We're back! TPB 2005 thoughts

[jbmagic]

on play by play

when you goto strategy/sub screen, are you able to click on player name for player card like it says on bottom? it wasnt working before?

thanks

[Gary Gorski]

yeah, that should be working now as well

[PSUColonel]

I just downloaded and got my NBA setup cooking and all I can say is HOLY SHIT!!!. This is the future of American sports simulations. Please tell me you guys are doing football as well Gary. WOW!! BTW- thanks for you're note after I purchased. I'm glad I did now. I am not really a hoops fan, but man this game is simply the most detailed sports sim I've ever seen!!

[pbot]

I'm just about ready to purchase...but the inability to edit certain items (specifically the team's city names - I would like my fictional teams to be based in non-NBA cities) without MS Access is a limiting factor. Will there be an ingame editor for 'simple' things such as city names, jersey #'s, etc? Or, does anyone know a free db editor that will work? I haven't had any success finding one, so far.

[jbmagic]

there free .mdb editor to download..


do a google search

[Crapshoot]

so the one thing bothering me in the demo is the ingame subs- I have to repeatedly try and drop the player into the "box" before he gets substituted, to the point of frustration- wouldnt it be easer to just drop him into the larger picture box as opposed to the little "power forward" box ? Or am I missing something ?

[jbmagic]

Originally Posted by Aadik

so the one thing bothering me in the demo is the ingame subs- I have to repeatedly try and drop the player into the "box" before he gets substituted, to the point of frustration- wouldnt it be easer to just drop him into the larger picture box as opposed to the little "power forward" box ? Or am I missing something ?

he fix that.

it will be on this new patch coming out

[Danny]

Yes Aadik, being I tested the new patch, I can confirm that it now allowes you to drop the name anywhere in the box.

[jbmagic]

Danny

how the new patch testing going so far?

[Crapshoot]

Originally Posted by Danny Drickman

Yes Aadik, being I tested the new patch, I can confirm that it now allowes you to drop the name anywhere in the box.

thanks danny.
another thing- I've twice now had a game have run time errors- a '381" out of range error in the middle of a game now- and I had failed to save. The first time I tried it, I had a run time error ( I wish I could recall the exact one) in the roster creation screen. Any guesses ?

[Danny]

The in game 381 bug is also a confirmed fix.

By roster creation, do you mean the fantasy draft? If so, there has been another report of a crash during the fantasy draft. As of now, we have been able to reproduce it, but it's certainly something we are looking for. If you remember what exactly you did to get the RTE, that could be a big help.

[Crapshoot]

Originally Posted by Danny Drickman

The in game 381 bug is also a confirmed fix.

By roster creation, do you mean the fantasy draft? If so, there has been another report of a crash during the fantasy draft. As of now, we have been able to reproduce it, but it's certainly something we are looking for. If you remember what exactly you did to get the RTE, that could be a big help.

wasnt a fantasy draft- I had just traded for a player, and was moving him on the IR - and then the RTE happened - to be honest, im not sure exactly what kind of RTE it was.

[MizzouRah]

Excellent game, excellent support.

Nothing much to add except I'm glad to see people like Jon playing the game and enjoying it. I went in with a ho-hum attitude and came out shocked at how much work went into this game. It's really everything I've wanted in a text sim, although I never thought an NBA sim would do it for me.

I can't wait to get some more games in this weekend, work permitting.


Todd

[Danny]

Aadik, did it happen when trying to swap a player in the 13th, 14th or 15th spot of the depth chart?

[mckerney]

Took a look at the demo, and found the interface disappointing, though much better than the previous versions. It'd be nice to be able to see attitude and scouting info (Both individual potentials and overall rating) on the roster screen and free agent list. I'd also be nice if when cycling through player cards of free agents it would only show the positions you have selected on the free agent list. Not being able to try and trade that involves more than one other team is disappointing, and it seems odd that you can put players from each team in the same 'players to trade' window.

[JonInMiddleGA]

Originally Posted by MizzouRah

Nothing much to add except I'm glad to see people like Jon playing the game and enjoying it.

And right now, you could probably up my enthusiasm by another 50% since my post.

Of course, re-tooling the Hawks into a team that was a 5th seed in the East in 2005, rallied from a 3-0 defecit to beat Indiana (who we had owned in the regular season), survived an injury to our leading scorer (more on that in a minute) to beat the Pistons 4-3, THEN survived Miami 4-2 in spite of the loss of our 2nd & 3rd leading scorers for part of the series, and THEN won the NBA Title 4-1 over Phoenix ... well, that might have something to do with it

Now, lest anybody think I'm just gung-ho because I transformed the miserable Hawks into a champion (on medium level) in just my 2nd season, the thing that really makes this exciting is the details of the transformation.

