FOFNext: Yay or Nay?

[gstelmack]

Originally Posted by Daimyo

but then every time a player gets seriously injured or heals you have to go back in and redo the depth charts.

One "easy" fix for a lot of this in my mind is a single "recommend" button somewhere. I should be able to hit "Recommend Depth Chart" and have my depth chart set without having to go into each individual screen. I should be able to hit "Recommend Offensive Gameplan" and/or "Recommend Defensive Gameplan" and then go tweak either or as I want to. This diving in to a bunch of screens to hit individual Recommend buttons just slows me down and takes away from the other stuff I want to be spending time on.

[Ben E Lou]

Originally Posted by gstelmack

For those who LIKE the drafting, how long do you spend preparing for a draft?

I love the drafting. In SP, if I had to guess, I'd say I spend 15ish minutes running extractor on the draft class, 20-30 minutes on interviews, (combination of deciding who to interview, and then actually hitting the buttons), and 10 minutes red-marking "hot target" players. Since it's SP, I don't spend a lot of time ranking guys; I spend a lot more time in the draft itself doing that. For a MP draft, I probably spend an additional 2-3 hours preparing a ranked list.

[JetsIn06]

Originally Posted by SkyDog

I love the drafting. In SP, if I had to guess, I'd say I spend 15ish minutes running extractor on the draft class, 20-30 minutes on interviews, (combination of deciding who to interview, and then actually hitting the buttons), and 10 minutes red-marking "hot target" players. Since it's SP, I don't spend a lot of time ranking guys; I spend a lot more time in the draft itself doing that. For a MP draft, I probably spend an additional 2-3 hours preparing a ranked list.

I also love the drafting, and I would say I spend about the same amount of time as you on it.

[RedKingGold]

Originally Posted by SkyDog

I love the drafting. In SP, if I had to guess, I'd say I spend 15ish minutes running extractor on the draft class, 20-30 minutes on interviews, (combination of deciding who to interview, and then actually hitting the buttons), and 10 minutes red-marking "hot target" players. Since it's SP, I don't spend a lot of time ranking guys; I spend a lot more time in the draft itself doing that. For a MP draft, I probably spend an additional 2-3 hours preparing a ranked list.

Put me also in the camp of those whom love drafting in FOF2K7. I think part of the challenge is that it's so new, but if you actually play the game (both SP and MP), you'd be surprised how much more things stick out to you that didn't when first starting to play.

[CU Tiger]

Im relly encouraged to read Jims replies.
And discouraged at the same time.
Encourageed because he iss listening and understanding many of the grumblings.

Discouraged becaus I almost feel like he is taking the stance, "I am taking this game and series where I want it to go, and since some of my loyal followers dont want to follow I must go recruit new folllowers instead of altering my course."

Fair enough, He has that right he is the developer.

I just hope he realizes that the reason people are frustrated is FOF is 10x better than its next closest competitor, mainly because it has no competitors.
It would be interesting to see what an influx of product into the market would impact in this series development.

Its not a case of a horrible prouct, instead its an A- product with clear A+ potential. And it seems so easy to get the A+ (at least to outsiders) but there just seems to be total reluctance go there.

The only 3 real complaints I have are:
1) (and this has been beat to death) Why did X happen. I dont need to know you lost the dice role by 11% but maybe just a sporadic sprinkling of hints. "the rb lacked the HR to hit the wide open hole" or "The new oline is still not on the same page, there was a definite lack of communication there" I dont want/need a magic bullet for every play but I think its safe that every outcome has at leat 2or 3 major contributors just give me one, a few times per series. Let me know what I need to work on.

Currently, it would be like a debriefing where Peeole asks Belicheck what happened out there?
"We couldnt run the ball"
Why?
No, Clue 20 carries 12 yards
Why?
no idea, the Rb got tackled
Well who didnt block?
Dont know
Why did you keep running the ball?
had to
Well were there holes there and the RB missed them or did they let defenders get penetration
dont know just got tackled
Were there other areas we could have run to but didnt try?
Dont know...

