Re: Honest question for those more
I don't say the following to trivialize any faults in the game or provide an out for Tiburon about anything, but this is my take nevertheless: compared to other sports, making a football game is hard.
A basketball game has few direct player-player interactions (most player-player contact is an illegal foul), has fewer players on the playing surface, fewer set piece plays, and has a less complex rule set. Player differentiation to the user is easier to achieve by applying direct modifiers to the ability of a player to move with the basketball or make a jumpshot.
A soccer game has fewer direct player interactions (most player-player contact is an illegal foul), fewer rules, fewer set piece plays, and though there are 22 players on the field, much of the game involves many of the players standing around, with only a subset of players involved in the success of any given sequence of gameplay. Player differentiation to the user is easier to achieve by applying direct modifiers to the ability of a player to move with the soccer ball, complete a pass, or score a goal.
Hockey is similar to soccer, but with more player-player interactions and fewer actors on the playing surface.
A baseball game has the least direct player-player interactions of all the sports (the only significant player-player contact is at plays at the plate), fewer players on the playing surface, and strictly-defined AI with regard to how defenders should act on a given play (referring to where to throw a ball once in play). Any play in baseball is more-or-less a predetermined reaction to a given set piece; the ball can be hit to a different location, sure, but most often it's ideal to achieve force-outs (with a few exceptions), and always try to prevent runners from reaching home plate. Player differentiation to the user is easier to achieve by applying direct modifiers to the ability of a player to hit a ball with a correctly-timed swing, execute a pitch into the strike zone, or complete a throw to a base.
In a racing game, player-player interaction is minimal as deliberate contact between cars is often considered unsportsmanlike. Optimal racing lines are easy to compute, and difficulty is easy to change via AI tolerance to differentiation from this line, implementation of strategies by which an AI reacts to car-car contact, and ability to maximize car performance. Differentiation of cars to the user is incredibly easy to tune via direction modifiers to car top speed, acceleration, braking power, and handling. There is admittedly potentially an insane amount of complexity in the depth and power of the driving physics model.
A first-person shooter essentially is a real-time free-movement point-and-click adventure game, and as a previous person noted the same level of realism is not expected in an FPS as in a sports game.
Compared to all these, football is hard. The success of a football play for either side is dependent on all 22 actors on the field, and player-player interaction drives the success or failure of any given actor (be it in blocking, WR-DB jostling, breaking tackles, or what have you). Football's rule set is possibly the most complex in all of sports. Football has the greatest number of possible strategies with which to advance downfield given the absurd number of possible plays, any of which could cause a problem for the AI if not implemented or tuned right. Football is a combination of a turn-based strategy game (choosing personnel deployment and alignment before a set piece) and a real-time strategy (any number of different things can happen after a snap; pass? scramble? lateral? change of possession?). Player differentiation to the user is hard because there is no scoring action for a player in possession of the ball other than running; there are no "shots on goal" or "free throws" for example.
Just my $0.02; again, this doesn't excuse any flaws in the game one may deem unacceptable, and this isn't an attempt to trivialize or simplify any other type of video game; making games in general is hard, regardless of genre. I simply submit that making a football game is very hard.
Last edited by CM Hooe; 04-21-2013 at 07:50 PM.
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