how future hockey manager games could work?

[grazza]

I have been thinking how in a business and realistic sense a future ehm type game could be sustainable and would like to see what others think

I would look at it firstly as a one off project not necessarily keeping a full time team for long term making new games yearly. If say we had a very strong editor like FM 2010 that allowed the community to create leagues and alter existing structures then the game would take longer to go out of date.

The game itself would have no or at least very limited licenses to keep costs down. Perhaps NHL is neccesary for marketing purposes but beyond that let the community take care of it.

Rigorous beta testing. Especially if once game is out there it may not be patched after one or two times it needs to function well and so the testing period should be long and open. I would look at open beta testing for say half a season in game and closed beta testing for longer than that.

In game advertising - Not making it too intrusive but in there and hockey related where possible

Add ons - People may want different things from the game and so charge them for added stuff perhaps the game could come out after a period of time but still be worked on and add ons added like mmos.

Add ons

* Unlock the game - gives you the basic editor and allows community made updates to work in your game
* League/Comp editor - like FM 10
* Stop advertising in game - allows you to cut it out
* Retro seasons e.g. 1960 NHL
* New playable leagues - Every future addition to the game will be covered
* Ability to manage national teams
* Ability to play in server online leagues

Hall of famer - lifetime member, you get every add on covered in that price
Season Ticket - Everything for first season of release
Powerplay - three add-ons for price of two

Reward system - Say in online leagues those that win certain things or manage certain achievements get rewards so it may be a golden team jersey no one else gets or a discount or free future updates.

Anyway just a few ideas I have the basic game on release would be similar to what EHM 07 was but would continue to generate revenue through advertising and revenue. Some updates could be free to good customers to keep them engaged with the product. I would suggest perhaps using Steam or a similar system to minimilise piracy of course it probably won't be stopped completely but certainly would stop the usage of some features.

[B. Stinson]

I think for a young game, your first two points are the most critical:

1. Deep customization and editability. Editability will cover for the lack of licenses, and customization will give everyone more ways than one to play - greatly delaying the point in which the game gets predictable and boring.

2. No licenses. This should free-up budget and resources for more important parts of the game.

However, I disagree with the add-on idea. I think the best way to get the game out there in the public is to make it accessible to anyone and everyone - and the best way to do that is make stuff free. Once there's a price attached, in comes the question of: "do I really want this enough to go through the effort to pay for it?" And, being such an obscure title, they have to put in even more effort just to make a decision. At that point, the decision quickly becomes "oh who cares", and they move on to something else.

[grazza]

The add on thing would need to be more cosmetic than anything. Don't want something that inhibits people playing the game. I have seen web games like power play manager that I believe charge people for premium accounts. It would be interesting to see how their doing. Perhaps do what they do that the initial game is free but people pay for the additional stuff. At least it would get folk into the game it the basic product was free though not sure how feasible it would be.

It would have been good if SI had included the demo of EHM with the FM games they released could maybe have got a few more folk into the game with some cross selling.

Some sort of server system for online leagues would make them more sustainable rather than relying on hosts and the politics that ensue perhaps people could pay something to cover the server costs and that way they could keep running after the developer has moved on to other projects.

Anyway I wanna try and play devils advocate to try and provoke peoples opinions

[B. Stinson]

The online server idea is another good one.

EHM Online has so much potential considering how much the experience changes for the better, but one of the bigger problems with it is that someone has to host it... and have it running 24/7 so everyone can access it when they need to. But who has an extra internet-ready computer laying around to devote to running a game? Plus, you need at least a few other people who can access that computer to fix things if the commissioner isn't around to do it.

Although, if I were the developer, I would probably save this one for later. The EHM community has proven to be fairly passive with online play, so putting time and money into some servers may be a bit of a risk at first.

As for including a demo with Football Manager, I believe they did do that to an extent. Out of the Park Baseball had a demo of EHM2007. Unfortunately, that was only OOTP. Football Manager, like you recommend, would probably have been a much more beneficial choice.

