Realism versus playibility in sims
 

Question...I think we've reached a crucial juncture in the world of sports management games. Realism versus playibility. We're seeing it now as people jump the OOTP ship a bit to a simpler game that is simply more fun/less bogged down to play. I think most who got head coach feel the same when comparing FOF to it.

Would you rather have extreme realism or playibility? For me, the game has to be fun and the sims that are coming out are more and more not fun.

It's not about realism (okay, it's not ENTIRELY about realism.) I think pretty much every mature sports management game has the realistic pieces of the puzzle down, or at least, pretty close.

It's about immersion. It's about being able to really CARE about your team/players/whatever. It's about sitting there going crazy when your team performs, or fails to. It's about being able to get into the nitty gritty and bitch out that superstar who also happens to be an ungrateful whiny little bitch.

Et cetera.

Having not played head coach, or read much of the thread..what does this mean? Head Coach is more playable then FOF, but less realistic? Or vice versa?

For the record, I agree with CW. You want the game to be as realistic as possible, but you don't want to sacrifice TOO MUCH playability (sometimes it's probably okay). However, some people have differing opinions as to what makes a game more playable, or differing opinion as to how much playability is too much to sacrifice. Probably the best example is the argument over how recruiting should be handled in college football sims -- people are all over the board on that one.

Head Coach is not playable in my mind. Has everything that it should but is a boring game. Same with OOTP.

I like some games that are more playable than realistic (Baseball Mogul) and some games that are more realistic than playable (FOF). Playable to me is primarily an interface issue. I've never liked FOF's interface as much as some people (not for the lack of bells and whistles, but because I don't find it very efficient). Baseball Mogul, on the other hand, like FBCB, has a great interface and a very quick sim engine. So, I don't prioritize realism over playability (or vice versa) - the games I keep playing usually do well in both categories (although they aren't perfect).

I'm not sure I understand the Head Coach reference in the first post, though. Although I don't own the game, it seems to me that people are finding it both unrealistic and unplayable. So, it seems to fail in both categories.

In order, my preferences are -

1. Accurate Sim Engine
2. Solid AI
3. Immersion Factor
4. Playability/Interface

I pretty much agree with this. However, in my book playability/interface and immersion are pretty closely related.

I don't know. FM doesn't have the greatest of interface due to the fact that is has so many darn screens, but the immersion factor is definitely there.

How do we define 'realistic'? What does this term mean in the discussion?

I care about immersion. At the point you're playing a computer game, realism goes out the door IMHO, because if I wanted real..I'd take myself outside and just or coach the real thing. Obviously not as a pro GM, but..you know.

But if I can immerse myself, the game generally has to be playable or else..it's hard to stick with it long enough.

Yep, immersion is parallel to realism in my book. If I'm immersed, it's because the game has believable AI and stats/realism.

This is a key statement, and I'd expand on it to say that You want the game to be as realistic as possible, but you don't want to sacrifice TOO MUCH playability for minimal gain in realism. A classic example of where realism went overboard was the RFA bidding in TPF, as opposed to the simplified version in FOF. Yes, we all know the one or two big names a year that the tender offer matters to, but the fact of the matter is that every NFL team (and every FOF/TPF team) is signing a good number of minisal rookies every year. The more-realistic process in TPF was one of the game-killers for me. It just took too freakin' long to go through that process, considering how rarely that process meant anything important in the game. A game shouldn't make you spend that kind of time on roster fillers. On the other hand, I desire more realism and depth in areas that are very significant to roster building, such as recruiting in college games, and free agency/trading/draft in pro games.

Ajaxab hits on something that seems pretty key here: how is "realism" defined?

For me, I think that may get into the realm of whether a game "feels right" for whatever it's trying to emulate; basically do the things that happen seem believable and appropriate for the real-life version of the genre?

It's a lot like the old saying about pornography I think, the one about "I don't know how to define it but I know it when I see it". Which I believe has to have a lot to do with why it's so hard to acheive.

