[JPhillips]

Just got started a little last night with the preview. I tend to look at interface and mechanics assues as I don't cover the stats as well as some other guys around here.

The Good

Facegen is really cool
Thank God for the offer player trade option and star ratings
Much easier to get around than in 2006
Player's countries of origin seem much more realistic, but one season is a very small sample
The "fun" factor is way up. It feels much less like work then 2006
Age ranges in the minors looks much better, especially rookie ball

The Problems

Scouting difference between SISA and the team scout is too high. I'm regularly seeing my team scout rate guys as 5 star potential and SISA has them as 1 star potential. If this happened occasionally it would be fine, but it's happening a lot. Starting a career with a draft really shows the issue. Guys drafted in the first few rounds of a dispersal draft shouldn't have such wild variances between SISA and team scouts.

The dispersal draft also caused weird issues with payroll because of the scouting issue. Players with very high salaries that were drafted early based on a 5 star potential were assigned to minor league teams. I had two 5 mil+ pitchers with a one current/5 potential playing in AAA. I don't mind drafting on potential, but those guys shouldn't be drafted so high that they eat up so much money.

Can we please have sortable columns in the world screen? It would make scouting nations much easier.

There's still a big problem with staff that doesn't start at the major league level. I saw no coach or scout with double digit ratings that didn't start in MLB. This means that the only movement of staff comes between MLB teams. There is no use in promoting or searching other minor league talent.

I really don't like the limitation on shopping players. I think the 3 per day rule just needlessly aggravates. There is no real limit on how many guys I can shop(if I do three a day starting Jan 1 I can shop over 600 by the deadline), so this rule doesn't really accomplish anything other than making it more difficult for the player. I don't want to have to remember to start shopping a day before the deadline because I want to shop four players. A possible solution would be to only allow a player to be shopped once per calendar year.


I haven't played much and probably won't be able to play much with my remaining days. It seems to be a big improvement over 2006, though. If I get much farther in the game I'll post some more impressions.