P.S. I would like to offer my own ideas, instead of simply commenting on yours, but you stole my two best ideas, and I don't have anything else. ...customization and cutting back on licenses would be a must.

[drewst18]

Well you only really need others around to take care of the game when the commish isn't around because of the errors that we get in games from using the editors. If we took the original ehm and original database it would never have errors, well not never, but very very very rarely.

Also online for any game uses a server, Warcraft, Counterstrike, NHL 10, the only difference is in EHM it is a community based server, that someone in the league hosts rather than the developer. I am 100% positive that if EHM 07 had a decent online feature that it would be what everyone plays now...I find the biggest issue with online play is that people don't wanna go back to 05.

Personally I think that lisencing is important, but if a new game is gonna be made the NHL is a MUST! The game would never take off without it, sure it would do fine with the die hards, but so did 05 and 07. The new casual gamer isn't gonna come on the net to look into downloading rosters UNLESS you make it an option in the game to download community roster updates. Kind of like what they do in NCAA games now a days

The editability levels of OOTP would probably be a must in this game, and would bring the game to new levels...but for now its all a pipe dream

[grazza]

Certainly the ability to edit and customise would be key. I kind of agree about the licenses I think if they are going to charge a fair amount of money e.g. $20 + then the NHL should be in there with real names and logos etc. As for the other leagues in Europe not as big a deal if this game was being initially targeted to the North American market. The community would do the updating.

As for the online server I'm not an expert in that field and I suppose there are different ways of defining a server. I would like to see is one perhaps ran by the developers initially and then passed onto the community. Drew you yourself have hosted leagues I imagine it can be pretty tiring and stressful keeping everyone happy and ensuring the league is up regularly. Whereas if we had a system where the league was ran off a server by a neutral party like an MMO then it takes away that pressure on people and make leagues more stable. We would maybe see more take up of online leagues if there was less commitment required.

[bruins72]

Management simulation games are definitely a niche market. You're never going to be able to land the casual gamer in North America. It just won't happen. The casual gamer doesn't have the attention span for a hockey management sim. The key would be to make sure you target the correct audience. First and foremost, a game like this would need to be heavily promoted in Canada to die-hard hockey fans. You might pick up some people that are interested in this type of game but were aware that it existed. Then you promote it heavily in countries like Sweden and Finland. Even though I'm an American, I think it would be a waste of money to spend much promoting it in the US. You've only got certain regions that are hockey fans and most gamers in the US just don't like "thinking games". They like action games.

If a game were ever made and targeted at the right people, I don't think league licenses would really matter. Let the fan community create custom databases and graphics. The real important matter would be to ensure that the game is FULLY customizable. All for rule customization. Allow for a change in start date. Allow for adding and subtracting leagues and setting up their structure. Make it so that just about anything you can think of is customizable. Make it so that we can make a historical database that allows us to have it start in the 1980's, with the correct number of teams in the league, with no salary cap, and players making the kind of money they did back then. Once everything is customizable, then the game's sole focus should be on adding more features with each release and polishing the game more and more. OOTP seems to have it's market. Also, check out Grey Dog Software. They do wrestling and MMA games mostly but they also do a college (US) football game. They seem to be able to create deep games without licenses. They release their games with their own "fantasy characters" and then let the fan community create custom databases with the real leagues.

[Djungelurban]

There's no way you can charge for an editor. That would be suicide for your game. Assuming there won't be any licenses (and there shouldn't be), these guys are the ones that are gonna make half the game for you. In fact, as soon as you got the database structure somewhat locked you need to get an editor together and release it to the community. If your game seems promising enough people will start working on databases out of sheer excitement. You also need to ensure that whatever changes you do to there database structure, albeit it being just you figuring out a better way to set it up or adding new factors to the database, users needs to be able to convert their old database into the new format. Nothing makes you crankier than spending copious amounts of time doing something just to have it rendered obsolete just like that.

