Now I know more what the tasks consists of, so I'll let you in on a little briefing as well as my thoughts about it.

First, directly taken from Enzyme's website (that's where I work) is their definition of Pre-Certification. If you actually go to the site, I know, it hasn't been updated in forever.

In addition to being recognized as an official "Authorized Microsoft XboxTM and Xbox360TM Games Test Vendor and certified as a video game testing and pre-certification facility on other major console platforms, Enzyme Testing Labs™ will perform pre-certification tests on your games according to the rigid standards established by the leading console manufacturers. Our privileged relationship with all the leading manufacturers ensures our specifications are always up-to-date and permits you to rapidly receive your approval rating and minimize your time-to-market.

So yeah, basicaly, every video games on the market had to pass a Certification test to be accepted by the console's company. If a company such as Capcom, konami, etc. wants to release a game on the Wii for example, well the game has to be aproved by Nintendo by passing a Certification test which requires specific criterias by Nintendo in order to pass the test. It's the same for Microsoft and Sony, xept they all have different estalished criterias to respect.

Has you might guess, being a Pre-Certification tester basicaly consist of making sure the game will pass the Certification process, that way the company creating the game can save money (it is extremly expensive to take the Certification test) and they can be sure that the game will be aproved, saving them time.. and money. I think we are one of the few, if not the only, to offer such testing.

So anyway, instead of doing like Functionality testing where I had to just free roam in a game (most of the time) and find "bugs" such as passing through walls, wrong textures, crashes, etc. I have a very specific list of criterias required by the console's company to follow and make sure it is as it should be within the game. It's alot of stuff that are directly related to the console but is caused by the game itself. Therefore, every problem that you would be ready to blame the console for it's happening is actually caused by the game, not the console.

In the end, how did I find my first day? It's pretty cool actually. You always work with the same people because in Pre-Cert there rarely is any movement in terms of people, unlike Functionality, where everyday you will probably work with different people in your team, and it sucked, especially that I was the one they would ask for training the newbies on the team. The ambience is pretty cool, and it doesn't have a choice to be cool, cause since you always work with the same people, everybody has to get along and have fun. On top of it, you always know what you did, even if you didn't enter any major bugs or any bugs at all, you just check at the list of criterias and you know what you have done. You always have something to follow instead of doing some free testing like in Functionality.

It definitely is very different, it isn't MORE fun, nor is it less fun, it's just different and brings a different state of mind. Of course, I miss Functionality testing a little bit, but that's only because I'm what you can consider a newbie in Pre-Cert, it feels like my first day ever over there lol.