“There’s not much reason to play on Star Citizens Public Test Universe when there’s not much to do or see, but for production to move forward CIG need to find a way to get players involved.
As someone who works in Game Marketing, here’s my p”
Playing Star Citizen involves multiple different game versions that players can enjoy. One of the most popular versions is the Persistent Universe (PU). This version is the live version of the game, so players can download and play it immediately. The Public Test Universe (PTU) is another version, where patches and updates are tested out before they are pushed onto the live version. The goal of the PTU is to ensure the changes made to the game are tested in a live environment.
In order to get the most out of the PTU, the developers need to ensure people are participating. One of the main issue with this is that players are only partially enticed to log in and test patches - the updates may not be drastic or impactful enough to encourage players to test out the changes. In addition, not every patch is formally tested, meaning the developers have to rely on player reports and feedback.
To help with this, the developers could potentially look towards incentivisation, as this could encourage more people to test out the changes. However, this is not as easy as it sounds. Resources including time and money need to be allocated for this, and free ships or exclusive in-game items could reduce the value of the game as a whole - as the more ships given away for free, the less unique they become. This is why the referral program is successful - as it encourages people to join the game’s community and helps improve the value of ships.
One potential solution could be to offer incrementally visually upgrading items or flair. Examples of this could be kill notches where each contribution to a patch adds a new scratch, or a military jacket where each patch tested adds a new metal. The goal would be to create a few custom items that reward playtime and length of involvement in the game. Not only would this add value to the game as a whole, but encourage more people to participate in the PTU, making the testing process smoother and more effective.