Animations and graphics have been at a virtual standstill for years. TBH, I'm seeing animations that are very similar to MLB The Show that I played on my PSP. How long ago was that...lol}

The Show is reminding me of GameFreak more and more. Feeding on our nostalgia/fandom

Guys, they still use some of the same animations that they used back in '07. Let's not kid ourselves here lol

I'm guessing youre new to the party. Welcome to The Show 21.
We've all said this for a while now. Game is too far gone at this point. Got guys throwing 103mph dotting the corner consistently even after 6-7 innings of fatigue lol

@tvsectog_xbl said in Lipstick on a pig:

....oh....and SDS, after watching above and reading all of those comments.... can you also answer the questions below?

SDS has three main audiences this time of year.

New Players

Returning Players

Parents.... who are financially responsible for the purchases

It seems that much of the the marketing hype focuses on gaining 'new' players, yet this isn't as helpful/meaningful for returning players. Many returning players are looking for different features, one being game stability, which new players might now know about.

As a returning player, below are the questions I hope that SDS answers, which are different than many new players. I don't expect them to answer the questions in a stream, yet some kind of statement, response or FAQ with more details would be greatly appreciated. If you have questions as well, go ahead and leave them here.

Engineering likely 'branched' the code. Did the bugs found in '21 get double-committed (or sync'd) into the '22 branch, or will we be starting all over and finding many of the same bugs again in '22 that were fixed in '21??
For example, the "collection duplicate bug" ..... is that fixed from the very beginning in '22, or are people going to flood support again getting this fixed if they make a mistake?

SDS, do you know the root cause of the crashes/freezes in '21?? Memory leak? Have you run static-analysis against the code to find memory leaks?
Is the issue a timing issue? What specifically triggers the code to loop, and thus hang?

Anymore information you can share about the root cause of the hangs, that we can look out as players that could help you debug the root cause (if you don't know what it is)?

Is the issue in the code that causes the hangs an issue in the game itself, or it's interaction with the OS (PlayStation OS, Xbox OS, etc.)??? Are the hangs seen more often if the users are on different platforms (ie - PS4 and Xbox Series X|S, PS5 to Xbox, etc)?

Is there anything we can do as users to prevent the hangs?? (Ie - Always plug in our consoles (if possible) instead of using WiFi? Close the MLBTS app after playing for x number of hours, etc? (Closing/Killing the app completely might help, if it is in fact a memory leak somewhere in the code.) Any recommendations that you (SDS) have that leads to less hangs?

Also, not looking for a marketing/sales answer that states ...."all the crashes from '21 are fixed in '22", which we all know is not true. Looking for actual, technical reasons, recommendations you may have to avoid game freezes and/or things that we can do to help and/or prevent crashes.

How many CFD (customer found defects) have been committed into '22?? What percentage of the code committed in '22 is new features versus CFD's?

What changes were made to your support team (increased headcount?), tools and or processes that will allow you to respond to issues faster in '22 than '21??

Subsequently, can you provide some metrics regarding your support team and also a breakdown of the cases you receive?

Ie....

30% of cases involve crashes
20% of cases involve chasing down players with inappropriate content
10% of cases are caused by backend, database issues
15% are caused by backend server issues related to load/performance/etc?

X number of cases are handled by frontend support
Y number of cases requires backend engineering support

How many cases were caused by bad code that was pushed (like a .12 release....that immediately required a .13 code update to go out)?

Some breakdown numbers would be great.

Oh...and another set of regression questions I'd like to see SDS Engineering answer....is for 18,19,20,21 .... what do their regression metrics look like? Are bug fixes for older releases not making it into their newer releases, or are their regression bugs trending down between releases??? Their answer would tell us a lot about the code quality, TBH, and would be great to know as well.

Will '22 support 120fps, specifically 4k@120?? Everything that I have seen so far leads me to believe that '22 will still only support 60fps, even though both Sony and Microsoft have released features that would easily allow the game to get 120fps. Since Sony and Microsoft have both issued patches to bring 120fps support to games....what is the holdup for why you are not implementing the fix?? I know why you didn't want to include it in '21, yet the same reason isn't valid for why it is not in '22. It seems there is not a good technical reason why 120fps should not be in '22....so please enable 4k@120fps in '22.....as I know it can easily be done, and you know that, too.
Anyway, for returning players the answers to questions like above are more interesting than just the regular marketing slides that will say "'22 is incredible". Returning players want to know that the game will be more stable and also have some, real, techological advancement (4k@120fps), not just marketing hyped slides.

