Why the bugs and Q/A problems, here is my theory

[Dantragk]

At an old company we used to use Romanian DEV team. You get 5 to 1 for the price of a single American DEV. But our local DEV ended up spending A LOT of time fixing the issues they came up with their software.

 

Apples and oranges but still.

[Ekahab]

So they can't do a decent job? Huh. It's a wonder that anyone can work with anyone else.

 

No they cant, the condition of the patches we have recieved and the bugs added that were obvious yet still overlooked speaks much louder than your obscure internet article.

 

If my work produced the same obvious defects that gets by these outsourced teams & departments in every single patch, then I would be adding to the national unemployment percentage.

 

How you can take a stance of defending a team that lets things like Ilum being entirely broken is beyond me, its not like a small part of the community is only experiencing this issue...it just didnt get tested with this latest version.

 

Also JustTed, you flat out told me I was wrong and directed me to some obscure op-ed piece, without expalining how or what I was wrong about, so the burden of proof is on you, sir.

[Ekahab]

The language, cultural, and communication barrier is still there. That is my problem with outsourcing in any form. To say the quality coming out of Q/A would be identical if they were in Austin vs India is just beyond rational thought in my opinion.

 

I can verbally explain to a co-worker how to down SOA far easier than I could type out a email and translate it into a form I hope a Indian can understand clearly.

 

I then hope I can understand his response correctly.

 

Unneeded, pointless, and anything but time efficient.

 

Well said sir, well said.

[Twolow]

Well said sir, well said.

 

Well, someone had to say it without the fan boy spandex suit on.

[Twolow]

The down time tomorrow morning to fix issues with the last patch is yet another fail in terms of why their Q/A design is flawed. Every week we get a patch and every week we have emergency maintenance to fix issues with those patches.

[Snibb]

You might have missed the part of the article about team sizes, prioritization, and limited resources. Here's the rub:

 

Yes, because there isn't a slew of Americans (talented ones at that) looking for work. Furthermore, QA is a foot in the door to the gaming industry, so it is in high demand even though the pay isn't that great. They have plenty of resources, monetary and otherwise... but in trying to pinch pennies where ever they can, they'll end up losing subscriptions and costing themselves more in the long run. This is how backwards the corporate giants' world is today. I see the same thing at the company I work for every day (another huge corporation.)

[Snibb]

So they can't do a decent job? Huh. It's a wonder that anyone can work with anyone else.

 

I work with people from India on a regular basis. If you haven't, then you have absolutely no idea. Things may eventually get done properly, but the learning curve is tremendous (for both sides involved.) Also, the turnaround in employment facilities over there is extremely high, so you're constantly trying to retrain new individuals. The language barrier definitely becomes a problem, but worse than that is how they handle problems as a culture. Americans are confrontational, and attack problems head on, in general, where as Indian culture promotes avoidance of problems in the hopes that they'll go away on their own. You might see how this could be an issue if an American sets a deadline for the India office that they feel is not attainable. The India office might not say anything, do what they can, and leave the work incomplete.

Also, consider the time delay all this back and forth causes. I've often wondered why the patches seemed to solve such a small number of issues compared to past MMO's at launch, well this might be a large reason why.

[Twolow]

I work with people from India on a regular basis. If you haven't, then you have absolutely no idea. Things may eventually get done properly, but the learning curve is tremendous (for both sides involved.) Also, the turnaround in employment facilities over there is extremely high, so you're constantly trying to retrain new individuals. The language barrier definitely becomes a problem, but worse than that is how they handle problems as a culture. Americans are confrontational, and attack problems head on, in general, where as Indian culture promotes avoidance of problems in the hopes that they'll go away on their own. You might see how this could be an issue if an American sets a deadline for the India office that they feel is not attainable. The India office might not say anything, do what they can, and leave the work incomplete.

Also, consider the time delay all this back and forth causes. I've often wondered why the patches seemed to solve such a small number of issues compared to past MMO's at launch, well this might be a large reason why.

 

This is what I've been trying to say but you said it much better. It is really funny that they outsourced the cheapest part of the process. Game testers are part time minimum wage jobs. Heck, everyone laughs about 'The Tester' show because the grand prize is a part time minimum wage job.

 

Q/A is the final safety check before a patch goes out. A last chance to ensure the patch is not buggy. It is OBVIOUS that the current setup of american devs and indian testers is NOT working. We have proof of that every week.

 

I am not screaming for bugs that have been around since beta to be fixed. I'm just saying test your patches so we don't get new ones EVERY week. India is not earning their 20 cents a hour game testing your patches. I wonder if they even understand this game they are testing. It's not in their language for one. They most likely are completely clueless as to what they are even doing when they log in.

