Managing a QC team during the pandemic: the AC Valhalla experience

What the talk is about

Maryna Buibarova describes how the quality control team at Ubisoft's Kyiv studio worked on Assassin's Creed Valhalla during the pandemic. The game involved 14 internal studios plus three outsourcing partners, with Montreal as the lead studio and testing split across several studios, including Bucharest and Kyiv. She covers the switch to remote work in spring 2020: more reporting and productivity tracking, changes in team communication, and new habits such as always-open voice rooms and more active Teams channels. She also goes through the technical setups for remote testing (VPN, a home hardware kit, cloud-based Stadia) and explains which areas can be tested remotely, such as levels, AI, quests and UI, and which need direct hardware access: graphics, performance, sound and compatibility. Useful for QC leads and managers of test teams.