Oh...and as a parent buying deciding whether to buy the game or not for my kids, I also want to know the answers of above. '20 and '21 are very similar....and frankly, without the game having 4k@120fps ....I'm having a hard time justifying getting '22, which has a cascading effect of additional lost sales. If I don't get it for myself and my kids, I talk with other parents and they won't get it for their kids, they talk to other parents, etc. In addition, the last couple of years I have bought copies of the game for 5 to 10 other people (not including my kid's friends). I'm not the only parent that makes this calculation every year (same calculation we use to determine which system to buy for our kids, be it a PS5 or Xbox).....and with Covid likely coming to an end later this year....there will be many more options of what to spend $$ on this year. Thus, if I decide to buy The Show '22, I at least want to make sure it has the features I want (4k@120) along with metrics and answers to questions that show it will be a stable game this year ....otherwise I am far less inclined to buy it this year TBH.

Absent real questions like above being answered, it will be harder to convince me to buy '22. I don't want the same game as prior years (that have a lot of bugs in them), I want a better, more stable product, and so far what I have seen hasn't convinced me this is the case in regard to '22. Additionally, I am the only one thinking this way. I know multiple streamers who are setting up second accounts to play other games, because they are concerned about just being dependent on MLBTS, especially since it is so buggy. The streamers are concerned about their revenue streams being dependent on a buggy game, as it makes it harder for them to make content. Hopefully, SDS engineering ( and not SDS marketing) will answer these questions honestly, to put us all at a little more ease in regard to '22.

Can SDS Engineering comment on the off-PCI homers? Personally, I think the issue is not really an issue, yet rather an offset/timing bug between the hitting engine code and the display code. I think sometimes that code that displays the hitting location displays slightly incorrectly in relation to the actual hitting engine code. The display code of the hitting feedback would be single-threaded code, dependent on the actual hitting engine code. I am tired of listening to people complain that "this was an off-PCI home run", when in reality it probably was not, yet rather just that their is a bug in the hitting feedback display code that makes it look worse than it is. Some comment from SDS engineering regarding if there is a disconnect between the actual hitting engine code and the feedback display code would be great. Maybe something that says "....The hitting display feedback is not always 100% correct, and sometimes displays off-PCI home runs, that are in-fact, actual home runs, yet just don't always display correctly. We are aware of the issue and it is a bug, yet rest assured, off-PCI home runs are actual home-runs and it is just a bug in our hitting feedback code." Some statement like this would be much appreciated.

Content filters to limit inappropriate content......did they receive significant updates in '22?? Seemed like their were no inappropriate content filters that actually worked in '21. Hopefully, this code was fixed in '22 (<cough, cough>).

(Coincidentally, just some basic database scans on the backend that looked for offending words would be great ..... and could be done in an automated manner. User puts offending words for their team name from the app on their Playstation, Xbox or Switch device). Scan runs once a night on the backend looking for offending items....and removes any it finds by just doing a substitution and replace of the offending content. In addition, if the backend scan finds anything offensive...it automatically keeps track of how many times the user put some offensive content in the game....and after three strikes (scans) that identify offensive material....their account gets suspended for x amount of days. After 6 strikes .... they get suspended for a week, 9 strikes ..... 2 weeks, etc. This is an area in the code that needs significant improvement.

[censored] you went all in with putting SDS on a hot seat, I like it. Unfortunately SDS is not the only gaming company to abuse the GACHA/Loot Box element. The fact that they used Randy Johnson being in the game as an advertisement, is exactly what I'm scared of for the video game industry.

They may be scottfree legally since technically, you dont have to spend any money to get any of the players. There's no clear pay wall after the initial $60-$70 investment. Theit focus on DD just sucks for the rest of us MLB video game fans.

Real Life Example: The mother of my kid shelled out $100 worth of stubs just so my kid can buy the Tatis Jr Live Series card in the market lolol. Considering she's definitely not the only mom/nongamer to do this, SDS and the rest of the companies aren't changing their profit model any time soon.

