Open testing with no purchase required.
Back in November 2020, Valve built a new thingamabob into Steam allowing developers to have open playtests. What does that mean? It’s a way for developers to allow people to test games on Steam without having to worry about asking for, generating, and distributing codes via third parties. More importantly it prevents unscrupulous folks from gathering and selling beta access to said games.
But how do you find out what games are testing, you might ask. The answer of course comes down to our good friends over at SteamDB who have just the solution. If you check out this page it currently lists all apps tagged as having open playtesting. And yes, I Am Jesus Christ is on the list. Now I should note that it doesn’t mean you’ll be able to test all the games. Steam playtesting for the most part is not a matter of hitting a button and gaining immediate access. Unless it is.
Rather by signing up you show interest in testing the game, and the developer is responsible for letting in groups of applicants at their discretion. Plenty of these titles will no doubt let you in immediately or close to it, as it’s a lot of indie developers eager for testers. You are testing a game, so for the sake of respect you should really try to provide some honest feedback on the forums once you’re done. There’s nothing forcing you to do it however, and you will eventually lose access to the game once the developer concludes testing. Also the playtest is generally going to be a demo or a beta or alpha rather than the full near-release game.
There are nearly four hundred titles currently open for playtesting as of this publishing, so there’s a lot of free stuff to play. And again, try to give the developer some honest feedback as part of the playtesting. Be nice about it, they’re putting the game out in this form specifically to get feedback.
MMO Fallout 