Posts I'll Never Understand

[Medway]

Re: Posts I'll Never Understand

Or when there are sliders that you have no clue what they do (doesn't MVP have one called "Variable Stuff" huh??).

Variable stuff isn't too ambiguous, the term "stuff" is regularly used to describe if a pitcher has "it" that day in real baseball games.

[fossen]

Re: Posts I'll Never Understand

And if it makes you feel any better, yours is the only blog that I felt compelled enough to write a response to. If nothing else, it made for a good conversation piece....and that's what its all about isn't it?

Yeah - it's just a topic for conversation. I believe there are actual theoretical issues that we can discuss as sports gamers. There are enough threads on sock color, who's cheesing who, and the 8th 'Who's your favorite band?' of the week in EE ...

I'm interested in gaming on a theoretical level, the way you'd discuss film or literature, and it's fun to have a debate on these "brass tacks" of sports gaming. Sliders fascinate me because they are so unique to the world of sports gaming, and bring up interesting issues of author's intent. We expect sliders in MVP, but not in Splinter Cell, and I can't help but wonder why.

I'll probably come back to a slider discussion at some other point down the road. Part of the problem on this blog was that I was trying to not simply write about sliders (mainly about that particular combination of watching/sliders), but got a little carried away.

[gambler]

Re: Posts I'll Never Understand

I'll take a shot at 'explaining' the reason I fully understand both slider tweaking and CPU/CPU watching since I do both.

In the context of CPU/CPU watching, slider tweaking is usually a must. Maybe the sliders have been tweaked, polished, etc by the developers and testers, but they're set for the way most people play the game which is to actually pick up a controller and play the game "the way it was meant to be played." Therefore, if you want to play the game in 'GM' mode (as I call it), the sliders usually have to be tweaked to give more realistic results. Some games are easier than others (ESPN College Hoops 2K5 is excellent out of the box, with the biggest slider change being switching to 15 minute halves for watched games... EA's football games tend to take a bit of work and never quite achieve the 'realism' goal). Anyhow, to me, understanding why sliders are necessary for CPU/CPU watchers should be the easy part. They're playing a different game than the one that came in the box. For people who actually 'play' the game, slider tweaking may make less sense as the article indicates, but I can't comment on that.

As far as GM mode... Why, you (and others) ask, don't I just play any of the fine GM text based games out there like Out of the Park Baseball, Tournament Dreams College Basketball, Front Office Football: The College Years, Total Pro Football, etc? Well... I do. But I also want the 'thrill' of seeing that young outfielder I picked #1 in the draft 3 years ago get a September callup and hit a homerun in his first game, or the defensive line I put together via the draft and free agency absolutely dominate games, or watch the 7 yard run in the closing minutes of a game that puts my halfback above 2000 yards. Yeah, some text based games have excellent play by plays that almost let you 'see the action' but it's still not the same. I'm cursed by loving GM mode games, and equally cursed by not wanting to just 'imagine' the action. I want to see the team I'm molding performing on the field (which by the way can make it easier to see why a team might not be performing as well as you'd expect, as compared to trying to figure it out from play by plays, etc).

One other factor comes into play too. Time. I don't have as much of it to spend these days, often needing to do something else much of an evening. A GM mode game allows me to start a game, watch it while I'm reading, on the computer, eating, etc. In a lot of ways, this is why I'll GM a 'video game' over a text based game. Some text based games (OOTP comes to mind) require you to push a button after every play. Even those that run by themselves don't allow the ability to just glance up once in awhile to take in a play, you have to walk over to the computer, sit down and read.

Anyhow, I'll stop the ramble now, but figured I'd take my shot at explanation.

[ChicagoSparty]

Re: Posts I'll Never Understand

That's nuts. There's a plenty good slider set inside that plastic - it's called "default".


'Course, my argument is .... "learn to hit".

I disagree completely. Your argument might work with regard to certain games, but many games can be improved significantly by tweaking here and there.

There's no real way to "strategize" to do any of the following: (i) make the CPU run more in a football game; (ii) make the CPU steal more in a baseball game; or (iii) make the CPU drop less passes in an NCAA football game. The list goes on; add your favorites. Sliders are crucial to achieve as accurate results as are possible, because I can play my game, but if the CPU doesn't do its part, then where's the fun?

I don't think it's a stretch to say that slider tweaks can improve almost every sports game. WE8 and its predecessors are widely recognized as fantastically realistic games. But for every WEx, there's a game where the CPU continually goes 8-30 passing the ball, or a game where left-handed hitters can't hit home runs, or a game where the CPU-controlled pitcher simply will not throw ball 4, or a game where there are 3-4 wild pitches every other inning. Not all great examples, and at least one not fixable with sliders, but the point is the same: developers make mistakes.

So it seems to me like developers can use the help. They do a great job in creating fun, mostly realistic games within relatively short periods of time. But there often are glaring errors, many of which can be fixed with sliders. I'm happy we have them.