Although this probably isn't the place for a dynasty report, I think the details are indicative of why I'm so personally pleased with the game. Look at the roster that won a title:

PG Marko Jaric -- Had been traded from LAC to Mil in '04. Free agent acquisition late in the 2005 for us, provided 9.4 ppg & 5.2 apg

SG Allen Iverson -- I know what you're thinking: "Jon abused a weak trading AI to ... get AI". That's the best part, it wasn't like that at all. Iverson was unhappy right at the '04 trading deadline. The Hawks were built around Antoine Walker (a 5/5 player at this point) ... but he got pissed at me during contract negotiations. Desparate, and realizing that I had to get something for him ... I swung a deal on deadline day -- Walker & spare parts for Iverson (4.5/4.5) & spare parts. I could not pry Andre Iguodala from them no matter what I tried. Iverson leads the league in scoring & provides a ton of steals en route to a ring.

SF Matt Harpring -- An overachieving 3.5/3.5, who gave me 17 ppg & 7 rpg this year. Acquired at the '04 deadline when Utah cleaned house (they had 5 players on the block, the only team with so many).

PF Al Harrington -- He & Harpring swapped back & forth between SF & PF for me, with 11.4 ppg & 6.8 rpg from the man who earned his 4 year contract extension.

C Chris Anderson -- Acquired from the Hornets early in '04,in a deal that was motivated mostly by my urge to dump some roster filler cash he was a backup whose performance blossomed even if his ratings remained at 2.5/3.0 -- 7.7 ppg, 7.2 rpg, 1.9 bpg

The bench included: Dan Gadzuric 7.7 ppg/6.2 rpg ('05 late FA because I really didn't have a decent center; PG Kueth Jordan ('05 2nd rd pick that blossomed); F Josh Childress (a disappointment really, down to a 3.0/3.5),
F Josh Smith (a bigger disappointment, 2.5/5.0 who wants to be traded);
PG Mike Kirkland ('05 1st rd pick/4th overall, just a 3.0/3.5); C Curtis Borchardt ('05 FA pick-up, much like Gadzuric, 2.5/3.0); PF Zaza Pachulia (2.5/3.0, signed as roster filler '05); SG Tony Delk (veteran holdover who played sparingly, wants to be traded now); PF/C Predag Drobnjak (holdover who basically wastes cap room)

My point to all this isn't the players or their performance, it's the realistic feel to how the roster was built. A couple of holdovers with good years, a trio of underacheiving (so far) young holdovers, a superstar acquired for another superstar in a deal entirely motivated by contract issues, a good-but- not-great veteran who found a perfect role to blossom in, dead weight both young & old at the end of the bench, a pair of rookies that turned out to have the lower pick be the more productive player, and some temp service bulk that served its purpose just well enough.

Hell, if that ain't an NBA roster, I don't know what is.

[Bee]

The game is fun and I'm enjoying it, but I do have one small complaint.

It would be nice to be able to cycle through players in the order they appear on the list. For example, if I'm looking for a PG in free agency and turn off all positions but PGs, then go to a player card and start cycling through the various free agents using the arrow keys, it doesn't exclude other positions. Same with putting them in alphabetical order, cycling through the player cards doesn't show them in the same order as the overall list.

Hope that makes sense. Otherwise the game is enjoyable and I'm having a good time playing around with it.

B

Edit: Just saw mckerney's post about this as well. I also agree with his other issues with the interface, but this is the one that seems to be bothering me the most.

[JonInMiddleGA]

Originally Posted by Bee

The game is fun and I'm enjoying it, but I do have one small complaint.

Ditto.

[edit to add] -- And maybe one other complaint. I go back to the game after winning the title & check the awards. Iverson leads the league in scoring & leads the team to an NBA title and gets ignored, doesn't even make the 3rd team. Woodson leads his team to the title in his 2nd season as a head coach but Popovich gets the Coach of the Year Award, presumably for having the best regular season record & in spite of losing in the Conference Final. Umm ...

[Crapshoot]

Originally Posted by Danny Drickman

Aadik, did it happen when trying to swap a player in the 13th, 14th or 15th spot of the depth chart?

yup.

[jbmagic]

Originally Posted by Aadik

yup.

i beleive it fix on 1.1 update

go try it now and see if you get same problem

[Danny]

That's fixed with the 1.1 patch then.

[Bee]

Originally Posted by JonInMiddleGA

Ditto.

[edit to add] -- And maybe one other complaint. I go back to the game after winning the title & check the awards. Iverson leads the league in scoring & leads the team to an NBA title and gets ignored, doesn't even make the 3rd team. Woodson leads his team to the title in his 2nd season as a head coach but Popovich gets the Coach of the Year Award, presumably for having the best regular season record & in spite of losing in the Conference Final. Umm ...

