1.16 (BETA) Patch

[puresimmer]

As always, note this is a BETA patch. Use it at your own risk. If you prefer to play it safe, you may want to wait for the official patch. That said, all Beta patches are typically extremely stable..

http://www.psmultiplayer.150m.com/PureSim2007-SetupRelease-v116_Beta_Patch.exe (27mb)


Here is the change log since the 1.10 official patch:

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=== 1.16 Beta Changes ===

- Fix: Fixed Error 91 generating HTML Almanac (Bug introduced in Beta 1.13)

- Tweak: If the user decides to import some real players into the association just before the amateur draft, then those players will now be available to be signed in the amateur draft.

- Change: Auto backup now only keeps a max of 2 old backups (as opposed to 5).

- Tweak: Teams are more aggressive in the amateur draft, in the past some teams would not pick in every round, now they are more likely to (assuming the roster is not already stocked)

- Tweak: Trade AI was slightly over-valuing middle relievers, so in some cases if 3 or 4 middler relievers were offered it was a bit too easy to obtain a top tier player


=== 1.15 Beta Changes ===

- Fix: Fixed "Assertion Failed" crash error that was introduced in Beta 1.14 (It was crashing on a career-ending injury)

- New: New PSPN Story notes when a record-breaking hitting streak comes to an end. Note, this only gets mentioned on hitting streaks of 15 games or more.

- Tweak: Existing PSPN "Active Hitting Streaks" story makes note of teh current all-time record, and lists players in boldface type that are currently tied/ahead of the record.

- Fix: On the pre-game lineup screen, the new feature added in the beta to show the player names colorized based on their fatigue level was showing the home and visitor teams with the same colors.


=== 1.14 Beta Changes ===

- Fix: If the pitcher was injured while batting in a game that the user was managing, then the game would correctly prompt to replace him, however no matter what the user did PureSim would not accept the replacement, so the user would be locked on the lineup dialog with no way out except terminating the game via end task or CTRL-ALT-DEL.

- New: Added "View Card" link to player almanac page, which allows the player card to be viewed from the player's almanac page.

- New: Added "Transactions" section to season almanac page

- BIG Tweak: Injury severity/healing duration variation greatly increased. You'll see a greater number of significant injuries and a wider range of severity in general. Estimated days until return is now more accurate as well. Note, if you play an injured guy they heal more slowly, players on the DL heal the fastest (even over players on the bench but not the DL)

- BIG Tweak: Injuries can now span seasons. For example, its possible for a player to get an injury that requires almost a full year to heal.

=== 1.13 beta changes ===

- BIG Tweak: Greatly improved time period specific pitcher usage, leading to more complete games, IP etc in eras where it was all about the starter. A lot of this revolved around an AI that was just too aggressive with the pinch hitter usage in the early years of baseball, where in fact this was VERY rare.

- BIG Tweak: No longer imposing restrictions on the number of pitchers a team must carry on the major league roster. The AI is also cognizant of this, and based on the time period it will carry an appropriate number of pitchers (e.g. in 1901 it may carry a total of 7 with 4 starters and no closer)

- Tweak: The pre-game lineup screen shows the players names color-coded based on their fatigue level

- Tweak: On PSPNCast the team info windows are always hidden when the graphical ball flight animation is playing. This can help with some ball park photos that don't match the layout of the one that ships with the game (note in a previous beta I was hiding the scoreboard as well, but decided to put that back...)

=== 1.12 beta changes ===

- New: The AI now dynamically adjusts it's GM/Managerial tendencies based on the team's charateristoics

- Tweak: On the "Import Real Players" screen the previous default sort order was AB, now it is always alphabetical

- Speed: No longer doing unnecessary compact of the secondary (.psx) database in the off season. When association files got up over 1gb this was taking an exceedingly long time and providing little benefit. Basically after 50 or so years of history in larger associations, this would bring the off season to a crawl. Note, the primary (.psa) association file *is* still being compacted, and that is very important.

- New: Added SAC Bunt frequency managerial tendency

- New: Press ANY key during animated ball flight to skip the rest of the animation sequence.

- New: Added [x] Disable Ambient Sounds option to the PSPNCast "Play Options" dialog.

- Fix: Greatly reduced chance a runner will score when attempting to steal home.

- Fix: When managing a game, if the user clicked "OF Depth" as opposed to pressing the "O" key, instead of toggling the outfield depth PureSim would start the play. No click works just like pressing "O" works, it toggles through the outfield depth options with each click.

- Fix: SLG was wrong in some cases on the splits tab on the player card.

- Fix: Very Rare "Error 3022" When Building almanac, along with some additional robustness improvements in that area

- Fix: If the user viewed splits for a player, then clicked the "next" link to move to another player, then the splits would not be displayed for the next player if the user attempted to view them

- Fix: PSPNCast was sometimes showing the on field message in "red" when the play result was a base hit or home run.

- Fix: In some cases the tooltip for the fielders on the defensive team was showing their offensive ratings as opposed to their defensive ones

- New: Now have ability to have bullpens without closers. PureSim's AI is cognizant of this as well. This feature is setup when you start the association. It is typically used to better simulate eras in history where the closer was not employed in the pen. Note, as your association transitions into the modern era PureSim will prompt you to see if you'd like to transition to using the closer.

- Tweak: Multiple improvements to ball flight trajectories on PSPNCast

- Tweak: Added warning message that lets user know that they are using a non-standard ball park image, and that in-game ball flight animation will suffer horrible performance. Note, park images should be 1024x768

- Tweak: When playing in unattended auto play mode the "Please Wait" dialog has been moved down the screen and made more translucent so the standings are clearly visible at all times.