2) (Like wise beat to death) I am a former football coach and the playcalling is a bit too detailed for me. I can tell you I spent a few years at 100 hours per week gameplanning and we never thought about %. We studied opponents tendencies, and then reacted in the game. I understand unless you play call you dont have this ability but the coach should carry out this function. The management should give direction, but it seems stupid to set a GP up where if we are down by x with y minutes remaining we throw x%.

"But coach everytime we drop back to pass our LT gets ate up and the Qb throws a Duck and it turns into a jump ball, fine we aint throing no more. "

Not here we just keep right on doing what isnt working.

I understand it is a text sim and we have to make some concessions to get the desired results, but I hope everyone realizes that no coach in the history of time has ever said, we really neeed to consider runnings 5% more on 3rd and 2 situations.

I have the football knowledge to sit down and tear apart a game and analyze things that we cant even begin to simulate in this game, but thats not fun. At least not to me. When I coached we spent on average 90 hours preparing for each game. Of that a good 50 was GP building and film review, YUCK, we all hated it. But it was a necessary evil. The game is whats fun.

I almost feel like at times some people want to just pour through data and make it work so they can feel like they are really a coach or something. Trust me if you showed the GP spreadsheets to an NFL coordinator he would laugh, and have no clue where to begin.

3) (and this I am surprised no one has mentioned) I feel like some data is kept from us that we should have. Why do I have to use an outside program to record and track player development? Why cant a players past ratings be stored in game? Its not like in real life a coach says that Vick he is a good Qb, prolly a 65 sure wish I had wrote down what he was last year, cant remember if he is marginally better or marginally worse than he was.
I think this is just inexcusable. this data should be right in front of us.
Like wise If we need 6 spreadshheets of GP data, I would like to be able to get detailed scouting reports. Calling again on my past coaching experience, I can tell you we DID absolutely set GAs to work on tape and have EXACT % of expectation before very game. I think this could really turn up the cat and mouse game in MP. If I could pull a report with one click that says in the past x games or x seasons Skydog has thrown deep x% of times on 2nd and short, then it is not so daunting a task to go line by line through a spreadsheeet. I can look at his tendencies and set my D up accorrdingly, of course always mindful of th fact that he may say, "this is a big game and I am getting too predictable its time to totally reverse this trend"you would have to prepare for that, but at least you would have data to analyze.


I think the game asks for an abhorrent quantity of input with a pathetic amount of data to analyze to draw thiss input from.

Now all that said I love this game.
Its not FOF2, but it is fun.
I fear the series peaked at 2k4 and we will see a tailspin from here. I HOPE I am wrong.

If adm when the next FOF comes out I will hesitantly consider it, and wait for feedback from others.
When the next non-FOF solecismic product comes out I will be a day 1 buyer.

[Vinatieri for Prez]

Originally Posted by gstelmack

And I don't have TIME to be the scout. I'm the GM, and I'm busy figuring out who to pay money to, etc. I just don't have time to track everyone in a spreadsheet (especially when the spreadsheet game should be doing it FOR me), pour over numbers, etc. I'm paying good money for that scout, darn it.

For those who LIKE the drafting, how long do you spend preparing for a draft?

But you are underestimating the role of an NFL GM. An NFL GM is indeed responsible for talent evaluation. Believe me, they are very much involved in the evaluation process, including actually attending the combine and pro days. They get input from the scouts on the details and for when they can't attend workouts. But there also looking at film, etc. in evaluations. An NFL GM does not entirely rely on scouts in making a decision. If they did, scouts would be paid 100 times what they're making now. The GM takes it all in, applies his own evaluation skills, and makes the final decision.

So, I think SD is wrong when he characterized the player as being the scout. The player is the GM. I just think most people misapprehend what an NFL GM does.

[Vinatieri for Prez]

CU, you're right. Having something like change tracker (or have the player card simply record past ratings at each season's end) and draft analyzer in game would raise it another level.