And the game itself should also be customizable. I recently gave NHL 2K10 a whirl and while I thought the game was rather rubbish, the one thing I loved about it was how ridiculously customizable the game was (especially for a hockey "simulation" game). You need that too. Not sure if that should be in-game or something you adjust in the editor (probably editor though) but you need it. Not only obvious things like injury and trading frequency but also things like stamina drain rate and top speed for slapshots. The sliders needs to be open ended too (where it's applicable, open ended "player skill" values would just be unworkable). It's rather annoying when you adjust something to the max or min setting and it's still not enough.

In fact, customizability is be key for everything. Someone wants games to only be played with 4 players, then let them. No goalie? Go for it. Or maybe two goalies and much larger net? Or two nets! Or how about we take the entire game and try to convert it into an as accurate representation of bandy as possible. I'm not saying you should actually make any effort to make bandy work accurately, but if someone wants to try, then by all means let them. Basically, if there's a value anywhere in the game, we need to be able to adjust it.

[archibalduk]

I think 99.9% of die hard EHM fans (i.e. all the EHM fans that are here now, several years after the last EHM game) would agree customisation is key. From what I gather, paying for all of the licences takes up a large chunk of the game's development budget. Ditch the licences and use fake player names (e.g Boston Bears with Tony Thomas in goal ). Make everything fully customisable and the fans/community will do the rest. In fact I think the fact that users can customise the game and generate their own original content creates the sort of tight-knit community that we have at TBL.

Starting with the first version, the most important aspects would be to allow all names and attributes to be edited (like in EHM but without the limitations that EHM imposes). Things like a customisable start date and league structure would be difficult (but possible) to code and would be best introduced in a second or third version because they would involve so much work.

I'd love to see a historical database so that we have every single player who ever played/coached hockey since something like 1950. The DB would have attributes for each season for each player so you could choose your starting season with accurate rosters and attributes. As you go through the seasons ingame the players would develop according to their potential ability and factors ingame rather than progressing through each season's attributes stored in the DB. This would mean players wouldn't necessarily develop like real life in the long term (e.g. what would happen if Gretzky breaks his leg ingame at an early age? Would that prevent the 99 jersey from being retired?). Such a project would be a huge undertaking but there's no reason why we couldn't start with just having current ability and potential ability ratings for each historical player and then taking it from there by using the community's help to add attributes for these players.

I can see why you would want to make the game free but charge for addons. However, it would only work if you charged for small benefits/addons, such as the ability to install skins or perhaps even facepacks. Charging for anything more important than that would put people off the game.

Maybe we should create a "changelist" of what we would add/improve/remove to EHM if an EHM 2010 were to come out? Maybe in years to come the likes of SI or another developer could use it as a basis for a new hockey management game?

[B. Stinson]

Another thing I think would really add to the game is evolution. Being able to see an impact being made by certain events, players, coaches, GMs, etc., and as a result, seeing teams, leagues, and nations improve in quality.

[Djungelurban]

Things like a customisable start date and league structure would be difficult (but possible) to code

I keep hearing that and I just don't think that's true. I mean, I'm not saying it would be a cakewalk, but not any harder than making anything else in database form. As long as the infrastructure is there the rest will fall into place fairly easily. Like you hardcode everything in just like normal but the thing that tells the game which of the routines to use at any given time is all controlled by the database. Instead of having the game looking in the code to see how many teams should be in league X, it looks in the database. I know exactly how one could do this. Unfortunately I only know it on a conceptual and structural level since my programming skills are about on the "I can make MegaMan jump in Game Maker" level... But honest, this could be done.

[axwel3221]

because of the threads name, I just can say : Great

[A9L3E]

I think you've forgotten two important things: realistic AI and very few bugs.

[alexob18]

Realistic AI would be great.

[newsguyone]

1. Better way of generating players. The regens are terrible, even with improvements in 07.
2. Maybe not licensed, but you must continue to have a very, very deep simulation with russia, sweden, etc. etc.
3. Forget having a new game every year. Sell one game. Don't make a new one for like three years.
4. Online w/ commissioner mode.
5. More based on scouting, less on atts. More steals. Players who never get drafted but make the league. Gems.

