Hello again all. I know I say this all the time too, but I hope you are doing well.
As I'm continuing to create sets (and eventually rules) for two new games (more on that later), again there are just two new sets available this month.
For Precision Handball, the 2023 Men's World Championship set from the recently played tournament held in Poland and Sweden is available for £6.50. As always all 32 teams have now got full and basic team cards and quick score module ratings for the event won for the third time by Denmark, beating Olympic champions France in the final.
And for Precision Field Hockey, the 2023 Men's World Cup set from the recently played tournament held in India is available for £3. Again, this set uses the simplified play module rules, but all 16 teams also have goal scorer cards (including extra scorers) and goal keeper starters if you want them.
So that's all the new sets, and until the two new titles are released, I will continue to service new competitions only, although if you want to request an older competition you can continue to do so in the forum here.
As that's not much, I thought I'd let you know about the latest updates in the creation of Precision Down Under Football and Precision Volleyball. Both these titles were requested by PSG players.
For our Australian Rules football title, at release there will be five sets at release - 1998 for men, 2017 for men and women, and 2022 for men and women. I had tried to check what years Chris Kean's RJH Games title released, but the web store they used meant it wasn't archived. I know they released 1989, 2004, 2010, 2011 and 2012 (as well as 1998), as I have those. If anyone reading knows of others, please let me know.
I plan to do 2004 and 2010 at some point, but want to restrict the launch sets for now so I can actually get the title released. 1998 is the first year 'inside 50s' were recorded, but it is possible at some time in future earlier seasons can be created using a different method to generate scoring chances. The game will have both the full play method I played out three rounds of before my laptop gave up, and a quick score method for quicker result.
For our volleyball title, there will also be five sets at release - all four tournaments in 2022, which are both men's and women's World Championships, and similar Nation League tournaments, as well as the 2021 (2020) Olympics (men and women combined set). If I can fit it in and it doesn't delay the release too long, I will try to add the 2022 Division I Women's Tournament as I know people are interested in college volleyball too. There is someone, who I don't know if they'll want to be revealed or not, who is helping by collecting match data for earlier tournaments which will go back into the early 2000s, which I will release over time. As I said above, I want to restrict the launch sets here too, so I can get the game out. There will be both the point-by-point resolving method, as well as a quick score method included.
I have all the Down Under Football release sets created, and have completed the two World Championship sets for Volleyball already. I am leaving the rules to the end as I find that the hardest thing to do given the requirement for conciseness but also correctness and enough clarification to explain the rules to everyone who unlike me doesn't know them.
As it looks, I think my previous belief the titles would be released in March at earliest is going to be pushed back to April instead. Whilst creating sets doesn't take too long, the rules process, for me at least, probably will be more time-consuming. So to play it safe I will say that month. Apologies for the time slippage.
Before I go, one final thing to ask of anyone who has read this far. And this is not a project that would happen any time soon. But when Street Basketball was being created when I was with Joe Bryan at Sideline Strategy Games, I was also asked if a 5-on-5 version of the game could be created in future. Knowing he was designing a quick-play version of his full play title, I decided it wasn't going to be possible. But now I'm here alone, and have no idea if he will ever be in a position to create a new title again, I am open to the possibility of this happening.
So the question is - would a 5-on-5, therefore team results based and scoring shots and fouls only game like Street Basketball be of interest to anyone here? If the answer is yes, it will require some assistance from you to decide how long each section would be, given the differences in strategy between a 3-on-3 and 5-on-5 game. In theory, a 24 second shot clock would have 20 second segments, but especially for the last few minutes of each quarter that would be too long. What should the length be and when in each quarter should it be tighter? Also possible rules to convert 2-point shots to 3-point tries may be needed, although like with intentional fouling, in a non-possession-by-possession method, these may not even be possible.
I found a website that scrapes free throw type data from the NBA, although I don't know where on the NBA website it comes from. If anyone knows that, again please let me know.
No rush on deciding on this given it will be a longer-term idea if it happens, but I just want to put it out there for you all to think about if it's something wanted or not.
Thanks for reading,
Paul.