[Logan]

Originally Posted by Vinatieri for Prez

But you are underestimating the role of an NFL GM. An NFL GM is indeed responsible for talent evaluation. Believe me, they are very much involved in the evaluation process, including actually attending the combine and pro days. They get input from the scouts on the details and for when they can't attend workouts. But there also looking at film, etc. in evaluations. An NFL GM does not entirely rely on scouts in making a decision. If they did, scouts would be paid 100 times what they're making now. The GM takes it all in, applies his own evaluation skills, and makes the final decision.

So, I think SD is wrong when he characterized the player as being the scout. The player is the GM. I just think most people misapprehend what an NFL GM does.

This is one of my problems with the game though. Supposedly, we have a scouting department complete with a full staff, but we see every player through the eyes of our one scout with his biased ratings for each position. I really think that adding an EHM-style scouting system, as I described earlier, would improve this game a lot and give us much more to work with.

[Vinatieri for Prez]

What is this EHM-style scouting you describe. Please explain. I'm always open to new ideas.

[Logan]

Just in case you weren't aware, I'm referring to the freeware version of Eastside Hockey Manager that was big a few years back. Anyway, as I said in this thread, post 73, this is what I wrote in a thread started by SkyDog that was targeted towards the fast-sim, GM-only player:

How to fix it: IMO, it starts with the draft. Not just because it's easily the most entertaining part of the personnel process, but because it's the area that, if expanded, could basically be going on throughout the entire universe of the game. Yes, seeing mock drafts (at least prior to the draft, but maybe even updating monthly during the season) would be a great first step. But it shouldn't stop there...

In this thread (and others have done so elsewhere), Buc brought up the "TCY universe that runs parallel to the game" idea. Obviously, this would be a huge addition to the game and would go very far in improving the GM aspects. I think back to how the freeware EHM handled the draft, and more specifically, scouting for the draft. For those who don't remember or never played, near the beginning of the season, the Central Scouting Bureau puts out the list of the top X number of prospects (I don't remember the #, but it was large...250 maybe?). And as the season goes on, I believe the rankings changed. Just this would be a great start to something in FOF. But where it really got cool is in scouting. You have a stable of scouts (6-8?) who, throughout the season, could be assigned to evaluate your shortlist of players (guys on your team or others who you want to know more about), NHL teams, or entire countries. Looking at the countries will get you reports on the draft-eligible players. Assign a guy to the US, Russia, Canada, Czech Republic, etc and a couple weeks later you start getting scouting reports back on these players.

Can't this work in FOF? Instead of assigning your scouts (yes, not just one guy...although the fine print within FOF seems to indicate that you technically have a staff) to countries, you assign them to different regions of the country (or even NCAA conferences). Then you start getting reports back about players with strengths and weaknesses. I recognize that I'm getting extremely greedy here...but can you imagine something where you didn't necessarily just get a "Ray Rice, RB, Rutgers" report (which would be great in and of itself, and no, I didn't choose that just for the alliteration), but instead your Big East scout gave you weekly reports that discussed who played well, who sucked, etc. "Rutgers defeated Boston College 24-17. Ray Rice ran for 135 yards and 2 TDs on 27 carries, and BC LB Brian Toal looked poor in run support." If you use these resources, you have a tremendous depth of knowledge when it comes to preparing for the draft. I WANT TO KNOW THESE PLAYERS!!! Say you're the GM of a team who is starting a massive rebuilding process. You have the 4th pick in the draft, and you have needs on the defensive side of the ball but you also need a QB of the future. There's a stud DE sitting there for you, as well as a QB who seems to have the physical talents but didn't perform very well in college. But because you're aware of what else is going on in college football, you know that Tennessee's sophomore QB is tearing up the SEC to the tune of 350 yards a game. Maybe now you take the DE instead of the questionable QB, hoping to nab the stud the year after.

That's all the time I have now. So if you'll excuse me, I'm gonna go change my pants.

