Back in January, 1998 the M.A.X. 2 development team organized a huge closed beta test program that lasted for several months even though the team wanted to release the game by March that year. The version showcased by this video is the first released version from 16th of January, 1998. This initial release was very raw, e.g. the version number on the title screen says Alpha, and limited in features. The demo is very unstable, tripping on failed assertion tests as soon as the computer player starts to do something meaningful so the video is somewhat short. Only human, or Concord, land units are in the game, their sprites are often disproportionate, the 3D map is a flat texture, many UI elements are disabled or just placeholders, but the core game play in real time mode is there. Turn based modes lock up on the first end turn event. You might rightfully ask yourselves why did the developers release such an obviously broken version to the voluntary beta testers wasting everybody’s time? We get a clear answer from the readme file of the release: Quite honestly, we don’t yet know who we can trust. Testers who are looking for a free game will be disappointed with this version. People who are seriously interested in testing will not. Those who respond with good bug reports to this version will be eligible for the next version.


Jason Levine wrote a nice article about his M.A.X. 2 closed beta program experience. It gives us a good insight into the first two months of the program. We can read some of the developer chat logs on Len lindsay’s home page that give us further insights into how difficult it was to manage the beta program and how bad direction it took over the months. No wonder Paul Kellner, the producer of M.A.X. 2, referred to himself as janitor of the project in an interview.