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Marvels Rivals requires creators to sign a contract that removes your right to give a negative review in order to access the playtest
(files.catbox.moe)
On today's episode of "This shouldn't be legal"...
Source: https://twitter.com/A_Seagull/status/1789468582281400792
I work for a video game company, and I promise you're being far too generous about their motives. This NDA prevents press from doing press. If the alpha is bad, they're not allowed to say how or why it's bad, at all.
I understand exactly why they are doing it; what you say comes as no surprise. It's 100% part of my point.
Coming from software development, including a small amount of game development, I understand how trash alphas can be, especially if you introduce users/players. So it seems reasonable that if the point of the alpha is to flush these bugs/exploits out, which is the point, then restricting the players who are allowed in from disparaging a far from complete game is not some ridiculous overreach everyone here seems to want it to be.
I'm on publisher QA side. Every so often, around this time of year, my company does closed internal playtests for games that are on the pre-alpha release candidate (usually it's the ones they expect to be blockbusters). Generally when a pre-alpha RC is selected for this, a very small subsection of the game is highly polished to give Users an honest preview of what the devs expect the launch game to be. Obviously since it's in alpha a lot of things will be changed and there are a lot of game breaking bugs to be found still, but the general experience should still be up for discussion if it was bad. I know it's possible to imagine a game in alpha as released, because part of my job is to give professional feedback to the producers without ever mentioning unfinished or bugged aspects of the game.
Okay, if they want to bug test, there’s DECADES of accepted practice. Paid/intern bug hunters or playtesters, with an airtight NDA. They’re there to stress tests and find issues, there needn’t be a public facing element.
Marvel want free bug testers, and to get the hype train moving - but don’t want to pay for actual testers who work quietly, and want only positive commentary. Marvel want an astroturf campaign to push preorders, not actual genuine discussion or bug testing.
I’ve been part of public alpha releases, and generally they don’t allow streaming or public commentary, outside of the invite-only forum/discord channels - BECAUSE THEY WANT THE FEEDBACK TO FIX ISSUES.
Okay, then the problem is with the people doing the work for free, not with Marvel realizing that people will do it for free.
The issue is that the people who do this work for free are not like you, and want that early access. . .either for strictly personal reasons or because it benefits them financially (such as is the case with streamers).
You’re literally defending ‘post-truth, race to the bottom standard’ capitalism. Yes dumb consumers exist, but that isn’t a free pass for corporate exploitation or false advertising. Because this isn’t an alpha, it’s advertising.
Except I didn't see where they advertised that people were going to be able to join the alpha with no restrictions, and I don't see this as "exploitation" at all. People want to play these games first. I don't get why, but they do. And they are being given that opportunity.
If your alpha is trash, then:
Most people (except for you, apparently) can see right through this kind of thing. The only reason you'd make someone sign a legally binding document saying "you're not allowed to say bad things" is because you know there are bad things to say. If there are bad things to say and you know about them, the correct move (from both a technical and PR perspective) is to fix the bad things before allowing your game to be played publicly. Preventing people from talking about the bad things won't magically get rid of the bad things.
Alpha testing is, by definition, testing on unreleased code. Even though they are offering the testing to some select group of people, it's still considered un-released.
False dichotomy. There is also the possibility that you realize, from experience, that when you start introducing users, unexpected shit happens.
They could do the alpha testing completely internally, or they could give some super fans pre-access with more restrictions on what they are allowed to say. Would I prefer they be able to speak their mind? Of course. But I get why the company would do this and it's really a complete non-issue.
Sure, they could do an NDA, or they could also get free publicity. It's reasonable for them to choose the latter, and if you don't like it, it's reasonable for you to wait for release.
Yeah, that's pretty clearly not the point. They presumably want to fix the bugs without them counting against them in the court of public opinion.
I go out of my way to explain how alphas are typically done as a games industry professional, and you're still out here spewing the same nonsense? get outta here. This is not a defensible action by a corporation. When a game reaches alpha, the whole of the game is unready but the part used in the public playtests are extensively reviewed by QA and gets as polished as possible. When a game is at alpha stage, it's by definition gone through multiple release candidates.
Are you arguing that alpha testing is not considered in house testing? It's literally the definition.
I'm sure parts of the game are well polished. I'm sure some only release a small part of the game for advertising reasons. They are doing something different here maybe. I don't really know. But this is such a non-issue that the outrage over it is laughable. Not surprising, at all, however, considering I've been a gamer all my life and I know how unreasonable we can be.
If you're not willing to let the unexpected shit be public, don't do a public alpha test. That's the point everyone here is trying to make. Like, what are these streamers and content creators supposed to do when they run into a game-breaking bug, or they run into some mechanic they really dislike? Ignore it and hope no one notices, for fear of saying something "disparaging" about the game? Do you not see how unreasonable that is? We all understand that alphas are incomplete and will have bugs, and unexpected shit will happen. We all also have different opinions about what we like in video games. Them trying to hide from that, rather than just being upfront about it (like every other alpha or early access game I've ever played) is asinine.
They should do the alpha testing internally, if they're not willing to have their product be honestly reviewed, or pay to have their product advertised.
Considering that this thread exists, Seagull's original tweet got the immense attention it did, and the studio announced hours ago that the particular clause everyone (except you) is taking issue with was a mistake that they're looking into fixing, uh, maybe it actually isn't just a "non-issue"?
No, actually, I don't think it's reasonable to expect "free publicity" on the condition that the ones providing that publicity muzzle themselves if they don't like the game. That's exploitative behavior by this studio. Expecting free anything and then attaching unreasonable legal stipulations that you know the other party cannot fight is unethical.
They want to control the narrative around their unfinished video game, by trying to legally bully content creators, who have way less legal and financial leverage, into doing their bidding. That is unethical. Full stop, no I will not be taking any more questions.