Wolverine Studios Announces Draft Day Sports: Pro Basketball 3

[Izulde]

What's New In DDS:PB3 - Wolverine Studios

Thread detailing some of the new features and early discussion. Personally, I'm most excited for the season disk feature.

[Carman Bulldog]

I was hoping their next announcement would be for DDS Pro Football. Quite disappointing actually.

[MizzouRah]

FULL SCREEN, yes!

[Johninja]

So that explains why they havn't been supporting DDSPB2 for the last six months.

Full screen in CB2 was nice but you can't see the text on anything over 1200x800.

[BYU 14]

Originally Posted by Carman Bulldog

I was hoping their next announcement would be for DDS College Football.

Fixed

[Comey]

Originally Posted by Carman Bulldog

I was hoping their next announcement would be for DDS Pro Football. Quite disappointing actually.

Hate to say, given my love for Gary, but big +1.

[jaygr]

Originally Posted by Comey

Hate to say, given my love for Gary, but big +1.

Same here. Every time I see one of these threads announcing a new text sim I always think Yeah OK, but when is a football one coming out?

[Izulde]

DDS:PB 3 beta ordering info is up: Ordering Info For Beta - Wolverine Studios

Also, as per user discussion and suggestions, the following new features/changes have been added:

*The team chemistry option is now Optional.
*An Efficiency player stat has now been added.
*Rebounding has now been tweaked to better reflect rebounding ratings rather than having the centers in the best position to grab the rebound most of the time.
*Sub matrix generation by minutes is now added. You'll be able to select the number of minutes for your starters and 5 bench players and the AI will generate a sub matrix based on it.

And, arguably the biggest and most frequently requested future:

*Expanded offensive strategies have been added. I'll let Gary's post speak for itself.

1. Standard
2. Single Post
3. Double Post
4. High Post
5. Iso Offense
6. Dribble Drive
7. Ball Movement

These are not meant to be set plays or designed offenses (so no, I will not program the complexities of the Triangle or Princeton offense) - they are meant to be mechanisms to give you more control over your style of play. If you are playing in local mode you will operate based on the preferences of the head coach, like always. If you are in global mode you will operate on the preferences of the head coach unless you uncheck the box on the roster/strategy tab for use coach settings - then it will revert to your philosophy settings which are changed in the office screen.

The standard offense is just what the game does now - each player tends to move to the areas on the floor he is most comfortable with.

The single post offense will take your center and place him in the post and the other four offensive players will be outside of the post (4 out 1 in offense)

The double post offense works similar but uses 3 perimeter players and 2 post players (PF/C)

The high post offense puts the SF and PF in similar wing/high post/low post opportunities while the guards play the perimeter and the C works the low post

The iso offense works like the standard offense but the emphasis is even more highly on getting the ball to players who are highly rated in SCORING and can create their own shot

The dribble drive offense works like the standard offense except that it discourages players from taking some jump shots in an effort to create more drive play either for layups/dunks, shots off the dribble or kick outs for shots.

The ball movement offense works like the standard offense but it puts less emphasis on the SCORING rating. It will not prevent/discourage a player from shooting but it will encourage players to look for other players outside of your top scorers more often.

[Izulde]

Also, keep adding your suggestions and discussion on the WS forums if you have them.

[korme]

Great, I'm excited all over again. The league history built in will be worth it - but I still want to start in 76-77!

[whomario]

Originally Posted by Izulde

DDS:PB 3 beta ordering info is up: Ordering Info For Beta - Wolverine Studios

*Expanded offensive strategies have been added. I'll let Gary's post speak for itself.

I think you mean "re-added" here never understood why it was taken out in the first place as it worked great in the early games.


Still not sure i´ll purchase it, but fwiw there is a discount available if you allready purchased DDSPB2 :

[Apathetic Lurker]

Im not an owner of the previous ones so one thing confuses me: season disks...Does this game NOT have a career mode? I was under the assumption it did until I read something about season disks...

[whomario]

Originally Posted by Apathetic Lurker

Im not an owner of the previous ones so one thing confuses me: season disks...Does this game NOT have a career mode? I was under the assumption it did until I read something about season disks...

it does, just no pre-dated stats or different historic start points. You could start with the 2010 roster and everything set up like in the real NBA(or in theory create any roster you´d like and set the start year accordingly, or play with fictional rosters and f.e. a 16 team league), but the players then wouldn´t have any career stats before 2010, the game records everything that happens from 2010 on only.

