Picked this up - Some issues

[gambler1650]

Hi all,

I played an earlier version of this game a few years back before Wolverine Studios became the publisher. It appeared much more polished in a couple of reviews so I took a chance on it. So far I like it a lot, I've made a sandbox style game with 40 teams split between 20 teams from the NFL (with a couple of changes - such as adding the San Antonio Riders and Portland Breakers from the WFL and the USFL, sending the Colts back to Baltimore, etc) and a world league (Canadian, Mexican, European, and Asian). Finding helmets has been a large part of my work. I'll let it run about 10 years and then take over a downtrodden team to see what I can do with it.

There are a few issues I have, in spite of having a blast overall:

1) Penalties: Pretty sure the Unsportsmanlike and Unnecessary Roughness penalties aren't being applied properly from the end of the play. If the defense commits one of these, the play should still count and the penalty yardage tacked on.

2) Play calling at the end of the game: This is better than some games, but inside of 2 minutes, with a team down, I see way too many runs - sometimes even 3 or so in a row. My guess is it's the way the Base Play modifiers (or whatever they're called) interact with the actual gameplans, so that sometimes the Base Play percentages override the gameplans. This shouldn't happen in special circumstances like end of the game. The flip side is that I see a lot of teams with a pretty safe lead continue to throw like they're down 2 touchdowns near the end of the game. I'm not saying it should always be pass pass pass when behind and run run run when ahead, but it ruins some of the realism for me.

3) The 2D screen needs some refining. The first down line doesn't reset until the play AFTER a first down is made (or after a change of possession). If the screen could be made bigger so that some numbers could be seen on the circles instead of the positions, that would be nice too. Hard to tell who the players are until after the play.

4) Adding records to the league weekly schedule screen could be helpful. I like to see at a glance what the big games are (in my case so I can choose which ones to watch). I found the league schedule which shows it as a list, and the records are there, but not as quick to get to.

Those are just a few immediate comments. But otherwise this is a great game.

[brooks_piggott]

1) We can add it to the list to take a look at. That code is ancient, which doesn't mean it's right, but it would surprise me that it hasn't been noticed yet.
2) This one is constant refining... we had the game set up to pass at the end of the game, but teams would go 3 and out or throw int's at the end of games they had no shot at winning. So we dialed it back. Should be if they're within a score or two they should be passing more and if they are really behind they mail it in and just try to run out the clock.
3) Need to look into this...
4) The records are in the game all over the place but we took them out in cases where the final scores are not known yet. If you turn off Hide Scores in options you should be able to see records. The problem was people didn't want to see the records change before they had a chance to watch the game.

[gambler1650]

So, this was from the end of a game...

Game is tied, 0:58 left in the 4th quarter after Mexico City ties it up with a touchdown.

Cancun takes over at their own 31. Sequence of plays is:

1st down: Rush for 5 yards (to Cancun's 36).
2nd down: QB spikes the ball to stop the clock.
3rd and 5 (41 seconds left): Run for -1 yards (to Cancun's 35).
Cancun calls timeout.
4th and 6 (38 seconds left): Cancun punts, great return by Mexico City sets up the game winning field goal.

Pretty sure I don't need to tell any football fan how weird that sequence looks.

[gambler1650]

Regarding the penalties.. It does look like it's applied properly after all. There's something odd about the sequencing of the play and the penalty that made me think otherwise.