Bugs and upgrades

[PriorFir4383355_XBL]

Let's tell the truth.

This is the fifth year that the stadium developer community have repeated the same short list of upgrades, and for the fifth year we have gotten one upgrade on that short list -- standing fans. Golly gee!

When one considers the list of unfixed bugs that should have been fixed before MLB 22 was released, then the full measure of the neglect this game mode has suffered becomes clear.

1. Stand prop map points for snapping misaligned. Good grief, of all the bugs this one should have been fixed in an upgrade patch offered for MLB 21. When you created SC the stand props were among those props that were intended to have snap mapping points to ensure that when snapped the props of the same type would affix to each other smooth and tight. Yet, there are multiple examples where snapping props together misaligns them significantly and they have to be manually maneuvered to mesh up.

2. Overmodeled props. Within the world of 3D model design for video games there is a concept called multi-resolution (multi-res for short). The concept is that there would be multiple versions of the same object, one fashioned with a low poly count to be viewed from a measured far distance from the rastered vantage point, and then perhaps one or even two other models with higher poly counts that would be substituted when that object was viewed from a closer vantage point. The tradeoff being that far away the lower poly count wouldn't change the actual appearance quality, but would significantly increase the game's framerate. When the object was "close" then it filled a far higher percentage of the screen and therefore the increased poly count would not matter. This concept was introduced in video gaming back in the late 1980's. There is therefore no reason for props to be modeled with more polys that is necessary to support construction of a realistic looking appearance within the game. Yet, many props contain high poly counts that consume precious memory. Yes, these overmodeled props have been identified multiple times and never fixed.

3. Foul pole types causing crash to desktop. This bug was noted years ago as well. If you change the foul pole type then this causes games played in those stadiums to experience a CTD. This to such a reliable degree that any vantage point raster image that shows the foul poles is more likely than not to cause the CTD. This hasn't been fixed.

4. Wall window alignment. This bug first reported years ago with the blue wall windows has actually been made worse over the years as the green windows have now been rendered as poorly as the blue ones. The bug is that one cannot mesh up wall windows, but is instead forced to put one window on the wall, and then have a bare wall segment separating the next wall window. This is NOT how stadiums employ wall windows. SO, the result in SC is ugly and unrealistic. Again, reported year after year and actually made worse vice fixed!

5. Wall window adjacent to foul pole. This bug was again reported years ago. If you place a wall window right up against the foul pole -- meaning nested up against the foul line, then the result in the game is that the ball's flight path suddenly becomes highly compromised, making game play impossible in anything approaching a realistic manner. This has never been fixed. This is why you don't see custom stadiums with a wall window nested tight with the foul lines.

6. Fan towel bug. This option was introduced with MLB 24 to have fans wave towels during a game. It was a nice addition, but it caused the created stadium seat colors to revert from their assigned pallet color to white. This again was reported and never fixed. Moreover, it wasn't fixed in MLB 25 either. The bug happened whenever the between innings video segment was played where multiple players were presented in a vignette scene.

7. Backstop screen not working. Might seem like a small issue given the ball's out of play regardless, but from a visual immersion point of view when the ball passes through the backstop screen like it's not actually there, then that's a bug that should be fixed. Again, it was reported multiple times, and has never been fixed. The backstop screens work in the official SDS stadiums, but do not function properly in customer created custom stadiums. And while we're on that subject, why when the baseline screens were created in actual MLB stadiums and replicated in the official stadiums in the game were not the baseline screens added as an option to SC? Again, not only was the original bug never fixed, but SDS decided to heck with the notion of keeping custom stadiums up with the times!

8. Overmodeled avoidance areas. Of all the bugs reported over the five years, this is the one that annoys dedicated stadium designers the most. Any place where the outfield wall forms an acute angle, the way in which the code measures and implements the prop avoidance area is way over modeled. In terms of scale distances, the avoidance areas in these outfield wall corners is often the equivalent of forcing blank space to exist for over 25 feet from the wall itself. Any prop placed inside this area (visually well removed from the wall) is falsely interpreted by the code as intruding into the field of play. It makes rendering realistic looking outfield seating and concourses essentially impossible. Yes, again, this bug was brought to the attention of SDS years ago and has never been fixed.

9. Overmodeled avoidance areas on batters eyes. Yes, we know the intent here was to keep people from creating stadiums that yielded some cheating advantage during online competition play. Yet, the code was so overdone that one cannot even mesh up seat stands nor concourse props up against the sides of the batters eye props. Again, this results in an ugly stadium appearance that is also unrealistic. Again, reported over the years and never fixed. I mean we cannot even put cameras in the cameral wells modeled on the batters eye props. How ridiculous is that!

I could go further. There are dozens more such bugs, all reported and all ignored. You add this to the anger over the lack of upgrades, plus the equally neglected aspects of custom uniform and logo creation, and this is why the customer base that enjoys creating custom game content is near universally critical of SDS.

So, @SDS_JoeK_PSN , we are now at the four month point in the release of MLB 25. You're seeing these bugs -- some for the first time -- because the hundreds of paying customers who tried to work patiently with SDS have had their efforts ignored for so long they've given up on SDS and quit purchasing their games. The comments you have read this year are from the relative few who remain.

I wrote months back that patience was already worn thin. I'm repeating it now. If SDS thinks that fixing the horrible vault issue that made backward compatibility impossible was an adequate effort, then SDS has made another terrible mistake.

[PriorFir4383355_XBL]

And now we learn after five full years of utter frustration, that the ability to manually edit and move the individual wall panels of the entire stadium including the baseline and backstop walls, has been an integral part of the Stadium Creator code. The only reason we designers have been blocked from employing this option is that SDS decided to write a section of code with the deliberate design of barring us from doing so!

SDS spent the coding time and money to deny us paying customers a treasured and highly desired custom stadium design option, even though employing this option would render the stadium ineligible for use in any Diamond Dynasty option same as has been the known case for editing outfield walls since Stadium Creator was first released.

In short, it is a choice we can make for ourselves. Leave the wall locations "as is" and play the custom stadium in all game modes, or choose to edit the location of the wall panels and accept creating a more customized stadium in return for having it blocked from play in all DD game modes.

That is the kind of choice we can accept and even support. Just be honest with us SDS! For God's sake, stop treating us like children and deceiving us! The truth is you don't want us to have these options. It has nothing to do with spending time and money on coding. That deception is now rendered fully known! You spent extra code and money to keep that option locked away from us and this has now been outed because some "glitch" happened where a one-in-a-million sequence of actions and game pad inputs caused the block code you implemented to be bypassed and suddenly the baseline and backstop walls were moveable.

Your internal SDS team can do this and can use their version of SC to create stadiums with the full range of options and props. No, we don't expect you to give us access to copyrighted logos and props. We understand there are tort laws that prevent that. But, generic non-copyrighted versions of signs, buildings, and other props that do not violate copyright can be given to us.

Again, treat us like adults and stop the bait and switch actions. Give us what we are asking for and stop acting like it cannot be done!