[VorpalK]

Huh. that's funny. I work on a team where we have 45 people spread over half a dozen or more countries. Granted we're not making an MMO, but it doesn't seem to affect us negatively. As a bonus I get to work from home and travel to a bunch of interesting places.

 

But keep up the FUD about distributed development. That's sure to be a winning arguement.

 

EDIT: of course we do this because we hire the best person for the job, wherever he/she may live. I don't think EA is quite motivated in that way. One reason I refuse to work for a large corp driven by bottom line calculations again.

 

I do have experience having had to train/direct a QA office in India remotely. The cultural differences can be an issue. They simply would not take initiative on anything, and only followed specific instructions. I don't know if that's a collective CYA that was going on, or what, but paying someone 1/5 the typical wage breaks down when you have to have them rework at least 6 times....

Edited February 9, 2012 by VorpalK

[MithurElb]

They most likely are completely clueless as to what they are even doing when they log in.

 

Contrary to the common belief, almost in every country in the world outside US the people speak more than one lenguage. Also, the game have a very easy learning curve, so anyone can learn it very quickly.

 

For your information, India got out the Stone Age a few years ago, and the indians have an average IQ similar to the americans, so no problem with that.

 

For the end, not only this thread is taking a stinky racist smell, but it also appear written by backcountry american hicks.

 

So please, think twice your misconceptions before write a thread.

 

Outsorcing is a logistical problem, and even a corporate culture problem, but not an intelectual o technological problem.

[Andarion]

Contrary to the common belief, almost in every country in the world outside US the people speak more than one lenguage. Also, the game have a very easy learning curve, so anyone can learn it very quickly.

 

For your information, India got out the Stone Age a few years ago, and the indians have an average IQ similar to the americans, so no problem with that.

 

For the end, not only this thread is taking a stinky racist smell, but it also appear written by backcountry american hicks.

 

So please, think twice your misconceptions before write a thread.

 

Outsorcing is a logistical problem, and even a corporate culture problem, but not an intelectual o technological problem.

 

I'm not American or even European, I'm South American, but many posters have very strong points, namely on the issue of communication, sure Indians may have a similar IQ to Americans and they may be taught english, but that doesn't mean they can commnicate ideas PROPERLY in english, clear communication is vital for any organization in order for it to survive such a turbulent enviroment as is in the game/tech industry.

 

Also in many cases people know how to speak english with basic words, but in order to do QA you need to have a more extense vocabulary in order to identify issues properly, so I don't really see the issue, because there ARE problems with the Quality Assurance team of SWTOR.

Edited February 9, 2012 by Andarion

[MithurElb]

I'm not American or even European, I'm South American, but many posters have very strong points, namely on the issue of communication, sure Indians may have a similar IQ to Americans and they may be taught english, but that doesn't mean they can commnicate ideas PROPERLY in english, clear communication is vital for any organization in order for it to survive such a turbulent enviroment as is in the game/tech industry.

 

Also in many cases people know how to speak english with basic words, but in order to do QA you need to have a more extense vocabulary in order to identify issues properly, so I don't really see the issue, because there ARE problems with the Quality Assurance team of SWTOR.

 

Have you read the quote in my post?

 

As I say: could be communication problems (Not too hard to solve). Could be corporate culture problems. But to say that they probably don't know what to do afetr log in... is very much the same that say the indians are stupid and don't know how to use the mouse.

 

I agree with the fact that the Q/A team have problems. Something is working. I'm just saying that some arguments in this thread are stupid and racist.

 

BTW, I'm not indian, but European.

[Twolow]

Also in many cases people know how to speak english with basic words, but in order to do QA you need to have a more extense vocabulary in order to identify issues properly, so I don't really see the issue, because there ARE problems with the Quality Assurance team of SWTOR.

 

That and I am pretty confident that those foreigners fluent in speaking/writing/understanding English would make more money in another field with that being in such high demand. If EA is spending top dollar to get the best in India they could have spent that same amount to get some bottom dollar college kids who could be testing the work of the devs side by side.

 

At least the college kids have the passion (for the most part) to do a good job and work their way up within the gaming industry. I doubt there is much room for advancement short of Q/A shift manager in India.

 

The Q/A I see every week is devoid of passion if we can spot the problems 5 minutes after the servers go up.

[MithurElb]

That and I am pretty confident that those foreigners fluent in speaking/writing/understanding English would make more money in another field with that being in such high demand. If EA is spending top dollar to get the best in India they could have spent that same amount to get some bottom dollar college kids who could be testing the work of the devs side by side.

 

So your point is:

 

a) They must be good, because if they weren't they'll be working in another place. But men, not knowing nothing else, that's a circular argument.

