What Do We Do as a QA Engineer?: Welcome to the Testing World for Game Development
Hello. I'm Naoki Sakaue. I work as a QA engineer in "Ryu Ga Gotoku Studio" of SEGA Games. I have been creating the video games of "Ryu ga Gotoku/Yakuza" series about 10 years. In the following article, I will explain the role of a QA engineer and playback the game development history of "Ryu Ga Gotoku Studio".
Before we go on to the main topic, let me explain what a QA in the game development is. QA stands for Quality Assurance. When we use a word "QA" in the game development, it usually means the work itself but also the departments or the project teams, depending on the organization. The basic purpose of QA in the game development is to find bugs and make sure if the games are working correctly in required quality.
Then, what do we do when we use a word "Test" in the game development? In most cases, it means to play the games manually to find bugs and fix them. (Unit testing and smoke testing which are well-known in the software development are also held in the game development, and I will explain them later in this article.)
The games under development are checked by people called a "QA Tester" to see if there is no bugs left in the games, the products are well followed by the specification documents, the games meet the product standard, and the games are come up fun as the final products. Their works cover a wide range, such as a simple testing of crashing a wall to find collision bugs, finding failures triggered by a complex procedure or specific timing, and a physical testing of plugging or unplugging cables.
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