Thank you and Goodbye to cricket captain

ahmedleo414

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I made this post on the Cricket Captain form and I will post it here if anyone wants to read it. https://www.childishthings.com/forum/forum/cricket-captain-2022/78972-thank-you-and-goodbye

The first time I discovered this series was on the PSP with International Cricket Captain 3. I was so happy when I found it because it was exactly what I was looking for. Finally a cricket management style game. I have always been interested in the genre with Wrestling, Soccer, Baseball and now I finally had a cricket game.

I used to play that game every free time I had, on the subway going to and from work, at work, at school. It went everywhere with me. Then life got busy and I sort of forgot about gaming for a while. Then a few years ago I noticed something on the Google Play store called Cricket Captain 2018 I was so happy because it reminded me of Cricket Captain 3, just with more features. That's when I found out that it was made by the same people and all the memories came back. I fell in love with the game once again.

Since 2018. I have bought every single version that has come out, either on my phone or with the last 3 on steam and with each edition that comes out I am hoping to once again discover all the changes I found when I went from International Cricket Captain 3 to 2018. Alas, every single change has been so minor that it's almost not worth mentioning.

I have basically used the same strategy playing Cricket Captain 2018 until 2022 and even on Normal difficultly I seem to win most of my matches. The biggest thing that has continually disappointed me is the lack of an editor, thank god for weetabixharry and his editor that made the last 2 games playable for me.

One of the things I love doing in any management/simulation game that I play is picking a team with the lowest stats and try to make them a championship team, but in Cricket Captain there is no sense of reward for that, sure I might win a world cup or two, but if I play the game as Ireland or Zimbabwe the pool of players that are generated seem to stay at a low level, they don't have a domestic structure (unless you want to count English for Ireland) and so there is no way to know who is a good player and who isn't. We can't see any stats for anyone (other than their playing stats). I want to know how the coaching is affecting my players, and 90% of the time i just don't even bother with any coaching or physio because in my experience they do either very little or nothing at all.

Why not give us an option to play as an associate side and let us earn our way into test cricket. Why not let us create custom tournaments without cricket board restrictions. I want to be able to create an 8 team tournament with players all around the world and either play each game myself or have the option to simulate it (because even simulating tournaments like that is fun)

There are so many other things I can talk about but i just don't have the time right now. Maybe all these features will be included in some future version of the game. International Cricket Captain 3 came out in 2007, Cricket Caption 2018 came out in 11 years. Maybe I will check back in 11 years and see what else is new in Cricket Captain 2033, but as for now this has been extremely disappointing and I will not be purchasing another game next year because all it will be is a roster update and nothing more.

Thank you for the memories, and goodbye for now
 

Aislabie

Test Cricket is Best Cricket
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I made this post on the Cricket Captain form and I will post it here if anyone wants to read it. https://www.childishthings.com/forum/forum/cricket-captain-2022/78972-thank-you-and-goodbye
I can't disagree with any of this.

I usually buy every other year, and I've bought 2022 this year and am surprised to find that if anything there are fewer features and that the things which have been added serve only to make the game less playable. Examples include the revamped bowling aggression, which makes it more difficult to use sensible white-ball bowling tactics, and the changes made to the All Time Greats mode where every player from Geoffrey Boycott to Gilbert Jessop; from Jack Russell to Adam Gilchrist has been given a "Very Defensive" batting style.

There's simply no attention to detail anymore, and perhaps there never was.
 

Sureshot1

School Cricketer
Joined
Oct 14, 2020
Hi @Aislabie

I read your post last night, the ATGs being Very Defensive was a bug, we've fixed and released an update for that now. Thank you for making us aware of that.

Why do you find bowling aggression more difficult to use for white-ball formats?

The changes this year were designed to provide more options for default defensive bowling options.

Regards,
Nigel and Chris
 

Bevab

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Is this the thread where I finally get to rant about this game? :spy

The very responses to your post on the official forum should tell you everything about this game's 'fans'. It is downright pathetic that every year's iteration is nearly the same (save for some minor improvements that should have been in long ago and the occasional major improvement like the DLS, career switching) and it is even more sad that there are a bunch of people who continue to buy the same and support this. After all, why would the devs care to make meaningful improvements when all they can see is a loyal bunch of supporters who seem to believe nothing can be done wrong by them and who'll buy every product of theirs no matter how similar it is?

