MLB 2K11 Developer Diary #4 - Revamped Fielding System, Animations, Sliders & Videos

[The Gamer]

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2K Sports have just posted MLB 2K11 Developer Diary #4, going over the revamped fielding system, animations, fielding sliders and more.

"I’m an avid gamer and the most important part of any sports game is player differentiation. I expect a 75 rated player to feel different than an 85 and so on. This is always difficult to accomplish because, traditionally in sports games, there are so many ratings and trying to make each attribute affect a player’s performance can be very challenging. In MLB 2K11, our fielders are differentiated by three skills:

1) Range – broken down to range and anticipation
2) Glove
3) Arm – broken down to strength and accuracy

By simplifying things, it allows us to introduce new elements of gameplay and, more importantly, differentiate the players. With that said, let’s get right to it and introduce the new features."

[jeffy777]

Re: MLB 2k11 Developer Diary #4: Revamped Fielding System

Nice. The gameplay videos look good. I really like the fielding camera.

EDIT:

I also dig the new sliders:

Throw Accuracy – Modifies the difficulty of the throw meter when fielding.

Gather error frequency – Increases the slider to see more gather errors and decrease to see less gather errors.

Throwing error frequency – Modifies the frequency of throwing errors by the CPU or when putting the meter into the red.

Outfield & Infield Throw Speed modifier – Tunes the throw speed of the outfielders and infielders separately.

Outfield & Infield Run Speed modifier – Adjusts the running speed of the outfielders and infielders separately.

Baserunner speed – Tunes the running speed of the baserunners.

Catcher Arm Strength and Accuracy – Tunes how hard and accurate the catchers will throw on steal attempts.
All sliders can be adjusted separately for the user and CPU.

[The Gamer]

Re: MLB 2k11 Developer Diary #4: Revamped Fielding System

This is on of the better DD that they have released. Lots of good info and the video support to show what they are explaining. Fielding looks to be majorly improved over previous versions. I'm so glad that errors have been included as that was the main sticking point for me with 2k10.

[Blitzburgh]

Re: MLB 2k11 Developer Diary #4: Revamped Fielding System

WOW! This game has me excited for baseball and I hope fans of the other game (which I am) give this a shot. It looks vastly improved where as the other game basically added new controls to an already good game. It looks like we may have two good games this year for a change. Now, if only football could be the same way! lol

[RGmoney]

Re: MLB 2k11 Developer Diary #4: Revamped Fielding System

This is on of the better DD that they have released. Lots of good info and the video support to show what they are explaining. Fielding looks to be majorly improved over previous versions. I'm so glad that errors have been included as that was the main sticking point for me with 2k10.

Agree with my fellow Cubbie.

[jeffy777]

Re: MLB 2k11 Developer Diary #4: Revamped Fielding System

A lot of good info in the "Animations" section. Hopefully it all translates well into good gameplay. Looking forward to seeing more of it in action.

I especially like:

No more “football catches” – Playing MLB 2K10, we cringed every time we saw a shortstop run backwards and make what we called “football catches”. We knew that we wanted to address that issue by adding new animations. We added animation coverage that has the fielder turn around while the ball is in midair in order to catch it. These animations look very smooth and make our game look more authentic.

Sliding catches – We have a good database of diving catches already, but we didn’t have many catches where the outfielders are sliding in to catch the ball. You see this frequently in real baseball when an outfielder is charging a ball and, instead of diving head first, they slide feet first. We added quite a few animations to add variety and refresh our diving catches.

Barehand queue ups – Last year, we introduced the ability to preload a throw and the fielders could trigger these smooth catch-and-throw animations. This year, we took that a step further by adding the same kind of plays from barehand gathers. That means that if a ball is hit into the gap and the ball stops at the foot of the outfield wall, if you queue up a throw, your outfielder should be able to just pick up the ball and fire it into the infield in one smooth animation. These animations are my personal favorite when they appear.

Restricting animations by ratings and weight – We wanted to continue to add to our realism and get rid of as many “that player wouldn’t do that in real life” moments as we could. We did a couple of very interesting things to limit that in the field this year. The first thing we did is limit animations to different ratings, so certain animations won’t trigger unless your glove rating is greater than 90, etc. We also limited animations by height and weight so that, even if a player has a good glove or arm rating, you won’t see bigger players make amazingly athletic plays.