With season discs you will start in 2011 and every player will have his complete career stats chronicled allready. For now that will be the only difference, allways had a full career mode.

[Tim Tellean]

And you get the rookie file for the draft....

[Tim Tellean]

Release candidate 1 has dropped.

[MizzouRah]

Thoughts on those who have purchased?

I see the discount ends after Sunday and I'm still on the fence, especially since I'm having fun with DDSPB2.

[whomario]

if you order and had DDSPB2 allready, be sure to use the discount DDSPBLOYAL30 (only works when putting in the same email you used when ordering DDSPB2)

Originally Posted by MizzouRah

Thoughts on those who have purchased?

I see the discount ends after Sunday and I'm still on the fence, especially since I'm having fun with DDSPB2.

There are a couple definite improvements, for example is the AI much better at setting their lineups in not going strictly by star ratings but sometimes bringing better players off the bench like Harden and Ginobili.

- Drive and dunk now aren´t shot types but tendencies. shot types are now post, jumpshot and 3 only while the driving tendency determines how likely a player is to try and create it himself.
Drive and Dunk will also decline with age, so that older players tend to be more spot up shooters than slashers.

- rebound distribution changed so that PFs can be more dominant in that regard (not quite working overall with too many PGs snatching away rebounds, but it´ll get there)

- FG% has been overhauled, meaning way less of theese 20 ppg on 35% guys created by the game or 40% guys at the PF/C spot, for me that´s a huge correction

- contract rules are of course updated to the new CBA

there´s many smaller additions as well like the ability to create your own draft board to rank prospects or just a couple days ago that metric stats only show qualifiers.

The season disk is pretty nice, but will get very pricey if you buy multiple of those. Doesn´t have player game records unfortunately (career and season are there)

[MizzouRah]

thanks whomario.. how is the overall gameplay?

[LloydLungs]

Are you able to sim a season or seasons at the outset, then pick any franchise you want to start with once a little history is built up, without having to apply for jobs? Inability to do this was mostly the reason I never played the last one.

[whomario]

gameplay as in on the court ? No idea, i sim all games. Gameplay in terms of signings and transfers seems solid, although i couldn´t tell if much has changed yet.

Originally Posted by LloydLungs

Are you able to sim a season or seasons at the outset, then pick any franchise you want to start with once a little history is built up, without having to apply for jobs? Inability to do this was mostly the reason I never played the last one.

unfortunately not ... I have complained about that on their forums as well, no dice aparently ...

[MizzouRah]

Originally Posted by whomario

gameplay as in on the court ? No idea, i sim all games. Gameplay in terms of signings and transfers seems solid, although i couldn´t tell if much has changed yet.



unfortunately not ... I have complained about that on their forums as well, no dice aparently ...

I mean, the AI.. say, maybe a few seasons in? I've read a dynasty over at the forums and saw where the CPU drafted a player in the first round (maybe #2) and then the person playing drafted their player at #7 and traded them to the CPU team straight up?

Also saw where the CPU drafts players at a certain position even though it has a young star already at that position?

[Apathetic Lurker]

I remember reading somewhere that you could play in the European leagues in the 2nd version. Is it still possible in this one?

[MizzouRah]

I'll be gone most of the day tomorrow.. so I purchased.

[MizzouRah]

All I can say is... THANK YOU FOR FULL SCREEN!

[korme]

How about the guy that always writes in giant, red comic sans over there at Wolverine? Kind of weirded out

[Galaril]

Originally Posted by korme

How about the guy that always writes in giant, red comic sans over there at Wolverine? Kind of weirded out

Oh boy I agree he is fucking annoying as hell. He is very passive aggressive in his posts and the red Sans font with all kind of text emoticons like =), ;{ drive me crazy. Oh and to top it off he loves OOTP 13 and comes on the forum for PS 5 there and slaggs PS as well. A real treat.

[MizzouRah]

Be nice

[Mota]

Nah, he's the most positive PS5 guy out there! Probably 50% of the PS5 posts are from that guy.

[dubb93]

I have what can only be a bug, however, I don't access to start threads over at the Wolverine forums.

Probably has to do with me having no posts, but my account is old and I have no desire to post randomly over there so I will air the bug here.

I just started a season with the Clippers. I started default, GM only, and skipped the off-season.

