EHM The Blue Line

So I guess there's two ways in which a be a player mode could be implemented (or maybe you could do both):

1) Just creating a player and watching him develop like dave1927p and YZG mention above (and perhaps controlling his salary demands, contract renewals, etc)

2) Where you control every part of the player's career - e.g. choose which team to join, training (?), renewing contracts, and to some extent micromanaging a player.

With regards to no. 2 what exactly could a user control? Clearly there's not much you can do during games short of an action game like EA NHL or NHL 2K. I wonder how you could have some sort of control over a player in preparation for each game within the confines of a text based game?

Maybe one idea is that you have a certain amount of points which you can spend before each game in order to boost (for just that one game) some of your attributes. The amount of points you can spend would depend on morale and fitness condition. So if you had high morale and 100% fitness/condition you would have a number of points which you could spend to improve some of your attributes for just that one game. After that game, your boosted attributes return to normal. Then before the next game, you can boost again. If your fitness and/or morale is low then you would have fewer points to use to boost attributes. It would make things a bit arcadey but it's all I can come up with at the moment with regards to how to be involved during games.

For ideas on how to do a "Be A Player" type game where you control a career, check out Wrestling Spirit. It's a "Be A Player" type game where you're a wrestler. Playing that a bit could give some ideas on things you could do in that type of game.

http://www.greydogsoftware.com/ws2/

Also there is a flash game where you do basically develop a warrior/knight/wizard/whatever. It's called My Pet Protector 2. This is another way you could go with this.

http://www.kongregate.com/games/undefin ... rotector-2

As far as a player retiring and becoming a coach on the team he is with is cool, but it would also be great to go down a league or two - say to the ECHL or more preferably to Junior - to become a coach or GM/Coach.


And like i mentioned previously for Be a Player Mode, i think it would be important for users to be able to control multiple players...maybe that was the biggest problem with Inside the Park Baseball. I actually feel the biggest part of Inside the Park Baseball was that it was run seperately (well, in was actually a different game altogether). Alot of users like to see their league evolve and ITPB would really limit that...if they would add that feature to their game so that users could control GMs, commish, and players it would be a bigger success.

What i'm getting at here is that instead of "Be A Player" being a seperate mode run seperatly from a Dynasty type mode i think it would be much better in the bigger picture to be run simultaneously; letting the user retire their Be A Player careers, continuing on with another player or being a GM with that player or just being a GM with an entirely new player all in the same game world. I know i may have stated most of this before but just trying to make it alittle more clear - i don't know if i have done that now lol


Also i like the idea of sometimes having to work way up being an assistant coach (in fact i love it) but my concern here is how to make that fun and not feel like work?

I'd like to be start as a scout and have a rapsheet on the guys i recommended to my GM, who the GM actually selected and their career NHL stats.

looks fine; as long as player names and teams are links to their ingame profiles i'm thrilled...

are you able to make the game fullscreen?

Be a player is an interesting idea. Could be fun. Good luck with this.

Yes the game will be full screen as default, but I am going to put in an option for minimized screen.

As far as anything else you guys would like to see in the game, just let me know and I will see what I can do!

@dave- I completely agree with you. It is something that I am trying my best to implement, but I am having the hardest time trying to tie everything in. I think that I will have more success creating all the features separately, then meshing them together after that. Again though, you are right, and it is something I am working my best on.

@bruins- Thanks for examples, everything helps! Ill keep you guys updated with the be a player mode at every step (ill even let everyone test it when the time comes). Hopefully we can make a great game!

Sort of a bit like a roleplaying type aspect to the game of hockey it would seem to be.... and it sounds pretty durn good

lol i'm sure we have some more thoughts to throw out on layout but i'll wait to see alittle more.

UHS_2010, I just found out about your game and I'm really looking forward to the day when it is ready to use.

You have some very ambitious ideas for your game, I hope that you can include all of them.

Just a status update of the past few weeks...I have been working on the new attribute system quite a bit lately. I have already scratched a few of the ideas that we had completed. We are leaning less towards the EHM 2007 attribute system, and more towards a custom. more enhanced version.

What are the attributes you'll be using for your game? Are you ready to share that yet? Maybe we can help you with some suggestions?

We are now thinking of using a graph system. The current system in EHM has many, many flaws. For instance, a player with amazing skating attributes, is better than a player that has the same physical/shooting attributes, but has lower skating ability. In EHM, there is basically no difference between the to. Each player in the NHL has a role on his team. Whether it be skating fast, great passing, or a fast shot. The EHM system is only set up to enable players with high shooting/skating/mental attributes to be ultra successful. We want players with good defensive abilities/ and or good skating abilities to be successful too.

I can name many players in the NHL that were successful because they specialized in 1 area.

We are open to suggestions still.

Using a new system for this type of game is very intriguing.
If you decide to go with a graph system I'm looking forward to when you are able to show us a screenshot.

I am going to try and get a screenshot up for you guys within the next few days.

What does everyone think of this new system?

I'm intrigued by the idea of a graph type of system but I think I've got to see exactly what you're talking about. I guess when you post the screenshot I'll be able to tell you more.

The new screen shot it here. It demonstrated our basic concept for the new attribute system. The attributes have been broken up into 8 categories. We are still contemplating on whether or not to increase the categories to 15+. Thoughts and suggestions are wanted and welcome.

Doesn't look very different from normal attribute systems, what kind of different does the graph make then? If this guy had 15 skating 15 slap- and wristshot he would still be alot better than guy with 15 wrister and slap, but worse skating.
I was expecting kinda similar graph as NHL10/11 shows when youre comparing players for trades etc.

Are these the only attributes or are these attributes made up of several sub-attributes?

each attribute has a "sub attribute". For instance, "Wrist Shot" will have an "Accuracy", and "Power" sub attribute.

Now will those sub-attributes be visible in some other screen?

That is correct. When you click the attribute name, a number will appear bellow that attribute, along with the name of the sub attribute. We are considering getting rid of sub attributes, and just extending the overall attributes to 20.

I like the base attributes with the sub attributes in a way because if you're looking to get a quick idea of a player's abilities, you can look at a handful of attributes. Then if you want to look further, you can see the sub attributes. I guess my issue is the main attributes that you're using there. Or maybe we can call them "categories". I would combine slap shot and wrist shot into one category called "shooting". Then have slap shot and wrist shot as sub attributes. What about a playmaking category? That could have sub attributes for passing, creativity, vision, and stuff like that. I think I'd combine skating and agility into one category called skating. I think agility might be more of a sub attribute of skating. Strength could have things like balance, size, and power as sub attributes. Stamina seems like it would just be it's own thing. I can't think of sub attributes for it. Position could have offensive and defensive positioning as sub attributes but I'm not sure what else. Checking could include backchecking, forechecking, and maybe hitting. What else? Maybe a mental category to include several sub attributes like leadership, determination, and stuff like that. What about fighting, aggression, agitation? Things like that? Where would they go?

Great Ideas! We are going to test this as much as possible, hopefully we get a fit!

As for the the fighting, aggression, agitation...This portion sort of has me stumped. Maybe I should include a new category in tribute for these sub attributes. After all, those 3 things are huge in hockey. Maybe something like a "Toughness" attribute? Then have fighting, aggression, and agitation as a sub attribute. What are your thoughts on that?