DICE: Battlefield 4 Beta Testers Are "Objectively Wrong" On Faults

[Steven Bogos]

DICE: Battlefield 4 Beta Testers Are "Objectively Wrong" On Faults

DICE producer Patrick Bach says the beta build is "well out of date" and that testers "aren't playing the actual game".

The Battlefield 4 beta, while fun, has been criticized for being pretty laden with bugs, and balance flaws, especially considering that the game will launch later this month. However, DICE producer Patrick Bach says that as well as these critiques being "objectively wrong," testers are also playing a long-outdated version of the game. What was the point of the beta then? Stress testing the game, says Bach, "so that you don't end up in a Rockstar situation where the game doesn't actually work on day one."

"And it's actually quite scary to see how objectively wrong people can be. Because they want to win, personally, therefore they claim the thing that prevents them from winning is a design flaw or a bug or something."

Bach said that in the past, when DICE was not as experienced as it was today, it would design patches and updates based on internet rage, which made its games worse because player perception is inaccurate. "It's in our interest to keep the game balanced and stable and find the right things to tweak to keep things on top. If people are only using one gun in the game, the game is probably broken," he said.

"I saw people saying 'oh, you haven't fixed the problems you had in 3 because there are too many snipers,' and it's like no, we can see on the data that you are objectively wrong about this thing."

As for the bugs and glitches, "we're trying to compare our list of feedback and bugs with the list we're getting from the community," says Bach. "While we know that what people are playing isn't the latest game, it's one or two months old, we're comparing notes on what is already fixed."

So what do you think? Does this ease your concerns about the game? Were you unimpressed by the beta?

Source: VG24/7 [http://www.gamesindustry.biz/articles/2013-10-17-bach-to-the-frontlines-battlefield-4s-lead-producer-opens-up]

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[suitepee7]

the beta would never connect for me, so i can't objectively comment. although i'm not wrong about my bug, the game wouldnt fucking load

 

[Adultism]

Pretty sure they are just lying and we will see a big pile of crap at release. Unsurprised though, this happens with EA subsidiaries.

EDIT: What they are saying in a nutshell

Oh, Our game isn't bad. Its the players! Not only do they not know good content when it smacks them in the face, but we also gave them a old outdated version for the beta because we KNOW its amazing no matter what anyone says.

 

[Drummodino]

Yes insulting your fans is a great strategy DICE. Keep it up.

 

[Drummodino]

I will be amazed if a lot of people actually buy this.

I mean fucking hell people, the last modern warfare battlefield was released TWO YEARS AGO.

at least the waited 6 years between 2 and 3

Sadly the people who buy CoD every year will have no problem buying Battlefield only two years after the last one.

 

[Shamanic Rhythm]

What was the point of the beta then? Stress testing the game, says Bach, "so that you don't end up in a Rockstar situation where the game doesn't actually work on day one."

Otherwise known as a 'Maxis situation'.

Or even better, a 'DICE situation' [http://www.pcgamer.com/2011/10/31/battlefield-3-fixes-connection-to-server-has-times-out-crashes-disconnections-and-more/].

Pot kettle glass houses etc.

 

[StriderShinryu]

I can see him largely being right on this one, but I wouldn't totally blame the players. If the beta was intended as more of a stress test and general performance test, that's cool. Betas don't really exist in the same state that they used to though. For players, now, it's all about the early access. They are looking to win and to get a leg up on those players who won't be playing until launch. And, as anyone who even remotely makes note of competitive games will attest to, the first thing people do complain about is that one thing that they repeatedly get beaten by.

Basically, this is a mess caused by the current state of what Beta means, and has ended up there due to a mix of obscured developer intent and questionable player interest when they get early access.

 

[MysticSlayer]

Yeah, because DICE's reputation of releasing a game in a better state on launch than it was in the Beta is so well know. I mean, Bad Company 2 totally didn't have a horrible Ping problem on launch! Oh, and I hear Medal of Honor didn't even need an extra patch to fix the PC server issues, not to mention the fact that it was the most balanced game imaginable where the Sniper was perfectly balanced. Battlefield 3 was even better! In fact...yeah, I'm going to stop with the sarcasm now. DICE is hardly one to target Rockstar about server issues. Heck, DICE takes time to stress-test their servers and they still are near unplayable for many people on launch.

