Gameplay/Presentation for MLB12

[loganmorrison1]

Re: Gameplay/Presentation for MLB12

I would like the ability to automate stealing. Basically have stealing based solely on stats like catcher's arm, lead, pitcher's ability to hold runner, and runner's speed. The old stratomatic game did this very well. You would roll the die to see if you got a lead, then factor in the pitcher's hold and the catcher's arm into the runner's stealing ability, that would give you what chance you had of stealing and then you determine whether you want to attempt the steal or not. I would just like to see something flash on the screen saying if you get a lead, you have an 85% chance of being safe, do you want to steal

This might be something more towards MOM, either way I feel like stealing doesn't really work right

[loganmorrison1]

Re: Gameplay/Presentation for MLB12

When you hit a home run with guys on base (and it's not a cutscene no doubter kind of HR), as the ball is in flight the men on base will start to trot before you even know that the ball is over the fence for sure.

So you'll hit a drive deep to center and you'll always know if it's gone or not by watching the baserunners. If they hesitate, it's in the park. if they trot it's gone.

Would be nice to mix this up and preserve the drama and suspense of a long fly ball a few moments more.

This is a great point. Also, it allows tagging up to be more difficult. If my guys go halfway and then stop, I know it's an out, so i can retreat them back to the bag and get an unfair advantage for tagging up

[Russell_SCEA]

Re: Gameplay/Presentation for MLB12

Unfortunately due to the title and first post of this thread its turned into a wishlist. 95% of these wishes/suggestions will not be implemented into MLB 12 unless they where already on the schedule. What this thread should be for is fixes, re-balancing, and tweaks to existing gameplay features.

[stealyerface]

Re: Gameplay/Presentation for MLB12

1. After a solo homerun, and typically it was with Adrien Gonzalez with the Red Sox, Matty V would say, "A two run shot by Adrien". Might be just a programming, or if/then error, but it happens every time he hits a solo shot.

2. Still have a dropped third strike and subsequent throw to first for the out registering as an error for the catcher. No reason for that.

~syf

[tnixen]

Re: Gameplay/Presentation for MLB12

After the Grounds Crew comes out the chalk is totally back around Home Plate in the 4th inning.

In real life the Grounds Crew never touches up the chalk around Home Plate.

Also there is a slight pause/Freeze sometimes when the Grounds Crew comes out.

Please fix this!

In fact I would like to see more wear and tear on the whole field. First and third base lines including the dirt and grass getting beat up some. The chalk around Home Plate should be almost gone by the 9th inning.

I love that the Grounds Crew comes out and I still want them to in MLB 12 The Show however please let the chalk disappear over the course of the game like in real life.

The Grounds Crew should just smooth out the dirt and leave the chalk alone.

[tnixen]

Re: Gameplay/Presentation for MLB12

I would like to see a lot of new foul ball camera views in MLB 12 The Show.

Its time for a lot of new ones to keep the game feeling fresh.

Also when a ball is hit off of scoreboards in the stadiums I would like to hear a louder bang then it currently is.

[tnixen]

Re: Gameplay/Presentation for MLB12

Please remove the players photo for the " Stat Box Overlay" before each at bat.

In real TV broadcasts none of them show a picture of the batter with the stats.

Make it like this.

[PsychoBulk]

Re: Gameplay/Presentation for MLB12

Can we please get rid of the stuttering in night games?

Day...silky smooth, night, clear stutter when pitching (fine when hitting), even worse with runners on base.

[tnixen]

Re: Gameplay/Presentation for MLB12

Probably under the category of nit-picking, but when using Real-Time Presentation, can we please have the 1B/3B coaches slap five with the player after he hits a home run? Currently, the guy just runs around the bases and the coaches act like he's not even there.

As I only use RTP I would love if this was added!!!

And while were at it how about if the batter high fives the other players when he crosses Home Plate.

[nomo17k]

Re: Gameplay/Presentation for MLB12

I'll be editing this post till I exhaust what I remember... Sorry I may be duplicating what has already been discussed but I just want to make sure what I remember gets mentioned...

Gameplay

Fielding

-- Too few wild pitches. It was overcorrected by the patch for '10. Pitches in the dirt should result in more errant plays. Currently catchers are too good keeping them in front. On a related note, dropped third strikes should result more in catchers tagging the batter runner, rather than throwing to 1B for completing an out. If a gamer is in control of a hitter, then I think it would make sense that the batter doesn't break to 1B on a dropped third strike, unless the gamer instructs to do so.