[Darth Guapo]

Originally Posted by Solecismic

...The only high-volume request I see that I think would require rewriting many modules is the idea of having flexible league sizes.

...
I don't see myself as old. Or lacking motivation. But I've always found I need a certain elan for major new features. Not there right now for the pro game and flexible leagues sizes. I love the 32-team format the way it is, and I don't think people would tolerate a new release where that was the single biggest new feature. However, if there is a TCY2, that's probably a necessity because of the way I envision MP working.

Don't mistake all this for rigidity. When working on FOF 2007, I made sure that every new piece was designed in such a way that I would be able to work it with flexible league sizes down the road if I made that decision. I'm a very decisive person, but not necessarily a senselessly stubborn person.

Just FYI - I won't buy another game without the flexible league size feature. I passed on 2k7 because of this, and I'll continue to do so. 2k4 is feature-rich enough for me in every other regard, and I don't do MP.

[Ben E Lou]

Originally Posted by Darth Guapo

Just FYI - I won't buy another game without the flexible league size feature. I passed on 2k7 because of this, and I'll continue to do so. 2k4 is feature-rich enough for me in every other regard, and I don't do MP.

You already told Jim this when he announced the game, Franklin.

[rkmsuf]

Originally Posted by SkyDog

You already told Jim this when he announced the game, Franklin.

DOH!

[Logan]

Some levity brought into the thread.

[stevew]

Originally Posted by SkyDog

You already told Jim this when he announced the game, Franklin.

Burn

[RedKingGold]

Is M.Night Shamalyan in charge of this thread?

[rkmsuf]

Darth Guapo....we hardly knew ye?

[Logan]

Percent chance this thread returns to being on topic?

[Flasch186]

14%

[rkmsuf]

Originally Posted by Logan

Percent chance this thread returns to being on topic?

depends if sov or suicane can figure out how to register the "C-Peeonme" user name

[Subby]

Originally Posted by SkyDog

You already told Jim this when he announced the game, Franklin.

Careful he might sick his pretend wife on you.

[RedKingGold]

Originally Posted by Subby

Careful he might sick his pretend wife on you.

Would she throw up on him, or something?

[Subby]

What did I tell you about typing the first thing that comes into your head?

[sabotai]

Originally Posted by Logan

Just in case you weren't aware, I'm referring to the freeware version of Eastside Hockey Manager that was big a few years back.

From the way you described it, it's the same way in the SI version of EHM (as well as FM)

[Logan]

That game is way too complex for my simple brain.

[Logan]

Wait a minute, are we back on topic?

[Young Drachma]

Originally Posted by Logan

Percent chance this thread returns to being on topic?

Where's Tony Reali when you need 'em?

[sabotai]

Originally Posted by Logan

Wait a minute, are we back on topic?

Sorry.

[Logan]

Side story: I played baseball with the youngest Reali brother for about 10 years.

[Kodos]

Originally Posted by Subby

Careful he might sick his pretend wife on you.

Wait. Did I miss a key development in the FN saga?

[Solecismic]

Originally Posted by CU Tiger

Discouraged becaus I almost feel like he is taking the stance, "I am taking this game and series where I want it to go, and since some of my loyal followers dont want to follow I must go recruit new folllowers instead of altering my course."

I realize that there's a risk people might take that away from what I said. That's not my intent. FOF is at a point where it can go in many different directions. People are going to be disappointed no matter where I go.

I need to market to new customers in order to replace those who are growing out of this style of game, or who simply need something new.

Originally Posted by CU Tiger

I just hope he realizes that the reason people are frustrated is FOF is 10x better than its next closest competitor, mainly because it has no competitors.
It would be interesting to see what an influx of product into the market would impact in this series development.

Its not a case of a horrible prouct, instead its an A- product with clear A+ potential. And it seems so easy to get the A+ (at least to outsiders) but there just seems to be total reluctance go there.