After the season(we won 52 games and bowed out in the 2nd round) I was promptly fired by the owner(despite full job security) because I wasn't as successful as I said I would be and spent more money than I said I would.

That is odd, considering my full job security and this was my first season but whatever.

Here is the kicker. Since I opted to start before the season and skip the off-season I wasn't prompted to tell the owner how money games we would win or how much I would spend! That happens during the off-season. Pretty big bug here.

Was absolutely game stopping for me and there seems to be nothing I can/could do about it since the damage seems to have been done in the off-season that did not happen when the CPU made promises that I could neither see, nor know about.

[MizzouRah]

Yes, that happens in the pre season. I've had some bugs too, hopefully Gary sees your post, if not, I'll post it over there for you.

I bought early due to the discount, but besides the bugs preventing me from really digging in and getting serious with the Wizards, I really love all the work Gary has put into the game.

The game view screen without the 2d players is excellent.

Seems quite a bit away from a release though...

[Izulde]

dubb, I emailed Gary a link to your post here.

[Gary Gorski]

Sorry guys, I'm not around these parts much unless someone (like Tim) tells me there are questions. I'll quote the recent posts with questions and provide answers. If you need your WS account activated or whatever just send me an PM on the WS site.

[Gary Gorski]

Originally Posted by LloydLungs

Are you able to sim a season or seasons at the outset, then pick any franchise you want to start with once a little history is built up, without having to apply for jobs? Inability to do this was mostly the reason I never played the last one.

No you can't set the game to sim like 10 years or something BUT if you want history as a starting point you can purchase the 2011 season disk (or any other season disk that will come out) and you get full history right there. All past champions, award winners, historical stats and career leaders by league and team.

The season disks have two options - you can either start a career from that season or import that season's rookies into the game. You import rookies before you begin the season so lets say you want to play the 2011 season - you would use the 2011 season disk and when it prompts you prior to the start of the season for rookies you would import the 2012 season disk rookies. You do not have to import rookies though - you can start with the 2011 season disk and let the game generate rookies and go from there like usual as well.

Right now only the 2011 season disk is available. I have someone working on the historical disks - 1976 is nearing completion - and I will be doing the 2012 disk soon. It will be released around the draft so that you could replay the 2011 season and have the 2012 rookies loaded in if you want and I will update it in the fall with the 2012 opening day rosters if your preference would be to start a league from that point.

Season disks are totally optional though - the basic game still comes with the 2011 rosters as always but like always its just the roster, no historical data comes with it.

[Gary Gorski]

Originally Posted by MizzouRah

I mean, the AI.. say, maybe a few seasons in? I've read a dynasty over at the forums and saw where the CPU drafted a player in the first round (maybe #2) and then the person playing drafted their player at #7 and traded them to the CPU team straight up?

Also saw where the CPU drafts players at a certain position even though it has a young star already at that position?

#1 was addressed in one of the builds so that should not be happening (at least not straight up in a trade)

#2 it happens - teams don't always draft for need when there's a much better player on the board and in basketball its not even so awful because players can easily play more than one spot

[Gary Gorski]

Originally Posted by Apathetic Lurker

I remember reading somewhere that you could play in the European leagues in the 2nd version. Is it still possible in this one?

Yeah, that functionality (as well as the ability to draft foreign players and leave them overseas) still is part of the game.

[Gary Gorski]

Originally Posted by MizzouRah

All I can say is... THANK YOU FOR FULL SCREEN!

You're welcome - hopefully all the people who lambasted me back in the day for not having it in full screen are happy now

BTW just as a mention on this - "full screen" does not mean the data is just giant sized and spread out. What I choose to do is keep all the main data the same size and layout but add additional data to fill up the empty space so you get more things pushed to you at a glance - one of my favorite additions is the "Around The League" news section which gives you nightly blurbs pushed right to you about what happened in last nights games as well as rumors and news from the teams.

[Gary Gorski]

Originally Posted by dubb93

I have what can only be a bug, however, I don't access to start threads over at the Wolverine forums.

Probably has to do with me having no posts, but my account is old and I have no desire to post randomly over there so I will air the bug here.

I just started a season with the Clippers. I started default, GM only, and skipped the off-season.

After the season(we won 52 games and bowed out in the 2nd round) I was promptly fired by the owner(despite full job security) because I wasn't as successful as I said I would be and spent more money than I said I would.

