Quality Assurance - Has Valve Said Anything?

[Narfo]

This is my first post ever, so please be gentle.

Anyway, I've been recently re-watching Jim Sterling's videos on Valve's poor quality control for games on Steam - Day One: Garry's Incident and Air Control come to mind - and I realized that I've heard plenty from Jim and TotalBiscuit and from the developers themselves, but I haven't heard anything from Valve on the issue.

I guess that's the question I'm asking here: has Gabe Newell, or a representative of Valve, said anything concerning quality assurance in response to these veritable shit-storms and what Jim (and whoever else) has been practically screaming?

 

[Keoul]

Spoiler

I believe Valve's stance is that quality comes first no matter how many years you have to delay the game, at least for their own games. Just look at how long it takes for them to release sequels.

Whats available on steam not so much, just kinda put on what people will pay for.

 

[Weaver]

To my knowledge valve has made no comment on quality control for Steam games.
IMO they should really set a baseline standard and do something about it. Like, why can't we start with "the game can boot"?

 

[AmberSword]

Valve is a private listed company with only slightly more than 300 employees in total if I recall correctly, yet they are handling international sales and marketing of a gigantic platform as if they were Google or Apple. I really don't think they have enough staff to QA Steam games not their own, so the only solution is to crowdsource, as they have always done in the past. Valve just needs to tweak the greenlight system, and add a redlight system. (like Twinkle mentioned)

 

[Steppin Razor]

They basically don't give a crap about the quality of games being put on steam unless it causes a shitstorm.

 

[Smooth Operator]

Well they are far more likely to make new features and systems then actually talk about any of it, which I do respect because droning on with PR bull has never ever gotten anything done. But yes some basic QA would be nice, even just one fucking employee installing and trying the games before they go public... check if the shit you sell works because we are talking illegal conduct otherwise, yes it is actually that critical.

On the other hand however I do not want to see them spawn some XBL/PSN 1-3 month QA hell hole, presaging devs into exclusives and what not. Also they can absolutely not become the arbiter of good games, that is what reviewers are for and that is why you need to pay attention.

 

[Phrozenflame500]

Valve's store policy really always has been "as long as it's not falsely advertised, you can sell it". They want to present an open market where nearly everyone can put something up for sale and as long as it's not illegal the buyer has to be the one who researches how "good" the product is.

But yeah, the current situation is that some games are in such bad shape that they don't even run. Valve needs to have some response to the games which are blatantly falsely advertised.

 

[Pedro The Hutt]

They basically don't give a crap about the quality of games being put on steam unless it causes a shitstorm.

To be honest, every retailer has the right to sell bad products. Your local video rental store will probably have some trash flicks besides the Oscar winning materials.

Amazon sells piles upon piles of rubbish up to and including dinosaur themed "erotic" literature, they're under no obligation to check whether their films, games or literature are any good besides that they work, the retailer shouldn't have to do the research whether you'll like something for you. Especially because some people bizarrely enough like things most people would consider terrible, and they shouldn't be denied their games either.

In short, look up a few reviews before clicking that buy button. It's your personal responsibility.

 

[AmberSword]

They basically don't give a crap about the quality of games being put on steam unless it causes a shitstorm.

To be honest, every retailer has the right to sell bad products. Your local video rental store will probably have some trash flicks besides the Oscar winning materials.

Amazon sells piles upon piles of rubbish up to and including dinosaur themed "erotic" literature, they're under no obligation to check whether their films, games or literature are any good besides that they work, the retailer shouldn't have to do the research whether you'll like something for you. Especially because some people bizarrely enough like things most people would consider terrible, and they shouldn't be denied their games either.

In short, look up a few reviews before clicking that buy button. It's your personal responsibility.

]

All true.. except for the part where you mentioned the product has to work.
In many cases, the game simply doesn't. Sorry...

 

[black_knight1337]

Not anymore. Before Greenlight became the only way to get games on Steam they required developers to submit a copy of the game for them to make sure that it was of acceptable quality. Nowadays though, if the community want it, we get it. Even if the game itself is illegal.

 

[Pedro The Hutt]

Well, "work" is a pretty broad concept, if the game runs and you don't crash to desktop the moment you try to do anything the game technically "works". Whether or not it crashes to desktop fives minutes in is another issue all together but games with far more reputable publishers and far larger budgets have had to put up with that as well. Yet no one is crying for their removal from Steam.

All the same, as far as I know most of the disputed games do manage to run in the barest sense of the work on a variety of systems. But I could be mistaken, if any of those games fail to even do anything on most of the PCs out there feel free to provide me with their titles, o' course.

