My assessment of the game in its current state

I've been keeping my opinion to myself ever since the game launched, because I didn't dive into the online game modes right away. I usually grind some of the offline stuff first to build a somewhat decent team and that's exactly what I did. That meant I couldn't really give an objective opinion on the game since I didn't play online enough yet and for most of us this game centers around the online game modes.

Let me start of by saying that even though I consider myself an upper tier/elite player, this opinion is mine and mine alone. My opinion is not weighing heavier than any offline player or the more casual type of player whatsoever. You do not have to agree with anything I say, but I do ask you to respect my opinion as I will respect yours.

I can describe this game in an online environment in its current state as following:
I can not pitch.
I can not field.
I can not hit.
And yet somehow I can still win.

I throw so many meatballs and I can't control a single pitcher. Good releases sometimes lead to hangers down the middle. Horrible releases sometimes result in absolute dots on the black. Every pitch feels like spinning the wheel of fortune, I'm just lost when it comes to pitching, honestly.

When it comes to fielding, the obvious issue of outfielders not locking onto flyballs is a problem. I'm sure that will be fixed at some point. What annoys me way more is when the ball gets down and bounces off the wall, your outfielder is literally lost. There is no urgency to pick it up or throw it away quickly, you actually run past it often. Singles turn into doubles and doubles turn into triples because of this.

And the hitting.. I don't even know where to start. I struggle hitting fastballs, while I've always been a really good fastball hitter. Now I have to gamble and as a result that gets me out in front of almost every offspeed pitch. It only takes 1 inning for my opponent to figure this out. The funny thing is that an inning later I can be out in front on fastballs while I'm pretty certain that my reaction time is the same as before. It just feels off and inconsistent, I don't understand it.
I also tend to get under the ball a whole lot, while I'm not even slamming the PCI down. In my screen I align the ball in the middle of the PCI, yet the feedback says I got under it too much resulting in a good/okay flyout. This happens to me way too often.
The perfect/perfect idea is great. In reality only the perfect/perfect flyballs with power guys do real damage. I've lined out on perfect/perfect liners more often than not and perfect/perfect grounders are usually just groundouts or even double plays. You'd expect the perfect input would make you find the infield hole, which sometimes happens but not nearly enough.

All and all I'm just really disappointed more than anything. I was really hoping that we could leave 18 and 19 behind us and start moving in the right direction again, like a tweaked hybrid of 16+17 where the flaws of those games were fixed. But that's clearly not their vision for this franchise moving forward unfortunately.

For now I'll keep playing casually instead of competitively, hoping that future patches will resolve some of the stuff I mentioned, but I'm kinda pessimistic about it. Sorry. I usually quit playing ranked around Christmas, this year that might be a lot sooner.

You summed it up perfectly. Can't hit, pitch, or field, yet its still possible to win. I played 4 games last night. I lost one that I should've won off bad luck, won one that I should've lost on good luck, won one that was fairly even but luck pushed me over the edge, and won one that I deserved to win.

My biggest gripe is the inconsistencies with PCI placement and results. So frustrating to square it up perfectly only to see good/okay on the screen. Same goes for pitching. Like you said, its all based on whether or not RNG is in your favor, even if you release it perfectly. I share the same sentiment as you that this game will almost definitely not last until Christmas

Good post OP.

We've reached a cross roads it seems where maximizing player spending on stubs has outweighed competitive gameplay. No lead feels safe and there are so many animation/programming factors that can interfere with the game.

I'm ending up on both sides of the spectrum. It's rare I feel like I just outplayed someone or was outplayed. It's did I get the right bounce or animation to go my way.

Nothing between hitting, fielding, pitching, or base running feels consistent online. We didn't even touch on the strike zone for balls and strikes. Nothing is called a strike that isn't more than 50% in the zone. It's too easy to shrink the zone and just wait for your service of RNG meatballs.

Offline the game is really nice though

Yup said it perfectly. I’ve been playing this game since 08 and online since 16. I think 18 was the end of what was a great competitive game. It was hard, really hard, but also very rewarding to know you won or lost mostly based on your input and skill. They have clearly moved in a different direction and unfortunately they won’t return.

Good post. I can’t agree more.

