Looking for opinions on sports sim games

[Boomer]

As an avid avid gamer, one of the few genres that I've least delved into would be sports sims. I mean sure, I've played MLB Life modes with one player I focused on...but I'm talking about GM sims.

I'm seriously considering trying out a sim baseball league as a GM, and I wanted to get some opinions. Out of the Park Baseball 9 is what I'm looking into, and I can already tell that it is really really intricate. I'm just afraid that it might take a little too much knowledge to start playing in an online league or anything.

It sounds like fun, I just don't want to suck...nor do I want it to take up all my time. I want to spend about as much time on it (probably a little more) than I do with a fantasy football team or something like that.

Any opinions on any sports sim games would be appreciated.

[Kalyx triaD]

I believe their acceptance as competitive games is folly, as sports sims - by definition - are not balanced for competitive play and should not be considered so.

[Boomer]

I'm going to need a little bit of elaboration on that. I mean I don't really expect to win my first "year" of simming or anything, as building a baseball team takes time.

I don't see how sports sims are inherently unbalanced is what I'm saying.

[DaveWadding]

Baseball Mogul.

[Kalyx triaD]

Well... Consider this:

Say you cloned yourself and challenged yourself to a game of Madden. Boomer A picks the Colts and Boomer B picks... the Dolphins. Now your skills as Madden players are identical, yet the game isn't balanced in a way to offer viable team options to a player. So Boomer A is going to annihilate Boomer B because Madden 'simulates' teams according to their past season performance, and the Dolphins won't stand a chance against the Colts based solely on number crunching stats and not actual player skill.

While EA has made strides to this issue (with the EA IQ auto-balance thing in '09), it doesn't change the fact that some teams are just not competitively viable options in Madden - or other simulation sports games. Play a ranked game online with any sports simulation and you will not see a variety or contenders the way you would in a more balanced competitive game (Street Fighter, Virtua Fighter). It gets to a point where you get angry at the next guy who picks the Patriots! lol

[Boomer]

But that's why you play extended seasons of sims. Teams get better and worse. The Yankees pay more than anyone and still don't win. That's the point. I'd figure picking a horrible team and making them awesome would be far more interesting and fun...and yes more difficult.

Also...Wadding. Is Mogul better? I have the OOTP demo, and I like the sheer amount of things available. I'm just afraid it may be too much.

[Kalyx triaD]

I'm not familiar with evolving stats; at best I can relate with fighting games getting arcade revisions but that's as close as I get.

Evolving teams against other real players does sound interesting and rewarding.

[Boomer]

The evolving stats stuff is really intriguing me. Just looking at OOTP, they have current and potential rankings for every player. Not sure how you might work these players to fully reach their potential, but it sounds like a lot of fun.

[Mike the Metal Ed]

Football Manager is like crack for most people in the UK.

[Ogen]

Think OOTP was made by the same people as Football Manager over here ( football as in soccer ) if so if you like baseball I'd imagine its insanely fantastic.