 

[AmberSword]

Well, "work" is a pretty broad concept, if the game runs and you don't crash to desktop the moment you try to do anything the game technically "works". Whether or not it crashes to desktop fives minutes in is another issue all together but games with far more reputable publishers and far larger budgets have had to put up with that as well. Yet no one is crying for their removal from Steam.

All the same, as far as I know most of the disputed games do manage to run in the barest sense of the work on a variety of systems. But I could be mistaken, if any of those games fail to even do anything on most of the PCs out there feel free to provide me with their titles, o' course.

You've probably already heard of this, but try Air Control, almost all games pass your perfectly acceptable albeit bare bones definition of work, but this one doesn't, unless you get really lucky or spend a huge amount of time researching how to get the game to work in the first place.

To me, a game not only has to work, it has to work as advertised. Steam seems to agree with my definition as well, as evidenced by the many games that have been taken down from Steam often temporarily. Problem is, this only happens when a sufficiently large shitstorm has been conjured, which is probably 1 in 10 of such cases.

What I mean is, whatever you dare put on your store page, you better make sure that it's actually in the game.
Early Access is excused from this (very grudgingly), but even then there are still tonnes of "finished products" that make use of false advertising.

Beyond that, the game's demo and trailers (*cough Aliens Colonial Marines and Watch Dogs*) also shouldn't lie to the customer, but that is beyond Steam's responsibilities, as long as they don't place such lies on the store page itself, then Steam isn't responsible.

 

[Pedro The Hutt]

Well, false advertising is another matter entirely. A bad game is free to be sold if it doesn't pretend to be more than it is. But enhanced screenshots (like with the WarZ)or bragging about features that aren't there aren't acceptable by any stretch of the imagination.

And yeah, pretty sure the last hasn't been said or seen in regards to the troubles Early Access can potentially cause, especially since there is no pressure from Valve to actually put a game out of Early Access by a certain point, a game can currently just perpetually be in Early Access, for better or for worse (probably worse).

 

[an annoyed writer]

Gary Newman

Garry Newman? The maker of Garry's Mod and Rust, and head of Facepunch? What's he got to do with this? He doesn't work for Valve. Gabe Newell's the head of Valve, pal. As for the original question, I've heard nothing. They're notoriously secretive though.

 

[Steppin Razor]

That was kind of my point, games like The War Z end up on steam when 5 minutes of playing it would have shown someone that half the features being advertised aren't actually in it. Hence me saying that valve don't really care that much about quality control unless it's so bad that it causes a shitstorm.

As for early access, it's kind of a mixed bag. On the one hand, there isn't really any pressure for the devs to finish making their game, but on the other the small indie devs would never have gotten the opportunity to even make it halfway into a beta build without the funding received from people deciding to take a gamble on their game. It's exploitable but it could also lead to some good games we'd never have seen otherwise.

 

[sanquin]

They could start by separating new releases and other games. And then also change policy, so a re-release can't be called a new game and won't show up on the new releases list. Maybe even a separate page/search function for re-releases.

But no, I haven't heard anything from Valve about quality control. I kind of see Steam as a games store and very expensive flea market in one. You have your usual games you used to find in games stores, but mixed in with them stand the games I'd expect to find at a flea market stall back in the 90's or something. The crappy, unknown or old games. Only they're going for high prices as well.

 

[TheYellowCellPhone]

The only thing I can immediately remember them doing was shutting down that DayZ clone, The War Z but now called Infestation: Survivor Stories, and offering to give refunds back to people who bought the game. That was only because the game was released under a full license promising things like large, expansive lands with multiple country areas, but the game only had one country thingie and it was well underneath the size promised. Also the game was buggy, a blatant grab at the DayZ craze, and the developers weren't well liked.

Otherwise, they've let some stupid things go. I've heard of but don't know for certain of multiplayer-only games with no servers, early access games that aren't promising to fulfill their future guidelines like The War Z, buggy games, and games that aren't compatable with well used OS like Windows 7.

 

[Something Amyss]

Valve's store policy really always has been "as long as it's not falsely advertised, you can sell it".

And even if you falsely advertise, you can sell it until it reaches critical mass.

And even then, sometimes you can still sell it.

Valve is a honeybadger. Valve doesn't give a crap.

 

[StriderShinryu]

They basically don't give a crap about the quality of games being put on steam unless it causes a shitstorm.

Pretty much. People are too hooked on Steam, both on the developer side and the player side, to stop using it so Valve doesn't really have to do anything. I absolutely feel they should but until people stop worshiping at the alter of Gabe there's no reason for Valve to change.