I just played a ranked game and lost 2-1. I had 5 hits, my opponent 4. Two of his were swinging bunt dribblers that my pitcher could not field fast enough.

In short, two average players struggling to hit the fastball, 16 combined strikeouts. Nearly all the hits had that weird off the end sound of poor contact.

Three home runs on mistake pitches decide the game.

It’s just not much fun.

I’m legit terrible right now. Haha. Usually I’m decent.

Fastball seems like it’s coming in so fast. Legend offline feels like all star online.

@raesONE said in My assessment of the game in its current state:

I've been keeping my opinion to myself ever since the game launched, because I didn't dive into the online game modes right away. I usually grind some of the offline stuff first to build a somewhat decent team and that's exactly what I did. That meant I couldn't really give an objective opinion on the game since I didn't play online enough yet and for most of us this game centers around the online game modes.

Let me start of by saying that even though I consider myself an upper tier/elite player, this opinion is mine and mine alone. My opinion is not weighing heavier than any offline player or the more casual type of player whatsoever. You do not have to agree with anything I say, but I do ask you to respect my opinion as I will respect yours.

I can describe this game in an online environment in its current state as following:
I can not pitch.
I can not field.
I can not hit.
And yet somehow I can still win.

I throw so many meatballs and I can't control a single pitcher. Good releases sometimes lead to hangers down the middle. Horrible releases sometimes result in absolute dots on the black. Every pitch feels like spinning the wheel of fortune, I'm just lost when it comes to pitching, honestly.

When it comes to fielding, the obvious issue of outfielders not locking onto flyballs is a problem. I'm sure that will be fixed at some point. What annoys me way more is when the ball gets down and bounces off the wall, your outfielder is literally lost. There is no urgency to pick it up or throw it away quickly, you actually run past it often. Singles turn into doubles and doubles turn into triples because of this.

And the hitting.. I don't even know where to start. I struggle hitting fastballs, while I've always been a really good fastball hitter. Now I have to gamble and as a result that gets me out in front of almost every offspeed pitch. It only takes 1 inning for my opponent to figure this out. The funny thing is that an inning later I can be out in front on fastballs while I'm pretty certain that my reaction time is the same as before. It just feels off and inconsistent, I don't understand it.
I also tend to get under the ball a whole lot, while I'm not even slamming the PCI down. In my screen I align the ball in the middle of the PCI, yet the feedback says I got under it too much resulting in a good/okay flyout. This happens to me way too often.
The perfect/perfect idea is great. In reality only the perfect/perfect flyballs with power guys do real damage. I've lined out on perfect/perfect liners more often than not and perfect/perfect grounders are usually just groundouts or even double plays. You'd expect the perfect input would make you find the infield hole, which sometimes happens but not nearly enough.

All and all I'm just really disappointed more than anything. I was really hoping that we could leave 18 and 19 behind us and start moving in the right direction again, like a tweaked hybrid of 16+17 where the flaws of those games were fixed. But that's clearly not their vision for this franchise moving forward unfortunately.

For now I'll keep playing casually instead of competitively, hoping that future patches will resolve some of the stuff I mentioned, but I'm kinda pessimistic about it. Sorry. I usually quit playing ranked around Christmas, this year that might be a lot sooner.

I'm 11-0 in RS. Doesn't mean the game doesn't play like [censored].

i see the honeymoon phase is over lmao

Hopefully one of these years developers of these sports games/ultimate team modes will get over this fad. Its a fad. "Lets see how many different RNG rolls/algorithms we can stuff into each individual in-game event."

Just because the hardware can do it doesn't mean it should be programmed to do it. Its getting real old at this point.

@superfly2789 said in My assessment of the game in its current state:

Yup said it perfectly. I’ve been playing this game since 08 and online since 16. I think 18 was the end of what was a great competitive game. It was hard, really hard, but also very rewarding to know you won or lost mostly based on your input and skill. They have clearly moved in a different direction and unfortunately they won’t return.

Wut lmaooo 18 had no fastballs

@Chuck_Dizzle29 said in My assessment of the game in its current state:

We've reached a cross roads it seems where maximizing player spending on stubs has outweighed competitive gameplay. No lead feels safe and there are so many animation/programming factors that can interfere with the game.