I don't even get the small team excuse that is trotted out by these fans as we've got plenty of indie games on Steam, many of which have been developed by one man with multitudes of features. In contrast, all we get every year here are the same animations, the same UI, the same gameplay and some database changes. The game's also deliberately made dense without any attribute displays under the pretense of 'we want to challenge the players'. And yet there are no other tools beyond simple stats to actually play without attributes. If I wanted to play without attributes in a game like OOTP or even FM, there are numerous stats to describe how a particular player has played over the course of a season that tells me exactly what to expect from him and gives me a rough estimate of how capable he will be. But here though? All you get are the preferences which are hilariously wrong often. Virat Kohli prefers spin? Shreyas Iyer prefers pace strongly? Dinesh Karthik and KL Rahul have average aggression? I fully agree with @Aislabie, there is no attention paid to players beyond a cursory glance at their Cricinfo pages for their career numbers. Heck, some don't even get that royalty.

And don't get me started on the feature that is often trotted out every year in the form of 'revamped aggression'. It is supposed to be one of the highlights every year and yet you still have every cricketer playing like Chris Gayle or Shai Hope with a block-block-boundary-block fashion. The game simply cannot replicate the role of a modern, dynamic accumulator who keeps dot balls to a minimum and can score a fifty with just a couple of boundaries like Babar Azam or Joe Root. All you need as proof of this is Virat Kohli's burgeoning rise in boundary percentage as you keep playing him in the career mode. Real youth players very often disappear into the abyss in favour of newgens (although that is supposed to have been fixed this year apparently but who knows). There is no sense of meaningful progression with a lower ranked side as you will always be limited in terms of opportunities, facilities and players. What is the point of even playing a game if all you get is stagnancy without real progression?

The absolute hilarity of all this is that a game that came out 8 years ago in Cricket Coach still has more teams and more features than this sad excuse of a game. And that game was developed by only one person. While it does lack polish and has some funny quirks and bugs, it still had ambition that this entire franchise seems to have abandoned. The only saving reason I can think of for the game not being subjected to major improvements every year is that the game's code must be an absolute nightmare to work with. Given what Harry had to say whilst working on his editor about how he struggled to find the variables that matched certain attributes, it could be true. Then again, would the devs actually start from scratch if given the choice when their current franchise seems to be a success no matter how less it changes?

And finally speaking of the editor. The only reason why we don't have an official editor when literally every other sports game out there has some form of one is because it would expose how little work the devs have put into each iteration. An editor would basically mean that the buyers could edit and customize each save to their heart's content and ensure that they can stay up to date with database changes and whatnot. Given that database changes are the only meaningful changes happening every year, it is easy to see why an editor has never been on the plate for these devs. Any other claim of 'oh but the sanctity and purity of the gaming experience shall be spoiled' is absolute tripe that they serve to hoodwink these buyers who have no remorse or regret.
 

Aislabie

Test Cricket is Best Cricket
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Real youth players very often disappear into the abyss in favour of newgens (although that is supposed to have been fixed this year apparently but who knows)
Yeah, some youth players do come good in this iteration. It's pretty random though - in one save, Surrey picked up Sam Young from the free agents pile, then when I faced them he was their first-choice opener - then when the first Test came along he was England's first choice opener. In the 2022 season

Sam Young.

So it's less "these players develop interestingly" and more "a random handful of them will start out just absurdly good. I don't hate that - I loved watching someone's Cricket 19 playthrough where Craig Overton became the new Ben Stokes and Freddie van den Bergh became a Test star. I'm all for players' attributes evolving with a hearty dose of randomness. But Sam Young didn't evolve, he just appeared that way.
 

Prashanth S Kharche

Club Captain
Joined
Apr 13, 2020
Is this the thread where I finally get to rant about this game? :spy

The very responses to your post on the official forum should tell you everything about this game's 'fans'. It is downright pathetic that every year's iteration is nearly the same (save for some minor improvements that should have been in long ago and the occasional major improvement like the DLS, career switching) and it is even more sad that there are a bunch of people who continue to buy the same and support this. After all, why would the devs care to make meaningful improvements when all they can see is a loyal bunch of supporters who seem to believe nothing can be done wrong by them and who'll buy every product of theirs no matter how similar it is?

I don't even get the small team excuse that is trotted out by these fans as we've got plenty of indie games on Steam, many of which have been developed by one man with multitudes of features. In contrast, all we get every year here are the same animations, the same UI, the same gameplay and some database changes. The game's also deliberately made dense without any attribute displays under the pretense of 'we want to challenge the players'. And yet there are no other tools beyond simple stats to actually play without attributes. If I wanted to play without attributes in a game like OOTP or even FM, there are numerous stats to describe how a particular player has played over the course of a season that tells me exactly what to expect from him and gives me a rough estimate of how capable he will be. But here though? All you get are the preferences which are hilariously wrong often. Virat Kohli prefers spin? Shreyas Iyer prefers pace strongly? Dinesh Karthik and KL Rahul have average aggression? I fully agree with @Aislabie, there is no attention paid to players beyond a cursory glance at their Cricinfo pages for their career numbers. Heck, some don't even get that royalty.

