OOTP Developments Forums - Journey of a Welshman

I'm not quite sure of how much interest this is to anyone but since I've bought OOTP it would seem that I've unwittingly embarked on a journey into the unknown. I feel like a male Alice falling into the rabbit-hole of OOTP and, indeed, of baseball itself. But this 'accident' is proving to be quite the adventure - one that I'm fairly excited about. And so I thought it would be interesting to put down in type some of my thoughts and feelings regarding the whole incident.

I don't have the best internet connection as I moved to an area where they have no cable just last year. So I will keep my posts fairly short so that I'm not going to lose anything I've written. For this reason, I will gradually expand this one post in the form of edits.

I hope that someone out there gets some enjoyment out of what I write!

One: Me
:confused: - This is me. I live in a place where football (that'd be Soccer to most of you folks) is often frowned on as a sport for the weak, a place where we grow up playing (even indoctrinated) into the sport of Rugby. We play it at school from such an early age that it almost seems like we are born into it. The only things we know about baseball are its similarities to other sports played in this country, what we see in films, and that Americans seem unduly enthusiastic about it. It is totally alien to us - totally alien to me. My first impressions of baseball itself are that it is one hell of a tedious game to watch. I don't get where the excitement is, I don't smell the famous hotdogs you guys are always dropping into conversations, I don't even really know what a pretzel is - or if I've spelt it right. Although, I have to admit, it does seem marginally more exciting than watching cricket - which to me is the equivalent of sitting in with a can of beer after a hard days work as I admire the wall I've just painted and watch in anticipation as the paint slowly dries. When I think about baseball I think "ahhh, I get it, it's just Rounders.". Rounders is a children's game played in primary/elementary schools during our rare and notoriously short summers.
Despite the fact that Rugby is the Welsh national sport I sometimes spend my time playing a game you might have heard of, it's called Football Manager, and when I play that game sometimes I look at the clock and think "wow, the time went by fast", other times I look out the window and see that the dark of evening has turned to the light of dawn. I fall into, and out of, addiction to this game from time to time. Now is one of the latter and the hole in my life left by not playing it has left me with moments of prolonged boredom. I'm so bored that I might as well be watching cricket! I then spend a fair bit of time trawling through my huge library of games on Steam, revisiting some for a while, but none of them are quite up to the task of replacing the great FM. I look through the Steam store on a daily basis for new games I might find interesting, I pick up the odd older game in the daily sales, but still find nothing long-term. I look through Steam's catalogue of back titles hoping to find something of interest, I buy a few in desperation hoping I might strike lucky - I don't.
Then, one day, whilst engaging in this seemingly pointless activity, I notice an old game called 'OOTP Baseball 9' and I remember reading articles where people who's opinions I used to respect wrote that despite the alien nature of baseball itself this was a truly great game with bags of depth "comparable with Football Manager". "But hang on, this is an old game" I think, "I'm pretty sure there will be a newer version somewhere". I Google OOTP, I find OOTP Developments, I download OOTP 14 since downloading it is free, I install and start up the game, nothing happens, it's not free, ("but the website said it is half-price"). I am still undecided, I click on the purchase button within the game, but still I don't go through with it. I cancel the order knowing I know absolutely nothing about baseball. I'm still bored.
I decide to see what people are saying about the game on facebook and hit the link. I skim through the posts and decide to make a random comment: "Why isn't this game on Steam? It only has OOTP 9. Weird". I am blasted with shock when I get an instant reply from 'OOTP Baseball'. "What's this? I just got a response from the game itself!" - of course I know the game has not decided to talk to me through facebook, if I thought that I'd be booking myself into the nearest lunatic asylum. But I am aware, and impressed, by the fact that someone from OOTPD is actually listening to what people have to say - to what I have to say. I'm no longer interested in the fact that I know squat about baseball and I quickly boot up the game and click through the purchase process, I hit confirm and - NOTHING HAPPENS (I don't know it yet but my purchase timed out while I spoke with the person from OOTPD on facebook). I panic "What happened? I don't want to pay for it twice.". The patient OOTP Baseball person (whoever they may be) calmly replies that they will check on my purchase "when I get back to my computer" impressing me still further with this personal attention and confirming my thoughts that this was a person of note. But I'm pretty sure I've done something wrong, something about my attempted purchase wasn't right, I'm excited now and I can't wait for them to go and check "What the hell, I'm doing it anyway, if it's a mistake maybe I can get a refund on the double buy", I rush through the order process for a second time - this time I get an instant receipt and automatic game registration and am relieved to realise the first attempt was a no-sale and I haven't made a blunder.
I took a swing, I didn't strike out, okay it was only a bunt but I made the hit and.... my journey (around the bases?) begins. [yep..this is me showing off...I'm learning the terms]

Two: 2 Out and Bases Empty
I fire up the game and make myself manager of the only team I can identify with due to my exposure to Hollywood - The iconic New York Yankees ("Detroit? Who are they?"). I click through masses of stuff I don't understand. I have no idea what a DH or a SS is. I'm pretty sure I know what pitchers and hitters are "but why the hell are there so many pitchers?". I skip the preseason and automatically advance to my first game against the Red Sox. I randomly click on different buttons during the game and doing so throws away a couple of run-ins here and there but somehow I manage to win. I advance to the next game which I lose. I'm not contributing anything here, I haven't changed the starting lineup, I don't know what a pinch or a bunt is and I'm still cluelessly hitting random buttons. This is a wash. I can't play this game AT ALL (Me - :rant:). I ignore it for a couple of days. Meanwhile I've received a personal email from the kind chap from the OOTP facebook page. It turns out his name is Brad Cook (who is the PR manager for OOTPD) and he gives me all the details of the purchase that actually went through and reminds me that if I have any questions about the game he would be happy to help. Once again I am struck by the unusual care for RandomUser.