I'm ending up on both sides of the spectrum. It's rare I feel like I just outplayed someone or was outplayed. It's did I get the right bounce or animation to go my way.

Nothing between hitting, fielding, pitching, or base running feels consistent online. We didn't even touch on the strike zone for balls and strikes. Nothing is called a strike that isn't more than 50% in the zone. It's too easy to shrink the zone and just wait for your service of RNG meatballs.

Offline the game is really nice though

I don't know if I would say offline is really nice though. With these last two patches they slipped back into the inconsistent hitting bs where you had to work the count on almost every at bat and first pitch swings were penalized 9/10 times with a pop-out, line-out or ground-outs. That's just annoying. Also with the inconsistent timing window most conquest games are stretching into 7 innings because hitting is such [censored]. So no offline is not nice.

All they had to do was refine the control setting of pitching and fine tune the fielding issues. You had two jobs SDS.

What bothers me most is that I see them going down the same path that EA has gone down with FIFA where they have people play a beta that is fun and builds hype. Patch the hell out of it early and often to where nothing makes sense and it somehow is driven to benefit the esports ambitions? Then they just keep releasing shiny new card "content" that generates quick money. And it's crickets when people criticize them for it.

Let's face it, none of us want to sit on these forums and complain about the game. We'd rather be discussing interesting players, lineups, goals, and aspects of the game we enjoy... and here we are once again complaining about the game year in and year out.

You explained it so well. This game is playing like a dog fart

@allmustfall16 said in My assessment of the game in its current state:

I’m legit terrible right now. Haha. Usually I’m decent.

Fastball seems like it’s coming in so fast. Legend offline feels like all star online.

Exactly! What is going on???

@D_e_m_I_s_E said in My assessment of the game in its current state:

@raesONE said in My assessment of the game in its current state:

I've been keeping my opinion to myself ever since the game launched, because I didn't dive into the online game modes right away. I usually grind some of the offline stuff first to build a somewhat decent team and that's exactly what I did. That meant I couldn't really give an objective opinion on the game since I didn't play online enough yet and for most of us this game centers around the online game modes.

Let me start of by saying that even though I consider myself an upper tier/elite player, this opinion is mine and mine alone. My opinion is not weighing heavier than any offline player or the more casual type of player whatsoever. You do not have to agree with anything I say, but I do ask you to respect my opinion as I will respect yours.

I can describe this game in an online environment in its current state as following:
I can not pitch.
I can not field.
I can not hit.
And yet somehow I can still win.

I throw so many meatballs and I can't control a single pitcher. Good releases sometimes lead to hangers down the middle. Horrible releases sometimes result in absolute dots on the black. Every pitch feels like spinning the wheel of fortune, I'm just lost when it comes to pitching, honestly.

When it comes to fielding, the obvious issue of outfielders not locking onto flyballs is a problem. I'm sure that will be fixed at some point. What annoys me way more is when the ball gets down and bounces off the wall, your outfielder is literally lost. There is no urgency to pick it up or throw it away quickly, you actually run past it often. Singles turn into doubles and doubles turn into triples because of this.

And the hitting.. I don't even know where to start. I struggle hitting fastballs, while I've always been a really good fastball hitter. Now I have to gamble and as a result that gets me out in front of almost every offspeed pitch. It only takes 1 inning for my opponent to figure this out. The funny thing is that an inning later I can be out in front on fastballs while I'm pretty certain that my reaction time is the same as before. It just feels off and inconsistent, I don't understand it.
I also tend to get under the ball a whole lot, while I'm not even slamming the PCI down. In my screen I align the ball in the middle of the PCI, yet the feedback says I got under it too much resulting in a good/okay flyout. This happens to me way too often.
The perfect/perfect idea is great. In reality only the perfect/perfect flyballs with power guys do real damage. I've lined out on perfect/perfect liners more often than not and perfect/perfect grounders are usually just groundouts or even double plays. You'd expect the perfect input would make you find the infield hole, which sometimes happens but not nearly enough.

All and all I'm just really disappointed more than anything. I was really hoping that we could leave 18 and 19 behind us and start moving in the right direction again, like a tweaked hybrid of 16+17 where the flaws of those games were fixed. But that's clearly not their vision for this franchise moving forward unfortunately.