This game desperately needs a revamp or a Blizzard-level debacle to shake things up. The VERY repetitive animations and gameplay are unacceptable at this day and age. The day to day gameplay is already repetitive, I mean, it's baseball for God's sake. But to have the same diving, throwing, fielding animations is just plain lazy. Makes playing the game a bore once you realize it.

Yeah It will more than likely be copy and paste...Why mess with a "winning" formula

DD gives them the opportunity to focus on profit rather than innovation.

TO SDS:

Just get a bunch of minor leaguer's who need more money as it is...and get them in MoCap suits ASAP. We need to see more dazzling plays, more silly swings, more DADDY HACKS, more unconventional dives in the outfield. DD does not need more development. It's fine for now. Go Focus on the gameplay.

@chuckclc_psn said in The Graphics Don't Usually Bother Me...:

I am sure a lot of people saw KevinGohD's video yesterday or a couple days ago. Playing MLB 12 The Show. That was 2 consoles and almost 10 years ago yet the graphics look very similar to today. TBH though there isnt much improvements that can be made. They were way ahead of their time back then. I never even played the show until 15, but all I remember is people telling me how great it looks and how its the best Baseball game ever. I was still modding MVP baseball on PC lol.

It's less about the graphics and more about player animations and gameplay for me

• Stealing and throwing people out are a constant coin flip for me
• Bunting is another crapshoot
• Predetermined player animations and game mechanics where you automatically know what's about to happen on a particular play.
• Every player making the same plays and movements on the field.
• Attributes that don't make sense/dont matter
• The swing timing and feedback not making sense

These are all separate from how nice the game looks in a screenshot.

@king_dome30_psn said in The online play is garbage:

When good user input is constantly punished and bad user input is constantly rewarded, it makes for terrible online play.

That, and attributes that don't matter.

And gameplay so stale that I dont know how anyone plays 9 whole innings watching the same plays happen over and over again. And then one random home run...then back to the monotonous plays over and over.

@donttuchmethaar_xbl said in MLB The Show 22 Trailer thoughts:

@nxtdoc_psn said in MLB The Show 22 Trailer thoughts:

I believe we should be seeing larger graphical leaps, and Jersey animations in The Show. These Jerseys fit, and reacts stiffly. Nearly the exact same way as the Show 13 on PS3. Cmon now. Have some pride SDS. Especially now that you're fully Mulit-Platform.

They're still having to accommodate for last gen consoles. The switch is more of a different story but the One and the 4 is still being used as the core code for the X and the 5.

When those aren't supported anymore, you'll see a difference.

I think it's more than hardware differences. There are plenty of games out there that have progressed in the graphics/gameplay standpoint.

When I'm playing The Show21 on my PS4 (2021), there are multiple times where I get literal flashbacks of playing The Show on my PSP(Over 10 years ago)

Just for the heck of it, I went and looked up MLB 07 The Show gameplay on PSP. The "Early Swing" animation is EXACTLY the same on The Show 21....

@nygxnymxfan68_xbl said in Woo Hoo , I now own every single card in the game (for now):

@nflman2033_mlbts said in Woo Hoo , I now own every single card in the game (for now):

@jaycruise21_psn said in Woo Hoo , I now own every single card in the game (for now):

I think it's the principle of the matter. It's less about how someone spends their money, and more about understanding what an actual accomplishment is per se. Especially as gamers, we are more impressed with actual gameplay or dedication/time put into something. Once someone literally buys a chunk of the progress, we do not care anymore. I think stating how much it cost in the beginning might have gone over better with everyone.

I think the issue is that a person isn't being allowed to be proud of something because other people feel like it was something so easy that anyone can do it. I say so what? If a person is happy about something that isn't hurting others then good for them, and it's ridiculous to see others belittle them over it.

FYI, I've gone 12-0 and 2 yrs ago I was always around WS. I have been friendly with some of the best players in the game. I don't need to flex and this was not a flex, I thinkk I made that clear in my OP. I don't have the time in my life to grind like I used to and I play for fun now , not to go 12-0 or get my rating above 900. I could care less if you're salty about my post. That says more about you than it does about me. Not even sure why you've spent so much time and energy responding to this thread and the people who are commenting on it.