Interesting thoughts and I guess I would say realism goes along with immersion. If a game doesn't feel real then it's not going to keep my attention. However, as some point out, there comes a point with certain things where you can get by with a simplified version of something that doesn't clog down the game.

My view has changed over time to where "playability" is most important. By that I mean that the game must flow like a strategy game with a "just-one-more-turn" feel. No game that gets bogged down in micromanagement for the sake of realism or that has stages/gameplay tasks that are dreaded can be positively playable. Solecismic games are good examples of this where, for some, it becomes a chore just to get through the season and you feel a sense of relief to just stop playing it (FOF MP doesn't fit this though). Additionally, I think OOTP after version 6 has become like this, as well as those GDS games (from what I follow).

Conversely, take a look at the heap of praise Brian gets for FBCB. The game does not have a slick interface nor does it have a tedious interface, just a very straightforward one that is conducive to focusing on the game. It also does not have the immersion of FM but somehow it does not need to because all of the information is presented simply and clearly to where you feel like you are in control in however you want to play the game. I still haven't figured out whether it's the nature of a college basketball sim that makes it so and whether that can work for other sports like football. I don't know.

Back on immersion. If the nature of the sim makes it so that some stages are more tedious than others, then that's where I think immersion can make a difference. I believe FM is a classic example of this. By immersion in this context, I mean giving the gamer feedback as if you are playing against a human opponent or dealing with players/agents/etc. in a more realistic way. That's what intrigued me about the concept (but not the execution) in EA NFL HC regarding feedback during the draft. How many times in all of these games have you screamed at the computer in saying, "WHY?!?!?" or "Tell me what you think" or "How am I doing in my job/task?" or "What's wrong with you?" - and would love to get a plausible answer? Something like this has to be done right which FM has learned to do over the years.

I have a bias in that I am not a hardcore sports simmer - I am a strategy gamer and I approach these games as a strategy game. Sid Meier have taught me about "simple yet deep" in his Civ series and I apply that to every game I play. I play games for the career or history which is why games like Diamond Mind do not appeal to me. How can I play a 20-year career and have every year flow by in the most fun and addictive way possible with sense of earning your successes and learning from your failures? That way to do that is for the developer to remember that it is a game above all.

Or something like that.

Thanks for expanding. That's pretty much what I meant to say. The flip side of your example, however, is that I get pretty miffed with the way FOF handles RFAs, in that you have until training camp to sign these guys. Since no one can touch them until then, if you don't want to sign them, they have to wait until after camp. Which means they only sign a one-year deal. Which means they can't renegotiate with that team, and will probably end up with a different team next year. That's not very realistic. Does it affect playability? For some, yes. For some, it's out of team, out of thought, so it wouldn't. Then again, I never played TPF -- for all I know, that RFA process could be so mind-numbinly tedious that it kills the game. YMMV.

Weenie.

That is a very key statement. Nothing will kill the "flow" of the game than engaging in time-consuming stages/tasks that are not critical to decision-making or success/failure of the career.

Yes, that's a problem, but a fixable one, I would think.

It did for me. I gave it several shots, but every time, I'd get bogged down in either my first or second time going through the RFA process. The amount of time and clicks it took to get your roster filler players signed each year just killed it for me.

Pretentious. :)

Yeah. "Flow" was the word I was looking for there.

I got spoiled by FBCB which I think you would agree has a great flow. And back to the original question about realism vs playability, I don't know or care if the flow of FBCB is realistic or not (compared to real life college basketball), it works for the game.

I think it is reasonably close, although I don't know all the details the ins and outs of dead recruiting periods in basketball. That brings me to another point regarding the original discussion: the more I know the real thing, the more I need realism in the text SIM(ulation). By contrast, I know the significance of the first of May, the First Wednesday In February (it really ought to be a Federal Holiday), the first week of June, and various other key points in the college football offseason. I know every player's responsibility on many offensive plays. I can intelligently discuss the merits of tossing the sweep versus using the stretch handoff. As a result, I'd like to see more nuance represented in football games.