Game Development Reference
In-Depth Information
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Note
If you have trouble remembering this list, try remembering the acronym “FACT BADI.�?
Defect examples in this section are taken from the Dark Age of Camelot (DAOC) game
Version 1.70i Release Notes, posted on July 1, 2004. Dark Age of Camelot is a Massive
Multiplayer Online Role-Playing Game (MMORPG) that is continually modified by
design to continue to expand and enhance the players' game experience. As a result, it
is patched frequently with the dual purpose of fixing bugs and adding or modifying
capabilities. This gives us the opportunity to examine it as it is being developed, as
opposed to a game that has a single point of release to the public.
The defect description by itself doesn't tell us how the defect was introduced in the
code—which is what the defect type classification describes. Since I don't have access
to the development team's defect tracking system to know exactly how this bug
occurred, let's take one specific bug and look at how it could have been caused by any
of the defect types.
Here is a fix released in a patch for Dark Age of Camelot that will be referenced
throughout the examples in this chapter:
“The Vanish realm ability now reports how many seconds of super-stealth you have
when used.�?
If that's how it's supposed to work, then you can imagine the bug was logged with a
description that went something like this:
“The Vanish realm ability fails to report how many seconds of super-stealth you
have when it's used.�?
See the “Vanish�? sidebar for additional details of this ability.
Functions
A Function error is one that affects a game capability or how the user experiences the
game. The code providing this function is missing or incorrect in some or all instances
where it is required.
 
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