-- CPU-controlled fielders, especially outfielders, make too many unrealistically stupid errors. Forcing them to make errors is perhaps necessary to produce errors in the amount comparable to real life, but when I was watching CPU vs CPU games, I noticed a vast majority of outfield errors are of "totally botched" types. Like dropping very routine fly balls (rare IRL), throwing wide to cutoff men (also rare). If they make more realistic errors (perhaps on harder plays), that would be great...

-- Too many outs at third base. Don't know if this is the result of overly aggressive base runners or too accurate long throws, but in general, there are too many outs made at third base. This can be balanced easily by long throws less accurate and/or making base runners less aggressive.

-- Making reaction time worse for pitchers and catchers. I think pitchers handle too many (hard-hit) infield grounders. Also, catchers sometimes have AMAZING reactions for batted balls around the home plate, catching them as soon as they were hit. I think these guys need to have longer reaction times. Pop-ups should be harder for catchers to handle so it's also good for that...

-- Make collision detection between pitcher and batted balls less lenient. Way too many hits to center end up hitting pitchers. They should simply go through more.

-- Make fielders ready to make the next action quicker when completing a putout. The biggest "exploit" of slow animation happens when a runner takes an extra base on a routine grounder or bunt, because the first baseman is slow to get off the bag and be ready to throw to the next base if the runner tries to sneak an extra base in. This is also needed for double steal with runners on 1st and 3rd.

-- Make fielders quicker on handling bunt. Enough said.

-- Make fielders make roughly right proportions of throwing and fielding errors. From CPU vs CPU games, we found that throwing errors were way more frequent than fielding errors. These have different effects on games so they should be generated by roughly correct proportion compared to real life.

-- Fielder speed and arm strengths. Don't know how these are tweaked, but I think it goes a long way to adjust these using real life numbers. I didn't time things myself, but I had impressions that in '11 fielder speed was too fast and arm strength too strong at default sliders.

-- More variety in errant throws. I think there are only a few ways that throws go wide off targets. For example, some times, an outfielder can throw waaaay over the head of third baseman or catcher IRL. That doesn't happen in the game right now. One thing that can be added is to increase the probability of error on a very hard throw from a short distance. It is simply harder to handle; it may be fun to think about *not* throwing too hard to be considerate to the receiver... takes some skill.

-- Less accurate long throws (to 3B). I think the reason why there are too many outfield assists (to 3B especially) in the game is that long throws are often too accurate. In the case of outs at 3B, throws are often too accurate even though they are long, and the third baseman can be very very quick (unphysically) to tag the runner.

-- Fielder momentum. I also made some comments about the momentum system in the "analog control" thread

http://www.operationsports.com/forum...post2042981627

so I'd appreciate if you take a look...

-- Cutoff man location. Often when the first baseman is the cutoff man, he's very slow to be near the pitcher's mound and the cutoff throw goes to him standing in a weird location near 1B; the first baseman should be quicker to be in his right cutoff position.

-- Throws to the base, not to the fielder. In the game the throws are made to the player covering the base, not to the base. That's reasonable if it's a toss and the fielder still has some distance to walk/run before he reaches the base, but in general, if the player will be on time to cover the base, the thrower would throw to the base, not to the fielder covering the base. The same goes for cutoff men.

-- More random paths by outfielders getting to the ball. The current systems appears to compute the shortest distance between the fielder and the ball landing location, and the moving fielder takes that shortest straight path, effectively handling it perfectly every time. Many have mentioned this in the context of outfielders handling balls off the outfield walls perfectly every time, which reduces the variety of plays leading to extra base hits. I have read somewhere that the devs have been trying to make it less perfect but haven't been able to do it reasonably well. Here are a couple of ideas...

(1) Let each fielder start moving in a random direction slightly off the best straight path. (Yes I'm aware this does happen sometimes with fielders with low reaction in the current system.) This can be tied in with fielder reaction to some extent. A fielder with the best reaction takes close to the best path almost every time, but one with a lower rating can be off that path a lot of times. As the fielder continues to run, he continually corrects his path so that eventually he figures the shortest path to the ball. And (2) when the fielder really isn't surely on the best path yet, the fielder should be running at a slower speed. Once he knows he's "on track", he accelerates to his max speed. IRL, you see a lot of times the outfielders are not really running at full speed when he's tentative (unless he already knows that the landing location is almost far out of his reach, in which case he should be running at full speed even slightly off the best path).