For now I'll keep playing casually instead of competitively, hoping that future patches will resolve some of the stuff I mentioned, but I'm kinda pessimistic about it. Sorry. I usually quit playing ranked around Christmas, this year that might be a lot sooner.

I'm 11-0 in RS. Doesn't mean the game doesn't play like [censored].
Who is on your team and have you made it out of ALLSTAR level pitching.

Basically they game us a game where skill mattered at release saw people getting pumpled by good players and said nope that enough time to hand up participation trophies for just being able to load into a game

It genuinely feels like the timing window between very early and very late is 1-2 frames depending on if it’s all star or HOF+

@Chuck_Dizzle29 said in My assessment of the game in its current state:

We've reached a cross roads it seems where maximizing player spending on stubs has outweighed competitive gameplay. No lead feels safe and there are so many animation/programming factors that can interfere with the game.

I'm ending up on both sides of the spectrum. It's rare I feel like I just outplayed someone or was outplayed. It's did I get the right bounce or animation to go my way.

Nothing between hitting, fielding, pitching, or base running feels consistent online. We didn't even touch on the strike zone for balls and strikes. Nothing is called a strike that isn't more than 50% in the zone. It's too easy to shrink the zone and just wait for your service of RNG meatballs.

Offline the game is really nice though

Said it perfectly at the beginning. SDS has the keys to the car. Players have absolutely no reason to upgrade a team if they’re hitting tanks with silvers. But, you mess with the hitting a bit, the average user feels they need to upgrade their team to “be better” then, little billy spends $50-$60 on stubs on top of X dollars they spent on the game.

@raesONE said in My assessment of the game in its current state:

I've been keeping my opinion to myself ever since the game launched, because I didn't dive into the online game modes right away. I usually grind some of the offline stuff first to build a somewhat decent team and that's exactly what I did. That meant I couldn't really give an objective opinion on the game since I didn't play online enough yet and for most of us this game centers around the online game modes.

Let me start of by saying that even though I consider myself an upper tier/elite player, this opinion is mine and mine alone. My opinion is not weighing heavier than any offline player or the more casual type of player whatsoever. You do not have to agree with anything I say, but I do ask you to respect my opinion as I will respect yours.

I can describe this game in an online environment in its current state as following:
I can not pitch.
I can not field.
I can not hit.
And yet somehow I can still win.

I throw so many meatballs and I can't control a single pitcher. Good releases sometimes lead to hangers down the middle. Horrible releases sometimes result in absolute dots on the black. Every pitch feels like spinning the wheel of fortune, I'm just lost when it comes to pitching, honestly.

When it comes to fielding, the obvious issue of outfielders not locking onto flyballs is a problem. I'm sure that will be fixed at some point. What annoys me way more is when the ball gets down and bounces off the wall, your outfielder is literally lost. There is no urgency to pick it up or throw it away quickly, you actually run past it often. Singles turn into doubles and doubles turn into triples because of this.

And the hitting.. I don't even know where to start. I struggle hitting fastballs, while I've always been a really good fastball hitter. Now I have to gamble and as a result that gets me out in front of almost every offspeed pitch. It only takes 1 inning for my opponent to figure this out. The funny thing is that an inning later I can be out in front on fastballs while I'm pretty certain that my reaction time is the same as before. It just feels off and inconsistent, I don't understand it.
I also tend to get under the ball a whole lot, while I'm not even slamming the PCI down. In my screen I align the ball in the middle of the PCI, yet the feedback says I got under it too much resulting in a good/okay flyout. This happens to me way too often.
The perfect/perfect idea is great. In reality only the perfect/perfect flyballs with power guys do real damage. I've lined out on perfect/perfect liners more often than not and perfect/perfect grounders are usually just groundouts or even double plays. You'd expect the perfect input would make you find the infield hole, which sometimes happens but not nearly enough.

All and all I'm just really disappointed more than anything. I was really hoping that we could leave 18 and 19 behind us and start moving in the right direction again, like a tweaked hybrid of 16+17 where the flaws of those games were fixed. But that's clearly not their vision for this franchise moving forward unfortunately.

For now I'll keep playing casually instead of competitively, hoping that future patches will resolve some of the stuff I mentioned, but I'm kinda pessimistic about it. Sorry. I usually quit playing ranked around Christmas, this year that might be a lot sooner.

