Evolve Beta Test Coming In January

Those of you looking to put your hunting skills to the test won't have to wait much longer to track down massive monsters with a handful of friends in tow, as Turtle Rock Studios has announced that the Evolve open beta will begin on Jan. 15 for Xbox One.

In case you forgot, the Evolve beta is exclusive to Xbox One so, if you're gaming on the PC and PlayStataion 4, you can expect a “limited technical test” instead. I suppose that's all well and good, but I have trouble understanding this whole console exclusivity for testing a game.

This news comes to us from VG247, announcing that anyone with an Xbox Live Gold subscription will be able to jump into the beta and enjoy the Hunt game mode starting Jan. 15. That means you'll be able to tackle the Goliath and Kraken with the eight initial hunters across all 12 maps that will launch with the game.

Two days later, you'll be able to enjoy the Evacuation mode within the Xbox One beta, which combines all of the games content into a massive objective-driven romp. Also worth noting is that anything you unlock in this beta will carry over into the full game.

The PS4 technical test will be hosted around the same time, but it's limited to the alpha participants (who should keep their eye out for invite emails soon), it won't include the Evacuation mode and nothing unlocked during the test will carry over into the full game.

Finally, for PC gamers, if you were a part of the alpha or own either Left 4 Dead or BioShock: Infinite on Steam, then you should be able to join that platforms technical test at around the same time. Same rules apply as with the PS4 version, lacking Evacuation mode and no carry-over.

This, to me, is a shaky type of exclusivity I'm not too comfortable with.

Normally I'd say, “It's Turtle Rock! They've got this under control.” But then I'm reminded of all the other games that hit the market these days, online or otherwise, that are utterly broken. I mean, I can't be the only one who remembers what happened with Battlefield 4's online modes, and Dice actually hosted loads of betas for that game before tragedy struck.

Then again, it's not like the beta exclusivity is the only testing they're doing. There were alphas for Evolve before this and, while far more limited, those technical tests on PS4 and PC will hopefully help the development team work out all the kinks before prime time. Because, you know, what could go wrong?

Hopefully I'm fretting over nothing here. Valve usually has a firm grasp on these types of things. Unfortunately I've been conditioned by the past few years of disappointingly broken launches, so my neutral state of being is now “wary.” But, hey, if Bungie could do it for a game like Destiny, maybe Turtle Rock can pull it off nicely with Evolve.