PbP Description problems

[pedrotn]

Is anyone experiencing this? I am running a patched version and the PbP is just badly pieced together. I don't know how many times I have walloped, smashed, drilled, smoked, blister, ect... a ball to have the next line be and the (fielder) wont have a problem with that. Similarly how many amazing diving plays can outfielders make. I don't mind the outs but there needs to be some level or routine plays in a game. In my real life experience and from watching enough baseball on tv there is normally no more than 2-3 truly amazing plays in a game and a handful of truly remarkable hits. It takes the specialness out of those adjectives to have them used 20 times a game.

Peter looks at the keyboard, smashes the keys, its going, going, going, caught and filed with ease.

[Syd Thrift]

Maybe you have Ken Levine as your play by play guy. Also, I remember watching a game on TV in the 1980s (I think it was a Cards game on national TV) where the announcer went crazy about a would-be homerun ball "GOING, GOING... CAUGHT in short center field... it's a windy day out here today". Then the producer switched to a camera that showed an inanimate wind sock. The announcer saw this and said "see? The wind is blowing straight down".

But yeah, I understand what you're saying. There are probably a few too many colorful adjectives in here. I'd prefer to have info about the pitch of the ball ("that ball's lined into left center for a base hit" or "soft pop-up into short left") than descriptors like "walloped" (who remembers to say "walloped" in real life play by play?) or "pugilated" (admittedly I've never seen this one).

[jbsnadb]

I cannot tell you how many times mediocre outfielders have made phenomenal catches against the wall, over the wall, make shoestring catches on the warning track, loose the ball in the lights but never drop the ball.

The PxP as written is not the problem. It's how the game uses those snippets of text that is shaping up to be beyond poor.

My personal favourite: Bases loaded in the bottom of the tenth. Two out. The infield is in. A comebacker to the pitcher described as such: "Sharp bounder back to the mound. Brantley fields it, but he'll not risk the throw... That was a smart move... Roy crosses the plate... MacIndoe wins it with an RBI-single!"

[pedrotn]

I agree the writing is great but it never flows right. One of my favorites is when it goes something like this:

Blasted to deep CF
CF gets turned around
moves to his left
makes a shoe string catch

Why is he making a shoe string catch on a ball that would obviously be behind him?

I guess it doesn't really make a difference but I would prefer

There is a lazy fly to CF
CF gets there in time
Out

[RBLwebguy]

Thanks for the feedback and something that we can look at. Some of it maybe the text descriptions, some may be the calling of those descriptions.

[White Sox]

Originally Posted by pedrotn

Is anyone experiencing this? I am running a patched version and the PbP is just badly pieced together. I don't know how many times I have walloped, smashed, drilled, smoked, blister, ect... a ball to have the next line be and the (fielder) wont have a problem with that. Similarly how many amazing diving plays can outfielders make. I don't mind the outs but there needs to be some level or routine plays in a game. In my real life experience and from watching enough baseball on tv there is normally no more than 2-3 truly amazing plays in a game and a handful of truly remarkable hits. It takes the specialness out of those adjectives to have them used 20 times a game.

Peter looks at the keyboard, smashes the keys, its going, going, going, caught and filed with ease.

This sounds more like poor play by play announcing than anything else. Chip Caray anyone? I'm so glad that mistake is out of Chicago. How many times I heard him describe a soft looping base hit as a LASER TO LEFT FIELD!!!!

[Elendil]

Here's a radical idea... Why have PbP text at all? Why not just have the outcome of the play (along with any dialogs needing human input)? It would help make the game go faster, not to have to scroll through all that text.

Maybe something for OOTPBM2007.

[Twelvefield]

Originally Posted by Syd Thrift

who remembers to say "walloped" in real life play by play?

http://www.wallopinwebsnappers.com/

That being said, I, too have a number of players making diving or shoestring catches for balls that have suddenly gone well behind them.

In animation, we use a system called "keyframing" or "key posing" or "keys" for short. A key is a pose that instantly tells the viewer the extent and the storytelling value of the character's action for that one frame. We string key poses together to make full motion.

I find that sometimes the key poses that are in my mind from reading the PbP do go way out of sequence -- the dreaded jump-cut -- and that breaks the reality of the scene. The solution in animation is "simplify and clarify". Sometimes the PbP is being asked to do too much with too little.

[Raidergoo]

Originally Posted by Waninski

This sounds more like poor play by play announcing than anything else. Chip Caray anyone? I'm so glad that mistake is out of Chicago. How many times I heard him describe a soft looping base hit as a LASER TO LEFT FIELD!!!!