Three: You
I'm not ready to give up and admit that I've thrown away my cash on something I will never use. I'm still intrigued by the prospect of understanding all those letters and numbers. Somehow I have to make an effort to learn more about baseball itself and about the way OOTP works. I hit the forums and make a few random comments about the inaccessibility of baseball to the layman. I make a few comments about my thoughts on the way FM is going and quickly realise there are quite a few fans of that game here as well. I receive almost instant replies to everything I type. I'm not used to this, and the fact that this community is so active inspires me to continue to look into it more and more. A guy calling himself The Wolf posts me several links to articles about baseball, how it works, what the rules are, what the positions are, some of the more rare plays - there is a hell of a lot of information to process but I begin to read, I read for a whole day, and I begin to understand Baseball. I'm impressed with the thread of humour that winds its way through some of these articles - these 'baseball geeks' aren't so uptight, they are just Fans, and are passionate about a sport they clearly love. Back on the forums I'm getting more and more people rushing to offer me help. They are eager for more people to learn about the sport and about the computer game they have so much feeling for. They are not dismissive of the clueless- they are not dismissive of me.
I'm beginning to really take pleasure from the fact that I'm not just unproductively playing games, that I'm learning something, that even though it might seem worthless in the 'big scheme of things' what I'm really learning about is not just a game but a big part of another culture. A part of that culture that embraces those who show any interest in it. (Me -:thumbup1:)

Four: The Slump
After watching a few great, user made, videos for noobs and still failing to make any concrete impact within OOTP I've lost interest in it, and in Baseball itself, the past couple of days . One of the first things I did was to make my entire staff "legendary" in Commissioner mode. I feel this is probably important for a total noob like myself, especially for the scout, since I already don't know who is who and I have to know exactly how players look 'on paper' without human error being a factor. My Add-Ons Central appears not to work throwing out an error message after I've waited for downloads to reach 100%. I want to see what the players all look like and find this annoying. My real-life is temporarily hectic and I've just picked up an old friend in the shape of 'Spellforce Complete' in the Steam weekly at 75% off. I know I'll come back to OOTP soon but for now it's a bust. SF is huge and we have a lot of catching up to do. However, after enjoying many of the 'during calculations' snippets within OOTP I remain interested in learning a lot more about the history of baseball and will continue what has now become My Research by looking into this some more during my break should I find the time. At this point I'm not so interested in the facts and figures (like who hit the most homers in any given season, who pitched a perfect game, or even who won which World Series and when) as I am about what the people involved had to say about the game - I'm looking for a story I guess -since it would appear that I remain far too inept at the game to make one of my own.

Five: Slide
On my return I fire up the game thinking "I really need to do something with this game". All In One Mod 2013 finally loads and installs after about ten previous attempts. This is a good start but I'm still not convinced by Facegen and prefer the older 2D pictures. At least I feel a little more motivated to do something of worth. I am told that the Yankees have a weakness at 1st and catcher and wonder what to do about it. The most simple option has to be to shop around some dead-weight and see what I'm offered. I know that if I offer pure trash that's pretty much what I'm going to get back so, noticing that the Yankees have probably too much quality depth at SP I decide to shop out Ivan Nova who looks decent but not awesome - I trade him for 1B man Billy Butler at the KC Royals. I then look to catcher and, after several attempts to shop out some trash and failing miserably, I settle for another SP Phil Hughes who I trade to Cincinnati Reds for Devin Mesoraco. Some of my Japanese players seem a little pissed off about this but screw them, I'm the boss. I make 2 more minor trades high priced trash for low priced trash, tie up some contracts before draft comes around (my projected income has increased by a few million because these guys don't negotiate their salaries too well despite being some of my best players.), and I'm set to pllllayyy ball. After auto playing through the first two games of the season because I still don't have the slightest idea of calling plays I note with great satisfaction that my two biggest trades are doing well with Billy Butler in particular showing a .750 AVG, just as nice my "trash" appears to be kicking ass as well. "Mwahaha" I think, "what's all the fuss about?" Baseball is a walk.... Safe. But wait, what's this? My SP, CC Sabathia, has a little red battery next to his name, I mouse over it and the word 'exhausted' pops up. Hmmm...now what did I do with my other decent SPs? Oops.

Interim
I'm joint top of the AL East at 7-2 with Tampa but I'm getting a little impatient and decide to auto play through for a little while. When the calculator stops I'm 4th and 8-8 - wth! I was not happy. I decide that the season is a bust and it's time to find out exactly how much I can mess with this program. So I flip Comish mode and force-trade all the best players from the other teams in AL East. Yes I know it's lame but I'm just messing with a broken season (you might call it a posh rage-quit). I let it auto-play the season out and still don't win the division which begs the question of exactly how much influence I'm having on the game at all. A pointless exercise? Perhaps, but at least I'm starting to learn who the major players are and why I need to be looking more at the positional depth and rotating players manually. Oh well, back to square (diamond) one.