To be honest, I responded to this because of the way people are filling SDS' pockets with money for basically a $60 roster update every year. It's ruining the game for a lot of other people. But I know. I know. That's really not your problem.

I think it's the principle of the matter. It's less about how someone spends their money, and more about understanding what an actual accomplishment is per se. Especially as gamers, we are more impressed with actual gameplay or dedication/time put into something. Once someone literally buys a chunk of the progress, we do not care anymore. I think stating how much it cost in the beginning might have gone over better with everyone.

@sshack72_xbl said in First pitcher not named ohtani that you homered with.:

Warren Spahn

My 7yr old hit one off of me with Warren Spahn. -__- and yes I was actually trying. Is the kid good or Warren Spahn #glitched

So, I am an avid fan/hater of The Show. At times, it plays great. I love baseball, and this truly is a top notch game.

But as much as I wanted to buy it, I skipped The Show 22 because clearly, SDS is just trying to keep the moneytrain rolling. There really is'nt any new innovation to warrant the move from '21 to '22.

And you know what I've noticed....I enjoy the game wayy more now that I'm not rushing through each inning, playing against people in ranked, trying to keep up. I'm enjoying playing The Show 21 now to the point of JUST playing the show the past 2 weeks now..This game just has way too short of a lifespan and shaky game coding behind the scenes, for me to be able to enjoy grinding like the way SDS expects us to.

All in all, I hope sports games find a different model to release their games. Maybe free to play with "battle pass" seasons, or multi year releases, or something!

Yeah This has been a problem for years now. They don't know how to adjust their copy and paste coding of this game lolol

@spin_doctor01_psn said in The Great Regression...:

@jake98833_psn said in The Great Regression...:

I mean I still like the game but if they could add the details that they excelled at in past games it would be excellent

After spending some time with it I'm finding this game is just okay. Every mode has some kind of deal breaking BS associated with it. I'm probably going to shelve this thing and go back to 20. It looks good. But for me that's about it

A lot of us smelled this BS coming all the way back during the early cycle of The Show 21.

@maniacmatt1782_mlbts said in When will DH be used from now on in DD?:

@jaycruise21_psn said in When will DH be used from now on in DD?:

It's too much work to code it in

False. It a willful competetive balance reason to keep it out, and the correct one. You get 8 monster bats in your lineup from all eras of baseball and a bench of 5 guys that you already only use 1 or 2. Do you really need a 9th bat and no reason to use your bench at all?

Fair enough. I don't have this year's iteration of The Show, but if I get next year's I'd prefer no DH in DD then. You right.

It's too much work to code it in

@joshjays44_psn said in MLB the "NO" SHOW!:

Another day, another DD casual getting triggered by their own noobness. What most of you complaining Karens don't realize is that if your only experience with The Show is online stuff and DD stuff its going to be hot garbage because default settings are basically for an arcade experience. If you play this game offline with Franchise with tested Sliders, which might take many hours to adjust, this game plays as a very good Simulation of baseball. Most of you never get to experience this cause all you're concerned about is collecting cards and building your silly All-Star teams and when something goes wrong you come on here and yap and yap that the game is broken, when all that's happening is your lack of practice/skill isn't there because you don't put in the work and you're stuck playing at Default game settings.

For me, It's less about the difficulty, or RNG of the game. Some of our concerns are more about the "copy/paste" direction that SDS takes with each year's iteration.

My gripe is that I'm a ball player and gamer, and a dad, and a normal human being with limited time to waste on gaming.

I'm frustrated that they have a solid game but they aren't improving on it or fixing problems quickly. ESPECIALLY when the game is left behind come April when the new year's game comes out.

Even if I invested in it every year and enjoyed a smooth game every year, I can't get over the fact of how copy and paste the animations are. I see the same player animations over and over. Same hitting and field animations over and over. Very robotic field mechanics.

It's a lazy update to a game that's been the same for 15 years, hiding behind a few new modes, and new clean graphics.

This is part of the overarching dark cloud above "The Show" that's been there for years. There's some of us that can see the BS clear as day, but SDS just has too many common consumers filling their pockets every year, for SDS to care that much about fixing/improving their game.