That is odd, considering my full job security and this was my first season but whatever.

Here is the kicker. Since I opted to start before the season and skip the off-season I wasn't prompted to tell the owner how money games we would win or how much I would spend! That happens during the off-season. Pretty big bug here.

Was absolutely game stopping for me and there seems to be nothing I can/could do about it since the damage seems to have been done in the off-season that did not happen when the CPU made promises that I could neither see, nor know about.

Just a bug - you don't happen to have a copy of the save game prior to being canned do you? I'm willing to bet the Clippers expanded payroll doesn't mesh very well with the "cheapness" the game has hardcoded for their owner. I'll fix it up.

[Gary Gorski]

Originally Posted by MizzouRah

Seems quite a bit away from a release though...

Not sure why you would say that? The game is extremely stable - there have only been a couple of crashes in 7 builds of it. I know you posted 3 bugs on the WS site - one of which is fixed in RC7 and the other two I have to look into but the majority of work has been squashing minor annoyances and work with the stats/sim engine since I revamped it totally.

[Gary Gorski]

Figured since I'm here I thought I would mention that I rewrote a good chunk of the sim engine for PB3 to take care of alot of annoyances from the past. Some of those highlights are...

1. The new offensive strategies option which allows you to implement a specific style of offense to your team giving you much more control than in the past.

2. New shot preference usage which breaks players down into slashers v shooters as opposed to the past where "driving" was just one kind of shot basically.

3. Improved the rebounding code so Cs are no longer as dominant by default compared especially to really good rebounding PFs.

4. Improved the ball handling code so that teams will outlet or inbound to non-PGs who are capable of running and initiating the offense for themselves or others (Lebron, Wade, Iggy etc...)

5. A great deal of work has gone into shooting percentages and player development in the future to maintain a proper distribution of shooting percentages.

[Gary Gorski]

And the last post for the day for me - if you're new to the game or prefer to try games out there will be a demo available shortly. As I mentioned the game is in really good shape, fully complete from a feature standpoint and really there's nothing left that couldn't or wouldn't be fixed in a post-release state so if you're hoping for a demo to try it out there will be one available soon.

[MizzouRah]

Originally Posted by Gary Gorski

#1 was addressed in one of the builds so that should not be happening (at least not straight up in a trade)

#2 it happens - teams don't always draft for need when there's a much better player on the board and in basketball its not even so awful because players can easily play more than one spot

From my experience so far, #1 seems improved in the last draft I did.

[MizzouRah]

Originally Posted by Gary Gorski

Not sure why you would say that? The game is extremely stable - there have only been a couple of crashes in 7 builds of it. I know you posted 3 bugs on the WS site - one of which is fixed in RC7 and the other two I have to look into but the majority of work has been squashing minor annoyances and work with the stats/sim engine since I revamped it totally.

Fair enough.. I'll check out the latest build.. just seemed like some things were clunky.. and I don't mean that in a horrible way. Kind of like the email that wouldn't go away, a screen in the draft with dialog from the commentator that when a trade would pop up, would overlap the trade screen, etc.. just some overall wonkyness if you will.

The gameplay itself is much improved for the 4-5 hours I've put into the game so far, very immersive.

[dubb93]

Originally Posted by Gary Gorski

Just a bug - you don't happen to have a copy of the save game prior to being canned do you? I'm willing to bet the Clippers expanded payroll doesn't mesh very well with the "cheapness" the game has hardcoded for their owner. I'll fix it up.

I have a save game during the playoffs. To recreate what happened to me you would have to sim until you lost the playoff series you are in. May not be super easy since you are up and have a vastly superior team. Let me send you the save tomorrow when I get back home.

[LloydLungs]

Originally Posted by Gary Gorski

No you can't set the game to sim like 10 years or something BUT if you want history as a starting point you can purchase the 2011 season disk (or any other season disk that will come out) and you get full history right there.

My thing is, I prefer playing with all fictional guys. But I don't like taking over a team with fictional players without any history built up. I like to sim at least a year to get a feel for who's good and who's not and to learn the league before I jump in. When I did that with DDSPB2, I had a few sub-NBA job offers after a season and that's it, take it or leave it. There needs to be some sort of commissioner mode override to allow me to take any job I want.

[Bad-example]

I was sick one night many months ago and tried to buy the newest PBB game. I accidentally purchased the older version but immediately realized my mistake. I never installed it and tried via email to get a refund.