At least to outsiders. There's no reluctance, just a simple lack of time. If I was everything to everyone at this stage, new products would come out once every ten years and be obsolete long before.

There are existing competitors and there will be new competitors. I honestly don't think that changes my approach.

Originally Posted by CU Tiger

I am a former football coach and the playcalling is a bit too detailed for me. I can tell you I spent a few years at 100 hours per week gameplanning and we never thought about %. We studied opponents tendencies, and then reacted in the game. I understand unless you play call you dont have this ability but the coach should carry out this function. The management should give direction, but it seems stupid to set a GP up where if we are down by x with y minutes remaining we throw x%.

"But coach everytime we drop back to pass our LT gets ate up and the Qb throws a Duck and it turns into a jump ball, fine we aint throing no more. "

Not here we just keep right on doing what isnt working.

If I went in that direction (which might be easier, actually), people would feel they had too little control over the game. This is an area where a product like NFL Head Coach could excel, rather than the insipid repetitive practice scheduling dance.

Originally Posted by CU Tiger

I have the football knowledge to sit down and tear apart a game and analyze things that we cant even begin to simulate in this game, but thats not fun. At least not to me. When I coached we spent on average 90 hours preparing for each game. Of that a good 50 was GP building and film review, YUCK, we all hated it. But it was a necessary evil. The game is whats fun.

Do you really want a game where you need to spend 90 hours reviewing your upcoming opponent?

Look at it this way. Football coaching is a relationship - a relationship with your upcoming opponent.

Dating is practice. You learn about your opponent, you scan film to determine strengths and weaknesses, you get inside their heads, you review their baggage, you know everything about them.

The game is marriage. You have to react to everything instantly. Sometimes you make mistakes and you need to apologize. Your success is determined by how quickly you read reactions to your behavior and adjust accordingly. A great quarterback is like having a great figure - it can compensate for flaws elsewhere.

That type of interaction is outside the scope of a computer game, specifically because no one wants to spend that kind of time prior to each game. They want to get straight to the sex, and climax or not accordingly (sorry for being graphic).

I see your point. But how do you present it, except when you're going head to head with the computer? Ask the user beforehand? If your LT is being overwhelmed on every play, should you throw more quickly, call more misdirection runs? Well, yes. Then what? The defense has to react, then you have to re-react, then the defense adjusts again.

How do you present that kind of give-and-take in a game plan without abandoning the entire concept of game planning?

Originally Posted by CU Tiger

I almost feel like at times some people want to just pour through data and make it work so they can feel like they are really a coach or something. Trust me if you showed the GP spreadsheets to an NFL coordinator he would laugh, and have no clue where to begin.

I think an NFL coordinator would tell me that's useful prep material, but not something he'd reference during a game. By game-time, he has to be far beyond that point, and he's spent 90 hours getting there.

Anyhow, I have ideas along these lines - I think people will be pleased with the results down the line.

[rkmsuf]

Originally Posted by Kodos

Wait. Did I miss a key development in the FN saga?

Eh, yeah.....wtf?

Darth Capisum as well?

[CU Tiger]

Jim,
Thanks for your insightful reply.

I appreciate your time constraints, and couldnt agree more with the opportunity that Head Coach had that flopped.

The one point I was making that I think you missed was the reference to 90 hours of prep work. I was NOT saying we needed more in thee game, but rather that it was my least favorite part of real football, and I would like to see the game focus more on W/L results and team/franchise building as opposed to detailed play analysis.

But I accept that I am in the minority here. When I play SP a game week usually takes me 4-5 days as I will review and read the game logs of everyone of my opponents games and build my GP around that. When I play MP I just load one of 6 pre-packaged GPs and roll.

[Subby]

Originally Posted by CU Tiger

When I play SP a game week usually takes me 4-5 days as I will review and read the game logs of everyone of my opponents games and build my GP around that.

You should try jamming a flaming skewer up your nostril. It is only slightly more painful and take WAY LESS TIME!

