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Working as a Game Tester

DaytonCIM writes "SFGate.com has a great story on the real life of game testers. 'Life is not all fun and games, though. It's all games -- with little time left for sleeping or eating, at least during the busy months before Christmas. The longest week he has logged was 106 hours, and 60-hour-plus weeks are typical in deadline crunches, he said.'"

29 of 359 comments (clear)

  1. Oh please by unicron · · Score: 5, Funny

    Lemme get this straight. You get PAID to spend the majority of your time playing videogames. OH WHAT A HELLISH NIGHTMARE EXISTANCE!! WO IS YOU!!

    I just spent the afternoon degaussing 130 DLT tapes. You'll forgive me if I don't share in your plight of the hellishness that is Galaxies or Planetside. I'll pray for you tonight.

    --
    Finally, math books without any of that base 6 crap in them.
    1. Re:Oh please by Tackhead · · Score: 4, Funny
      > Imagin the fun of testing out EVERYWALL on some level to make sure that you don't walk through it.

      ...WTF d00d? Like how else am I supposed to I be sure I found all the secret doors and easter eggs?

      > Remember that they don't just get paid to play video games, they get paid to FIND BUGS!

      As opposed to customers, who pay to find bugs :)

  2. I was a game tester... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 4, Funny

    ...for vivid games. I quit when my palms were so covered in blisters that it was painful to drive.

    1. Re:I was a game tester... by AgentPhunk · · Score: 2, Funny

      Sure, blame the blisters on the video games. C'mon, fess up. We know what they were REALLY from.

  3. moderation baby by Em+Emalb · · Score: 2, Funny

    Just like anything else...

    too much of a good thing is still bad.

    Too much alcohol, the body revolts.

    Too much work, you revolt.

    --
    Sent from your iPad.
  4. 106 hours? by corsec67 · · Score: 3, Funny

    That guy must have been slacking off. I mean, with the 62 hours left during the 7 day week, he had about 62/7=8.8 hours left each day, which would be plenty of time to sleep. That slacker!

    --
    If I have nothing to hide, don't search me
  5. I wonder... by Genrou · · Score: 5, Funny

    What do they do as a hobby? Accounting, maybe?

    1. Re:I wonder... by orkysoft · · Score: 2, Funny

      Okay, that settles it. You're definately a guy :-P

      --

      I suffer from attention surplus disorder.
  6. Re:Poor babies... by gr0ngb0t · · Score: 2, Funny

    absolutely.

    If any of these game testers want to do a job swap, bring it on. I'll more than readily trade my 35 hour week office job for a 60+ hour week playing games and getting paid for it.

  7. Who needs a pension... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Funny

    ...when you are assured lifetime employment as a Duke Nukem Forever tester?

  8. Oh poor baby by Jordy · · Score: 5, Funny

    You think you have it bad.

    I'm the Chief Deneedler at a haystack company. You don't know what hell is until you spend 40 hours a week searching haystacks for needles.

    --
    The world is neither black nor white nor good nor evil, only many shades of CowboyNeal.
    1. Re:Oh poor baby by AELinuxGuy · · Score: 2, Funny

      Luxury. We used to have to get out of the lake at three o'clock in the morning, clean the lake, eat a handful of hot gravel, go to work at the mill every day for tuppence a month, come home, and Dad would beat us around the head and neck with a broken bottle, if we were LUCKY!

    2. Re:Oh poor baby by snubber1 · · Score: 2, Funny

      Hot gravel? S'cuse me Mr. Fancy Pants but in my day our gravel was cold as our dead grandpa, and besides, we only earned a half-tuppence between my fourteen brothers and I.

      --
      I don't really mind double posts on //..
  9. Easy solution... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 4, Funny

    1.Burn down the haystack.
    2.Run around with metal detector.
    3.Profit!!!

  10. Re:Poor babies... by dubbreak · · Score: 2, Funny

    not only the same game, but the same scene over and over to try to track down a bug and the scenario around that bug.. Even if the game is "fun" as a tester you won't be having fun the way you have to play it at work.