The folks in charge at WS decided that I could have a partial refund but insisted they keep some $ to cover the cost their distributor charges them for each sale.

Sure, I screwed up. But really, is it my fault they have a shitty distribution deal? Was it that important to ding me for an honest mistake, thereby guaranteeing I would never buy another product again?

[Gary Gorski]

Originally Posted by Bad-example

I was sick one night many months ago and tried to buy the newest PBB game. I accidentally purchased the older version but immediately realized my mistake. I never installed it and tried via email to get a refund.

The folks in charge at WS decided that I could have a partial refund but insisted they keep some $ to cover the cost their distributor charges them for each sale.

Sure, I screwed up. But really, is it my fault they have a shitty distribution deal? Was it that important to ding me for an honest mistake, thereby guaranteeing I would never buy another product again?

I don't recall this particular situation - we've had people in the past who have bought items and said they just didn't want it later on and I've offered to refund most of the game back (I mean there is a free demo and we have to pay the fees when a refund is given) but like I said I don't recall this situation.

Send me a PM with your real name and email address - I'll be happy to look into it and either send the difference to you via paypal or work out a discount towards the new game or whatever to make it up to you.

EDIT : Also wanted to ask you to forward the emails on the matter to me - [email protected] - thanks

[MizzouRah]

Originally Posted by Bad-example

I was sick one night many months ago and tried to buy the newest PBB game. I accidentally purchased the older version but immediately realized my mistake. I never installed it and tried via email to get a refund.

The folks in charge at WS decided that I could have a partial refund but insisted they keep some $ to cover the cost their distributor charges them for each sale.

Sure, I screwed up. But really, is it my fault they have a shitty distribution deal? Was it that important to ding me for an honest mistake, thereby guaranteeing I would never buy another product again?

Being serious here, if you did the same thing on Steam, would they refund your money? I'm just asking because I don't know policies for online software purchases.

I'm thinking you would be out the full price you just paid?

[Gary Gorski]

Originally Posted by Bad-example

I was sick one night many months ago and tried to buy the newest PBB game. I accidentally purchased the older version but immediately realized my mistake. I never installed it and tried via email to get a refund.

The folks in charge at WS decided that I could have a partial refund but insisted they keep some $ to cover the cost their distributor charges them for each sale.

Sure, I screwed up. But really, is it my fault they have a shitty distribution deal? Was it that important to ding me for an honest mistake, thereby guaranteeing I would never buy another product again?

Thank you for providing me the emails - its no wonder I did not recall anything about this since it happened about 18 months ago - that's a long time for me to remember anything.

Anyhow, yes it appears you bought the wrong version of the game and we said that since it was just a mistake to go ahead and buy the new one you meant to buy and we would fully refund the first. Then I guess you decided you didn't want to buy the new game since it cost more than the old game and despite our stated policy of "all sales being final" we offered to refund all but $4 to cover our license costs since we were essentially paying our license company for you to buy nothing or give you a coupon to use towards another game for the full purchase price and you elected to take the refund.

I'm sorry that you were unhappy with the way the situation was handled and the options we gave you. If you would like to PM me a paypal address I will personally paypal you the $4 difference. Thank you for bringing this to my attention and we'll certainly try to do better in the future.

[MizzouRah]

It's a bummer the way some of the members here treat some of the great developers that are still around, working their butts off to make great text sim games that the majority of us enjoy.

Some of the crap here at FOFC can be taken to PM's, instead people think it's ok to bitch and complain at just about anything.

I'm not just talking about Wolverine Studios, either.

Go beat up EA for some of shit they have been releasing and be a bit more tactful when posting - OR - better yet, send a private email or PM.

I actually enjoy the ootp forums over fofc lately.

[Bad-example]

Originally Posted by MizzouRah

It's a bummer the way some of the members here treat some of the great developers that are still around, working their butts off to make great text sim games that the majority of us enjoy.

Some of the crap here at FOFC can be taken to PM's, instead people think it's ok to bitch and complain at just about anything.

I'm not just talking about Wolverine Studios, either.

Go beat up EA for some of shit they have been releasing and be a bit more tactful when posting - OR - better yet, send a private email or PM.

I actually enjoy the ootp forums over fofc lately.

So you're saying I went too far when I boiled his pet rabbit?