Let me start off by thanking Transmission for a truly terrific game. The game is by no means perfect, but in my opinion, this is easily the best cricket game I've played (which incl BLC 99, BLIC 05/07, EA Cricket 05). Frankly, I have no gripes with the graphics or animations (am playing on a PC with everything maxed out, and it looks pretty neat -- this is no GOW2 but heck it's a cricket game), the batting/bowling are both challenging and varied, fielding is much improved and the ball physics are more or less spot on. The issues people raised should be addressed in a patch (I hope).
Regardless, here are some tips:
- this may sound lame, but complete the bowling tutorial! I can't tell you how much my bowling improved after I realized the correct areas to bowl. As others have noted, the ideal length to bowl in the game is much fuller than you would expect -- nothing gives you a better idea of this than the Gatting dismissal in the tutorial. My spinners used to get thrashed around in all forms of the game, going over 10 rpo, but I managed to bring this down to sensible levels and also get some wickets (without exploiting the off-spinner loophole)..other points to remember when bowling: try to change not only the type of delivery, but also the ball position at the last second; stopping the meter in the perfect region (yellow) really makes a difference
- ok, now the other big issue -- run outs. Here's something that has worked for me so far -- I've only played three games since making this change, so I can't be 100% sure about this, but the no. of run-outs drastically reduced..something like from 8 in a single game before the change to 3 over the next three games..what I did was improved all my players' fielding skills -- throwing speeds, accuracy and running speed (had to compromise in other places, but that's fine -- dropped bowling skills for my batsman and vice versa). I had noticed that the AI was taking silly runs, often just before the fielder threw the ball back from the outfield, but the ball would be overthrown..almost as if the AI determined that it should take a risky single based on the fielders' skill level (this is no real surprise, cos this is how it *should* work, except that I've rarely seen it work properly in a cricket game before)...and that most run-outs when looking at the final scorecard were restricted to a handful of bad fielders..so I made this change and it really looks like they've stopped going for silly runs esp when the ball goes in the outfield (the 3 runouts since were very risky infield singles with direct hits)..Anyways, this all could be wishful thinking on my part and maybe I got lucky in the three games since, but I hope someone else can confirm this.
Now, for some really silly issues which need a patch:
- save custom fields! how could this be overlooked?! unless I'm missing a way to do this in the game
- edges not carrying to the slips..after improving my bowling, I've managed to get wickets bowled, lbw and even caught behind by the wicketkeeper off a spinner, but getting a catch in the slips has been a real challenge.
One related point: I find that bowling under Normal difficulty is the most enjoyable, cos the AI gives you more chances of getting wickets, but batting is far too easy...I suppose there are two obvious workarounds: drop your player batting skills and play normal, or increase your bowling skills and play hard..will try the latter more.
Finally, I downloaded the game from gamesplanet as mentioned in the other thread -- it is perfectly legit, and it worked like a charm -- was up and running in a couple of hours. Thanks to chavanak etc for pointing this out! Real blessing for people in the US. The downside, however, is that I don't have a manual -- so a silly question -- can we unlock players like Warne etc. in the game? Also anyone know of other leg spinners in the game who have deliveries like the flipper, slider etc?
Regardless, here are some tips:
- this may sound lame, but complete the bowling tutorial! I can't tell you how much my bowling improved after I realized the correct areas to bowl. As others have noted, the ideal length to bowl in the game is much fuller than you would expect -- nothing gives you a better idea of this than the Gatting dismissal in the tutorial. My spinners used to get thrashed around in all forms of the game, going over 10 rpo, but I managed to bring this down to sensible levels and also get some wickets (without exploiting the off-spinner loophole)..other points to remember when bowling: try to change not only the type of delivery, but also the ball position at the last second; stopping the meter in the perfect region (yellow) really makes a difference
- ok, now the other big issue -- run outs. Here's something that has worked for me so far -- I've only played three games since making this change, so I can't be 100% sure about this, but the no. of run-outs drastically reduced..something like from 8 in a single game before the change to 3 over the next three games..what I did was improved all my players' fielding skills -- throwing speeds, accuracy and running speed (had to compromise in other places, but that's fine -- dropped bowling skills for my batsman and vice versa). I had noticed that the AI was taking silly runs, often just before the fielder threw the ball back from the outfield, but the ball would be overthrown..almost as if the AI determined that it should take a risky single based on the fielders' skill level (this is no real surprise, cos this is how it *should* work, except that I've rarely seen it work properly in a cricket game before)...and that most run-outs when looking at the final scorecard were restricted to a handful of bad fielders..so I made this change and it really looks like they've stopped going for silly runs esp when the ball goes in the outfield (the 3 runouts since were very risky infield singles with direct hits)..Anyways, this all could be wishful thinking on my part and maybe I got lucky in the three games since, but I hope someone else can confirm this.
Now, for some really silly issues which need a patch:
- save custom fields! how could this be overlooked?! unless I'm missing a way to do this in the game
- edges not carrying to the slips..after improving my bowling, I've managed to get wickets bowled, lbw and even caught behind by the wicketkeeper off a spinner, but getting a catch in the slips has been a real challenge.
One related point: I find that bowling under Normal difficulty is the most enjoyable, cos the AI gives you more chances of getting wickets, but batting is far too easy...I suppose there are two obvious workarounds: drop your player batting skills and play normal, or increase your bowling skills and play hard..will try the latter more.
Finally, I downloaded the game from gamesplanet as mentioned in the other thread -- it is perfectly legit, and it worked like a charm -- was up and running in a couple of hours. Thanks to chavanak etc for pointing this out! Real blessing for people in the US. The downside, however, is that I don't have a manual -- so a silly question -- can we unlock players like Warne etc. in the game? Also anyone know of other leg spinners in the game who have deliveries like the flipper, slider etc?