What I find amazing is that you feel you cannot pitch and everything is hit by your opponent, yet when he is pitching you cannot hit because his ability to pitch is too good. You realize that you are both using the same program to pitch and hit? What is easy or hard for you is also easy or hard for your opponent?

@raesONE said in My assessment of the game in its current state:

I've been keeping my opinion to myself ever since the game launched, because I didn't dive into the online game modes right away. I usually grind some of the offline stuff first to build a somewhat decent team and that's exactly what I did. That meant I couldn't really give an objective opinion on the game since I didn't play online enough yet and for most of us this game centers around the online game modes.

Let me start of by saying that even though I consider myself an upper tier/elite player, this opinion is mine and mine alone. My opinion is not weighing heavier than any offline player or the more casual type of player whatsoever. You do not have to agree with anything I say, but I do ask you to respect my opinion as I will respect yours.

I can describe this game in an online environment in its current state as following:
I can not pitch.
I can not field.
I can not hit.
And yet somehow I can still win.

I throw so many meatballs and I can't control a single pitcher. Good releases sometimes lead to hangers down the middle. Horrible releases sometimes result in absolute dots on the black. Every pitch feels like spinning the wheel of fortune, I'm just lost when it comes to pitching, honestly.

When it comes to fielding, the obvious issue of outfielders not locking onto flyballs is a problem. I'm sure that will be fixed at some point. What annoys me way more is when the ball gets down and bounces off the wall, your outfielder is literally lost. There is no urgency to pick it up or throw it away quickly, you actually run past it often. Singles turn into doubles and doubles turn into triples because of this.

And the hitting.. I don't even know where to start. I struggle hitting fastballs, while I've always been a really good fastball hitter. Now I have to gamble and as a result that gets me out in front of almost every offspeed pitch. It only takes 1 inning for my opponent to figure this out. The funny thing is that an inning later I can be out in front on fastballs while I'm pretty certain that my reaction time is the same as before. It just feels off and inconsistent, I don't understand it.
I also tend to get under the ball a whole lot, while I'm not even slamming the PCI down. In my screen I align the ball in the middle of the PCI, yet the feedback says I got under it too much resulting in a good/okay flyout. This happens to me way too often.
The perfect/perfect idea is great. In reality only the perfect/perfect flyballs with power guys do real damage. I've lined out on perfect/perfect liners more often than not and perfect/perfect grounders are usually just groundouts or even double plays. You'd expect the perfect input would make you find the infield hole, which sometimes happens but not nearly enough.

All and all I'm just really disappointed more than anything. I was really hoping that we could leave 18 and 19 behind us and start moving in the right direction again, like a tweaked hybrid of 16+17 where the flaws of those games were fixed. But that's clearly not their vision for this franchise moving forward unfortunately.

For now I'll keep playing casually instead of competitively, hoping that future patches will resolve some of the stuff I mentioned, but I'm kinda pessimistic about it. Sorry. I usually quit playing ranked around Christmas, this year that might be a lot sooner.

I cannot hit either, the 1st inning is your opponent seeing if you’re a swing at everything guy. 2nd-3rd is the “well maybe he can’t catch up to FB” then it’s an exploit. I know the challenge is to “beat your opponent” but beat then with skill, mixing up pitches, outsmarting them. Not throwing them 98-99 up where you KNOW it’s unhittable. I want to love this game, but I go into ranked games now praying for a win.

Great post guy! I hate saying this bc of all the lineouts but I actually had more fun in 19 to this point. The year is very young yet so we shall see where it goes from here. 19 had its flaws but [censored], just seeing the ball out of the hand and timing pitches was a lot better. Literally now we’re all in rocking chairs at the plate

I played 17 like a mad man, I stopped for a while because the grind burnt me out. Came back, and I was really enjoying it the first weekend. I'm still having fun, but mechanics suck, the grind is unenjoyable, and the content is repetitive.

@Vipersneak said in My assessment of the game in its current state:

@raesONE said in My assessment of the game in its current state:

I've been keeping my opinion to myself ever since the game launched, because I didn't dive into the online game modes right away. I usually grind some of the offline stuff first to build a somewhat decent team and that's exactly what I did. That meant I couldn't really give an objective opinion on the game since I didn't play online enough yet and for most of us this game centers around the online game modes.

