In the last devlog I showed off Franchise mode and said it was built, but had barely been played. It has been getting played since via a playtest, and there has been plenty to fix and improve. A lot of the last few weeks has been going back over things. How the skating feels, how the building sounds, whether a menu is annoying after you have used it a thousand times. I keep calling it polish, but a lot of it is rework I wish I thought of earlier. There are a few new things too. This is the current development build, so some of the newest stuff is still being tested. Franchise and the collectible rewards are full game stuff.
I wrote about this back in July, and I am still working on it. Turning at speed now has a wider arc and flows more "naturally". Reversing direction means stopping before going the other way. Let go of the stick and the player actually glides, which means his legs stop moving. At low speed you can still pivot quickly. I want you to be able to pick up a loose puck without it feeling like an Austin Powers 40 point turn. Getting that balance right has taken a few passes, because I want it to feel like ice while still feeling better than the current NHL games (in my opinion). A recent replay. Running into a player also used to stop both players. Glancing contact lets you keep moving now, while a proper collision now can take out both players, D level beer league head down style. The goalies have had more work on when to leave the crease and what to do once they get the puck. They'll "look" for an outlet before going out to collect it, then make the play and get back. For shooting, one timers need a pass arriving where your forehand can actually reach it. Holding shoot could turn a pass behind your back into a perfect shot, which even for this game was a bit unrealistic. Offsides and icings have had a bigger pass too, including delayed offside, tag up logic, and CPU teammates that try to stay onsides. Both are still optional and defaulted to off. You can also change your forecheck and defensive coverage before a game or from the pause menu.
The crowd was settling down too quickly after a goal. You would score, hear the reaction, and by the time the replay and faceoff were over the building had mostly forgotten about it. Now ,the crowd carries through the replay and into the next shift. A late tying goal, an overtime winner, or a playoff goal gets a louder reaction. Pressure and big saves build the crowd up between goals too, so there is more going on in the room while you are playing. The rest of the sound has had a lot of work around that. New skating recordings, clearer shots and post dings, less repetitive scraping from all the CPU players, and better merging between music at stoppages. The arena announcer sticks to introductions, penalties, and reading out the goal. The play by play is still defaulted off, but if you want he can still yell about the play. That is still me, probably unfortunately. The buildings got another pass as well. Different roofs, more detail in the concourses and suites, and jumbotrons that hang from the actual roof. The jerseys, ice, boards, and sticks have all had work. I have spent a probably unreasonable amount of time getting stripes to stay straight on the arms while moving, but finally they sit still. A big save or a huge hit can also get a replay at the next whistle now. The game picks one replay for the stoppage, and ordinary saves and checks do not qualify. I want to see the good moments without making every faceoff take forever, so they're all skipable of course.
Last time I wrote about rebuilding the trade room because it sucked to use. I have continued changing it. You can tell the rest of the league whether you are buying, holding, or selling, and incoming offers pay attention to that. EX: If I am selling, I want picks and young players coming back. There is also an OFF LIMITS tag for players you want to keep, including prospects. Normal offers leave them alone, although an occasional GM can still come in with a ridiculous overpay. Some of the most useful changes are smaller. Scouts can automatically take another assignment when they finish. Simming shows its progress and has a STOP SIM button, so you can interrupt it and keep the games already completed. It tells you when you are heading to the trade deadline, and once you are eliminated you can finish the remaining playoffs in one go. The progress card and STOP SIM button, shown here in a short test season. Seasons now go up to 82 games, with a schedule that gets you around the whole league while giving your division rivals more dates. Injuries, suspensions, and minor league replacements have had a pass so the lineup does change night to night. The salary cap was climbing too quickly, so its growth now follows league revenue more gradually. For your goals, the owner gives proper credit for a Cup and a deep playoff run. Winning championships should buy you a little patience from the guy upstairs (the owner, not god). League News is shorter and easier to read, with a newspaper and sports radio stations for each city and the facts right under the headline. Player histories, stat screens, and controller navigation have had attention too. You should be able to reach the last player in a list without the menu deciding you wanted the "close" button halfway down.
Win a Cup in Franchise and the banner gets raised at your first home game the following season. You can choose to retire a qualifying club legend's number, and that goes up too. As the career goes on, the building keeps that history. There are playoff beards now as well. They grow as you get deeper into the bracket, and not everybody is equally good at it (Looking at you, Sidney). Some players get a full beard, some try for four rounds and have tiny little bit of scruff. From clean shaven to Round 4. The Locker Room also has collectible jerseys and gear earned through playing. Helmets, gloves, patches, stick tape, and some longer-term rewards to work toward. The Jersey Rack shows what you own and what you still need to do.
Trying to up performance has taken up a lot of these weeks. There have been fixes for stalls around faceoffs, fights, and replays, along with work on how much the players and arena cost against CPU limitations on older hardware. The Steam Deck settings have had another pass based on what people are actually getting in games. This is still ongoing, I can't call handheld performance solved from a test on my desktop. There is an optional performance report in "Video settings" now that records a minute of play and saves it locally, which should help track down the cases that are still giving people trouble. If you do that, shoot me a message on discord and I'll take a look. If something feels wrong, tell me. Especially the skating, the goalies, and anything that makes a menu frustrating to use. The whole note can be "this feels weird." That is useful, but a bit more context is always nice too. Wishlist on Steam.