For Andreas, please red ;)

[OckHAM]

I played a lot this wonderful game in the last months and I noticed that with some minor fixes and improvements it could be even more appealing and exciting. First of all I have to say that I disagree on the plan to convert the game graphics to the 3d view: ChS has its wonderful appeal because it's the perfect evolution of a classical wonderful game as Sensible World of Soccer: there are a lot of 3d and graphics-based soccer games, and they lack the deepness and complexity of ChS, but the appeal too of a SWOS-like game: 2d cartoonish graphics is a fundamental component of the game, so if Andreas really wants to change the match engine I think that he should let the player choose between the "old" game graphics and the new 3d. Another very important element of the 2d graphics is that it's very customizable: customization is another great point of ChS, something that could be improved, I think, to let to the community the possibility to provide custom expansions and creations, so my suggestion to make this game THE soccer game, are the following:

Graphics
- Insert two more hair colours: red and black (actually only blonde and brown, that becomes darkbrown on dark skinned players).
- Insert two hair styles: long and bald, along with the "normal" style actually present.
- Insert in the players graphics one shadow for each color: actually only skin colours are shadowed (three gradations), sleeves shirt socks and shorts too should have at least one shadow colour to improve the game graphics.(*)
- Do not use a in-game build graphics for the field, but a bmp file that can be customized by the community: to begin it's sufficient just to link to a very very simple and poor field bmp, but this can be customized by the community, I'm sure fields and stadiums will grow up like for SWOS.(*)
- Every team will use the default field bmp, but should be added the possibility in team txt file, to indicate a custom Stadium/field bmp to use, so some teams can have customized fields. (*)

Game Improvements
- Improve the skill of goalkeepers (should be a bit harder to dribble the goalkeeper, anyway this point is optional, not one of the most important).
- Insert more Team informations: City, Stadium, maximum attendeance (stadium capability), logos (optional).
- In the game presentation add the players icons with proper kit near to the names of players (just like in SWOS).
- Insert more background images that alternate randomly.

Of course management too could be improved a bit, but I'm sure that with these modifications we don't need a ChS 2, because ChS would be the definitive soccer game: when I bought this game I did not think it could be so impressing and complete, and I hope that it can evolve allowing more and more customization possibilities because this is the REAL strenght of the game.

Do NOT change the game control, that is the perfect evolution from the SWOS style! A second button would be a disaster I think.

I would like to know from Andreas what he thinks of all this that I wrote and if he thinks that the (*) points can be easily achieved; I would like to know too if there other part of the game graphics that could be edited in any way, even with a programmation language.

Thanks in advance for the attention and compliments for your work,

OckHAM

[zarstar]

I've read the Ockham post, and i agree with many of the things that he said...
First, I love the 2d graphics too, and I only think that it can be a little improved.. improved frames, more frames, separated frames for the referees, benchs on field...

the second thing: I think that the customization is a very important thing..and with it, every game can grow thanks to the community...so: I think that the idea of Ockham for special fields for every team is a very good idea (if it's possible), and I think that PLAYERS of teams can be customizable!! So everyone can make a great patch with real names, and the game will be perfect!

I agree even for more hairs and color hairs... It is a CAREER GAME, so the own player must be very customizable! And for example, the hair can grow with the time! (it's only a stupid idea..but it can be good! ;P )
However..I think that the game must have players frames improved in a way that you can see the eyes of every player..so you can change the color of eyes too... and U can have your virtual yourself!!

third thing:
I like very much the commentary in games, and I think that if you implement in game a txt player (the computer voices that read the text files) everyone can make an own commentary, and everyone can make a commentary for all the persons that speak the same language...I've seen in some sites that are availables on many sites the TEXT PLAYERS Engine...but I've not seen if they're free...but if u are interested you can tell me, and I can see it..

