What are some important interview questions to ask prospective game testers?

Question

I've been handed the task of interviewing a candidate for a position I don't know much about. Call it bad management, the fact is I need to do the best I can. The testing position doesn't require any technical ability besides entering bugs in a very intuitive bug tracker system. I don't know much about the process, but I'm sure qualities such as creativity and patience are important things to focus on. I have a whole list of general interview questions to find out if they can zip up their pants and be at work on time, but I'd like to ask some questions specific to the process of testing games for bugs. Unfortunately, I lack the experience in that area. Can anybody test a game for bugs? If not, how would you find out during an interview?

Thanks in advance!

Answer 1

• Make sure the person does not wear a suit to the interview
• Ask them what kind of games they like to play
• Ask them which games they recently completed
• Ask them how many game hours they put into the last game they completed
• Ask them what they didn't like about the games they completed
• Ask them what the next generation of game consoles should have that the current ones do not

I would imagine you are looking for a gaming fanatic... and you shouldn't hire anything less than that... since they should be pretty easy to come by.

Answer 2

• ask them where they live; any answer other than "my mother's basement" is unacceptable
• ask them if WoW is a FPS; if they say yes, show them the door
• ask them what "pwn" means

EDIT: ask them if they'll take a drug test. The correct answer is 'which ones should i take?'

Answer 3

Ask the candidate:

• Have you ever found any bugs in a game?
• Have you ever found any easter eggs?
• Do you like to push a game to its limits?
• What was the last game you played? How long ago?
• Do they know what a "rocket jump" ;) is?

Answer 4

• Why do you want to be a game tester?
• What do you think a game tester does most of the day?

Answer 5

Surely someone in your organisation does know about the position - can you ask them?

Answer 6

Here are some facts about video game testers that you may find useful for your interview, as cited in this two minute interview with a game tester on G4TV's XPlay:

• 12-14 hour work days
• Industry pay is
• $8-$12 USD per hour
• Must have a passion for video games
• Must have an eye for detail
• Must see faults in the games they play

Obviously you will know better than anyone what the pay and hours will be for the position--this is in regards to the industry in general.

Answer 7

Anybody can test a game for bugs with varying degrees of success. However, you want someone that can be efficient in finding bugs and somewhat understanding if there are cheats, what do they look like, which boundary conditions does the game allow that it shouldn't, e.g. if the game is an RPG and my character dies and is supposed to lost experience but has very very little, could he have negative experience as a total?

I'd also look for attention to detail, documenting steps done when performing a test, examining specifications to know what the results are, e.g. if I slay dragon ABC do I get the proper amount of experience and treasure. Don't forget that the type of game and which types of games they enjoy may also be a factor here, e.g. if someone hates puzzle games then getting them to debug a Sudoku program may not be a good idea. ;-)

Answer 8

Do you play (test) games to live (make a living) or do you live to play games?

In other words, do you play games outside of testing games for your job?

I'm not sure what is the answer which is preferred. Yes means that person is passionate about games, while no could mean that the person might have innovative ideas not seen through a gamer's eyes.

Answer 9

There are two kinds of testings for games, and both require different skills:

• Testing for bugs
• Testing for fun

Most professional testers in the industry test for bugs: they look for problems and don't need to give a rat's ass as to whether the game is fun or not. The process is pretty much scientific experimentation, you need to be able to experimentally figure out what the exact conditions for a bug is - say there's a camera glitch, you need some experimenting to figure out that it's only when changing weapons facing a wall; an inferior tester might just say "sometimes the camera jumps when you change weapons". You also need to be willing to experiment with a lot of weird crazy things like going around a hill three times (I once had that - there was a bug with dynamic loading, after three times in the same direction a part of the map wouldn't be loaded) - so a hardcore gamer in the genre you're testing is a plus.

If that's who you're interviewing, maybe you could print out a list of bug reports, and ask him to go over them, tell you which ones might be the same bug, which descriptions aren't good enough, etc. You could also show him a video of a bug / crash and ask him to describe what happened.

I don't think enjoying games is a necessary condition - I'd rather have a very smart and focused tester that doesn't care about games than a gamer with a short attention span that doesn't want to be looking for rendering problems in the same damn half-finished level for weeks in a row. Plus, a non-gamer might try some things gamers wouldn't usually do. Being able to describe why a game is fun or not fun isn't important here (apart from figuring out what kind of games they play). Social skills aren't as important as for other jobs, testing is mostly solitary.

As for gameplay testers - those that test whether the game is fun - a lot of the time, they aren't there long term, they're just students or something that aren't reused. There are also some "experienced gameplay testers" who are more like game designers - their job is more to organize test with users and collect feedback. For these people, being able to describe why a game is fun, what they enjoyed, what kind of games they like, etc. - general game design and criticism skills.