[rkmsuf]

Originally Posted by Subby

You should try jamming a flaming skewer up your nostril. It is only slightly more painful and take WAY LESS TIME!

eh, he's never been under .500 in any season of play.

[Surtt]

Originally Posted by Daimyo

Currently you can't do that without turning off ai control, hitting recommend each game and then setting back the things you want to be different. IMO, that's workable in MP, but unacceptable for SP. Every time I've tried to play 2k4 or 2k7 solo I stop after a season or two of frustration with issues like this. A common one for me is if I draft a rookie QB and want to play him for development over a vet who is more filled out. To do that you have to turn off ai management of depth charts and slot your guy as the starter... but then every time a player gets seriously injured or heals you have to go back in and redo the depth charts.

If the "lock box" would only lock the player in for the whole season...

[Kodos]

Al Gore says put it in a "lock box."

[Anthony]

i tell ya, this has been the most vocal i've seen Jim in quite some time, and it's long overdue. part of the "allure" of the FOF series, most especially during the early days, was the buddying up with the creator of the game and seeing how down to earth he was and being charmed by his wit. really felt like we were all in this together. obviously some guys, maybe even myself, maybe made him reconsider being so available and public, but it's nice to once again get some peeks as to what's in store. i won't waste time playing "what's gonna be the next FOF game", i think the less we hang on his every word trying to get some definite answers the more free he'll be to share.

at this point all i think i need is a better interface, maybe more emails and maybe some more areas to customize things (player cards with actual player pics, etc). as long as the AI can handle the gameplan portion that's all i need. the rest i need is just bells and whistles and eye-candy.

[aef027]

Originally Posted by MizzouRah

Wow, can't believe all the negative shit I'm reading here. I love FOF and I hope Jim finally creates a 2d display, then I'll be in heaven.

As much as I think Madden will be good this year, there's something about FOF I always come back to and the reason the little "S" shortcut is always on my desktop.

Honestly, I'm a little shocked at some of the user's I see are saying "no" to another FOF game. MP does nothing for me, the same as XBL does nothing for me... I'm strictly a SP type gamer.

Color me disappointed in some of you vets here.

I am in the camp of would buy another version. I really like this game compared to its competitors. Madden's sim engine has been broken for a few years now. Plus, I really enjoy all of my MP experiences with this version.

[CraigSca]

Oh, btw, FOF7 would always be a must-buy for me. Jim's games have given me much enjoyment over the years, and I feel I owe him more than the $$$ I've spent on his games.

[A-Husker-4-Life]

TCY2 is a must buy for me when it comes out. I still play TCY when college football starts, it's the best Football Sim period. Think about a game that you purchased in 2001 that you are still playing today, it's pure gold.

Thanks Jim for creating that masterpiece, it will always stay on my hard drive for years to come.

[Senator]

I will follow Jim into hell. He created his first game, and it was one that I had in my mind since I was a teenager. And I have spent more time as an adult on his games than all the others combined.

He has my money until he stops doing this for a living.

[33sherman]

Originally Posted by A-Husker-4-Life

TCY2 is a must buy for me when it comes out. I still play TCY when college football starts, it's the best Football Sim period. Think about a game that you purchased in 2001 that you are still playing today, it's pure gold.

Thanks Jim for creating that masterpiece, it will always stay on my hard drive for years to come.

Cosign to everything here. I still play TCY in the winter (a lot). Alhough this thread seems to have confirmed that there will be no TCY2 this fall, it's given me hope that there might be at least a TCY update patch.

[Noble_Platypus]

I did not buy FOF2007 but I am curious if the bug has been fixed where teams draft players consecutive years at a position, say NT or LT and then they are benched behind a veteran who has slightly higher ability but way less potential, thus the young players never do play because it seems that they never realize any of that potential unless they actually play, not just practice. This would be huge on my buying another verion, especially since I am not into MP.

[MizzouRah]

The good thing is, once the NFL is in full swing soon.. FOF 2007 will be getting quite a good workout once again.