Again, if this sort of thing can be added with a more detailed fielder momentum system, players would really look organic out in the field. Some fun stuff to improve there!!

[nomo17k]

Re: Gameplay/Presentation for MLB12

Still to be done...

Gameplay

Misc.

-- More hit variety. I think there can be more variety in batted ball. This would make fielding more fun and less routine, particularly important for RTTS fielding. Especially lacking, I feel, are high bouncer in infield and blooper in outfield. There should be less of weak hits (both popups and grounders) near the home plate; 90 mph pitches coming off the bat shouldn't be hit that weakly, otherwise the bat should be shatter to absorb the energy....

-- Toned down wind effects. Was way too strong in '11.

-- Revisit rain day algorithm. I hardly ever saw rainy days in Tacoma.

-- Sunny day games might be too bright. Some have complained that the stadium/grass is too bright in day games, making it hard to see the ball in the field.

-- Custom camera views in online gameplay.

-- Player eye view. This might be a maniac category, but it might be interesting to add a camera view that follows that view of the player you are controlling. For RTTS this makes sense. You just put the camera at the eye of the player, rather than behind him a bit. It's just a fantasy of actually being that player. Whenever that would make much more sense to have a wider view, the view swaps between the player view and a wider view like implemented already.

-- Less ground balls, slightly more line drives/fly balls. According to the stats that I have accumulated in CPU vs CPU games, the game produces about 5% more ground balls than real life. That should become fly balls and line drives. (Although I have to say the game's identifications of those batted balls, which I just copied from the batter analysis screen, may not reflect how really the balls travel...)

-- More reasonable pitch speed on a pitch out. Every pitcher throws a mid- to high-heat on a pitch out. Instead it should be a similar speed with the fastest pitch the pitcher can throw.

[Legionnaire]

Re: Gameplay/Presentation for MLB12

I'd like the announcers to stop acting like national broadcasters and act more like regional announcers during the franchise mode.

I mean, instead of treating every game like it's the only game of the series (or possibly the only game of the season) they'll see your team play, I'd like them to act more like a team's announcers act during a long season. Act like the regional broadcasting team that follows your team and covers them every game all year. Not the guys who just look in on you once a month when you play on national TV.

Game one of a series, they spend a lot of time talking about the opposing team. Letting you know who everyone is, introducing you to them, and how good/bad they are. Talking about their injuries, talking about players they've acquired or lost since the last time you played them. And going in-depth about which of the opponents' players are struggling and which are on fire.

By the last game of the series, they start spending more time talking about players' performance over the life of the series. Talking about things like, "This guy's having a big series, just carrying his team. Batting .600 so far in this 3-game set, and personally driving in 9 of the 12 runs his team has scored. They just have no answer for this guy right now." And during a slow time of the final game, they'll find time to bring up who the team is playing their next series against, mentioning whatever star attractions that team has.

It'd really make the long regular season feel more realistic (like watching your hometown team night-in and night-out) if the announcers felt more like your hometown announcing crew.

[Legionnaire]

Re: Gameplay/Presentation for MLB12

How about showing career stats in Franchise year for year and not just the last couple?

Not like other games haven't been doing that for years now...

Yeah. Honestly, not only do I want their whole career there (even Madden has this, and they're supposed to be the epitome of lazy when it comes to those kind of details), but I don't want things so condensed either. Don't want it like I'm looking at the back of a player's baseball card (only showing me a few stats and ignoring lots of important ones).

When I click on a player to see his info, why not make it like I'm sitting at my computer and clicking onto a player's baseball-reference.com page? Career stats, year by year. Where they were drafted, what all trades they've been apart of. Can't be that hard to compile this info, since it's as easy as going player-by-player on baseball-reference.com.

[nomo17k]

Re: Gameplay/Presentation for MLB12

Still to be done...

Gameplay

Batting

-- Either make analog/button response or swing speed faster. Many have mentioned it's too hard to pull inside high fastball this year. I definitely feel it's too hard with analog. With button it's easier but many button users have said the same thing.