The last thing.. I think that it's very hard to implement in a game, but I hope that you'll include it: the height and the weight of players..(Maybe you can resize in real time the frames of players, but if it's hard you can make 6 frames: Tall and Sick, Tall and normal, Tall and Fat ; Normal and sick, Normal and normal, normal and fat ; Short and sick, short and normal, short and fat....

I think that so the game will be The soccer game...

[OckHAM]

I think we should go/ask step by step, of course would be wonderful, if Andreas wants to develop further this wonderful game, to add, for example, custom wav files for teams chants: just a line in the team txt file can use a custom wav crowd file for particular chants, there are some many things that could be achieved if Andreas wants that Ch Soccer could really spread more and more famous and well known in the internet soccer community.

Look Andreas:

http://ockhamyoda.altervista.org/ockhamupdate.champ.graphics.htm

here you can see with the last two bmps what I was trying to explain about "shadows" in game, I don't know if this is hard to implement but from a graphical point view this should make more beautifil the 2d graphics of the game with more possibility of customization. I don't know a lot about programmation, but if you give us the possibility I think that the fans community could try to implement all these things just with a bit of help from you. Thanks in advance, I'll wait for your answer.

OckHAM

[OckHAM]

Little Post Scriptum:

I readed the other messages of this forum where you write that such things need 200+ hours of programmation to be implemented, and I understand you that you cannot live only of this project, but believe me: customization is the key, and spreading the features of this game over the internet community, especially on the SWOS community that has a lot of fans around the world.

I think that you should not work so much to implement all the elements I suggested, just leave the "link": the possibility for the community to do the job: just as you did for the teams and the leagues, more elements in the game, from the graphical point of view I think, could be customizable, or just release the part of the code regarding these points and the community can do the rest of the jub. For the stadium/field question, for example, just link to an empty green bmp of the dimension of the field, and then we will deal with it, adding more and more details for every custom stadiums present in the game. Let the community "works" for you: I dunno if it's possible, but releasing just the part of the code regarding a single improvement could be a good idea to let us work improving and publicizing this wonderful game.

I'm sure that the game is already complete, and wonderful, the dream of every SWOS and Player Manager fan (and there are A LOT): you/we just have to make it "cute": the important elements are already inside, what is needed is a bit of improvement on "cute" things, things that videogamers like: then I think you could sell your project to Sensible Software, for example, that can present it as the sequel/evolution of SWOS, or a similar solution, then I'm sure you will have even the personal and economical gratification for your work. In the meanwhile, me/we are here for help you, if you want.

OckHAM

[Andreas Osswald]

A 3d engine has a lot of advantages which might not be obvious at first:

Every player gets his own texture, for the animations only the vertices of the player models get modified, the textures internally always remain the same. This means while I need a own entire bitmap of a big resolution for 2D graphics for every player type (goalkeeper with all hair types, players with all hair types) for 3D players I can create a small texture for every player. A small texture for every 3D player on a pitch requires less memory than a big bitmap for every 2D player type. The memory is the smaller problem: but the hair-types and dress/kit bitmaps are created before the match (because there are no fix kits) which takes a lot of calculation time. Have you ever wondered why it takes a few seconds before the match starts? It's because the kits are painted on the players, once for every hair type multiplied with the number of kits. In a 3D engine every player can get his own hair-colour, number on the kit, name on the kit, skin-colour - while in a 2D engine it costs calculation to add further hair colours. With two further hair colours the pre-match calculations are raised about 30-40% in a 2D engine, in the 3D there are no further costs. It's the same with longer hair. It would raise the pre-match calculation time at the current design.

The number of background images are a problem because stadium pictures are copyrighted. Other companies got problems by using them as background pictures in their games.

[OckHAM]

I'm sure that you have very good reasons to choose a 3d engine, anyway I still believe that a lot of the "appeal" of Ch Soccer is that it's the perfect evolution of SWOS style game, I hope you can include a near-2d view more similar possible to the present match view, while I'm happy of the customization potential you write about :D Anyway I saw the last screenshots of CS2 and speaking frankly I don't like them: a more SWOS/cartoonish graphic I'm sure is better at all for the appeal of the game.

