you'll read here.

  • 07.16.2004 7:15 PM PDT
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first post! yay!

  • 07.16.2004 7:30 PM PDT
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well, you should take quotes of some of the testers besides Zach, liek thet them put in their 2 cents by telling us what the lake about their job

  • 07.16.2004 7:32 PM PDT
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anyways, its cool to know that the tester's job isn't as easy as it looks

btw i can't edit my post for some reason, the'res an error page

  • 07.16.2004 7:35 PM PDT
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W00t! Awesome...now I know that there is something to testing, besides just getting to play the game 3 months before us. :)

  • 07.16.2004 7:59 PM PDT
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BTW, I'm thinking about going for a Computer Science Degree...hopefully I'll land a job in gaming.

  • 07.16.2004 8:01 PM PDT
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hey frankie. Quick question. How much would your average tester make. I mean I want a job that pays well but i also want 2 have fun doing that job.

  • 07.16.2004 8:05 PM PDT
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I, personally, don't find that job appealing! Hats off to the testers at Bungie! Thank you for making the Halo Series possible!

- Yolego

  • 07.16.2004 8:17 PM PDT
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Through war we will teach your heresy.
Through battle we will teach your frailty.
Through death we will teach your fate.

Who knew all the tesing (while its not surprising) that goes into games these days, a entire team devoted to the sole perpose of being nit-pickity about every build they get their hands on. Good stuff.

  • 07.16.2004 8:27 PM PDT
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has anyone heard of the collage FULL SAIL that is a college with a game development facility look it up on fullsail.com if you are intrested

  • 07.16.2004 11:08 PM PDT

I did it for a week at Lionhead. It can get pretty boring.

  • 07.17.2004 3:42 AM PDT
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yeah if you think about it playing the same game straight for 8 hours with only one breck
that could get borring
and even worse if you are testing one of those stupid games like spongue bob square pants's adventure or something

  • 07.17.2004 6:33 AM PDT
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hmm.... i really would like to meet the bungie staff, and get to be friends with them:)
sadly, i am only going into the 8th grade, and i cannot test. :(
if i could test, i would... its my lifes goal to work with bungie on a miraculas game like halo.

  • 07.17.2004 7:15 AM PDT
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Darn. Too bad I'm only 14...

Anyway, it would kind of suck to be a tester. It would get pretty boring, and imagine playing 1 game for 60 hours a week... With Halo, of course, that wouldn't be a bad thing, but it does spoil your excitement and you see it before anyone else, so you don't get to share your joy.

  • 07.17.2004 7:45 AM PDT
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Posted by: Stickman Army
Darn. Too bad I'm only 14...

Anyway, it would kind of suck to be a tester. It would get pretty boring, and imagine playing 1 game for 60 hours a week... With Halo, of course, that wouldn't be a bad thing, but it does spoil your excitement and you see it before anyone else, so you don't get to share your joy.

it doesnt spoil the excitment at all!!!
you get to see it right now, and you be excited for that. and the new updates happening during the game, youll be excited to try some of that! theres always excitment as long as you have your imagination. instead of having one big giant excitment, you get little excitments frequently. and theres an upside....you play the game before everyone else, and get to brag.... lol

  • 07.17.2004 8:05 AM PDT
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17th POST!!!!!!!!!!!!!1 yay
o ya awsome news!!!!

  • 07.17.2004 8:36 AM PDT
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My career is developing more towards QA/Software testing with each successive job. I was just wondering if the Tester's positions deal with games exclusively, or are they more general Software Test Engineers?

I'm ultimately aiming for a job in the games industry, not necessarily in QA/Testing, but I'm accumulating experience in that department. I figure if I get a position doing that somewhere in the industry, I can move on to something else that interests me once I've established myself.

At the moment, I'm participating in a few Beta tests, hopefully that will help out my resume somewhat.

All that bug finding and reporting actually sounds fun. Its not that different from what I do at the moment, just that at Bungie its with games, where I am now its with less fun software...

Bug finding and testing I find to be kind of fun actually, since with every bug you find and report, the software runs smoother and smoother with each pass. You really get to see the effects of your work firsthand.

Anyhoo, great article Frankie. I'm registering on the MS careers page right now.

=)

~W

  • 07.17.2004 11:00 AM PDT
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You should have had some cool pictures of Plasma screens and expensive chairs, so people will think you guys take care of your staff.

  • 07.17.2004 11:02 AM PDT
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durandal, your my kinda guy [friend! not any gay relationship!!!!:|]
durandal does have a point of how smooth it gets over and over again, and it would be really nice to know that you helped that happen. this is what i want to feel, but i a only 13....
still, if bungie wants me to test, im right here at e-mails' reach. ill be willing to travell ;)
lol. but it is someting im considering to do for my career.... video games...

  • 07.17.2004 12:35 PM PDT
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Posted by: Gadwin
hmm.... i really would like to meet the bungie staff, and get to be friends with them:)
sadly, i am only going into the 8th grade, and i cannot test. :(
if i could test, i would... its my lifes goal to work with bungie on a miraculas game like halo.


I heard you can be a Contract Tester if you are 16+ , I dont think they let you get all technical but they use the contractors to make and suggest ideas for a game .

You and me dont got long ill b 15 soon :P

  • 07.17.2004 12:48 PM PDT
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well, me, i cant wait. for i want to be testing halo2. lol. but still, if i get to test for bungie, i have fufilled one of my lives' goals....
keep in touch for 2.5 years, and you can tell me where to apply ;)

  • 07.17.2004 1:08 PM PDT
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hmm.. i'm 14 too . it might be more difficult to be a game tester if every one else wants to be one(including me)

  • 07.17.2004 1:45 PM PDT
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Well I now have more respect for the testers! I don't know how true this is but the fact that the testers sometimes literally eat, drink and sleep at Bungie explains why the lights were on in some of the web cam's where they were not before.

The funny part about all this is that by the middle of 2005 I will have the education required to get a tester job, but I have some skills that could be used right now. Like those testers who play the game fo find any glitch in something like a wall where the player can run through the wall. I have no idea how many times I have played "NFSU" on Xbox and had the RX-7 fall off one of the "Market Place" Map. Obviously not a Bungie game but still, I found that glitch after EA released the game. To top that off I played the PC version on a friends computer and found the same glitch in the same spot.

Anyway, kinda getting off the subject, but the testers job does not sound so hard since I know what has to be done and how to do it myself. If it were a year earlier I would say something diffrent, but hey, its not.

  • 07.17.2004 1:50 PM PDT
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Hey, are you going to do an article about being a sound designer for games?

  • 07.17.2004 2:04 PM PDT