Sorry, maybe they were running low on gallium arsenide at the ballpark. I'll contact Budweiser for a delivery for the laser emitter.

[tysok]

Originally Posted by Twelvefield

I find that sometimes the key poses that are in my mind from reading the PbP do go way out of sequence -- the dreaded jump-cut -- and that breaks the reality of the scene. The solution in animation is "simplify and clarify". Sometimes the PbP is being asked to do too much with too little.

I agree. I've read through every line of the xml file, and it all looks fine taken independently. The problem comes into not really how it's called, but a mix of when it's called and the wide variation of what's there.
For instance, the line (if I remember correctly) that it's blasted to CF is a seperate line than the play where the fielder can catches it.
For instance, "blasted to deep CF" is one line.
The line "gets turned around and makes a shoe string catch" is another line in a different category. In that same category there might be a line that says "he races after it, dives and makes a great catch".
Obviously line 2 is the better one for that, and it could probably be fixed with conditions...

So the mix problem is that the game is calling incorrectly sometimes (for big power blasts perhaps too often), and then the pbp isn't set up exactly right for every possible outcome. I think there needs to be a much larger file, with a much wider use of conditions...... but I'm not exactly sure still how the conditions work exactly. However, in order to keep the pbp from being monotonous, this kind of situation is very understandable for now. There are at least 20 different ways of calling it, and is randomized so you'll most likely not see the same combination of calls, at least in one sitting. It's a major step forward IMO, and I believe it'll be a hard road but will get worked out.

[Exodor]

Originally Posted by Elendil

Here's a radical idea... Why have PbP text at all? Why not just have the outcome of the play (along with any dialogs needing human input)? It would help make the game go faster, not to have to scroll through all that text.

Maybe something for OOTPBM2007.

I'd be all for a stripped down PbP option.

I know PbP is customizable - is it possible to remove all the extra languange and just get the results?

[tysok]

Originally Posted by Exodor

I'd be all for a stripped down PbP option.

I know PbP is customizable - is it possible to remove all the extra languange and just get the results?

If you so desire, you can go through and delete every call except 1 from every category, and trim that last call down to saying "strike 1" instead of something like "fastball on the outsdie corner for strike one, Johnson wasn't happy with that and barks at the umpire".

It works fine, just gives no info, detail, or variation.

[White Sox]

Originally Posted by tysok

If you so desire, you can go through and delete every call except 1 from every category, and trim that last call down to saying "strike 1" instead of something like "fastball on the outsdie corner for strike one, Johnson wasn't happy with that and barks at the umpire".

It works fine, just gives no info, detail, or variation.

If you don't want detail, you might as well go back to baseball board games like APBA...although even they have included more PBP detail in recent versions.

[Raidergoo]

Originally Posted by tysok

If you so desire, you can go through and delete every call except 1 from every category

http://www.theperfectgame.net/forums...p?download=140

Brutally simple english.xml file here.

[tysok]

Originally Posted by Waninski

If you don't want detail, you might as well go back to baseball board games like APBA...although even they have included more PBP detail in recent versions.

I agree, but apparently Exodor doesn't want the detail. What I outlined would be even less than OOTP5 had, and that pbp bored me so much I only read the first word of every line.

This new move to xml is much better, and all the work the text team did on it is great and certainly works (and believe me it's a lot of work, it took me 40+ hours just to read it)... just needs to be waxed and shined up now.

The only thing I wish were really different is I'd like the continue button up all the time... instead of reading the pbp, hitting a button, waiting for the screen to clear and the continue button to come up... I'm on a slower machine so it takes a while. I'd rather see a seperate window for all the options (swing away, steal etc) andanother with the pbp commentary. Very small complaint, and the only one I have at the moment... (haven't played many games).

[tysok]

Originally Posted by Raidergoo

http://www.theperfectgame.net/forums...p?download=140

Brutally simple english.xml file here.

Haha... don't quote me! I didn't ask for it. If you must quote, although I hear doctor's are now claiming that quoting causes cancer, quote Exodor.

[battists]

The PbP is improving, little by little. I won't go into great detail about why some of this stuff happens, but please feel free to submit specific examples of PbP "incongruence" that you find. (Although, at this point, I would suggest not doing so until you apply Patch 2 this Friday.)

For now, I'm going to move this thread over to the Closed/Claimed Fixed forum.

Thanks very much.

Steve