PS BLOG: Everything New in MLB The Show 18’s Franchise Mode

[KGIY94]

Re: PS BLOG: Everything New in MLB The Show 18’s Franchise Mode

Do you play Out Of The Park Baseball? The game is outstanding for being a Manager/GM of a team and having full control over everything, simulating games, pouring over scouting reports, stats, financials.

There are other options. And this is the best at doing that.

For me, I prefer to play the game. But I also satisfy my GM/manger mode itch with OOTPB and 19 looks fantastic as the graphics have been greatly enhanced with rendered parks and 3D graphics.

You owe it to yourself to check it out. Deep as hell.

I play OOTP occasionally, but I still need the option to visualize my players and use them in actual games. I can't get invested enough in unplayable text boxes. Also I don't find it fun drafting and scouting players in OOTP either. Maybe I'm doing it wrong but just drafting the guy who has better ratings according to your scout is too straightforward. No game I've ever played captures the art and dynamism of drafting and developing players IMO.

[ninertravel]

Re: PS BLOG: Everything New in MLB The Show 18’s Franchise Mode

Told ya lame oases for less work was all we would get soon the coy will play franchise mode for us

[redsox4evur]

Re: PS BLOG: Everything New in MLB The Show 18’s Franchise Mode

Right. So here's the deal...

SDS has the data of what people are playing, and we all know that people's tastes have changed over the years. In the past, franchise/dynasty whatever was king, but that's no longer true. Now, it's all about team/card building. If people's tastes are evolving, it would be foolish to throw money at a phase of the game where there is dwindling interest (mind you, I don't have the data that SDS has on how people are playing the game, but I think we can see the writing on the wall with that one).

In the past 3 years, from VGChartz, here are MLB: The Show's sales:

15: 1.45m
16: 1.33m
17: 1.13m

So, as a franchise, it would be hard to justify adding more developers with decreasing revenue. You either (eventually) scale back on development, or make a big gamble, hire extra developers and hope it pays off (and if it doesn't, you run the risk of the entire franchise going under).

I've seen a lot of people asking for SDS to do what NBA2K does - 2K18's sales have reached approx. 4.82m (again, from VGChartz), and this does not even include PC sales. Over 4 times the revenue = much greater budget for development.

Bottom line is - you're always trying to increase revenue. When you do, you can afford to bring on more developers to continue the cycle. If interest is going down for franchise (across the board, not just in the Show) as percentage of play, then it would be foolish to devote more dollars to it. You're always looking for: "what feature or function is going to increase sales the most, within our own development constraints?" It's a shame for people who love franchise, but it looks like a fiscal decision was made to put less emphasis on it.

Just a heads up vgchartz doesn't take digital game sales in account and it also doesn't calculate any money that is spent by people on stubs. So to use those numbers to say their revenue is just silly to put it nicely. And I think I heard from people in the know that 2017 was SDS's best year revenue wise or it was best revenue post release one of the two.

[forme95]

Re: PS BLOG: Everything New in MLB The Show 18’s Franchise Mode

I play OOTP occasionally, but I still need the option to visualize my players and use them in actual games. I can't get invested enough in unplayable text boxes. Also I don't find it fun drafting and scouting players in OOTP either. Maybe I'm doing it wrong but just drafting the guy who has better ratings according to your scout is too straightforward. No game I've ever played captures the art and dynamism of drafting and developing players IMO.

I love the manage mode in MLBTS as I love watching my players play. It really immerses me into the GM role. I tried OOTP and found it fun, but it just didnt give me the full umph I was looking for. OOTP is a great game also, but I need to see actual players playing. I wasnt crazy about the animation of OOTP.

[bcruise]

Re: PS BLOG: Everything New in MLB The Show 18’s Franchise Mode

I love the manage mode in MLBTS as I love watching my players play. It really immerses me into the GM role. I tried OOTP and found it fun, but it just didnt give me the full umph I was looking for. OOTP is a great game also, but I need to see actual players playing. I wasnt crazy about the animation of OOTP.

Don't want to go too off topic here, but you might want to take a look at the "New Features" video that was posted in that forum yesterday. Things have changed from what you know in OOTP.

[eric7064]

Re: PS BLOG: Everything New in MLB The Show 18’s Franchise Mode

Right. So here's the deal...

SDS has the data of what people are playing, and we all know that people's tastes have changed over the years. In the past, franchise/dynasty whatever was king, but that's no longer true. Now, it's all about team/card building. If people's tastes are evolving, it would be foolish to throw money at a phase of the game where there is dwindling interest (mind you, I don't have the data that SDS has on how people are playing the game, but I think we can see the writing on the wall with that one).

