Open Beta content...

[omlech]

So I was thinking about this earlier and I wanted to get your thoughts on it. So say ANet does beta weekends for a month or so at some point. Well you have to ask yourself what content will they let us play? I think one of two things will happen.

1) All content will be open.

2) They'll restrict you to levels 1-10 and block you from changing to any zones that aren't a city, a 1-10 zone, pvp, or WvWvW. So this would give us 5 zones worth of content to experience which is nothing to sneeze at. I fully expect all features to be in the game at this point and that restricting us to level 1-10 wouldn't be horrible considering we'd have 5 entire zones to explore. I only think they'll restrict us to 1-10 because of the flat leveling curve and some people are very capable of leveling extremely fast. That's not to say that they would have any worries of people getting high level and saying OMG PAST X POINT THE GAME IS JUST BROKEN! considering they've already let people play every level range besides 60-80 prior to even entering beta.

So what do you guys think they'll do content wise? Open the flood gates or cap the level and restrict movement around the world?

[Jovanaar]

The Beta is a testing phase, and I think they let us test parts they aren't 100% sure about, or if everything works correctly as it should work.

In Factions BETA we played instantly from level 20, skipped the entire Kaineng part and we could play the mid-game right away for 1-2 missions I believe, also PvP was open.

[Squirrelbanes]

Flood gates. Anet are like hippies...no restrictions, mannnn.
The higher stuff is what's not been seen to be tested so far...stands to reason that want that tested out.

Maybe they'll give ppl level range slots for the open beta?
That would work well.

[Zeek Daniels]

i think open beta tests will mostly revolve around WvWvW. I think they internally test each pve event pretty thoroughly from what i have read and seen in interviews. But i think WvWvW is something that just cant be tested unless its done on a massive scale, and thats what i think the open beta will revolve around.

[Deleted]

The Beta is a testing phase...

I remember a dev saying that open beta will not involve testing. It will only be for promotion.

And yes I'm pretty sure there will be restrictions.

[Deleted]

The devs have said they want open beta to be like a demo of the game. It'll be short and basically what they're shipping to you.

Closed beta will be testing everything for us.

[Exerionx]

The devs have said they want open beta to be like a demo of the game. It'll be short and basically what they're shipping to you.

Closed beta will be testing everything for us.

Sounds about right, friend!

[ddsad2212]

Anet have said open beta will NOT be used for major testing, it is instead a short promotion event for the actually game, if you look at who is in closed beta you will see it is the top GW1 players in pvp, and if i heard right some top Pve players from other mmos, they are top end players and they can do the testing needed, i am sure all the smaller things that are wrong will be found in open beta, but really its been used to show the game off rather then make many changes.

I would say you will get at least 5-6 big very good dymanic events, alot of nice smaller ones, the first dungeon, so id say the level cap will be 40 or so. Full access to pvp!!. Sever for just world battles, to fully test them out at there full capacity(the only true testing i think we will see).

I hope they dont do many balance changes, as you cannot balance a game in pvp after just 2 weeks of playing, the players who have been testing it from closed should be listened to not, the open testers when it comes to beta

[GrodinLB]

As others have already pointed out, Anet has stated several times that the OB will be almost a purely promotional thing. We won't be testing specifics, they'll likely give us access to most of the content. They'll want to see how Dungeons work out, WvWvW will almost certainly be included, I expect most zones to be accessible.

They want people to get a feel for the game, and get excited for release, they're not going to make people feel restricted and quell their enthusiasm.

[AdrianCC100]

The Beta is a testing phase, and I think they let us test parts they aren't 100% sure about, or if everything works correctly as it should work.

In Factions BETA we played instantly from level 20, skipped the entire Kaineng part and we could play the mid-game right away for 1-2 missions I believe, also PvP was open.

It's been said a dozen times by ArenaNet employees that open beta is being used for a marketing campaign.

[Tackhisis]

Close betas with a handfuls of testers are only good for preventing negative publicity for a commercial product. Only the real open beta with several hundreds of thousands of players can detect bugs effectively.

Take a look on SW:ToR: even now people are complaining about the bugs we were personally reporting in their so-called "open beta" two months ago.

[GrodinLB]

Close betas with a handfuls of testers are only good for preventing negative publicity for a commercial product. Only the real open beta with several hundreds of thousands of players can detect bugs effectively.

Take a look on SW:ToR: even now people are complaining about the bugs we were personally reporting in their so-called "open beta" two months ago.

With the NDA active (and seemingly ironclad for once) we don't know how many people are actually testing at the moment. They've apparently recruited a lot of high level gamers to test it out. I know people who got into the SWtOR closed beta who don't know the first thing about computers, game design, and have never played at a high level of any game.

If SWtOR were more selective with its testers, instead of treating it like a carrot for fanbois, maybe those problems don't go unsovled. Also, if the bugs were being reported in their open beta, then it's the design team's fault for not correcting them, not the testers.

Anet has been steadfast that they'll release the game "when it's ready". I think a graduated scale of tester is a good way of working out the kinks before it sees a mass of inexperienced testers flooding the servers.

[Blznsmri]

It's been said a dozen times by ArenaNet employees that open beta is being used for a marketing campaign.

No, that they feel most players only view Open Beta as a demo for the game before playing, and thus, it won't be very long at all. It will likely be a full content server stress test.

[omlech]

Just to clarify, ANet doesn't handle their Betas like every other MMO dev. They have thousands of people testing their game for years while in devleopment so they can get 10+ builds out a day and respond to feedback right then and there instead of doing it in an open setting like most Betas do. Essentially they have what most consider Beta testing for years while they're in Alpha rather than getting feedback in Beta and having to wait a month to push out a new build with the feedback from the previous month. This allows them to create an extremely polished product before even entering Beta.

[Hulari]

The devs have said they want open beta to be like a demo of the game. It'll be short and basically what they're shipping to you.

Closed beta will be testing everything for us.

I hope we get a nice little demo to play. I can't remember the last time I played a demo.

[Deleted]

If it gets know how to get into the open beta some day. Please let us all know !

[Craind]

I'm very sure that they have stated that the game will be for promotion purposes only, and it will also be a few weeks before the game releases (as others have said prior to my post).

[AdrianCC100]

No, that they feel most players only view Open Beta as a demo for the game before playing, and thus, it won't be very long at all. It will likely be a full content server stress test.

No, they have said their open beta was for marketing purposes. Of course they'll still get some good information out of the open beta.