 

And the worst part:

 

b) A american college kid will always be better that a foreign professional in Q/A.

 

Men, you have to get out from your farm in middle of the backcountry, and see some world, know some sifferent cultures, and stop saying nonsense.

 

At least the college kids have the passion (for the most part) to do a good job and work their way up within the gaming industry. I doubt there is much room for advancement short of Q/A shift manager in India.

 

The Q/A I see every week is devoid of passion if we can spot the problems 5 minutes after the servers go up.

 

The thing is, you see nothing. You only see bad results, and blame someone basing only in your K-K-K preconceptions.

 

I, having some experience in Software quality and security (And less than you in farming and burning crosses) think that probably the blame is in the management team and overseers in the american side.

 

Man, you have a big problem in ignorance and preconceptions.

 

And I really surprised that BW allow this kind of **** in their forums.

Edited February 9, 2012 by MithurElb

[Zeppelin]

Bioware doesn't even have the technical ability to display a combat log in real time and you're wondering why they have bugs and QA problems?

[Blotter]

Their Q/A is outsourced to Romania and India. I would imagine once the devs in Texas create a change and then Google translate it for Romania and India, they read the translation and later Google translate their response back into English it is completely a cluster fudge. They could have mediocre interpreters much like the guys you speak with at a outsourced call center where you and them can't understand each other no matter how clear and slow you try to speak and they are giving answers unrelated to the reason you called.

 

Q/A should be under the same roof. The devs who made the changes should literally be standing there watching the Q/A guys play or be a couple of cubicals over from the guy tasked with looking at his changes.

 

My boss's door is down the hall in case I have a question, am confused about his orders, or need further elaboration. If he was speaking a foreign language 10,000 miles away, accessible only via email and translation software, and asleep when I'm working due to time zone differences who frikken knows if I would understand and do what he has tasked me to do correctly.

 

Source: http://herocomplex.latimes.com/2012/01/20/star-wars-the-old-republic-the-story-behind-a-galactic-gamble/#/0

 

 

How many times are you going to post this very same tinfoil-hatted idiocy under a different thread title? Seriously...the tinfoil hat is too tight dude...it's cutting into your scalp and preventing oxygen from getting to your brain.

[DarthTHC]

The reason there are so many issues with code coming out of BioWare is that BioWare hasn't been made to care enough about those issues yet.

 

Once BioWare starts to care, they will implement the processes to ensure that:

 

• Bugs are fully tested by internal testers before going to the public test server. Anything the internal testers find will be fixed, delaying the patch if necessary.
  
• Issues identified on the public test server will be taken seriously, triaged, and addressed and re-start the testing cycle until the code is clean.
  

 

But they don't care enough yet because we haven't made them care.

 

There are two things the community can do to make them care:

 

• Unsubscribe. One or 10 or 100 of us doing this won't matter to them. 10,000 will. If you really dislike the game that much, unsubscribe. Money counts more than anything to a business and BioWare and EA are businesses.
  
• Bad publicity. This isn't a bunch of retarded monkeys flinging around 6th grade grammar and phone-text abbreviations while whining on the internal forums. This is well thought out, well written reviews and commentary posted in places BioWare doesn't control.
  

 

There have been numerous games that had great potential and good starts but subsequently underperformed or failed because of issues with ongoing content and patches. BioWare learned about launch quality from other MMOs and had what I consider to be the best MMO launch ever. Unfortunately they seem to have ignored the lessons about post-launch quality.

 

Hopefully they learn the lesson before it's too late, because I really do like the concept and most of the implementation of this game and I'd hate to have to leave it because I get fed up with quality issues.

Edited February 9, 2012 by DarthTHC

[Twolow]

So your point is:

 

a) They must be good, because if they weren't they'll be working in another place. But men, not knowing nothing else, that's a circular argument.

 

And the worst part:

 

b) A american college kid will always be better that a foreign professional in Q/A.

 

If you would have read the first few pages I said the game would be less buggy if the devs were Indian or the Q/A was English. It has nothing to do with racism and everything to do with efficiency. Obviously there's no efficiency if these patches get released with so many glaring problems. Either there is a communication failure, cultural failure, or time constraint failure all of which would have never been a issue if they were one floor down from the devs in Austin.

 

I seriously believe they treat our test server the same way they treat the Q/A test server. They post the patch notes and that's it - done. It's up to us and up to Romania and India to shrug and say ok and try to check the changes out with limited resources and no clear instruction or direction as to what to test. Being halfway around the globe behind a language/cultural wall doesn't help.

