Sunday, October 2, 2011

Alpha-Beta Max

While playing the Battlefield 3 Open Beta the other day, I realized that any player could receive a review from any other player in the game, be it positive or negative with their Xbox Live Account. Honestly, you don’t even have to play a game with someone, or know who they are to submit a review. All you need is to be able to look up their profile, and then file away. In the case of the Beta, you can receive a negative review for exploiting any number of glitches in the game. Yet, Betas are designed to weed out bugs and glitches, so by using them you’re improving the final experience. The more people who screw up the game, the more likely the publishing company is to address the issue through patches. So xXxWeedyMcSmokesPotxXx is a hero in his own right. It like if more people bring shoe bombs onto a plane, the more likely you will have to take your shoes off at the security checkpoint. These people shouldn’t be punished: they should be reward for their douchebaggery.

There was an article, though, about how all the players in the Beta are ungrateful asshole for pointing out how much the game sucks:

http://www.gamebandits.com/news/battlefield-3-ungrateful-fans-get-an-earful-from-dice-16816/

The response was: If it’s free, don’t knock it. Lots of things are free in the world of gaming. Look at facebook. All those games are free, and they all suck. Why wouldn’t you knock it? The Beta they’ve released is more of a Demo than anything else. The article itself tells you they’ve already made changes to the game that address certain issues that players have, without even consulting the ongoing results of the Beta. They’re ignoring their audience. And why shouldn’t they? As long as they reach their quotas, why should they care?

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