I also something somewhat strange with the all-star game. I had Gilbert Arenas who was injured for the entire start of the season and only played in 2 or 3 games immediately before the all-star game and still got selected to play at the all-star game.

[jbmagic]

Originally Posted by Bee

I also something somewhat strange with the all-star game. I had Gilbert Arenas who was injured for the entire start of the season and only played in 2 or 3 games immediately before the all-star game and still got selected to play at the all-star game.

i think that happen to Shaq in the NBA once too...he was hurt alot to start the season and play like 20 games and got selected to all star

[JonInMiddleGA]

I swear to God, the internet & message boards have got to be the biggest two-edged sword of the gaming industry (and probably quite a few others)

Gary - great job on the game.

Greydog - you might wanna turn over "forum moderation", which comes across as "company line" whether they're paid or volunteers, to somebody other than a 17 y/o kid (per his public profile). Otherwise, business is gonna suffer ... and f'n quickly, if they're allowed to trot out the same tired b.s. that has plagued other indy game designers in the past.

[FBPro]

I started out with a 10 team fictional league and I'm loving it. I'm now in the process of d/l the NBA roster and give them a try as well.

[Radii]

Oh dear. I don't need a new game right now, but I feel compelled to try the demo after reading this.

[gstelmack]

Originally Posted by Radii

Oh dear. I don't need a new game right now, but I feel compelled to try the demo after reading this.

I've got myself working off the "I'll probably mostly want to play multiplayer, so until there's a league I'll stick with my other games" bit. I expect that to go out the window any day now when someone starts an FOFC league, and then hope I still have time to finish my R:TW game...

[MizzouRah]

Check out what's to come for you NBA fans, from Wally and IrishHand over at the TPB forums.

Excellent work by Wally on the graphics and after reading Jon's post, the rosters seem good as well.

[Gary Gorski]

Makes me very happy people enjoy the game so much they take the time and effort do make mods for it and share them with the community.

[TLK]

purchased and messed around with it for a bit. From what I've seen, coupled with the pic posted above... this could be love

[CHEMICAL SOLDIER]

Ok, I have my credit card out and before I buy : Is there a create a league feature?

[FBPro]

Yes, if I understand you to be asking if you can just create a league? Have you tried the demo? I d/l and tried the demo before I made my purchase.

[Gary Gorski]

CS - yes you can create leagues of 5 different sizes using default rosters or a roster set. There are a number of options to choose for the league settings and you can dump all players to a pool for a fantasy draft to start.

[CHEMICAL SOLDIER]

Looks like I'll be putting Ratchet & Clank away for a while.

[TLK]

we need an FOFC league as of now.... this game is solid.... someone hop on it

[Eaglesfan27]

Well it was/is a slow day at work today. I have my laptop, but I'm tired of the games on there. So, I just gave this demo some more time. I wanted to look at it with a critical eye, and I did. Darn, it is impressive. The stats seem realistic. The game looks good. The player ratings are interesting. The motivations of players seems like it has much potential. Also, those who have played the game have generally had very positive mini-reviews. Therefore I'm ditching my plan of waiting til ESPN College Basketball comes out to make any more game purchases and buying it now.

[MizzouRah]

Originally Posted by Eaglesfan27

Well it was/is a slow day at work today. I have my laptop, but I'm tired of the games on there. So, I just gave this demo some more time. I wanted to look at it with a critical eye, and I did. Darn, it is impressive. The stats seem realistic. The game looks good. The player ratings are interesting. The motivations of players seems like it has much potential. Also, those who have played the game have generally had very positive mini-reviews. Therefore I'm ditching my plan of waiting til ESPN College Basketball comes out to make any more game purchases and buying it now.

Good choice.


Todd

[astrosfan64]

I just picked this game up and it's a blast. Any chance of a college version one day?

[Gary Gorski]

Originally Posted by astrosfan64

I just picked this game up and it's a blast. Any chance of a college version one day?

I can safely say that 100%, without a doubt I could make a college version...someday

Right now the focus is on tweaking a few things, squashing the last couple of bugs and making some additions as well. My only concern right now is getting people interested in trying TPB 2005 and taking care of any lingering issues with that. Once TPB 2005 is at the place it needs to be then I'll start looking at my next project whether thats TPB 2006, a college version or something completely different.

Right now though - if you haven't played the demo where the heck have you been huh? 4 pages of trout-loving FOFCers can't be wrong

p.s. Mucho thanks to all who have tried the demo and/or purchased the game. I appreciate all the support and the nice comments that have been made in this thread about the game.

[astrosfan64]

Originally Posted by Gary Gorski

I can safely say that 100%, without a doubt I could make a college version...someday

Right now the focus is on tweaking a few things, squashing the last couple of bugs and making some additions as well. My only concern right now is getting people interested in trying TPB 2005 and taking care of any lingering issues with that. Once TPB 2005 is at the place it needs to be then I'll start looking at my next project whether thats TPB 2006, a college version or something completely different.

