@Red_Ted_is_back said in MLB 21 Product Description (Interesting Note):
@theu715 said in MLB 21 Product Description (Interesting Note):
@bhall09 said in MLB 21 Product Description (Interesting Note):
My question about that is they said stick skills over card ratings. So, can someone use a common and be better than someone else using a diamond? I guess that's good, maybe, but can't say for sure. And what would be the point of getting better cards then?
This would be a lazier way to look at it. Card's ratings should matter. They just shouldn't matter in the outcome. They should matter in the way the card is used. Lower contact, noticeably smaller PCI. Poor vision, smaller timing window. Low power, lower exit velo ability than high power guys. Pitchers with high control should have bigger contact spots on the meter or analog bars. Low BB/9 should mean the ball cursor is shakier when you try and pick your location. These are ways you can make the game have more importance on user input, but still make card ratings matter. Problem is, it would mean a total overhaul to the game's mechanics and SDS won't do that.
A thousand likes for your post!
Last sentence is half correct. It will indeed mean a total overhaul however they could very well do it. It’s just something that really needs to be a part of the seven-year plan due to the amount of work involved, not something that can be slotted in ‘next year because three months into the game’s release the community isn’t happy with the pitching interface’.
I said it last April or whenever, and I was right, 21 is the year of the pitching overhaul (I also said possibly baserunning too... we’ll see on that one). Hopefully for good (attributes and situation determines input difficulty, and input determines outcome - exactly how you described) and not for bad (RNG determines outcome).
Except in classic pitching, outcomes need to be RNG central.
My reasoning behind saying SDS won't overhaul the mechanics in 21, specifically is based on a their previous history with the game. The Show on PS3 had no mechanical changes the last 3-4 game cycles that I recall. When 14 released it was essentially a port, with slightly better graphics and some features removed for PS4.
15 focused on graphical improvements, specifically hair and eyes and stadiums. SDS touted that over the PS4 life cycle the graphics become incredible with better lighting for stadiums and the ability to add more fans (who looked different). 15 from a gameplay perspective was exactly the same as 14 except they removed analog hitting at launch. After complaints they added it back in a month or so later.
16 saw SDS focus more on DD and stadium detail. Players looked mostly the same and gameplay again, felt almost identical to 15, with some new animations. I can't remember if it was 16 or 17 they also started to try and add someone to the commentary team and then did some changes there with those guys for a couple years with Harold and D-Ro.
17 was the first time they actually tried to tune gameplay mechanics. The major selling point was more hit variety with slicing line drives and fly balls because of the new hitting system causing the bat to feel like a round bat, and not a flat wall. "Late became great" and you could slice HR's with guys who had no power at all pretty regularly. As always, lots of complaints and a few weeks after release they patched it and late was still great, but the hit variety with the slicing liners and fly balls went away.
18 was when pitching started to feel different. They said no more spamming pitches and if you did you'd be penalized with pitches hanging up in the zone. Hitting was unchanged and the game turned into a HR or bust game. I believe they did start trying to work on better reactions with infielders this year too.
19 saw no changes to hitting, except that all the squared up pitches were line outs for days. Again, hitting was HR or bust. Pitching saw more RNG, but nothing mechanically different with the hitting or pitching. Also, at some point in these cycles they added Pulse pitching, which isn't a mechanical thing, it's just a different style of input.
Here we are at 20 and they tried implementing the closest thing to a new mechanic we've seen with hitting since 17 with perfect/perfects. Also, they added "better" in there words hit analysis window, which still isn't very good IMO. Pitching feels like way more RNG, still nothing done mechanically with pitching since PS3 days.
Sorry, this is a lot. I'm not being a downer, but just showing that SDS has not shown that they are willing to make a major mechanical upgrade on the game since PS3 days. Honestly, I can't blame them. They're the only major MLB game on the market and overall they have a good game. One that if you love baseball, like myself and many others do, you're going to buy and play even when it's frustrating. With that said, to me, their promises of improvements to gameplay feel like empty at this point. This will be the first year since MLB 09 that I'm not pre-ordering the game. I'll wait a few weeks after release to see what people say about it and maybe even wait for a price drop. If I'm wrong though about any major gameplay changes in my analysis that would lead anyone to believe they will overhaul the game and leave it that way, I'd love to hear the reasoning why.