[McQwak]

I would also (among other ideas mentioned above) appreciate some shortcuts for in-game coaching. Let's say numeric keys for different lines, one key for pulling goalie and some other keys to slide between offensive-defensive mentality of whole team. At least.
Of course the best would be customised shortcuts for as many tactics settings as possible. No need to go in tactics screen and make ten changes in eight lines (or whatever) everytime you lead in the game.
I know this is more coaching aspect than managing but as EHM contains this, future hokey manager games can have it as well.

[bruins72]

Of course the best would be customised shortcuts for as many tactics settings as possible. No need to go in tactics screen and make ten changes in eight lines (or whatever) everytime you lead in the game.
I know this is more coaching aspect than managing but as EHM contains this, future hokey manager games can have it as well.

You know you can save multiple line tactics and load them as needed. You don't have to manually make all of those changes every time. You could make several presets to go back and forth between.

[53bast1an]

It's a nice idea, but don't think it's very realistic. But adding competitions is good (great?) idea: I'm missing an european club competion. If you have a franchise that dominates the league (like my Iserlohn Roosters in my EHM-Game) winning an european title is a new challenge

[adrenaline]

A cool feature would be if you'd be able to start a season by founding a new NHL franchise and build it from the bottom. The player could choose a major city in Canada or the US, where the difficulty level varies due to factors such as avalible arenas with capacity, financiers, general province hockey interest, etc.

Bottom line: I like the idea of getting top draft picks for 4 years in a row

[gibson41]

A cool feature would be if you'd be able to start a season by founding a new NHL franchise and build it from the bottom. The player could choose a major city in Canada or the US, where the difficulty level varies due to factors such as avalible arenas with capacity, financiers, general province hockey interest, etc.

Bottom line: I like the idea of getting top draft picks for 4 years in a row

Definitely a neat idea. Founding a NHL franchise and having an expansion draft, or relocating teams sounds just about right, because, let's face it - we all do love to take control over an awful team and turn it into a cup contender.

Besides that, deep game and full customization are key for a succesfull manager game.

[souamort]

All great Ideas, especially the part about making the game without licenses and letting the community of players create/unfake the DB for you.

Being a business owner, the first and most important thing that pops in my head is that I wonder how much it would cost to create a game like this. If all your paying up front is a developer to put the game together without licenses.

Im not in anything related to entertainment or gaming, so my knowledge of developers salries is basically nothing, but if I may speak in hypatheticals.

5 people putting together a group of say 2 or 3 developers with 18 months of work time to create a game as mentioned in this thread, with input from the people who are on here most and who dedicate their spare time to the game (i.e Lidas) and then turning around and charging for a basic game of great quality and customization, might not be impossible. If the cost of hiring the developers is say $35K each, a team of 3 costing you $105K over 18 months, TBL donating ad sapce on their wonderful web site and maybe another $10K give or take on ads in Hockey publications like The Hockey News, and Oprah (she farts on it, its gold ). Turning around and selling the game for $40-$50 each copy, after say 2500 copies sold you break even. Im not sure what the numbers were, but how many copies of EHM 07 sold with the naff job of marketing they did? I figure $120K split between 5 people isn't too high, you create the "group" as a non-profit thing with all money made after breaking even going to something like right to play or the one run by Canadian tire for kids hockey, or heck Timbit hockey, you get a pretty good sponsor and Im sure a little bit of marketing for it. Im sure the cost may end up being higher than $120 but even as high as $150 between 5 or more people wouldn't be outrageous.

Anyways, thats my little rant, if there are such people who have the ability and most importantly the knowledge and expertise in the field of game developing I'd be happy to look into it further. I can only speak for myself, but you come to me with a solid business plan and the right credentials, I'd be more than happy to invest in something I enjoy as much as I did EHM.

[ionkiller]

My best is advice is to create a standard arcade-sim "base" for the game, like EHM or even what EA NHL/NHL 2k try to do with Be-a-GM. This is just nice and appealing for the average joe to pick up the game and play with.

But most importantly, make the game as customizable as possible. This reduces the amount of work you have to do since communities will generally mod for you.