with no technical expertise, suffice. Game testing is normally a full-time job for experienced testers; however, many employees are hired as temporary staff, such as beta testers. In some cases, testers employed by a publisher may be sent to work at the developer's site. The most aggressive recruiting season is late summer/early autumn, as this is the start of the crunch period for games to be finished and shipped in time for the holiday season. Some games studios are starting to take a more technical approach to game QA that is more inline with traditional software testing. Technical Test positions are still fairly rare throughout the industry but these jobs are often full-time positions with long term career paths and require a 4-year computer science degree and significant experience with test automation. Some testers use the job as a stepping stone in the game industry. QA résumés, which display non-technical skill sets, tend towards management, than to marketing or production. Applicants for programming, art, or design positions need to demonstrate technical skills in these areas. fcnaz.com Compensation Game testing personnel are usually paid hourly (around US$10–12 an hour). Testing management is usually more lucrative, and requires experience and often a college education. An annual survey found that testers earn an average of $39k annually. Testers with less than three years' experience earn an average of US$25k while testers with over three years' experience earn US$43k. Testing leads, with over six years' experience, earn on an average of US$71k a year. Process A typical bug report progression of testing process is seen below: Identification. Incorrect program behavior is analyzed and identified as a bug. Reporting. The bug is reported to the developers using a defect tracking system. The circumstances of the bug and steps to reproduce are included in the report. Developers may request additional documentation such as a real-time video of the bug's manifestation. Analysis. The developer responsible for the bug, such as an artist, programmer or game designer checks the malfunction. This is outside the scope of game tester duties, although inconsistencies in the report may require more information or evidence from the tester. Verification. After the developer fixes the issue, the tester verifies that the bug no longer occurs. Not all bugs are addressed by the developer, for example, some bugs may be claimed as features (expressed as "NAB" or "not a bug"), and may also be "waived"