A Look Inside WC Saga’s Beta Testing (Part 3)
FROM: Colonel IceFire, TCN ONI
DATE: 2012.05.02
We're almost there! The beta testing has been a long process for the testers and for the team but we can all see the end of this very long road. With ten years of development behind some of the team members this is an incredible project coming to fruition.
Final Mission Testing
I have described in earlier reports that the beta testers have not had access to the entire campaign but rather we have tested the missions in the same order that players will experience when the project is complete. After 15 beta versions we have now arrived at a content complete beta test and testers are working hard beta testing the final missions.
Scale and Scope
I've talked about before how the scale of the missions in WC Saga has a huge amount of variation. You can expect small skirmishes with a half dozen spacecraft at once or huge engagements with over a hundred spacecraft in combat at once. Keeping the player relevant in the melee is important. So is making sure that the battle plays out the way it should, provided the player is doing their job correctly.
So we've been testing dozens of times to ensure that everything works the way it should. With large scal battles the complexity and potential for errors to appear increases so testers are making sure that these final missions live up to expectations.
Here's just a few of the bugs that we've been able to identify and eliminate:
- A Kilrathi raiding party arrives with several capital ships. In one instance two capital ships arrive on the same trigger and appear inside of each other. The triggers were changed and now they arrive separately. Much to the relief of the Kilrathi!
- In another mission the player receives a message to protect a Confed capital ship, however, if the ship is already lost the sound file is still played. Problem solved.
- A missing voice over causes a bug in the message line up resulting in some dialogue continuing over an autopilot sequence. Voice over files found and problem solved!
For All Mankind
There is a definite buzz and a sense that something special is really starting to come together as we test the final missions of the campaign where the story comes to its epic conclusion. More missions are green lit and problems are found and solved.
It takes many years of serious work and commitment to get to this point and there will be more time and serious work to come. I think it will be all worth it. Stay tuned for more updates in the near future!
-IceFire
This will be the most awesome thing ever in the history of everything. :D
Congrats to all the team, from the programmers to the beta-testers, the voice artists, the scenarists, the modellers and all those I've forgotten to list here. You're making all the WingNuts out here proud, people!
Been waiting for a new wc game to come out and after hearing there was none im so happy u guys did this, you really brought yoy to as all and i cant wait to put my teeth into this it looks totally awsome :)
As a longtime WC (and FS2) fan, I tip my hat to your endeavor. It looks mighty impressive!
I still can't belive it is finally coming, I lost count how many years I have been following this mod :-P I've been replaying the WC3 game lately (my favourite WC by far) and I am really glad WC Saga will finally make me replay the best hystoric period of WC. Can't wait to get my hands on this mod! Thank you WC Saga Team!
oh boy boy i am so excited, gonna dust off my old Microsoft Sidewinder Joystick tomorrow!
Seriously. I've given up on this project years ago, but came back every couple of months just to see how its going. There were always news, so I kept coming.Great that you pulled through! Thanks to all devs and testers!
Great Work and thank you so much Tolwyn, to you and you team, for create WC Saga it is the best Wing Commander Prject I have ever seen. keep up the great work.
regards Flanker
Outstanding stuff guys!I have been waiting for this since WC4.
Thank you all.
Regards
Wolfman
I will pay for this game!
Thank You...Thank You...Thank You! I will CERTAINLY pay for this game! 
Wing Commander-3, Wing Commander-4 and Wing Commander-Prophecy.....I was about sure the Saga had died. Thank you for breathing fresh life, hope into the Saga and restoring hope for the future.
my words will fail to describe how cool this is! How did I get here? I am still not sure, but I love it! I grew up playing the WC games and they were a seminal part of my childhood. I recently found the original Privateer from GOG.com and then I found Privateer Gold, and now THIS! I will definitely be playing this when its finished! Thank you for putting all the time and effort to bring back such a classic with an updated engine.