I would like to know anyway if it's possible in the actual version of Ch Soccer link the field graphics to a bmp maybe customizable for ever team.

If it's possible to link the crowd wav files to custom wav file for every team.

If it's possible for you to release just the part of the code of the game regarding a specifical improvement about which the community can care and work.

About the point on calculation time I think that it is a good "price" to have such improvements in game.

[zarstar]

I understand all advantages of have a 3d engine, but maybe you can make a 3d engine that seems in the same matter of the 2d engine!
Practically: you have to make the 3d models of players like the players of the 2d engine (with little comic graphics..not too big head, but little big head! ;P ) they must seems the same! So, with an aereal view, you can play like in the same 2d engine! but the 3d naturally seems more good, because there aren't only one frame for any direction!

So we got all the advantages of the 3d engine..and a better graphic for the game!

[Coach Rasta]

the ideas of ockham sound pretty nice, i had some ideas which went in the same direction.

as addition, more informations about teams and countries would be nice, for example:
i played a career with the european top-leagues and some south american leagues, i noticed that many top-earning players of europe changed to clubs in south america which is quite unrealistic. if there wouldnt be only the reputation-info but also a "financial"-info you could create countries with very good players but poor clubs (like it is in most south american countries, for example brazil).

and, hmm umm dont get me wrong on this point andreas but i think the coding should be improved, i mean you said one time that you didnt put more statistics and informations in the game because of the allready long calculation-time.
but games like "swos" (without player stats though) or the 15 years old "bundesliga manager pro" can handle lots of informations without having to calculate for minutes.
to say it clearly i still dont get why for example the calculation at the beginning takes ten minutes(!) on a 3,0ghz 1024mb RAM-machine. i really appreciate a improvement in the coding, it would make much more infos and statistics possible.
just my two cents though =)

[Andreas Osswald]

Sure, you can handle an enormous database, that's no problem.

The features that calculation time require are:

Dynamic squads: that means cpu teams create new tactics and a new starting eleven. (In swos for example all teams had a static tactic and a static starting eleven.)

Dynamic players: in CS the players age und improve/decrease their skills depending on performance, environment (team, league), potential (some players always will remain weak, some others have a high potential and will improve their skills.)

Dynamic managers: computer teams scout for players, buy and sell.

This is where the calculation times come from. The alternative is to leave parts of it static, for example by taking out features like player aging, youth players and the features above like it is done in other games.

A trick is to make a team "dynamic" as soon as a human-being takes it over. That means as long as it's managed/played by a human-being the players/squad/everything becomes dynamically.

I personally prefer real simulations like Championship Manager (meanwhile it's called Football Manager 2005 and is published by Sega) or Dino Dini's Player Manager, there you have these calculation times as well. Of course there can be done some optimisations here and there, but you cannot compare it to static teams like swos or bmp.

[OckHAM]

Andreas wrote that more info about teams and players would increase the loading time of the match; from my point of view this is a very small price "to pay" to have a deeper game and more features, anyway a good way to "use" the dead time of loading is to show more info and statics on loading screen: actually it's just presented a list of the players of the two teams playing the match: could be implemented, I think without a great effort, more detailed statistics about players: for example: nationality, performance of the player, number of assists and goals, along with team informations: medium age, image of the skirt (just the same shown in team informations), attendeance present; and maybe further "static" informations that could be stored in the team.txt like: City, Stadium, team logo (link to a bmp or another graphic format file): so the waiting time could be "used" in an interesting way and you can add more features.

I completely agree with Coach Rasta about the "financial info" of teams, that should influence the transfers: would be really realistical that some rich but minor Italian teams buy important brazilian and argentinian players importing them in Europe. While I disagree with Coach Rasta about a better coding and a less-memory management of the game: CS is a very "deep" game because it has dynamic managers and dynamic players, and this is a main feature, without which the game would lose a lot of its appeal.

