Sony seeks participants for PSN reality show, 'The Tester'

your dignity

Vee, you can't lose what you never had.

"This QA job sucks ass...I can't fuckin' throw dis shit!"

Lose Dignity?? from Testing Video games!??! Hell I play them enough I might as well get paid....then people can REALLY call me a PAID Sony Fanboy then....lol

Wonder how the wife would feel about moving to Cali?

Want to know what the average game tester gets paid...

$10 Hr

It may not be the best job in the world, but it IS a job. What I wouldn't do to get out of a department store. Too bad I'm only 19 and I can't sign up :(

Chris, don't you have an engineering degree? Don't you front as "The Aggie CEO"?

Set your sights higher, my friend.

"Guess I will enter this....what do I have to lose?? lol"

Your soul

my real job pays ok, but it's tedious, not fun, and overall sucks ass.

A bad day of playing video games is better than a day of work, so I'm all in for signing up for this.

Chris, go for it. That would be awesome to see a Joystiq member on there, then you could give us all the behind the scenes, lol.

Two-to-one odds says that none of the contestants will have any prior experience. If they did they wouldn't be jumping through hoops for this shit.

Dude, you don't want to be a play tester. Think of the ETs, the Superman 64s, the Bulletwitches you'll have to play through. Think about it. I wouldn't wish that on any poor soul.

"play video games all day, might as well get paid for it." interesting. you guys know how irritating it is to find that terrible game crashing bug in that new game you just bought? and you think, who's testing these games? you know how many bugs were eliminated before that game comes out? imagine the tedium of being the guy who isn't playing games for fun, but is methodically trying to reproduce every possible game crashing bug they can find. it sucks the fun out of playing games forever. FOREVER. still, better than working in food service.

Engineering?? LMAO....where that come from??

I have my Net+ and A+ Certifications so I can build PCs and run networks but damn sure dont have an Engineering degree....lol

Let's GO Chris D! We're going to cheer for ya!

Freakwincy42, much like being a gynecologist sucks the fun out of... well you know what I mean.

Obviously this is not an ideal job. However, it could just be considered a way into the gaming industry if that's what you're interested in.

Yeah I hear that from pretty much everyone who says they've been one, it's hell supposedly.

you got that right...

it's fun for awhile, then you realize how lame it is...

i was a QA tester, and was surrounded by 40 year old goth guys who would complain that their kids don't respect them... no wonder.

Next season: A 20 episode reality show that determines who will be the next sanitation engineer at your local Starbucks!

The Diuretic, Tuesdays at 8pm!

Indeed. Most people don't realise it but you're not supposed to actually play the game, most of the time you'll be searching for bugs, jumping a thousand times next to a corner to see if something weird happens.

It's also not exactly a 'once in a lifetime opportunity'. Some QA groups can be really awesome but overall it's a very undervalued field.

QA tester is only a dream job for people too stupid or inexperienced to know any better. Now if the winner makes the leap from temp straight to perm, that might be worth it but the pay still sucks and the hours are INSANE. It is a step up from manual labor or flipping burgers (depending on the pay) but a VERY minor one. Game testing is the job you don't know you would hate until you get there. They forget the disclaimer:

You are not paid to PLAY video games you are paid to TEST them, so try walking into an empty apartment building and going to each and every unit's bathroom and turning the water on and off, flushing the toilet, and opening each of the doors. Now, does each flush make the right sound? Does the flush happen correctly? Does the water turn on/off? At the correct temperature? Does every door open and close? Do the locks on the doors work correctly? That is game testing. Imagine doing that 40-plus hours a week. It is not a dream job by any stretch of the imagination. Granted it is better than most jobs I have had but it is not all fun and games, pardon the pun. When the hours are crazy you pretty much lose all sense of yourself and time because if you are half-way committed both of those things go out the window by the second or third week. It's draining to say the least.

@VaultBoy

not to mention that you usually aren't testing games that you want to play, I did a lot of testing for crappy shovelware titles, mobile games and the occasional "alright" game.

While it wasn't a horrible job, it wasn't the best job I've ever had. You can actually make more money flipping burgers and probably not lose your mind doing so.

Well, like you said, you were testing for small mobile games and such. I imagine the winner will be testing in big SCE games. Resulting in a much larger pay.

amen, VaultBoy. imagine going back to playing games for fun, and finding every irritating glitch noone else even notices... you can't unsee.

@Traceur_Ryuk (PSN: Ryuk_shinigami):

Sorry but the type of game you're on doesn't dictate your pay.

I QA-ed Resistance, Splinter Cell, pretty much every PS3 launch title, Star Wars: Battle Front, and just about every good PSP game.

Rate of pay? 12/hour.

@Vaultboy

Perfect for any OCD sufferers out there!

Haha, I thought the same thing myself.

And this, good sirs, is when you realise you need to get off the interwebs for a little bit ;_;

I must admit, it will be better than that, 51 Minds is producing , they do all the VH1 "_____" Of Love, shows. So the quality will be great, But the content, eh...

That does sound like it sucks, But i'm glad that someone did it rather than me playing a game with a bunch of those glitches.

And yet, for some reason, there are people who buy the game, and then spend a ton of time looking for glitches so they can post them up on YouTube to be The Coolest.

Yeah, and if you find something don't count on being the first. It is often the case that the bug you see was found too late in the process to be fixed because when crunch time hits, only crashes and standards violations are addressed.

Tighten up that vocabulary on level 3.

And tighten up that snark on level 2 while yer at it!