Next Beta Weekend?

[Pejo]

Hey guys,

Do we know when the next beta weekend will be? Twasn't a good weekend to try out the game for me, only got to level 5 :/

[Pachycrocuta]

According to their twitter or facebook account, they plan to do these about once a month (subject to change). Last one was the end of March. Don't expect one until the end of May. That way you are surprised if they announce one earlier than the final weekend of May.

[Arkenaw]

I wouldn't be surprised if they start having them more than once a month, but I also won't expect them to do that.

[leviathonlx]

I wouldn't be surprised if they start having them more than once a month, but I also won't expect them to do that.

At this point they are just hype demos to make sure the game stays fresh in peoples minds till whenever the game comes out.

[Zeek Daniels]

At this point they are just hype demos to make sure the game stays fresh in peoples minds till whenever the game comes out.

Yea i dont think so. They are still fine tuning alot of things with the characters. Yea events may be done and personal story stuff but they are prolly gonna get alot of profession feedback with traits and utility skills. Plus they might have work to do with WvW and better explain how it works to new players.

[Malthurius]

At this point they are just hype demos to make sure the game stays fresh in peoples minds till whenever the game comes out.

A hype demo would be more effective if it was public and not exclusive to those who already bought the game.

The BWEs are definitely for the finer things and client optimization; the fans will rip the game open to find annoyances, balance issues, and bugs; the ones who were interested enough to put down money ahead of time before playing.

[leviathonlx]

Yea i dont think so. They are still fine tuning alot of things with the characters. Yea events may be done and personal story stuff but they are prolly gonna get alot of profession feedback with traits and utility skills. Plus they might have work to do with WvW and better explain how it works to new players.

Feedback is good but that's not really Beta testing. A Beta test is more than 2 and a half days a month. It's a glorified demo, heck the game itself even uses the words demo when you reach the end of the personal story and when you try to enter closed off zones. I'm enjoying the game and looking forward to whenever it comes out to have as a nice side game but I can see what ArenaNets doing here.

[Malthurius]

Feedback is good but that's not really Beta testing. A Beta test is more than 2 and a half days a month.

Length has nothing to do with whether or not it's a legitimate beta test. GW1 had the same kind of tests if I recall correctly.

[PACOX]

At this point they are just hype demos to make sure the game stays fresh in peoples minds till whenever the game comes out.

You're mistaken. That last few games that have used beta weekends definitely changed between each weekend event. You're thinking of the "open beta"

[Edge-]

Feedback is good but that's not really Beta testing. A Beta test is more than 2 and a half days a month. It's a glorified demo, heck the game itself even uses the words demo when you reach the end of the personal story and when you try to enter closed off zones. I'm enjoying the game and looking forward to whenever it comes out to have as a nice side game but I can see what ArenaNets doing here.

There are different types of beta testing. They're running the larger tests intermittently (you're right that part of the reason they run them is for marketing purposes) because they get an insane amount of data/feedback during these events and it takes time to go through all of it. I have no doubt that they still have a small group of core testers that are testing the game throughout though.

[Gámbller]

It was a stress test and definitely a good one.

[Hanto]

Note this is just a beta weekend event. I'm sure that they already have testers in the "regular beta" which is running more frequently.