Five Ways to Get Noticed

Before long, you'll have settled into your testing job and gotten a feel for the routine. But of course, you want to do more than test for your whole career, especially if you're stuck on a game you don't like. You might have some ideas on how to improve the game, but chances are no one's listening. You want to climb up the chain, get a better view of your surroundings and the opportunities in them.

Of course, moving up requires getting recommended, and getting recommended requires being noticed. That can be tricky, and more so depending on where you are; your department might have five other testers, or it might have five hundred.

Here are some ways to better your chances:

1. Always volunteer for overtime. Some places will "volunteer" you regardless, but if given the option, always say yes. It not only shows dedication and diligence, and earns you extra cash besides, but it also gives you more time to spend with your fellow testers and with your lead. Which brings us to:

2. Make friends wherever you are. Every fellow tester you meet is a potential future contact in another department or field, so establish common ground and a solid rapport with everyone you can. Remember, when it comes time to pick people out for promotions, they'll be looking for people skills as well as testing ability. (We'll talk more later about what makes a good lead.)

Conversely, however, don't spend too much time chatting on the clock. If your bosses think you're distracting other testers from their work, they'll frown on that. On a related note:

3. Work harder than your friends. Your office might be too big for you to stand out as the hardest-working person on the floor — but you can stand out as the hardest-working person on your team. If you find more bugs, accomplish more assignments, and make it clear that you take the job more seriously than they do, you'll get yourself noticed.

Just be aware that there might be a price to pay; if your teammates think you're making them look bad by comparison, they might resent you for it, or you might find yourself in a rivalry with one or more of them. Keep it friendly and casual whenever possible. Don't flaunt your skills or work ethic, and don't criticize theirs; if you're doing a better job than they are, play it down, with an attitude like, "Gimme a sec; I gotta take care of this," or "Eh, I guess I do all right."

Your mileage may vary on this one. No two testers are the same; some are hard workers, while others are blatant slackers. If you're the only one doing your job, while everyone else in the room is watching YouTube, they probably will resent you — but, on the other hand, you'll have your self-respect and the respect of those above you. Choose for yourself what you want.

Closely related to #3 is:

4. Volunteer for special projects. They might need to send someone over to the developers to test offsite, or a pre-alpha (very early) build of an unannounced game might be looking for feedback, or maybe that mystery guy who works in the corner office, and works on games that no one else sees, might need a hand with something. Whatever they need, if you're at all capable of providing it, make sure you're the first to volunteer.

This can get you noticed not only by your own higher-ups, but sometimes by people outside your department; people in marketing, production, and possibly development. It's never too early to start making new friends and learning new things.

If you work offsite, be prepared for long drives, long hours, and extra logistical hoops to jump through; however, the experience of working directly with a developer is worth all that and more. Learn all you can when you're over there — about level design, AI scripting, or anything else anyone will show you — and take the chance to make more friends. One caveat: Don't rush things when you're over there. You're there as a guest, so be sure not to go poking around uninvited.

If they offer you a chance to give feedback, go for it; it's one of the few times, as a tester, when they might — and I emphasize might — listen to your opinion. Be as detailed, thorough, and insightful as you can be with each point you make; be sure to back up each opinion with as many facts as possible. If you have your own ideas, you might be allowed to suggest them, but think them all the way through first; how easy, or difficult, would it be for the developer to implement your idea, and how would doing so affect the rest of the game? Whatever you come up with, be as diplomatic about it as possible; you have a chance to show that you're an observant and creative problem solver, and the last thing you want is for your target audience to take offense.

To give an idea of what separates good feedback from bad, here are some examples:

Good Example: The wall run maneuver looks cool, but there's never any point in the game where the player needs it. As a suggestion, those empty hallways in the Underground Cathedral could be spiced up with pits and platforms to make the wall run useful there.

Whenever you can, open with praise. "I like this, but that could be better, and here's a viable suggestion on how to make it better." Now here's the same suggestion, poorly phrased.

Bad Example: The wall run's useless, since you're mostly just running down those long, empty, boring halls anyway. Maybe if you put something in the halls, like some pits or spikes or whatever, they'd actually be interesting.

A line like that might pass muster in an online review — most review sites expect you to be informal and snarky — but not when you're trying to convince the developers to take your suggestion.

Speaking of suggestions, remember to keep them realistic; use everything you know about the game and what's gone into it to determine if they're realistic or not. (Getting to work offsite with the developers can come in very handy here.)

