Submitted on: 02/21/2007 by
Steve Noah
Operation Sports Developer Diary #
3 (2-21-07)
MLB 07 The Show™ -- Online Features
Hi everyone. We are back again this week on the Operation Sports Developer Diary to discuss all that is new with our Online League Play and My Sliders. This weeks entry comes from Jason Villa, Producer for MLB 07 The Show™, Sony Computer Entertainment America, San Diego Studio.
MLB 07 The Show™ - Online League Play
New Features: Online Leagues (PlayStation 2 Screenshot)
SportsConnect technology is back for round two in MLB 07 The Show. Completely created, developed and maintained by the MLB development team, SportsConnect allows us the ability to offer new online features for players each year.
It’s the SportsConnect technology that gives you Online leagues on all three platforms. You may sign-up for an existing league or create a league to your specification.
To sign-up for an existing league select the Forming Leagues item from League List. To help find the league of your choice you can take a look at the league settings, as well as the players within the league. There’s even a Bulletin Board broken up into two categories…Players Needing Leagues and Leagues Needing Players. Post your information and start communicating with potential league members.
If you choose to create a team you must choose season length, gameplay settings, rules and more. Whether you want 6 or 30 players in a league, all stats, invitations, standings and schedules will be specific to their league. Leagues can be as short as 5 games or up to full-length regular season.
If you choose to create a league, you will fittingly be assigned commissioner duties. When creating a league you must choose your schedule (1, 3 or 5 game series), the name of your league, the name of it’s divisions, whether it’s private or public and series duration. You can also choose to create a divisional or round robin league. In a divisional league you’re fighting for the top seed in the division to make the playoffs. As the commissioner you can choose to weigh more importance on division games rather than inter-division games. A commissioner even chooses the number of teams and players that make it to the playoffs from each division.
Beyond setting up the league, the commissioner must also manage the league. As a commissioner you can invite players, drop players and activate the league. Once the league is activated it is the job of the commissioner to handle unresolved games. If games aren’t played in the correct amount of time, as the commissioner you must resolve these games. If games are left Unresolved, the league cannot advance to the next series.
Although the commissioner does have a lot of control over the league, members of the league will have a chance to rate their commissioner. Manage your league well and a good rating will follow. Manage your league poorly and your commissioner rating follows you throughout your MLB 07 The Show SportsConnect career!
New Features: Online Leagues League Schedule (PlayStation 2 Screenshot)
Once the
commissioner has activated the league the schedule is created. Take a look at
either My Schedule or the League Schedule to see who your opponent is each
series.
MLB 07 The Show Online League Lobby (PlayStation 2 Screenshot)
To play Online League games once activated you must enter the League Lobby. The
home team/host is responsible for challenging their league opponent. As the home
team/host, when you send a challenge, your opponent can accept his/her challenge
from anywhere in the online area.
You can always monitor the status of your league and communicate with other league members through the MLB 07 The Show SportsConnect website. You can find a link to SportsConnect at www.mlb07theshow.com.
MLB 07 The Show Online League Division Standings (PlayStation 2 Screenshot)
Let’s face it, stat tracking is what online is all about. What’s really cool about the stat tracking, is not only do you see how you stack up against the players in your specific league, but also players in all leagues. There are league specific leaderboards, as well as an Overall League leaderboard. And don’t worry about your league games not counting towards your overall SportsConnect points. All time spent playing rated games goes towards your player account stats. The main league view will always post the current week leader, current month leader and the champion for the past week and month. There’s always incentive to be on top of the leaderboards and get recognized by the entire community. Jump online, join a league and see if you’re good enough to make the champion list.
MLB 07 The Show™ - My Sliders
MLB 07 The Show Online My Sliders (PlayStation 2 Screenshot)
MLB 07 The Show is offering you more control over the game than ever before. With over 47 sliders/options for you to tweak and balance the possibilities are endless. For those of you who’ve wanted to design your own game, here’s your chance. Not only can you adjust all of these sliders, but now you can share them with the rest of the MLB The Show community.
Once you’ve created and saved your ideal slider set, login online and post them for the rest of the community to download. From the Online Home screen, select MLB Community, MLB Sliders, then Upload. Give your slider a name and description. That’s it! Now your slider is on the MLB 07 The Show servers for anyone on the MLB 07 The Show to download and use offline.
To download and use a slider is just as easy. Once you’ve logged in online, just selected MLB community, MLB Sliders and Browse/Download. When looking for your perfect slider use the search filter to select the right type and favor. You can even sort the Slider list to find the most downloaded and best rated Slider.
MLB 07 The Show Online My Sliders Filter (PlayStation 2 Screenshot)
Once you’ve found the Slider of your choice, download it, use it offline and come back online to give it a thumbs up or thumbs down.
Online Leagues and My Sliders are two unique features we’re proud to offer in MLB 07 The Show. They depth of Online Leagues is sure to give you plenty to do long after your career player has made it to The Show!
Thanks for reading and we will be back on here next week to discuss another feature in MLB 07 The Show.
Jason Villa
Producer, MLB 07 The Show™
Sony Computer Entertainment America, San Diego Studio
Operation Sports Developer Diary # 2 (2-15-07)
MLB 07 The Show™ - Road to the Show
New Features: Road to The Show (PlayStation 2 Screenshot)
This year we took
Career Mode in MLB 07 The Show™ and gave it a whole new personality with
Road to the Show Mode. Road to the Show is a completely new way to play a career
mode. Instead of a traditional mode where you play the game and follow the path
of your player as a side project, Road to the Show revolves everything around
your player. Not just from the decisions that you make with him from a
management standpoint, but the in-game is focused entirely around him as well.
