Quality Assurance

[kimkom]

Apologies, but following another forum member's complaints, I feel that I need to bring this into a new thread...

Quality Assurance is the one thing that concerns me the most right now with The Pinball Arcade.

As far as I am aware, FarSight are a small team but are trying to produce a lot of content across a large number of platforms, at a rate of around one or two tables per month.

The one thing I really do not want to see happen is that quality suffers as a result of trying to maintain this level of output.

With the latest releases, I have to say that am concerned that quality is suffering, and from the screenshots and gameplay video I have seen, Firepower does not look to be of a similar standard to say Gorgar, for example. Recently, there have also been quality issues raised regarding the PSVita version of Scared Stiff and a multiball camera issue raised for Dr. Dude.

Bugs are one thing, but poor quality is something else entirely and can be far more damaging.

Personally, I would much rather wait until FarSight polish these tables to perfection, than have them being rushed to market.

God knows I am willing to wait... I'm on Xbox and PC!

Please FarSight, stay true to your goals, treat each table with the respect it deserves and let's get these tables right.

 

[Tabe]

QA is not a top priority for them. That much has been made clear.

I do QA for a living and, well, it's obvious in a million ways that they simply don't emphasize it enough.

Tabe

 

[Sinistar]

Thank You KimKom for backing up the importance of this issue which we FANS and Customers have allowed too much leniency with FarSight Studios on.

I wont become insulting like the trolls on FaceBook , but the quality slide on the PSVita is not forgiveable , and should be a priority in the company to address , hire some more graphic artists , commision someone experienced in PS Vita games , but do not keep offering tables that dont have graphics up to N64 and Playstation One era graphics .

Does it look like a Genesis 16 bit game to you?

 

[tyche]

QA is an unfront, known cost. Lost sales due to poor, buggy games is an unknown cost.

I planned to stop buying any more tables because of this but decided to get Firepower because I do like the table. Well, guess what my initial joy turned into burned again with obvious and simple to occur game crushing bugs.

 

[Sumez]

Yeah, it's obviously a financial issue.

One could hope that FS would take a break from the production of new tables once their 40-table deal with WMS runs out, but I find it very unlikely that it won't just get renewed immediately.

They JUST released Dr.Dude and Firepower, and already they're saying the next table pack will be revealed as soon as they have some shots ready, which I'm assuming will probably be next week. From a consumer standpoint I'd say they are moving way too fast. They could easily cut their output frequency in half and use some more time working on ironing out bugs and issues, making the tables look and play better, and adding new features. Everyone would be happy, and I doubt anyone would complain that they aren't putting out enough new tables.

However, that would obviously mean a noticeable lower number of sales every second month, which is not only difficult to work with for a small developer without (?) a publisher to back them up, but also very noticeable when you base your entire business on extremely cheap mobile sales. They don't really have any other income.

 

[canuck]

Bug fixing doesn't pay the bills, producing new content does. IMO, most iOS developers do not release monthly bug fixes, which is exactly what farsight does. I'd wager they're doing the best they can, which must be working for them considering their growing success.

 

[Gord Lacey]

They don't release monthly bug fixes, they release new content monthly. Big difference.

 

[hectorpuppet]

Yeah, it's obviously a financial issue.

Perhaps they could have a Kickstarter for it?

 

[night]

You want to get FarSights attention? Stop buying.

 

[gooche77]

Firepower seems fine to me.

 

[MadScience2006]

Lingering bug fixes need to be addressed. The bugs can cause bad reviews to be given on the iTunes Store (of course, I'm speaking of iOS bugs in this case) and that can also hamper sales of new content...someone needs to realize this. Many of us here already have.

 

[night]

This place is gold for a company, yet I feel we are seen as rusty steel.

 

[kimkom]

Thank You KimKom for backing up the importance of this issue which we FANS and Customers have allowed too much leniency with FarSight Studios on.

No worries.

If you haven't seen it already, thought you might like this:
http://www.eurogamer.net/articles/2013-02-07-sinistar-retrospective

 

[Nik Barbour]

Firepower seems fine to me.

Android Firepower has a bug keeping track of balls in play during both normal play, and it's exasperatedly worse in multiball.
Had a few game ending bugs with this table, ball locks not releasing, bonus countdown at end of play stuck in a never ending loop....

Mike Reitmeyer has just finished (or is about to) finish a 3wk vacation though, so I think Farsight have been more stretched than normal.

 

[kimkom]

I also wonder if the Xbox issue is having a major impact. Meaning that FarSight may be having to compensate for lost sales on the 360, by releasing content on other platforms quicker than desired. Just a thought.

If that's the case though, it's nothing but a downward spiral and very unfortunate for everybody.

Let's hope FarSight maintain a high quality, with all their releases.

 

[Crush3d_Turtle]

Just to further support what Sinistar was saying, here is what Scared Stiff looks like on the PS Vita:

In addition to being a blurry mess, it also runs a a much lower framerate than all of the other tables, which produces jittery motion and all kind of weird occurrences where the ball will momentarily appear inside components such as the flippers. All of the DLC tables on the Vita have been bad, but this brings it to a whole new low.

 

[canuck]

Well, the number of Vita's Sony sells in a year is equivalent to the number of iOS devices sold in three or four days. So its not surprising that iOS (and android) are a priority.

 

[shutyertrap]

This reminds me of when games were released for Atari and ColecoVision, and the result would be this...

And they'd cost the same too.

 

[Crush3d_Turtle]

Well, the number of Vita's Sony sells in a year is equivalent to the number of iOS devices sold in three or four days. So its not surprising that iOS (and android) are a priority.

Priority or not, the tables on the PS Vita have had massive graphical issues since June 2012 and the developers have been completely silent about the whole problem. I don't care if we have to wait another month or two for them to iron out the problems, I just want to be sure that the tables I paid for (just like every person on iOS) are eventually brought up to a playable state.

 

[gooche77]

This reminds me of when games were released for Atari and ColecoVision, and the result would be this...

And they'd cost the same too.

love the coleco. Too bad those controllers crippled your thumbs.