Edited February 9, 2012 by Twolow

[MithurElb]

If you would have read the first few pages I said the game would be less buggy if the devs were Indian or the Q/A was English. It has nothing to do with racism and everything to do with efficiency. Obviously there's no efficiency if these patches get released with so many glaring problems. Either there is a communication failure, cultural failure, or time constraint failure all of which would have never been a issue if they were one floor down from the devs in Austin.

 

I seriously believe they treat our test server the same way they treat the Q/A test server. They post the patch notes and that's it - done. It's up to us and up to Romania and India to shrug and say ok and try to check the changes out with limited resources and no clear instruction or direction as to what to test. Being halfway around the globe behind a language/cultural wall doesn't help.

 

You think, you believe...

 

You-don't-know.

 

It's true there is a problem with Q/A. A serious one.

 

And we don't know anything else, because we don't know their bussiness process about that. Without that, you can't assign blame. But you do.

 

The rest are your prejudice misconceptions about "foreigners" and so on.

 

Seriously, take a look at that. You have a serious problem.

Edited February 9, 2012 by MithurElb

[asbalana]

Interesting thread. The outsourcing of the Q/A may go some way to explaing why such a wonderful game with so many good things and so much potential can be so buggy and broken. It can explain why fixes do not work and we have to go through cycles of fixes of fixes of fixes. An often stated rant that unfortunately has a ring of truth is, "Does anyone at BW actually play the game?"

 

I have no idea what the industry defined function of Q/A is, but as a layman not in the industry, it is clear that Q/A with respect to swtor is not working. It would seem to me as a noob that Q/A should be done under conditions that replicate actual game play on actual servers by people that understand gaming and can take some initiative and are able to communicate their findings accurately in great detail. I am not sure that I see how this can be done in a country that is remote, has a language barrier (yes they speak English but the meaning of what is being said may be lost or different than what is understood), has large cultural differences, has a time differential, etc.

 

I often go back to my old friend in swtor and that is ability delay. In a dev post, it was stated that this is not one simple issue, but a number of interlated issues that span everything from individual classes to the system itself. I wonder how after so many years in developement, if there was any meaningfuld Q/A by people who understood gaming and what game play and feel means, how so many issues could have made it to launch. The same is true for so many other bugs and problems that made it to launch and we see every time we play.

[DarthTHC]

You think, you believe...

 

You-don't-know.

 

It's true there is a problem with Q/A. A serious one.

 

And we don't know anything else, because we don't know their bussiness process about that. Without that, you can't assign blame. But you do.

 

The rest are your prejudice misconceptions about "foreigners" and so on.

 

Seriously, take a look at that. You have a serious problem.

 

Having experienced offshore development and QA firsthand, I can say that there is some merit to believing it is is more than capable of producing a lower quality result than onshore.

[rlhaas]

I don't know or care if it's out-sourced or not - it needs to be overhauled (the QA process). It's quite clear to me that pretty much no testing goes on for their new patches. One step they could try (you know, like every other damn MMO) is to actually let people copy over their damn characters or make premades for the PTR. STUFF LIKE THIS WOULDN'T BE BROKEN UPON RELEASE. Remember the 1.0 whatever patch where something was broken and someone actually found it so they were able to fix that before releasing it? That's how it's always supposed to work, Bioware. Give the players the tools to fix your game so you don't continue to look like a bunch of monkeys in party hats comprise your QA team.

[LordArioc]

Id like to point out that most of the problems we have are not QA problems. The ones that are are the ones that happen on patch day (eg, ILUM IS BORKED)

But the ones that have been around since beta? (eg Soa's missing platforms or WZ wins not counting) Theyre on the Project Management. QA has reported them. Beta testers reported them. End users reported them. Project Management told the devs to work on something else.

[Snibb]

Id like to point out that most of the problems we have are not QA problems. The ones that are are the ones that happen on patch day (eg, ILUM IS BORKED)

But the ones that have been around since beta? (eg Soa's missing platforms or WZ wins not counting) Theyre on the Project Management. QA has reported them. Beta testers reported them. End users reported them. Project Management told the devs to work on something else.

 

I have to agree that there is more than one issue going on here.

 

Also, I hope I didn't come across as digging on the Indian culture. It's just different than ours, so it adds extra complexity to bridge the two cultures so that getting work done goes smoothly. It can happen, but only if both sides make an effort to understand eachother, and you aren't constantly retraining people. It's a difficult task to say the least.

 

Companies like EA (because I am pretty sure they are the ones funding this) have to learn the hard way that outsourcing isn't a cost savings like they think it is. They'll learn thru losing subscriptions and from putting extra time/money into fixing errors that would have been fixed long ago.

 

Unfortunately, Bioware probably has little say in the matter, and we'll all suffer for it. I've seen this before in the industry, and I wouldn't be surprised if we see some lawsuits come out of all this.