As wrote in other post the main point is if has sense proposing improvements to cs1 if Andreas decides to work only on cs2 following a completely "alternative" way of developing the game: this means more time of work and programming, and I'm sure with minor results: if the community is able to conveince the great capacity of Andreas to work in the direction of a cs1 main improvement I think we could really play the definitive soccer game "conquering" all the old-style soccer fans (and there are a lot around the world): regarding me I would gladly spend even 50 € for a cs1"plus" with the features and improvements until now presented and suggested: maybe Andreas should try to make a poll with the actual community of fan, trying to see how much is convenient to invest, from an economical point of view, on cs1.

So I would like to know what the rest of the community thinks about this point and how many people would be disposed to financially support an evolution of cs1.

OckHAM

[zarstar]

I think that we must hope that Andreas doesn't leave the idea of old style game with the 3d...that's all...

He know athat we don't want another Winning Eleven, but only a realistic fun simple game for managers and players...
I think that the 3d can improve the game with more graphics, more hair and more of anything about graphics (height and weight for players, for example...), but I think that it's hard to remanin the same gameplay..

I hope that Andreas do the CS2 like the one, and that CS2 will be THE SAME of CS1, but in 3d.. I want the high visual, but I don't want to see ANTS run on a enormous green field.. I want the same size of CS1, but in 3d...So you can use the 3d on replays, viewing the actions by another view...It's a great improve! But for the game, I want the same....It's spectacular and fun!

For improving CS1 I think that it's a good idea...but like you've said, Andreas must spend his time with both projects...
I think that he can work with our help directly on second game...CS2...but he need the help of our players to know how it's proceeding....

PS: For Andreas: It's possible to use CEL SHADING? or it's too hard??
I think that if you use it, the game can sell very very very much!
It can be the first Soccer game (very complete!) with Cel Shading!!
For persons who don't know what is it: The Cel Shading is a graphic system with the 3d models appear like 2d!! Like cartoons! See Dragon Ball for PS2....It can be wonderful!

[zarstar]

http://www.gamedev.net/reference/articles/article1438.asp
see it for Cel Shading Andreas



http://www.speech.cs.cmu.edu/hephaestus.html
http://freetts.sourceforge.net/docs/index.php
See them for text-to-speech engine

[OckHAM]

I agree, but we have to consider as starting point of discussion on CS2 the screenshots in the Announcement section. I don't found any element of the CS1 style there..

OckHAM

[zarstar]

Yeah, This is problem...Andreas have to work with us, with our help....
Because who love this game, love it for what is it now...
I've told many times to Andreas that when he end a first version 0.00000000001 he can send it to us for try it...I think that we can help him....

[OckHAM]

In a 3D engine every player can get his own hair-colour, number on the kit, name on the kit, skin-colour - while in a 2D engine it costs calculation to add further hair colours. With two further hair colours the pre-match calculations are raised about 30-40% in a 2D engine, in the 3D there are no further costs. It's the same with longer hair. It would raise the pre-match calculation time at the current design.

About this I was thinking: Yoda Soccer is an opensource project and its code is completely free, including the graphics code and the match engine. More than this, it's programmed with the same language of Champ Soccer, blitzmax (I know it because sometimes I got "cannot inizialize blitzmax module" errors playing Champ Soccer): so how it's possible that the match graphics are elaborated almost instantaneously in YS and that in CS would be such a great problem to calculate a pair of hair colours more (for example)? What about using the part of the graphics code of Yoda keeping the excellent game dynamics and control method as it is now? Everyone knows how much Andreas dislikes spending n+3 hours programming for CS1, but in this case this would be just a copy and paste (with a little of adaptation) operation.

As you know I would gladly do the work of adaption for the single portion of the code related to game graphics, but I understand if you, as said before, don't want to share neither a little part of the game code.


OckHAM