[ChicagoSparty]

Re: Posts I'll Never Understand

Yeah - it's just a topic for conversation.

And a good one at that. 8 pages and rolling tells me you're on to something.

[inkcil]

Re: Posts I'll Never Understand

I'm interested in gaming on a theoretical level, the way you'd discuss film or literature, and it's fun to have a debate on these "brass tacks" of sports gaming. Sliders fascinate me because they are so unique to the world of sports gaming, and bring up interesting issues of author's intent. We expect sliders in MVP, but not in Splinter Cell, and I can't help but wonder why.

Good question. And for the record, I'm glad you posted this topic...I sorta interpreted you posting it as you wanting to hear explanations and reasons from the Slider/CPU Watcher community for why we do what we do. So your article didn't offend me at all.

I think that one reason why we want sliders in MVP (to take just one sports game as an example) is because of the exposure we get to the MLB on a daily basis, either through Radio, Print, TV, or just buddies talking about the games. We don't get that kind of exposure to government black ops, espionage and covert operations.

If you are hearing all year about how K-rod is striking out all these batters in real life, but while playing MVP or looking at stats notice that his ERA is consistently over 5.00 after X number of simmed seasons, you will question the integrity of the game (unless you're playing something like MLB Slugfest).

If you are hearing about Barry Bonds hitting all these homeruns on TV and when you play the game (or watch the CPU play) Bonds hits the same # of HRs as David Eckstein at the end of a simulated season, then you'll question the integrity of the game. Especially if you come to a forum and ev'one is saying the same thing about the virtual Bond's performance. There will be a thread like "Why can't Bonds Hit in this Game?" And I think the thread would be like 5-10 pages long in no time. The thread will be full of comments like:

"It's poor development"
"You need to learn to hit"
"I'm taking this game back"
"Use these slider adjustments to increase CPU hitting"
"Who says Bonds can't have only 12 hr's through 120 games in real life?"
"It's not a big deal. You guys are over-exaggerating. This game is great."
"I use the Giants and I hit plenty of HR with Barry Bonds."
"Will there be a patch?"
"They ruined this game."
"If you don't like it, just play the other baseball game."

And there will be other additional Threads on the same subject like:

"I know why Bonds can't Hit"
"Bonds hitting is..."
"CAP for Barry Bonds here"
"Anyone else notice this?"
"Quick Question"
"For all those who use the Giants"
"Barry Bonds glitch related to Steroid Allegations?"
"Does Anyone Know how to..."

So I think it's b/c we receive so much exposure to the real thing, that we desire for our sports games to mimic the real thing. And we have something to base it on - stats and images and recaps that we are bombarded with ev'day. I can't speak for ev'one, but it just adds to the fun factor when I have to pitch to Bonds with the bases loaded...b/c I get the same butterflies and want to strike him out just about as much as I want him to strike out if I am watching him on TV bat with the bases loaded agiant my fav. team. But if the virtual Bonds is batting .232 with 12 HRs through 120-plus games played in September, it just takes away from the experience.

And don't you just love it when the CPU walks Bonds with 2 outs and first base open in order to protect its lead in the 9th inning? And why do we like seeing that scenario unfold in a videogame? B/c we see it so much in real life.

Heck, if the game the developers gave us won't do it "right out the box," then maybe, just maybe, the sliders will.

Sliders keep hope alive.

[tigerx82]

Re: Posts I'll Never Understand

...this thread is crap...

You guys should use the settings to make it more enjoyable
Note: all points from the middle "default"

Sarcasm: +8
Politeness: -4
Humor: +3


My 2 cents: this is something i dont feel too strongly about. I like sliders because i have seen them address specific gameplay problems I am having, but i HATE them because they make me feel like i am never at the optimum gaming settings and there is always a final tweak I need to go to enjoy the game to a level to which someone else is enjoying it.

Sliders have made us much less tolerant to things we might once have overlooked thus making it harder for me to enjoy games. But I guess i still need them in case i find something in a game that i just have to tweak.

[Medway]

Re: Posts I'll Never Understand

[QUOTE=tigerx82
My 2 cents: this is something i dont feel too strongly about. I like sliders because i have seen them address specific gameplay problems I am having, but i HATE them because they make me feel like i am never at the optimum gaming settings and there is always a final tweak I need to go to enjoy the game to a level to which someone else is enjoying it.

Sliders have made us much less tolerant to things we might once have overlooked thus making it harder for me to enjoy games. But I guess i still need them in case i find something in a game that i just have to tweak.[/QUOTE]

Excellent point, I agree 100%. In the end though I'm glad I have sliders. And although a lot of people here obsess about them I think for the most part its really an ends to a means. If we didnt truly believe the games were being enhanced by sliders there wouldn't be such a fuss over them. In some cases sliders might be used as a crutch (as opposed to learning to play better). But in the end I I think it comes down to the fact that many of these games are not shipping with gameplay that matches real life as much as we'd like and sliders have time and again helped that.