But yeah, I see Bach is continuing to keep it classy, insulting DICE's competition every chance he gets, but not in the friendly way of the first Bad Company. Never mind the fact that he still views DICE as some god of gaming that can never go wrong and that the fans are really only ever complaining about non-issues. Oh, and never mind the fact that he loves flaunting his elite status over them all the time.

And people wonder why I hate DICE so much. It isn't enough to dumb down their games to give it wider appeal. They have to insult everyone else, especially their long-time fans, while they do it.

 

[Karathos]

People seem to always have such difficulty with reading comprehension, and the attention-grabber title of the article doesn't help either. From about five seconds of reading it becomes obvious he's talking about people being objectively wrong about CERTAIN THINGS SUCH AS BALANCE ISSUES FOR EXAMPLE.

What this means in layman's terms is that a random forum poster screaming "omg nerf X because it's overpowered" is objectively just wrong and is in fact just not very good at the game. It's seen in every single online game ever, and while sometimes the concerns are legit - sometimes they are not, and the people complaining are, and I quote: "Objectively wrong".

Come on, people. At least read into the damn article before you start panicking over "DICE insulting its customers :OOO"

 

[Phoenixmgs_v1legacy]

The BF4 Beta sucked, not because of the bugs but just because the gameplay isn't good. There's no lean, that context sensitive lean doesn't fucking count. There's no slide. The aim-assist was basically auto-aim. The gunplay just wasn't very good, that's why the beta sucked, not because of the bugs.

Oh, Our game isn't bad. Its the players! Not only do they not know good content when it smacks them in the face, but we also gave them a old outdated version for the beta because we KNOW its amazing no matter what anyone says.

It usually is the player's fault to be honest. The average player doesn't know a damn thing about proper balance. Hell, the average player doesn't even know how to play a shooter properly (the majority of people don't even play the objective). BF3 ended up sucking because DICE actually listened too much to the community. Go to the MoH Warfighter forum and post about anything being nerfed, everyone will be screaming at you that there should be "NO NERFS!!!" because of exactly what happened to BF3. From the article, it seems DICE has learned not to listen to the community. You give the community the power to "balance" the game and the game will turn to shit; it has happened before, it will happen again.

Honestly... I'm at a loss for words here...

There is just so much rampant idiocy in that one statement alone, that I don't know how to address it at all...


In order to test the game, you have players playing a Beta build of it, yet you claim its only really to stress the servers, and that any and all the bugs they are finding right now don't really exist... Yet by that very act, they aren't stress testing anything. Should their "miracle" client be released and played, the stress on that alone will be likely to produce a good deal of bugs. Bugs that would of been caught had they done the sensible thing and RELEASED an updated client.

The last thing you ever do is give people an, as purely an example here, alpha build and tell them that is beta. It not only creates a bunch of negative PR which will ultimately hurt you, but it's boneheaded and just plain... stupid, for a lack of a nicer term than what I wanted to use...


I guess all I can really say is... Good job Dice. You've made the average Call of Duty player appear more intelligent than you. And by "average CoD Player", I mean "Whiny brattish 12 year old who has no purpose playing the game" player.

Do people not understand what a Beta is? Of course, it's going to have bugs that were already fixed, a BETA is not a DEMO, they are 2 completely different things. And Alpha builds are like unplayable pretty much, the consumer will almost never play an Alpha build of a game.

 

[mirage202]

One of these days the industry attitude of "We are right and the consumers are all ignorant morons" is going to bite them in the arse.

On that day I shall gloat mercilessly without sympathy.

 

[Ed130 The Vanguard]

Remember when Beta meant Beta, rather than 'buggy, unbalanced demo?

Those were good days.

 

[thiosk]

Its like these guys are just seeing the internet for the very first time in their lives, gasp, and are horrified.

 

[Metalrocks]

the only problems i really had with this game were 1 shot kills and the spawning. only to frequently you spawn right behind enemies or vise versa. happened to me that i spawned, walked few steps, and then i got killed from behind because a player spawned right there were i was, and in the kill cam i saw that 5 more were standing there as well.

but not very nice of dice saying players are wrong. im sure they got some stupid feedback from people who dont know how to explain things properly but they cant deny that everyone is wrong.
well, im not getting it on day 1, i rather sit back and wait.