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bochi

What about unit testing? He constantly tests the changes manually, but I don't see any automated tests.

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There is so much that is subjective about gamedev that automated tests don't really work the same way.

How do you define a test for something as subjective as the "look and feel" of an interactive experience?

How do you automate this process?

1 Move the bounding box on the tree a few pixels.

2 Load the game

3 Move towards the tree until collision.

4 GOTO 1 UNLESS it "feels right"

Maybe regression testing, once you get things working, to prevent new bugs from popping up, or unit tests for game logic, but I don't know of many gamedevs doing full TDD.

His approach seems to be one of "crafting" an experience, by mostly testing it by playing the game himself after every change, instead of trying to "engineer" a piece of software.

A great aproach for designing an interactive piece.

He is testing: testing that people want this. In the beginning your biggest risk is making something poeple don't want, not code that breaks.

But if people then want your code, your stuck with code without tests. That you at most, can retro fit tests to.

"At most"?

The tests can be the same or even better that those added at some TDD style.

And, in either case, that would be a nice problem to have.

Depends on how long ago you wrote the tests. Pretty soon the tests you will write, will most likely test that the code does what it does. Not what it should do.

And yes, it is a better problem to have, then to have code that noone wants.

except the code already works right (in proportional to your skill). and if it stops working right you did something bad. and you're using version control, so you can do diffs, rollback, do branches/forks, experiments, etc. This is a much faster workflow than being weighed down by automated test baggage. Again, some folks hold the code in their mind and do a very good job of making perfect incremental changes, only moving forward, no regressions. (not 100% of the time, but with experience/skill you can approach that, especially before you end your dev session for the day.)

If thoose folks exists, i have never met any. And if they exist, they are few. And if i then need to hire more people to work on the project. Im pretty much out of luck. Even if i know i write perfect code (i dont). I wouldnt trust everyone that will work on my code to write perfect code.

relax uncle bobo ;) I'm a general proponent of testing, but this is a game and as such the feeling is more important, not everything is capturable by tests.

Notch is creating right now, watch http://vimeo.com/36579366 "inventing on principle" which explains the importance of immediate visual feedback.

Also give him just a "little" credit for minecraft

Yes, i dont mind that notch is writing code without tests.

I just dont want anyone else to think it is a good idea for them :-)

That works less well for games than other applications. Unit testing isn't always appropriate.

Unit testing for game logic: good.

Unit testing for graphics code: far more trouble than it's worth.

I'm an advocate of testing, and even TDD, but realistically, automated testing takes place in so, so few places compared to the entire world of software development and especially gamedev. People writing automated tests are, sadly, in a tiny minority. As an advocate for it, though, it makes me happy there are plenty of people left to convince and tools left to develop! :)

Maybe that's why his code is buggy?

I love the games Notch makes, but he's not perfect.

Game developers don't write tests :^P

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