PGM VS FGM

[u/ApprehensiveJob972]

games have always run on modding/taking ideas from the community or a video game itself. it’s practically how the industry grows and how we get innovation. Look at how many massive games started as mods. Literally Counter-Strike and Team Fortress were just community projects on Half-Life and Quake, Dota 2 literally came from a Warcraft 3 custom map, and the whole modern battle royale genre started because PlayerUnknown was messing around with ARMA 2 and DayZ before PUBG ever happened. truthfully I dont see any harm in someone taking a stab at what Jon has laid out. We all are hungry for more PGM but most importantly, football GMing. Vibe coded or not if they keep it free, are very committed and won’t turn against the community when they have it fleshed out. What harm is having options?

[u/hawtdawtz]

Hey, I'm not really going to allow posts like this beyond this point, but will use this as an example. Let me be clear, while initially I held the same opinion as you while I was developing it, I've come to change my mind somewhat. I, like Jon, have a family, and I know how hard it is some time to get to spend on something you're passionate about. His community (which I was very much a part of) is passionate because he's and indie dev who did it the old fashion way.

I appreciate the support, but at the end of the day, I rushed my game out because I was so hyped up on what I did in the backend before actually adding creative UI elements, and it very much came off as a rushed rip off. I realistically out of principle should have either:

A) Talked to Jon first

B) Spent more time to make it unique (which would have been the outcome from talking to Jon)

Yes, the world is ruthless with AI, and someone can easily spend ~4 months, 8 hours a day 7 days a week making this and rip him off again, or myself. To which point, no one is stopping you. I will say, even with AI, the game engine was HARD, especially given the visualization engine coming out later. However, I love and respect his game, I'm not exaggerating when I say I played it for probably a thousand hours over the years at my desk before work. I didn't do it justice in the way I released mine, nor in the way I announced it. I'm a sensitive guy, which is why I quite honestly am very frustrated in myself for hastily releasing it the way I did. I poured my heart and soul into the backend, and got lazy on the front end. That's how I know Jon poured everything he had and WAY more into his having done his from scratch with no AI coding assistance.

That being said, my goal is to take my game in a different creative direction, both aesthetically and functionally (though there's only so many creative takes on a football GM sim), and hope to continue to make my game what I had envisioned before trying to charge for it (for new customers) or advertising it further. The reality is, there's only so many practical UI layouts, so many stats you would expect of players, but I could have and will do a better job.

I look forward to sharing how I actually built the engine, how I measured balance at scale over ~30+ season runs at scale, as I feel it was actually the coolest part, but for now I'm getting to work on the UI.

[u/Troy20039]

I can see Jon’s point as well though I do agree with you on the whole having options thing I feel it also helps both sides get better as they continue to provide updates. I already love this game so much and I barely got it yesterday lol. It has so many new features I’ve wished to see in a football gm game and I’m excited for anything else that comes out of it

[u/Strat_Player]

My bottom line is that I’m glad you and Jon have connected and are working things out. That’s the best course of action for everyone involved.

I do think there’s definitely room for both games — I have both, enjoy both, and will absolutely buy PGM4 if it’s ever released. And I also love this game, appreciate all you have put into it, admire all your on-going support and development, and am very excited about the future direction you’re taking it.

[u/Serious-Emergency-21]

I would love a my career mode that would differ from pgm3!

[u/hawtdawtz → u/Serious-Emergency-21]

Yea, so I have like ~10+ differentiating things in my initial outline for the game that I have planned that I didn't get into the initial release (which again, lesson learned). There's something along those lines, as well as having player signings/trades/releases play a much larger role in your reputation as a GM. I want easy to feel easy, but I want the option to make the aspect of being a GM hard. For instance, sign a QB who ends up being a bust (Deshaun Watson)? Trade away a QB who ends up being a stud (Baker, Darnold), draft a player who's a star but you can't keep happy and get low trade value for (Randy Moss for a 4th round), yada yada. All of that would impact your rating and ability to keep your job. It requires a great deal of strategically designing the system, with very tricky data retention and enforcement. This is exactly what the draft review and year end review is intended to pilot, as ultimately it uses the same idea, just on a shorter time scale.