-- Less pronounced timing differences between inside/outside and high/low pitch. May actually be debatable if this is really desired... I do really like how such differences exist (and the devs know enough to realize this in the game). What I mean is that I feel kinda weird that many gamers end up hitting away inside pitches and pulling outside pitches more often than I actually think they happen IRL. The reason why this weirdness happen, I believe, is that the gamer tends to hit *everything* with similar timing given that all they do is to press a button/push up stick (as opposed to IRL you need different swings to hit inside/outside pitches). So if an inside pitch is hit with the same timing with an outside pitch, then the former tends to be hit away and the latter gets pulled (at least the timing right now is done in such a way I believe...). I found this to be the case, at least in '11. I feel the difference is a bit exaggerated now. Without knowing how the hit timing is coded I cannot really be to the point, but some adjustments in either timing window and/or the optimal timing for hitting right to the center would help... don't really know what gives me that weird feeling about too often pulling outside pitch. (On the other hand, going away with inside pitch might be because of the issue above, swing speed/response being slow....)

-- Tone down opposite field power. Not many hitters hit for power to the opposite field; in fact only 10 - 15% of HRs goes to the opposite field, e.g., http://www.hardballtimes.com/main/ar...the-other-way/. I think this would have a cool effect of the gamer trying to pull (which leads to reacting/swinging earlier, which leads to more whiffs, something power hitters do often) with power hitters and add a dimension to hitting strategy.

-- Make it easier to make contact with bunt. Bobhead's earlier post is right on there.

-- Make it easier to pull bunt attempt. It's too hard in '11.

-- Add offset view(s) with opposite perspective. This was actively discussed earlier in the forum. All preset offset views right now are shifted such that outside comes straight toward us the gamer. This makes it easier to have good eyes on outside pitches. In reality it probably should be opposite, i.e., outside pitches should be harder to judge. So some offset views should be added to accommodate this. The challenge is that with some hitters who stand close to the plate, it may become harder to see the release point of the pitcher (also when bunting). I love offset views so I'd really appreciate some thoughts here.

-- Allow even more flexible custom camera placement. I have this fantasy on how I want to hit with almost the same view as myself standing in a batter's box, like bringing the camera on the same eye level as the hitter. Currently the customizing camera doesn't allow such view; the camera has to stay behind the hitter. Would it be possible to make it more flexible? Not a big deal but...

-- Exaggerate the change in ball size as the pitch comes to the plate. Our brain judges how fast a ball is coming toward us by how much the size of the ball visually changes. Since we can only see 2D projected ball, it's very hard to distinguish fastball and change-up in the game. This is made worse by the fact that we cannot pick up the seam in game. So, in order to aid us by having more visual cue, why not add a mode (a mode because making things optional is always better than forcing us to play in certain ways...) in which the change of the ball size is a bit more exaggerated? I bet this would make it easier to time pitches. After playing a few hundred online games, I noticed only the very very best gamers can distinguish fastball and change-up. The rest simply cannot. So why not help the rest? It's better than guess pitch anyways...

-- (Only online gameplay) Make check swing easier for online play. Offline, check swing is implemented very well. Online, I think it's definitely much harder, and I presume that's because we don't have as much resolution (in terms of FPS?). Given that there are so many strikeouts in online games, it may help to make check swing easier just for online play.

[nomo17k]

Re: Gameplay/Presentation for MLB12

Still to be done...

Gameplay

Pitching

-- Pitcher control should be worse. Not reproduce discussions here cuz there are a bunch already.

-- Change-up (or other pitches whose pitch speed become slower as the speed rating goes higher) speed should be varied off the fastest pitch a particular pitcher throws. Don't know if it's easy to do, but when a non-pitcher is on the mound, he has only fastball and change-up, but his change is actually faster (in 80s) compared to his fastball (in 70s). This is weird. It seems changeup speed is hard coded against the pitch speed rating, but it would be cooler if the speed rating is tied to how much the pitcher takes off from the fastest pitch he throws. After all that's what change is for...

-- Make knuckler dance less. It dances way too much and unphysically.

-- More hit-by-pitches. CPU pitches rarely hit batters in '11. There should be more to bring the stats in line with MLB.

-- (For simulation engine) Very high BB/9 attribute rating should result in better BB/9 stats. What I noticed by looking at game-generate stats vs. attribute rating is that very high BB/9 attribute rating doesn't really lead to very very good control pitcher who rarely walks batters. For example

http://www.operationsports.com/forum...post2042336869

according to my OCD attempt to calibrate BB/9 player rating to BB/9 stats, even the best BB/9 rating leads to pitchers who walk about 2 - 2.5 walks per 9 innings. Best control pitchers in MLB on the other hand can have about 1 walk per 9 innings (e.g., Roy Halladay, Cliff Lee). So more dynamic range here would be great to reproduce their performance.