Players will start by creating their player as you’ve done in the past. You will be able to play as any position in Road to the Show and each will give a unique gameplay experience. Choosing your position and creating your player is as important step as any. What will your manager expect of you as a SS, would it be different from what he expects if you were to signup for LF? My money is on yes.
The menu portion of Road to the Show remains much the same as in previous versions of Career Mode with a few small additions. Training has been revamped with focus on training areas rather than specific attributes. Coupled with attribute atrophy as your player gets older, it is very important to focus your training time in the right areas.
Once you get into the game, you quickly realize that, Road to the Show does not just play a “normal” game of baseball. Road to the Show tracks what your player does when it is his turn, Road to the Show focuses on your players involvement in the game. The game will fast advance to situations where your player is involved in the action. Plus, when the situation calls for it, you will receive “goals” from your coach asking you to do anything from “sacrifice the runner to second” to something simple like “don’t get picked off”. These goals help keep you in your coach’s and teammates good graces, also allowing you to improve your position within the organization.
Goal screen prior to user batter’s at bat (PlayStation 2 Screenshot)
But probably the most unique aspect of this mode is the perspective. The camera positions itself behind your player whether in the field or on the bases to see what your player would see. Watch as you round 2nd base on a base hit to center. While the play is still in view of your runner, the camera tracks the ball, but as soon as you round the base and the play is behind you, the camera will do what you would do. Pivot around and pick up your 3rd base coach, should you hold up or should you run through the sign? It’s your call.
User base runner leading off in player perspective camera (PlayStation 2 Screenshot)
User base runner picking up third base coach in player perspective camera (PlayStation 2 Screenshot)
In the field, the same thing applies. You watch the action from your position and need to make the appropriate decisions yourself. Before every defensive situation, you are given a summary of where you are in the game (score, outs, base runners). Then it is your job to make the right play. Not able to make all the plays? Maybe you need to work on your speed, or your arm accuracy – next time that double you misplayed will be an easy out.
User fielder play a grounder from player perspective camera (PlayStation 2 Screenshot)
At the end of each game you are given a breakdown of what goals you attempted and whether you were successful or not. Those results tie into the front end and how you progress as a player, determining your things like your position in the lineup, where in the organization you best fit, to your future in the Bigs.
Post game career results screen (PlayStation 2 Screenshot)
Road to the Show is a whole new way to play a career and really gives you the sense of ownership over your player, as well as tying you and your decisions directly to the outcome of each and every game you play.
Thanks for reading and I will be back on here next week to discuss another feature in MLB 07: The Show.
Eddy Cramm
Senior Designer, MLB 07 The Show™
Sony Computer Entertainment America, San Diego Studio
Operation Sports Developer Diary # 1 (2-8-07)
Hey everyone. Thanks for checking this out. Over the next few weeks, I (with the help of some of our development team) will be bringing you some Developer Diary entries talking about some of the new features in our game. My name is Eddy Cramm and I am a Senior Designer on the MLB 07 The Show™ dev team at the Sony Computer Entertainment America San Diego Studios. The first entry is going to talk about our new base running controls, which I will call “New Base Running Controls”. Catchy, huh?
New Base Running Controls
This is one of the new features that is near and dear to my heart because it is something that I wanted to see in a baseball game before I even worked on one. One of the things that has always been aggravating in baseball simulations, is the confusing way you had to try and control multiple base runners and figure out what you want to do with them AND pay attention to where the ball is. Technically speaking, it is always possible to get the controls right, but not very probable. I would ask guys on the development team things like… “How do you send a runner between 1st and 2nd, back to 1st while sending the runner between 2nd and 3rd around to score?” I got nothing but blank stares. If someone did have an answer, he sure wasn’t confident in it. How can we expect the consumer to understand it all if we can’t do it ourselves?
The real problem was that there wasn’t any sort of visual feedback telling you who you are controlling or what you are doing. We created a system that gives you immediate feedback in regards to who you are controlling which makes it a lot easier to give the base running commands. What we did is put the base runner selection on the L-stick, which is very natural. You point the L-stick at the approximate position of the runner on the base path. If he is standing at 2nd base you would press up (12 o’clock), if he is running and almost at 3rd, you would press up and to the left (10 o’clock-ish). When you do that, you will see the base runner’s icon on the base running map highlight. When it is highlighted, you simply press the icon that corresponds with the base you want him to go to. So for example, on a base hit with no one on, when the ball is in play, you want to send him to 2nd base. The control would be:
1) Highlight the runner between home and 1st
2) Press triangle
Lets say you have runners on first and second on a base hit to left, and you want to send the lead runner home and send the man on first at 3rd. The controls would be:
1) Highlight the runner between 1st and 2nd
2) Press square
3) Highlight the runner between 2nd and 3rd
4) Press X
In comparison, in the old style you would have to do the following:
1) Find what icon of the runner between 2nd and 3rd is (either triangle or square)
2) Wait for him to get close to 3rd base
3) Keep holding the icon and press L1 to send him past 3rd and toward home
4) Find the icon of the runner between 1st and 2nd (either circle or triangle)
5) Wait for him to be close to 2nd base
6) Press L1 to send him past 2nd and to 3rd
It is only 2 less steps, but in the new system, you visually see your runner selection even though you don’t really need it. Just pressing the right direction is all the confidence you need. Plus, it is just a much more natural way to command your runners. We all know the buttons as bases at this point in our gaming careers and we certainly understand the L-stick as the natural way to point at something. Just like any base running system, there is a bit of a learning curve, but this one is nowhere near as steep and it is “masterable” (I know that isn’t really a word).
Thanks for taking the time to read our first MLB 07 The Show entry in our Operation Sports Developer Diary. We have a few more over the next few weeks, so keep checking back. I will be back again next week to talk about are all new career mode, “Road to the Show”.
Eddy Cramm
Sr. Designer
MLB 07: The Show
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