In the past 3 years, from VGChartz, here are MLB: The Show's sales:

15: 1.45m
16: 1.33m
17: 1.13m

So, as a franchise, it would be hard to justify adding more developers with decreasing revenue. You either (eventually) scale back on development, or make a big gamble, hire extra developers and hope it pays off (and if it doesn't, you run the risk of the entire franchise going under).

I've seen a lot of people asking for SDS to do what NBA2K does - 2K18's sales have reached approx. 4.82m (again, from VGChartz), and this does not even include PC sales. Over 4 times the revenue = much greater budget for development.

Bottom line is - you're always trying to increase revenue. When you do, you can afford to bring on more developers to continue the cycle. If interest is going down for franchise (across the board, not just in the Show) as percentage of play, then it would be foolish to devote more dollars to it. You're always looking for: "what feature or function is going to increase sales the most, within our own development constraints?" It's a shame for people who love franchise, but it looks like a fiscal decision was made to put less emphasis on it.

Lets also not forget that the Show has probably made more money then ever on the 16 & 17 version with the way DD is. Also, many people dont just buy the standard edition anymore. They are shelling out extra money.

As another user points out VGchartz does not account for digital sales which is only becoming more popular each year.

[forme95]

Re: PS BLOG: Everything New in MLB The Show 18’s Franchise Mode

Don't want to go too off topic here, but you might want to take a look at the "New Features" video that was posted in that forum yesterday. Things have changed from what you know in OOTP.

Thanks bcruise. I will go check it out.

[WaitTilNextYear]

Re: PS BLOG: Everything New in MLB The Show 18’s Franchise Mode

In the past 3 years, from VGChartz, here are MLB: The Show's sales:

15: 1.45m
16: 1.33m
17: 1.13m

I appreciate the attempt to drop actual data on us, but as was already mentioned I don't buy these data. Other data has showed their sales being basically flat (around 1 million units per year for the previous ~3 years)...and you'd imagine with the ballyhooing of pre-orders for more expensive ultra-deluxe-MVP-supreme-All Rise editions coupled with a drive toward digital discs over production/shipping of costlier physical media, they are probably making more margin per unit than ever before. Throw in the microtransactions that have been a huge post-release revenue stream for RTTS and DD, the increasing popularity of baseball as a sport, and they are likely doing ok.

[EnigmaNemesis]

Re: PS BLOG: Everything New in MLB The Show 18’s Franchise Mode

VGCHartz is not accurate, like at all. Please do not use their numbers, since they are not able to account for digital, nor are their physical accurate.

Every year, digital sales % bleeds (growing) into physical as well.

[bigtrip88]

MLB needs to add a start today feature like 2k has and madden just added this year....baseball is such a long season it would be nice to start a franchise in  August and have up to date stats and rosters

[bcruise]

Re: PS BLOG: Everything New in MLB The Show 18’s Franchise Mode

FWIW they just went over several trade logic improvements on the stream, none of which was mentioned in the blog.


Just sayin'. Don't ask me for specifics, I'm not watching the VoD until the stream is over.

[seasprite]

Re: PS BLOG: Everything New in MLB The Show 18’s Franchise Mode

FWIW they just went over several trade logic improvements on the stream, none of which was mentioned in the blog.


Just sayin'. Don't ask me for specifics, I'm not watching the VoD until the stream is over.

That would be a very welcomed tweak

[MrArlingtonBeach]

Re: PS BLOG: Everything New in MLB The Show 18’s Franchise Mode

FWIW they just went over several trade logic improvements on the stream, none of which was mentioned in the blog.


Just sayin'. Don't ask me for specifics, I'm not watching the VoD until the stream is over.

They said that in last year's game, players were being traded that should not have been. For example, players without contracts were being traded in the offseason.

[Beelzebot44]

Re: PS BLOG: Everything New in MLB The Show 18’s Franchise Mode

Question for everyone who played 17.

I stuck with 16 and plan on getting 18. Did you prefer the new way they did the Budgets? I know there is a few threads on this but it seems complicated lol

Budgets were a major step back. Just unnecessary confusion. I don't know what was wrong with using a yearly payroll budget instead of weekly. Who can easily figure out what a 7 year, $48.5 million dollar deal is per week? It's stupid.

[redsfan4life]

Re: PS BLOG: Everything New in MLB The Show 18’s Franchise Mode

My god man. I can't believe if you play this game every year hardcore you can even think like this. The meaningful strides in gameplay each year smoke every sports game on the market in terms of gameplay improvement.

The Show is consistently setting the bar higher and higher in terms of replicating it's said sport.

Did we play the same game last year? Last year the hitting was broken and they haven't touched franchise in 4 years. I'm not giving these guys the benefit of the doubt anymore. It's time to step up to the plate.