Interviews

March 3, 2008

Major League Baseball 2K8 Advancements and Enhancements with Producer Ben Brinkman
By Louis Bedigian

“This is a big jump from 2K7 to 2K8. We've added a lot more depth and features.”

Console transitions are rough. Just when the developers think they've mastered the current crop of game machines, another is released – then another, and before they know it, another. It's an ongoing challenge that has prompted some to compare game design to rocket science.

MLB 2K6 and MLB 2K7 were a part of the console transition. In addition to the aging console releases, these sports titles had to be brought up to the new generation. At the time that meant going back to the drawing board for gameplay refinements. "This year," says Major League Baseball 2K8 Producer Ben Brinkman, "it had to be about continuing to make a great baseball simulation and make it a new experience for people."

Part of the success in doing that is tied to 2K Sports’ all-new batter and throwing AI, the addition of 90 minor league teams, and a new trading card feature.  "Overall, this is a big jump from 2K7 to 2K8. We've added a lot more depth and features. We're really excited about getting the game out there."

New Pitching Interface

One of the most important advancements in MLB 2K8 development has been the pitching system. Ben said that after analyzing what had already been done, they realized that some pitching elements were really cool. Others, however, were not. As such, MLB 2K8 needed to take the controls to another level.

"That's where the analog pitching came about," Brinkman revealed. "It was something we came up with when we finished [2K7] last year. We knew we had to do something new. It started out with the idea, let's try it on right stick, just the idea of Tiger Woods, Fight Night, which used the right stick for more organic movement. What we ended up doing was focusing on making it a more natural feeling where you're throwing the pitch with the right stick and it feels like you're actually throwing the ball.

"The difference pitch inputs have different motions on the stick. It sounds pretty complex but in reality it's pretty straightforward. Once you figure out the depths to pitching it becomes quite intuitive. It's something that, in the past you could basically throw in a corner and hit it every time. Now there's all sorts of various areas for where the pitch is supposed to go. You're not going to miss by huge amounts. But if you're aiming for the corner and you mess up the pitch, you might aim outside of the strike zone. So there's a lot more gameplay there."

The Frame Game

One thing all the developers at 2K Sports have in common is their goal to achieve 60fps in every title. "Our goal this year was 60fps, and we will be up around 60fps pretty consistently," Brinkman confirmed. "We won't get down to 30fps ever. It's definitely gonna be a much more fluid experience than last year, especially on PS3, which just chugged most of the time. We did a lot of optimization early on instead of just trying to squeeze it in at the end. We did get it running a lot smoother, especially on PS3. The batter/pitcher game never drops below 60fps; in the field, it does if there's a lot of stuff going on but it's not that drastic."

Achieve and Receive

Xbox Live Achievements have been very successful, but can they be more than a showpiece for your success? Brinkman thinks so. "I love Xbox Live Achievements, and I'm sure a lot of you do as well," he said. "We wanted to give people a reason to play the game over and over, so we came up with the idea of trading cards. It's not a new idea but the way we're doing it really is. Each team can have anywhere between 12 and 15 trading cards that you can earn. It'll give you a reason not only to play as your favorite team but the other teams as well to get their cards.

"I don't know if a lot of people play as some of the lesser teams, but now you have a reason to. Do things like steal three bases in a game and you'll get a card. There are different tiers of cards -- the least rare to most rare. Depending on the level of difficulty you're playing on, if you're playing on Legend, the highest level in the game, you have the highest chance of winning the most rare card. If you're playing on Rookie you have the chance of winning the least card.

"You can complete your set by winning these in-game challenges. You also can complete them by winning wild cards in the game, and that's by doing anything from hitting a single to hitting a home run, there's a chance of winning a card. With that goal you either get a random card or a pack of cards. That's cool too because you open a pack of cards and you automatically get at least one unlockable, one legendary player, additional cards like that.

"With these cards there are a couple things you can do. You can trade 'em with your buddy to complete your set. What's really cool is you can actually put together a card team using the salary cap. Each card has a monetary value – not real-world, but in our game. You can put together a card team and play online. You can say, 'Look at my team, I've got all these platinum level (the rarest level) cards on my team.'

"When I play a game, it's really rewarding when I do something and know who all my players are and I know what I need to do to unlock their cards, and I see the thing on the bottom of the screen, 'You've unlocked [enter player here] card.' It's a level of satisfaction that you've never had before. It makes you want to go back and try to earn all of the cards.

Card Updates

After collecting the virtual cards packed in the game, players can look forward to updates via Xbox Live and the PlayStation Network. Brinkman comments: "One of the things we're doing is having a series of updated cards. If you collected cards growing up you may remember Topps doing an updated set at the end of the season with all the people who changed teams throughout the course of the year, and then rookie players would come up. We're working on something along those lines as well.

"The first one will be on or around the ship date, with the new cards, players, new uniforms. Johan Santana, his card is with the Twins. With the ship game, you'll unlock that card with the Twins. With the downloadable package there will be a different challenge to unlock that card with the Mets. It's pretty cool. We'll be doing this for Xbox 360 and PS3."

Value

As gamers, we all wrestle with the same issue: will the $60 spent on a new game be worth every penny? Will we finish it in a day? A week? A month? Will we have the urge to return when all is said and done? Brinkman agrees and hopes that MLB 2K8 will address many of those issues. He comments: "When I spend $60 on a game, I don't want it to be something that I just pick up and master. It has to be something that I learn over time, that changes the experience for me. With pitching, right out of the box, if you don't know what you're doing – it's not easy.

"But if you learn, if you pitch, if you use the pitching tutorial, it'll tell you exactly what you're doing right and what you're doing wrong. Once you wrap your head around it, it's very simple. At first, it'll take 5 – 10 minutes, to figure out what you have to do. It becomes a really rewarding experience and is the closest you'll come to throwing a baseball."

Problem Solved

Although graphics are important, they are not the prime element in creating a great game. Brinkman concurs, saying, "Last year was more about looking good than feeling good. We decided pretty early on that that wasn't going to cut it. There's nothing fun about having an icon on screen that says 'push stick' and the guy just runs from there and catches the ball. He can run 50 feet to catch the ball. That was something that didn't work, and something we went back to the drawing board on. It's a lot more intuitive and a lot more consistent with the way balls work with the rest of the game. And dives are now instantaneous – if you tell a guy to dive, he's going to dive."