[johnnyg713]

Re: MLB 2k11 Developer Diary #4: Revamped Fielding System

I like the DD a lot.. But honestly 2k.. If I hear "see ya" every time someone hits the ball deep im gonna smash my controller on the ground

[jeffy777]

Re: MLB 2k11 Developer Diary #4: Revamped Fielding System

I like the DD a lot.. But honestly 2k.. If I hear "see ya" every time someone hits the ball deep im gonna smash my controller on the ground

haha, I'm getting tired of that one too.

[rudyjuly2]

Re: MLB 2k11 Developer Diary #4: Revamped Fielding System

Love the new sliders and elimination of football catches. I was still hoping for a more zoomed out fielding camera where I could actually track the ball the entire time but I do like the new ball marker system. Can't wait to see how this works out.

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[bcruise]

Re: MLB 2k11 Developer Diary #4: Revamped Fielding System

I liked that landing indicator video - it looks like that could definitely make you think twice about having a poor fielder in the game in the late innings. Soriano's circle probably takes up all of Left Field....

But as I mentioned the last time this came up, the AI needs to be subject to this for the feature to truly be successful, IMO. It'll be great for online games as is, but if the AI fielder runs directly to the exact landing spot in single-player games regardless of rating and how large their circle is, it's only going to be a source of frustration for the user because they have to jump through a hoop that the AI doesn't.

This is the step no baseball game (to my knowledge) has taken yet, and I will be watching anxiously to see if this one takes that leap.

[bigfnjoe96]

Re: MLB 2k11 Developer Diary #4: Revamped Fielding System

Looks like we may have ourselves a helluva a Fielding System people. Man I can't wait to test drive this bad boy.. Also love that they put back some sliders that were remove EX: Throw Accuracy & Throw Speed

Very nice DD...

[NINJAK2]

Re: MLB 2k11 Developer Diary #4: Revamped Fielding System

Great DD! Game is looking nice!!!

[drterb]

Re: MLB 2k11 Developer Diary #4: Revamped Fielding System

WOW. This looks outstanding. I love the different animations that Sandoval and Longoria had fielding the same type of ground ball. Longoria was smooth and in control, nice throwing animation with a one hop to the first basemen. Sandoval looked like a spaz on all levels which fits his defensive game perfectly.

I didn't realize Garrett Jones was such a bad fielder, but I liked seeing him struggle to make that catch where Ichiro made it easily. I would like to see this demonstrated a few more times though. Show Ichiro making a tough play and then show Garrett Jones getting a similar play and have the ball drop or have him misplay it completely. In addition, show Jones miss the same fly ball he got in the video.

The Betancourt Rollins comparison was nice. It looked like the throw meter disappeared once Betancourt booted the ball. I'm not sure if I like that, but we'll see in a couple of weeks. I would've also like to see Rollins boot the ball, but then recover in time to get the runner. Other than that, Rollins looked silky smooth as he should.

Did Miller Park get rid of the electronic out of town scoreboard in left field?? They used the Wrigley/Fenway out of town scoreboard in the first 5-7 years, but they changed to an electronic left field scoreboard a few years ago. Maybe they changed back. I live in Milwaukee and I don't even know.

I'm not sure I'm a fan of if you're in the green (light or dark) on the throw meter it's 100% accurate. There should still be a chance (very slight) that you throw the ball off line (see Chuck Knoblauch). Hopefully sliders can affect this.

AWESOME sliders!! If they work....

Other than that, GREAT stuff in this diary. Easily the best one so far.

[JayhawkerStL]

Re: MLB 2k11 Developer Diary #4: Revamped Fielding System

Not only was the DD great, the video they showed looked great. The game really does have a nice look and feel to it. These new changes in fielding are going to go a long way in making every game feel fresh.

Good, good stuff. Imagine if the gameplay video had been day time, featured five minutes of of defense, and highlighted a HR without a tell, a chopper up the line, and a sac bunt while on offense.

The atmosphere in the forum would have been a heck of a lot different for the same game.

[Mike Smoove]

Re: MLB 2k11 Developer Diary #4: Revamped Fielding System

Not trying to nit pick but does anyone else feel the field is too small ?