Let me start of by saying that even though I consider myself an upper tier/elite player, this opinion is mine and mine alone. My opinion is not weighing heavier than any offline player or the more casual type of player whatsoever. You do not have to agree with anything I say, but I do ask you to respect my opinion as I will respect yours.

I can describe this game in an online environment in its current state as following:
I can not pitch.
I can not field.
I can not hit.
And yet somehow I can still win.

I throw so many meatballs and I can't control a single pitcher. Good releases sometimes lead to hangers down the middle. Horrible releases sometimes result in absolute dots on the black. Every pitch feels like spinning the wheel of fortune, I'm just lost when it comes to pitching, honestly.

When it comes to fielding, the obvious issue of outfielders not locking onto flyballs is a problem. I'm sure that will be fixed at some point. What annoys me way more is when the ball gets down and bounces off the wall, your outfielder is literally lost. There is no urgency to pick it up or throw it away quickly, you actually run past it often. Singles turn into doubles and doubles turn into triples because of this.

And the hitting.. I don't even know where to start. I struggle hitting fastballs, while I've always been a really good fastball hitter. Now I have to gamble and as a result that gets me out in front of almost every offspeed pitch. It only takes 1 inning for my opponent to figure this out. The funny thing is that an inning later I can be out in front on fastballs while I'm pretty certain that my reaction time is the same as before. It just feels off and inconsistent, I don't understand it.
I also tend to get under the ball a whole lot, while I'm not even slamming the PCI down. In my screen I align the ball in the middle of the PCI, yet the feedback says I got under it too much resulting in a good/okay flyout. This happens to me way too often.
The perfect/perfect idea is great. In reality only the perfect/perfect flyballs with power guys do real damage. I've lined out on perfect/perfect liners more often than not and perfect/perfect grounders are usually just groundouts or even double plays. You'd expect the perfect input would make you find the infield hole, which sometimes happens but not nearly enough.

All and all I'm just really disappointed more than anything. I was really hoping that we could leave 18 and 19 behind us and start moving in the right direction again, like a tweaked hybrid of 16+17 where the flaws of those games were fixed. But that's clearly not their vision for this franchise moving forward unfortunately.

For now I'll keep playing casually instead of competitively, hoping that future patches will resolve some of the stuff I mentioned, but I'm kinda pessimistic about it. Sorry. I usually quit playing ranked around Christmas, this year that might be a lot sooner.

What I find amazing is that you feel you cannot pitch and everything is hit by your opponent, yet when he is pitching you cannot hit because his ability to pitch is too good. You realize that you are both using the same program to pitch and hit? What is easy or hard for you is also easy or hard for your opponent?

Yeah I thought about this on many occasions as well and I find this very interesting. The weird part is that sometimes it feels like there's nothing I can do right and I'm losing to basically anyone and everyone and then the next game I score 10 runs in the first 2 innings against a guy who's rocking the WS banner.

I just don't get. It's also not like a slump. I've slumped before like everyone else. I know what it's like to go through a slump and I definitely know WHEN this is happening. This is not that.

@thespoobmonster said in My assessment of the game in its current state:

I played 17 like a mad man, I stopped for a while because the grind burnt me out. Came back, and I was really enjoying it the first weekend. I'm still having fun, but mechanics suck, the grind is unenjoyable, and the content is repetitive.

Even though 17 had some serious issues, that's really the last game I truly enjoyed. It went downhill from there imo.

So I finish up a game a few minutes ago guys throwing sale, my cap goes deep on first pitch. I’m good timing on everything the rest of the inning. Dominate him with sale on my side, go into second inning with mvp posey up. Hit a perfect/perfect flyball, fly out to warning track. Posey is supposed to mash lefty’s, the moment that didn’t go out I knew I was screwed. Followed up with a lot of good/okays with good pci placement, out play the guy the whole game, got no rewards. He ends up getting three decent swings the whole game, all three homers. I get walked off in the tenth lose 4-3. I’ve never made World Series and I’m the closest I’ve ever been, but I keep getting right on the brink and then have a game like this. Feel like I’ve increased my play enough to make it, but it’s like the game is keeping me from making it until I spend money to get the top players.