    --
    "If you are going through hell, keep going." - Winston Churchill
  11. Re:Poor babies... by no_opinion · · Score: 2, Funny

    I don't know... the top floor of my building (i.e. management) has been playing Snood every day for months! Granted, they probably only play about 40 hours a week.

  12. Test this! by rcastro0 · · Score: 3, Funny

    Welcome to Equilibrium, the Game of Life (c).
    You are at the north end of the Shrine of Delphi. There is a plaque in front of you. Exits: S
    >read plaque
    The plaque reads "Know thyself".
    >S
    You are at the south end of the Shrine of Delphi. There is a plaque in front of you. Exits: N
    >read plaque
    The plaque reads "Nothing in excess".
    >N
    You are at the north end of the Shrine of Delphi. There is a plaque in front of you. Exits: S
    (...)

    --
    Quem a paca cara compra, paca cara pagará.
  13. Re:funny story by Bastian · · Score: 4, Funny

    Obviously someone who likes to play Madden a little too much got some mod points.

  14. Stop shooting me! I'm checking walls! by phamlen · · Score: 4, Funny

    Imagine the fun of testing out EVERYWALL on some level to make sure that you don't walk through it.

    Yeah, and imagine that all your co-workers shooting you at the same time! "Boy, Jim is an easy target today. It's like he's always running into walls!"

    (On the other hand, if you do find a buggy wall, it would be "Hey! Where did he go?")

  15. Its true by intermodal · · Score: 5, Funny

    I am a games tester. When I finish a project, usually the first thing i do with my free cop(y/ies) is send them to friends who live far away.

    --
    In SOVIET RUSSIA... erm...NSA AMERICA, the Internet logs onto YOU!
  16. Re:Poor babies... by Josuah · · Score: 2, Funny

    If it's a fun game, that's no problem, but how many games out there do you REALLY want to play for 80 hours a week for a month or two solid? I can't think of very many. You'd get sick of it in a real hurry.

    Here's one: EverQuest. Whether or not you're sick of it, you're still playing!

  17. Re:Poor babies... 106 hours?!?!? by Carnivorous+Carrot · · Score: 2, Funny

    A hundred and six hours? 75 year old Supreme Court justices work 120 hours.

    I once worked 145 hours in a week in crunch time for a telematics show in Europe, and 450 hours over a 5 week period that same time. Longest work day? 33 hours.

    106 hours, I could do that with a malfunctioning pacemaker, a headache, and a snack machine out of everything but dry, oversalted pretzels and black licorice Good-n-Plenty.

    --
    "Has [being a kidnapped teenage girl, raped repeatedly for months] changed you?" - Katie Couric to Elizabeth Smart
  18. brain dead? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Funny

    if 7 hours a week has done this to me, then what would i be like if i spent 60 hours a week playing games? talk about no social life, you have daydreams of shooting your boss in the head with a freakishly large, hideously overpowered gun.

  19. Re:Explanation... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Funny

    The little kiddies with mod points can't handel the truth.

    Please bach up your claims.

  20. Re:Poor babies... by grammar+fascist · · Score: 4, Funny
    --
    I got my Linux laptop at System76.
  21. Zimbabwen by Jackson+Five · · Score: 2, Funny

    Hey, great to meet you buddy. I live far away.

  22. How Do Game Testers Relax? by IHateEverybody · · Score: 3, Funny


    The longest week he has logged was 106 hours, and 60-hour-plus weeks are typical in deadline crunches, he said.

    After a 106 hour marathon game testing session, he went home to unwind by going over budget figures in Microsoft Excel.

    --
    Does this .sig make my butt look big?
  23. Playing games that are 95% done.... by jordanda · · Score: 3, Funny

    Playing games that are 95% done is like drinking water that is 95% not urine. Sure, its mostly good, but that other %5 ruins the entire experience.

  24. Damn PC games developers by pommiekiwifruit · · Score: 2, Funny

    You wouldn't get away with that on a console. Well maybe CD-I.