What is a Quality Assurance Tester [WEEK 16]

QA or Quality assurance testers job is to find bugs within a game and report back to the development team on both what the bug was, and how to replicate it. (Screenskills, 2025) There are a few subsections of the QA job title which specialize in more specific areas of a game, for example there are the Game functionality testers, which is generally the overall testing for bugs, then there are the Localization testers who find errors in translated elements of the game to ensure the game is playable for consumers in other countries, Console Hardware testers which test the compatibility with hardware such as controllers and haptic feedback, remotes, and headsets. Finally there are the Console software testers which ensure each port of the game to a new platform has the right dimensions and filetypes to retain the game's overall quality. (Anon, 2023). 

Researching into job applications to be a QA tester i was able to identify some key skills an individual may need if they want to go into this role. On Indeed (2025) i was able to find a listing for a QA tester for the London based studio Pugpig. The employer outlined both the Key responsibilities and required skills and traits they are looking for, some of these include Patience, An eye for detail, academic skills and drive for writing documents, Problem and puzzle solving skills, Proficiency in software like JIRA and Testrail, excellent recounting abilities, and contributions to meetings with staff. (Indeed 2025) Although not stated in the job application, QA testers can earn anywhere between £32,000 to £47,000 a year (devIT n.d).

In terms of how our team has taken up the role of a QA tester for all the assets made for our project, largely the person who did this the most would probably be the director and the 3D lead. The director has overseen all the deliverables we have provided and informed us if they fit the visual standard that our project should meet, and on top of this, if any of our models had any problems being brought into unreal engine. If she did find any issues, she would report back what went wrong and how we can fix it, to some degree we have all been doing this with our own work throughout the creation process, if we see any concerns or issues we talk about what happened and how we intend to fix it. As far as the 3D lead goes, i spoke with him a few times on how he has identified issues with the models i have made, and what steps he has taken to either fix them, or plan to optimize them for the software. If we were to make a final fully fledged game, we would likely outsource our QA testing to the playerbase, as they may be able to pick up on any mistakes we might have overseen.

Bibliography-

Anon, 2023. An Introduction to Quality Assurance Testing in Video Games [Online]. Transperfect. Available at: https://www.transperfect.com/blog/introduction-quality-assurance-testing-video-games (Accessed at: 17 January 2025)

devIT, No Date. QA, Test Engineer salary in the UK
(Online). devIT. Available at: https://devitjobs.uk/salaries/Tester/all/all#:~:text=QA%2C%20Test%20Engineers%20working%20in,Engineer%20job%20in%20the%20UK. (Accessed at: 17 January 2025)

Screenskills, 2025. Quality assurance (Games) (Online). Screenskills. Available at : https://www.screenskills.com/job-profiles/browse/games/quality-assurance/games-tester/ (Accessed at: 17 January 2025)

Pugpig, 2025. QA Tester (Online). Indeed. Available at: https://uk.indeed.com/cmp/Pugpig/jobs?jk=a4470b5046e47132&start=0&clearPrefilter=1 (Accessed at: 17 January 2025)