Effort gone, damn!

[NBryant]

Well after tonight I am hanging up a lot of work that I had been putting in as an old retired guy. Some time back I began creating historical team sets to carry through the NFL from 1970 on. I had also gotten deep in creating a hypothetical NSFL league (USFL/XFL merger). With the new changes to PF24 the fields are no longer an option in this format. Damn, lots of time gone, but such is life. I went ahead and included examples here. You can see my updated template of newer fields with a white border, goal posts amd end zone markers. The older fields were progressing as they changed year by year in some cases. You can see a few examples of these early ones also.

Appreciate many of the changes to PF24 but will admit I am really on the fence about the new field view. Just my opinion. Would have loved to have a choice between the 2 3D versions but hey, change is inevitable. Anyway, I am going to go contemplate all this lost/wasted time for a bit, get a goods nights rest and move on to something else in the morning.

[slybelle1]

Why aren’t your fields an option anymore? The game still uses the same 2d field format and then the game itself repositions the field to look 3d. You don't actually design the field looking 3d. Just released my usual 2024 real world mod that uses the same field formats as prior versions of the game and everything looks fine. The only thing that I am not sure of is how exactly the goalposts would look without them have a 3D design, I suspect it would just look like a yellow line. I am not really sure there is a way to represent a 3d version of the goalpost via the field image file, may require the developer to superimpose a default goalpost on top of the field within the game itself, if that is even possible. I tried to use one of your images as an example to see how it would look in the game but since the images in the post is just one graphic of all fields combined, the field was blurry and looked stretched so it wouldn't do it justice to show that.

The game does have a league option where the game player can select to see the 3d player images or the previous 2d circle style, but in both cases the game renders the field in 3d. The 3d player models wouldn't look right on a top down 2d field and even if they could/would provide an option to switch between 2d/3d fields, thinking a good portion of game players would likely use the 3d views anyway, although I could be wrong as the default style is the old way. But if somehow when the game player has 2d circle option selected they could give the game player option of using the 2d field view, that would be nice for game players who prefer the previous game style but again, no idea if the way implemented would support that. With all that said, I still think everyone could use what you have done so far with the exception of confirming how the goalposts would be represented.

As an example from my 2024 real world mod, using a 2D file image (same size and format as previous versions of the game), it shows within the game like at the bottom.

Field Image File from Mod


How the Same Field Image Looks within the Game Without any Changes

[NBryant]

For the basic field design Sly you are correct. I added a few extra minor details though that do not and won't translate which would require me to go back through them. At the moment my heart just not there. Maybe in the future I will get the demo and tinker to see what can be done but for now I will move on to other projects. In addition, my own personal opinion here, I appreciate the change in the 3D view but my interest is not in the visuals but more in the content and make up of the game itself. If I wanted visuals I would just play Madden. Here I wanted depth. Depth in personnel, coaching, GM and owner functions. Depth in customization and the ability to accurately reflect historical timelines with the corresponding rule changes and restrictions. Much of the foundation exists and Brooks has done a great job over the last decade+ in providing many of these points but it still needs work. For this, again me personally, would be happy with the overhead 3D version or something as simple as the field configuration in BBCF or the old TPF (going way back). Hell, having the ability to choose between the two 3D modes would be awesome, but not going to happen. All in all it's good. Brooks has said on many occassions that he isn't creating a simulation but more a representation of American football. It will continue to move forward but until it can represent the true depth and complexity of the game, much like OOTP does baseball, having amazing graphics is just an overlay to a good but not great game.

[drummerJ99]

For the basic field design Sly you are correct. I added a few extra minor details though that do not and won't translate which would require me to go back through them. At the moment my heart just not there. Maybe in the future I will get the demo and tinker to see what can be done but for now I will move on to other projects. In addition, my own personal opinion here, I appreciate the change in the 3D view but my interest is not in the visuals but more in the content and make up of the game itself. If I wanted visuals I would just play Madden. Here I wanted depth. Depth in personnel, coaching, GM and owner functions. Depth in customization and the ability to accurately reflect historical timelines with the corresponding rule changes and restrictions. Much of the foundation exists and Brooks has done a great job over the last decade+ in providing many of these points but it still needs work. For this, again me personally, would be happy with the overhead 3D version or something as simple as the field configuration in BBCF or the old TPF (going way back). Hell, having the ability to choose between the two 3D modes would be awesome, but not going to happen. All in all it's good. Brooks has said on many occassions that he isn't creating a simulation but more a representation of American football. It will continue to move forward but until it can represent the true depth and complexity of the game, much like OOTP does baseball, having amazing graphics is just an overlay to a good but not great game.

While I agree with you to a extent, it's also 2023. I think the 3d gameplay is the only way forward and helps try and break into the video game market. Even OOTP is updating to 3d gameplay.

[slybelle1]

No worries, just wanted to make sure you knew most of your work was still valid, although I understand some of the stuff might require rework. Also certainly understand if the game overall is not meeting your expectations as that would lessen the motivation of supporting it with mods. Hopefully someday you will be able to try a future version where maybe it has some of what you want.

[brooks_piggott]

I added the ability to remove the zoom effect and perspective effect so people have options. That's kind of the whole point of First Access... to be able to get feedback that helps us tweak the releases. I do appreciate the effort and ideas you bring... hopefully in the future we'll get to a point where you enjoy the game again.