Bad Example: The game's fun while it lasts, but it feels like it ought to be longer. (Once the player knows where to go, the whole game lasts about four hours.) Would it be possible to add a few more levels?

This suggestion is politely phrased, but not very realistic. If the game's far enough along that you can tell it's too short, there's virtually no chance they'd have time left to add new levels, even if they wanted to. Adding new levels would mean more than just building them in Maya and dropping them into the game; they'd have to invent new content to fill those levels, and redesign the placement of the content they already have. In most circumstances, asking a question like this, even politely, may hurt your credibility with the devs; they'll decide you don't know enough about what it takes to build the game, and may stop listening to you.

Here's a more realistic way to request extending the game's length:

Good Example: The game's fun while it lasts, but it feels a bit short. (Once the player knows where to go, the whole game last about four hours.) Would it be possible to include some sort of bonus content, or extra difficulty mode, for replay value? As a suggestion, the pictures in the "Extras" gallery could be hidden as item pickups the second time through the game, instead of being unlocked all at once after the first time through.

A little cheap, a little quick-and-dirty, but it would give the game some replay value without having to generate much new content. The developers might take that suggestion, and could play around with it and come up with their own ideas for more bonus content in a second/third/fourth playthrough.

It's rare (although not quite unheard of) that the devs will generate new content based on tester suggestions. Most of the time, the ideal suggestions find clever ways to get the best use out of content they already have.

Of course, when you're thinking about what to suggest, think small as well as big; after all, the little things matter too.

Good Example: The hero feels a little too durable in the current build; I walked him into a room, let five Rock Men pound him nonstop while he stood still, and it took them almost a minute to kill him. Raising the monsters' attack ratings, or lowering the hero's HP, would make the monsters more threatening and thus make the game more exciting.

Good Example: The game feels a little too stingy with gold in this build. I needed to play through the first map perfectly, twice, just to buy all six party members the most basic equipment, and that trend continues through most of the game. The exceptions are the mini-Lunar Beasts, which — presumably due to a bug — give out as much gold each as the boss Lunar Beast does. About 20% more gold from most enemies, and less from the mini-Beasts, could improve the game's pacing.

If you just don't find the game fun, think about why. Are the objectives too repetitive? Is the presentation too bland? Is it too similar to games you've played before? Are the controls stiff? Whatever the issue or issues are, how could they be realistically improved? Answer those questions well, and you can improve your reputation with your co-workers, your supervisors, the developers, and potentially the whole office.

Now, depending on how your office is organized, you may have a separate team, or perhaps a lone individual, who works on a separate set of projects and occasionally requests to borrow a tester or two. If you can get their attention, show that you're dependable — and, when necessary, trustworthy at keeping secrets — you may find not only more friends, but a fast track to more contacts and consideration. (As with #3, this might alienate you from your fellow testers if you let it; make sure to maintain your friendships if your job starts to set you apart.)

Show initiative. Offer to help those who need it. If your lead has a lot on his or her plate, ask if there's anything you can help with, and then take the opportunity to impress them. If you finish your assignment early, ask for another one. No such thing as an overachiever, if you ask me.

5. Knowledge is power. You might already be an ace tester, but there are plenty of other things to learn about; first-party (Sony/Nintendo/Microsoft) regulations, FileMaker scripting, tricks with PowerPoint and Excel, foreign languages, and on and on. Learn from older testers about the history of your department. Ask if there are any old postmortems (post-project reports) you can read. Get to know who else is in the office. Who's approachable? Who's worked on what in the past? Who calls the shots? (Don't wander around outside of your department introducing yourself willy-nilly, mind you; rather, bide your time, excel at your job, and learn who you most want to work with in the future.)

If you can, learn which projects are coming down the pipeline, and convince people to let you into the projects you want. Be audacious, but also have the skill and the body of work to back that audacity up. "Hey, quick question: Do you have a team picked out for such-and-such yet? 'Cause you've seen my work on this, that, and the other; I'd be a good fit, and I'd love to do it."

You might not always get what you want. Sometimes the answer will be no, and part of succeeding in the long run is knowing when to hold 'em and when to fold 'em. But another part is building up credibility and goodwill; sometimes you just have to know the right time to call in a favor.

We'll talk more about that later. Up next: Ways to branch out once you've gotten started.