I read all the posts for a week – read all the good and lots of bad comments about the game – then hesitantly went out on Saturday and bought it, expecting the worst. Nice surprise… it’s a pretty good game – very addictive, and the commentary team of John and Joe is the BEST in any game ever, bar none. Very immersive baseball game play experience with them chatting away inning after inning, and I’ll definitely miss them next year and beyond (I don’t buy EA products).
Anyway, some things in the game stand out as just being wrong or too annoying to look past, so here’s a brief list of them and of the things I’m doing to improve the game from my perspective.
First thing I noticed that were off (that annoyed me too much) were the players’ body proportions and some batting stances. By editing each player’s physique and making everything a ‘5’ (chest, forearms, etc) the players all look pretty good now. I’m also experimenting with bumping up chest, upper arm and thighs of the sluggers to ‘6’, just to give them a bit more bulk. I’m also eliminating all batting stances of the “Tejada” variety where the batters arms are hoisted way up in the air, cutting off the part of the upper arms and most of the bat (when the batting camera fully zoomed in). I like to see the entire player, plus those stances just look too unnatural as well, IMO. They simply weren’t animated-drawn very well.
Tons of player ratings are off IMO. Individual pitchers’ pitch Speeds all need to be lowered by an average of 10 points – way too many 97 MPH fastballs, etc. And pitchers as batters should NOT have Contact and Doubles in the 40’s and Home Runs in the 20’s like many do, for example. And in general, position players’ Contact, Home Runs etc. ratings are too generically high as well. So I’ve started editing those: most pitchers to around 10 Contact, 5 Doubles and 2 Home Runs; mediocre fielders Contact begins in the 20’s and so forth. So my average hitter – say 260. – will have a Contact rating around 50-60, making the 70 Contact and up guys stand out more and all the more dangerous. As it is now, I’ve got one SS on my team who supposedly bats 180. Yet his Contact is 57 – way too high in comparison to a 300. hitter.
Fielding ratings are way, way too generically high, especially for pitchers, and I’ll be editing many of those as well. I’ve also noticed the Running Speed of players is all screwy, and they’re simply running too quickly when fielding especially – note how quickly (jumpy!) the P covers first or third. These ratings will need to be coordinated with the Fielding Speed slider, so there’s some work there to get the Speed ratings working properly.
I seldom play anything other than single seasons so, this will work for me (see thread title) plus I always spend more time editing than playing anyway. Anyway again, this game has a few problems but it’s nowhere near as broken as some have made it out to be. In fact, once it’s looking and running properly, it’s a very, very decent BB game… for sure the best I’ve played, all things considered :-)
Anyway, some things in the game stand out as just being wrong or too annoying to look past, so here’s a brief list of them and of the things I’m doing to improve the game from my perspective.
First thing I noticed that were off (that annoyed me too much) were the players’ body proportions and some batting stances. By editing each player’s physique and making everything a ‘5’ (chest, forearms, etc) the players all look pretty good now. I’m also experimenting with bumping up chest, upper arm and thighs of the sluggers to ‘6’, just to give them a bit more bulk. I’m also eliminating all batting stances of the “Tejada” variety where the batters arms are hoisted way up in the air, cutting off the part of the upper arms and most of the bat (when the batting camera fully zoomed in). I like to see the entire player, plus those stances just look too unnatural as well, IMO. They simply weren’t animated-drawn very well.
Tons of player ratings are off IMO. Individual pitchers’ pitch Speeds all need to be lowered by an average of 10 points – way too many 97 MPH fastballs, etc. And pitchers as batters should NOT have Contact and Doubles in the 40’s and Home Runs in the 20’s like many do, for example. And in general, position players’ Contact, Home Runs etc. ratings are too generically high as well. So I’ve started editing those: most pitchers to around 10 Contact, 5 Doubles and 2 Home Runs; mediocre fielders Contact begins in the 20’s and so forth. So my average hitter – say 260. – will have a Contact rating around 50-60, making the 70 Contact and up guys stand out more and all the more dangerous. As it is now, I’ve got one SS on my team who supposedly bats 180. Yet his Contact is 57 – way too high in comparison to a 300. hitter.
Fielding ratings are way, way too generically high, especially for pitchers, and I’ll be editing many of those as well. I’ve also noticed the Running Speed of players is all screwy, and they’re simply running too quickly when fielding especially – note how quickly (jumpy!) the P covers first or third. These ratings will need to be coordinated with the Fielding Speed slider, so there’s some work there to get the Speed ratings working properly.
I seldom play anything other than single seasons so, this will work for me (see thread title) plus I always spend more time editing than playing anyway. Anyway again, this game has a few problems but it’s nowhere near as broken as some have made it out to be. In fact, once it’s looking and running properly, it’s a very, very decent BB game… for sure the best I’ve played, all things considered :-)
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