Right now though - if you haven't played the demo where the heck have you been huh? 4 pages of trout-loving FOFCers can't be wrong

p.s. Mucho thanks to all who have tried the demo and/or purchased the game. I appreciate all the support and the nice comments that have been made in this thread about the game.

Ahh man I thought election season was over. I wanted a straight answer

[Pumpy Tudors]

I've started playing with NBA rosters, and I took over as GM of the Memphis Grizzlies. Now, I don't know why the real Grizzlies signed Brian Cardinal to a huge contract, but I tried hard to dump him, especially because my coach would only give Cardinal about 10 minutes per game. As you would all expect now, nobody would take his contract.

I got to the trading deadline, and I was desperate to make a move with Cardinal. I couldn't swing a deal, though. I'd angered Bonzi Wells by not offering him the contract extension he wanted, so I tried to trade him back to Portland. No go. The Blazers have so many massive contracts that I couldn't make the money match up without giving up Mike Miller. Well, sorry, but THAT wasn't going to happen. I only managed one deadline deal. Figuring that I might not be able to sign Stromile Swift after the season, I sent him to Milwaukee for Erick Strickland, Toni Kukoc, and the Bucks' first round pick in the upcoming draft. Strickland's and Kukoc's contracts expire at the end of the season, and I doubt I'll re-sign them, but now I have two first round picks coming up.

I'm really having a lot of fun with this game. Thank you, Gary!

[Gary Gorski]

Nice work PT - good summary - you should do a dynasty thread somewhere

[John Galt]

The problem I had in the demo with the trade AI blocking salary dumps is that it didn't seem to allow instances where I was willing to assume larger, more onerous contracts (at a position of need). It also didn't allow for instances where I packaged bad contract with very high quality player. My experience was probably limited and I know the AI is tough to design, but the statement that they won't accept a player's contract seems a little too broadly applied.

[bamcgee]

My 2005 team has an improving Yao Ming, Kirk Hinrich, Troy Murphy, and Tayshaun Prince. Prince is only so-so in the game, so I wanted to upgrade at small forward and hopefully get more scoring. Given that I won the title in 2004 (had Donyell Marshall on that team as well), I figured I would be willing to give up a fairly worthless first rounder, given that the team was unlikely to collapse. Well, I'm not sure how this went through, but I traded that first round pick for the #1 picked player in the draft. He hadn't been playing a ton and only averaged 7 points a game, but he does have potential of 4.5 stars. Since he came over, he was an immediate starter and is now scoring about 11 points a game, plays great D, and still has all that upside.

Does the game factor in current record when considering offers including draft picks? It certainly seemed to overvalue my pick in this case, several weeks into the season. Admittedly, the other team was moderately over the salary cap, but surely they would have preferred to trade someone other than a $3mm future star with four cheap yrs left. Maybe their GM is poorly rated - I'll have to check out his stats.

[Gary Gorski]

could be a number of factors - could be the GM of the other team was poorly rated along with the coaching staff and they thought they had a bust on their hands - could be they don't think that you are as good as you were last season, could be that the player has a bad attitude and was mad that he wasn't playing very much for them, could be that you simply just got away with one in this case. The AI isnt designed to be perfect - it will make mistakes from time to time.

[Icy]

By the way guys, a new TPB2005 online league is starting and 3 GM are need to fill all the teams, more info at the website:

http://www.baselinehoops.com/

This is the forum to apply for one of the 3 teams remaining:
http://www.baselinehoops.com/phpBB2/index.php

[dubb93]

***BUG ALERT***

This is with the newest update. I called a TO with 44 seconds left in the game and choose to have Hinrich as the passer/dribbler and Gordon as the shooter/screener for a 3 point shot. Well here is how it worked out.

Warriors 83, Bulls 87 - 0:44, 4th Quarter

The Warriors are in a half court zone defense.
Chicago inbounds the ball
Hinrich is looking to make a pass
That's the end of the game.
The final score is Chicago 87 and Golden State 83

Hinrich held the ball for 44 seconds, no shot clock violation, nothing and the game ended. An obvious bug.

[jbmagic]

dubb93

please post that also in the tech forum of tpb 2005
http://www.greydogsoftware.com/forum...isplay.php?f=5

[Gary Gorski]

no prob, I'm going to put a patch out this weekend anyways so I'll track it down - thanks for the heads up dubb

[hukarez]

Originally Posted by dubb93

I called a TO with 44 seconds left in the game and choose to have Hinrich as the passer/dribbler and Gordon as the shooter/screener for a 3 point shot.

How exactly do you assign those things individually? I always thought that was more of an "in general" thing for the whole team? Is this only done during timeouts?