Development Update from Sebastian

[archibalduk]

Sebastian has posted an update on the OOTP Forums explaining the recent silence:

People talking about the death of this project, so maybe it is time for a small update.

First, to explain the silence: up until late March I was almost exclusive working on iOOTP 2012 to get it out the door in time for season opener. After I submitted it to Apple I came back to the hockey project, needed a few days to get back on track but now fire away full force. I still do a lot of PR for iOOTP, we had some trouble with Apple with the first update and I continue to prepare more updates for it but a lot of my time is dedicated to the hockey project now, but something always falls of the cliff and at the moment it is posting here. But I read all posts and will start to comment more over the coming weeks.

The project itself makes good progress, it is nice to finally see stuff you code in the game itself on screens with almost final graphics. I ported the Text-Engine from OOTP so some news already get generated, I tweaked our injury system to incorporate some needed changes from OOTP, the world.xml file in a slightly modified way (to reflect hockey regions more accurate) is present in the project, season- and career-stats are finalized and in the case off NHL players are already shown in the game and a lot of the more boring things like Load/Save are done now.

Lastly, you may wonder about the name: we decided on it a long time ago but we want to wait with a public announcement until we have a logo designed and our graphics person Daniela will do this once she has some time to do it.

Thats it for the moment, I will try to be more present here from now on but please keep in mind that time I use to post I can't use for coding.

Original link: http://www.ootpdevelopments.com/board/w ... pdate.html

[CM0304]

I am wondering who will be quick,Dabo or Seba

[drewst18]

not a knock on dabo or his abilities but the two games should be night and day.

I expect the ootp development game to be at worst on par w/ ehm 07, with a possibility of being better, with the game looking to bring in a profit. DHM on the other hand is a project that a few people are working on in their spare time with no real revenue expected.

That alone should be enough of a reason as why they will be vastly different, but OOTP game has the added ability to use a lot of stuff from the actual baseball game, which should only speed up the process.

Regardless 2 games in the works is amazing and hopefully one of them drops in the 2012 calender year

[archibalduk]

I expect the ootp development game to be at worst on par w/ ehm 07, with a possibility of being better, with the game looking to bring in a profit.

You have extremely high hopes for the first version of OOTP. I hope I'm wrong, but I suspect you're going to be disappointed. When SI developed EHM, they had the Champ Manager engine to base it upon in a similar way the OOTP guys have with their baseball game. It still took Riz and Graeme something four years to get to the point of EHM 2007. The OOTP game is going to be a long term investment (hopefully); I can't see how the game will be anything much more or less than EHM 2004 (particularly as Sebastien has been side-tracked by the baseball game for the past few months). I do hope I'm wrong however because I'd be very happy then!

[Primis]

I expect the ootp development game to be at worst on par w/ ehm 07, with a possibility of being better, with the game looking to bring in a profit.

You have extremely high hopes for the first version of OOTP. I hope I'm wrong, but I suspect you're going to be disappointed. When SI developed EHM, they had the Champ Manager engine to base it upon in a similar way the OOTP guys have with their baseball game. It still took Riz and Graeme something four years to get to the point of EHM 2007. The OOTP game is going to be a long term investment (hopefully); I can't see how the game will be anything much more or less than EHM 2004 (particularly as Sebastien has been side-tracked by the baseball game for the past few months). I do hope I'm wrong however because I'd be very happy then!

Furthermore, Riz had years of the freeware EHM's development behind him before he even started the first SI version. And even with as awesome as freeware EHM was, I always found the original NHL: EHM to be kinda' a disaster and then 2005 to stilll not be very tolerable, especially since it took so long to do anything even if you weren't coaching games (whereas I could blow through a freeware season in a single evening). I couldn't hack the original or 2005 until I got 2007. And even then 2007 infuriates me sometimes to the point where I will go months without playing it and go back to the freeware instead.

Truthfully, I'm interested in someone releasing a mobile/tablet version of a hockey manager. I want one I can play natively on my Android tablet instead of needing to remote desktop in to my desktop in the other room... maybe this is a step towards that.

[YZG]

I agree 100% with Primis here - the first iteration of NHL EHM was horrible (I bought it, played once and never ever dared playing again). EHM 2005 was much better but still not quite what I felt it could be. NHL 2007 impressed me right away, though, but even then, the massive amount of hardcoding and various details such as the regen system and other in-game things got on my nerves and made the game a less interesting option. Meanwhile, the freeware stayed brilliant. It was too limited for my liking as far as the international aspect of the game or the amount of playable leagues go, but had a massive charm, didn't take forever to process simulation and managed to be very enjoyable even if it was so simple.

DHM is a very promising project as well -- and I don't just say that because of my ivolvement in it! It is being developped by fully considering the input of our knowledgeable community. IMO the chief difference between DHM and OOTP's project, where it will indeed be night and day, lies in the time it'll take to reach a playable first iteration. Indeed, we all work on it part-time... Just don't underestimate what passionate folks can do, though!

[gazzw87]

Well Sebastian has already said the leagues available for the first version will probably only be NHL, AHL, ECHL or so. So that rules out hundreds of leagues in the first version. OOTP Baseball hasn't got any international stuff so we'll have to see if they put it in the hockey game. Hopefully as it's important in hockey.

Other then that people need to be abit more appreciative. EHM is great, its the best hockey management game we have, no a new company which makes a very successful management game is releasing a hockey game for us all. Just accept what the first version is. It will be better then EHM im certain of it. The OOTP database is good and easy to edit with the editor (and all people go on about is make it editable!) and OOTP database runs fast and smooth. Unlike say SI's current FM series which is getting more and more slower and clunky

[archibalduk]

I agree 100% with Primis here - the first iteration of NHL EHM was horrible (I bought it, played once and never ever dared playing again). EHM 2005 was much better but still not quite what I felt it could be. NHL 2007 impressed me right away, though, but even then, the massive amount of hardcoding and various details such as the regen system and other in-game things got on my nerves and made the game a less interesting option. Meanwhile, the freeware stayed brilliant. It was too limited for my liking as far as the international aspect of the game or the amount of playable leagues go, but had a massive charm, didn't take forever to process simulation and managed to be very enjoyable even if it was so simple.

At the time, I thoroughly enjoyed EHM 2004 and 2005 - and I probably played both to death. I've probably played EHM 2007 the least but that's more because of running the site / modding EHM than anything else. Having said that, I just can't go back to EHM 2004/2005 from 2007 now; they both feel rather clunky/dated. I've been spoilt by EHM 2007!! It's frustrating because I understand that EHM 2008 was going to have a lot of the hardcoding removed.

Indeed, we all work on it part-time... Just don't underestimate what passionate folks can do, though!

Amen to that!

Well Sebastian has already said the leagues available for the first version will probably only be NHL, AHL, ECHL or so. So that rules out hundreds of leagues in the first version. OOTP Baseball hasn't got any international stuff so we'll have to see if they put it in the hockey game. Hopefully as it's important in hockey.

The NHL, AHL, ECHL, QMJHL, OHL and WHL are all confirmed as playable leagues. There might be some playable Euro leagues but it is entirely dependent upon there being enough people to volunteer as researchers. There will be quite a few non-playable leagues in the background but it really will depend upon people volunteering to research.

International hockey is unlikely for the first version but Sebastien or Malte posted a while back that they hoped to include it either as a patch for the first version or otherwise it will be in the second version.