- Tweak: No longer allowing user to import a park photo unless it is a 1024x768 .jpg file

- Cosmetic: Alignement of "Hall of Fame Member" text on player card was off a bit

- New: Player Affinity mode - If you choose this option (only avail for historical / real players association) the following will happen:

1. Teams will be highly likely to try and keep their makeup similar to what it was in real life, so if a player's contract is expiring in 1957, but he actually played with that team through 1960 in real life, then there is a high probability the team will offer an extension, and a high probability he will accept.

2. There is a very high probability that teams will sign rookies based on when they
appeared on that team in real life. For example I just played an association through the early 80's into the 90's and it was cool to see Griffey Junior show up on the M's and to see all the young talent come streaming into Cleveland as they went through that amazing build...

The net result is if you are looking for career play that retains a lot of flavor from reality even as the career progresses, this is a fun option. Note it is not 100% as there are tons of other issues in the mix with finances, trading etc. Still that actually keeps it fun.

- Tweak: Starter endurance, usage and number of complete games is now more greatly influenced by the time period being simulated (e.g. you'll see more complete games back in the early years of Baseball)

[XCom]

This day to day support of the game is well worth the sticker price!  Thanks as always for your hard work, Shaun.

[RandyChase]

"- Tweak: If the user decides to import some real players into the association just before the amateur draft, then those players will now be available to be signed in the amateur draft. "
 
Thanks for fixing this one Shaun!

[Taz0713]

This is really a newbie question, sorry:
 
Would you recommend updating to the beta patch or is there enough that still is being tested to suggest waiting for the official patch? 
 
I have to admit that some of the items being updated are very appealing, as I would love to include in my current association.  My concern is that I am still learning the game and don't want to get caught in some possible error issues.
 
I appreciate the suggestions.
 
Randy

[Paul Vebber]

I've been upgrading as the patches come out throughout Beta testing and have not seen any issues upgrading my associations and continuing. A couple times I had database errors crash, but the worst that ever happened was I had to restart Free agent signing when I restarted the game. Neither happened again.

[Amaroq]

ORIGINAL: Taz0713
Would you recommend updating to the beta patch or is there enough that still is being tested to suggest waiting for the official patch?

I have to admit that some of the items being updated are very appealing, as I would love to include in my current association. My concern is that I am still learning the game and don't want to get caught in some possible error issues.

Taz - I would say "Don't upgrade unless you're willing to *chance* losing data." By this I mean, if you're the personality type that would stress over the possibility, and for whom it would be a catastrophe if your season froze up and you had to go back to the previous off-season, then don't do a beta patch - especially not if it would turn you off of this game forever.

On the other hand, if you're familiar with the development process, you're aware of the possibility and willing to 'forgive' and report the occasional odd behavior, and would be able to take it if worst came to worst and your had to replay a season, and are in fact excited about the possibility of helping guide the development of the game through your feedback in the beta forum - then upgrading to a beta patch is for you.

What you can't expect is for it to be as 'solid' and 'tested' as an official release is: for the launch, we had a good team of guys banging on the game for weeks before you ever saw it.. for the beta patches, you're seeing it 'hot off the presses', with no official testing between the developer and your build: so, the *odds* of there being a bug are much higher.

If you decide to go to beta patch, I recommend that you start 'backing up' your association every few hours, so if you lose data you don't have to go too far back, whether thats once-per-season (for GM types) or perhaps once-per-month (for manager types).

(In practice, the game usually recovers gracefully even after a crash bug - I'm still happily playing an association which I started with the first test build. Its gone through maybe a dozen 'crash' bugs over the many test builds, etc, but that's never cost me data, or enjoyment.)

[Taz0713]

[Taz - I would say "Don't upgrade unless you're willing to *chance* losing data." By this I mean, if you're the personality type that would stress over the possibility, and for whom it would be a catastrophe if your season froze up and you had to go back to the previous off-season, then don't do a beta patch - especially not if it would turn you off of this game forever.

On the other hand, if you're familiar with the development process, you're aware of the possibility and willing to 'forgive' and report the occasional odd behavior, and would be able to take it if worst came to worst and your had to replay a season, and are in fact excited about the possibility of helping guide the development of the game through your feedback in the beta forum - then upgrading to a beta patch is for you.

What you can't expect is for it to be as 'solid' and 'tested' as an official release is: for the launch, we had a good team of guys banging on the game for weeks before you ever saw it.. for the beta patches, you're seeing it 'hot off the presses', with no official testing between the developer and your build: so, the *odds* of there being a bug are much higher.

If you decide to go to beta patch, I recommend that you start 'backing up' your association every few hours, so if you lose data you don't have to go too far back, whether thats once-per-season (for GM types) or perhaps once-per-month (for manager types).

(In practice, the game usually recovers gracefully even after a crash bug - I'm still happily playing an association which I started with the first test build. Its gone through maybe a dozen 'crash' bugs over the many test builds, etc, but that's never cost me data, or enjoyment.)

I am the type of person that finds myself getting really attached to an association and players on my team. I guess it is my little old universe that I fall in love with, kindof like a child. I would hate to see it die or something.

If I had a little better understanding about the backups, this would not be a problem. Personally, I would love to be someone that is able to add or help move the game forward. I just was curious from a stability point of view.

The only way I would lose enjoyment from the game would constant breakdowns from official releases and follow up official patches. Uploading a beta patch, I would have an understanding of the possiblities of errors.

Thanks again.

Randy

[Paul Vebber]

The backups are easy to use.

If something happens and you want to go back to a previous backup, just move or delete the .psa and .psx files in the psa folder and remove the ".backup_4" or what ever the most recent backup is. When you start the game you will back at the point where the association was thatwhen the backup was done. If you are REALLY conservative, you can periodically burn your backups to a CD or save them on a thumb drive.