And don't get me started on the feature that is often trotted out every year in the form of 'revamped aggression'. It is supposed to be one of the highlights every year and yet you still have every cricketer playing like Chris Gayle or Shai Hope with a block-block-boundary-block fashion. The game simply cannot replicate the role of a modern, dynamic accumulator who keeps dot balls to a minimum and can score a fifty with just a couple of boundaries like Babar Azam or Joe Root. All you need as proof of this is Virat Kohli's burgeoning rise in boundary percentage as you keep playing him in the career mode. Real youth players very often disappear into the abyss in favour of newgens (although that is supposed to have been fixed this year apparently but who knows). There is no sense of meaningful progression with a lower ranked side as you will always be limited in terms of opportunities, facilities and players. What is the point of even playing a game if all you get is stagnancy without real progression?

The absolute hilarity of all this is that a game that came out 8 years ago in Cricket Coach still has more teams and more features than this sad excuse of a game. And that game was developed by only one person. While it does lack polish and has some funny quirks and bugs, it still had ambition that this entire franchise seems to have abandoned. The only saving reason I can think of for the game not being subjected to major improvements every year is that the game's code must be an absolute nightmare to work with. Given what Harry had to say whilst working on his editor about how he struggled to find the variables that matched certain attributes, it could be true. Then again, would the devs actually start from scratch if given the choice when their current franchise seems to be a success no matter how less it changes?

And finally speaking of the editor. The only reason why we don't have an official editor when literally every other sports game out there has some form of one is because it would expose how little work the devs have put into each iteration. An editor would basically mean that the buyers could edit and customize each save to their heart's content and ensure that they can stay up to date with database changes and whatnot. Given that database changes are the only meaningful changes happening every year, it is easy to see why an editor has never been on the plate for these devs. Any other claim of 'oh but the sanctity and purity of the gaming experience shall be spoiled' is absolute tripe that they serve to hoodwink these buyers who have no remorse or regret.
I think you're missing the point. While the fans of this game are in numbers, please don't assume that they are not frustrated!

The problem is that no one else is developing a game to give this one any competition. So, it's obvious that fans will keep supporting it in the hope that it keeps improving albeit in miniscule iterations every year.
 

ahmedleo414

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I think you're missing the point. While the fans of this game are in numbers, please don't assume that they are not frustrated!

The problem is that no one else is developing a game to give this one any competition. So, it's obvious that fans will keep supporting it in the hope that it keeps improving albeit in miniscule iterations every year.

That's the problem though. As @Bevab pointed out cricket coach came out so long ago and was developed by just one person and has much more features than cricket captain even though it was developed by one person.

I would rather the team take a year or two off make some meaningful changes and then release a new game rather than the exact same thing ever single year with little to no changes and just an updated roster.

I work hard for my money, and with everything getting so expensive around me, I would rather spend my money on things that I enjoy and not spend it on the same game year after year with minor changes and a roster update. If they make meaningful changes I will surely buy the next game.
 

Bevab

Staff Member
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Online Cricket Games Owned
  1. Don Bradman Cricket 14 - Steam PC
So I was intrigued by all the comments about the accumulator and hitter roles in ODIs being a thing now and decided to test it out. Got the demo after seeing literally no one have any proper videos of this game on YouTube and played a game of India vs ROW XI.

Babar Azam who has a boundary percentage of around 36 scores around 70 percent of his runs via.. boundaries. This was a big knock too so it wasn’t just a statistical anomaly from a cameo. It is the same with other players.

Kohli plays a short cameo and yes he also has the same pattern. These are two of the biggest accumulators ODI cricket has ever known and despite having and displaying literal stats showing this they score double the amount of runs from boundaries than they normally do. Average this over multiple games and these blokes will inevitably have a boundary percentage of around 50-60.

I’m not even going to go in detail over how the bowling orders make no sense with no discretion for specialist powerplay, middle or death bowlers, the lack of proper utilization of all-rounders’ bowling in tests, the complete non-tendency to pick 6 bowling options in white ball cricket (I picked Stokes and Shakib for the ROW side and guess what? Stokes bats six and Shakib bats at eight for the match), the constant use of openers in the middle order for odd reasons, the batting preference numbers being nothing more than cosmetic display, the completely illogical team selection of an all pace attack on turners and the most egregious of all, the third bowler in test cricket always being a pacer for the AI which leads to funny situations like a random batter bowling a few overs always before the spinners come on. The simple fact that one of the like three new headline features they make a big deal of doesn’t even work in accumulators and hitters shows how little attention and care is given to this sorry excuse of a game. I feel ripped off for investing some time into this little experiment, I‘m genuinely astounded as to how there are people out there unironically enjoying this game to keep supporting it year after year with their cash. I’d rather all of this go into a kickstarter project for Oli so that he actually finishes his Cricket Coach game before climate change consumes us all.
 

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