New Feature: Achievements
It has come to my attention that some people are doing things besides constantly playing Basketball GM. The game just isn't addictive enough. Maybe part of the problem is that the game has always been self-paced. There's no way to "win", and there aren't any real objectives other than ones you define yourself.
Well, now that's changed. Today I added an "Achievements" system. This provides some challenges you aim to accomplish, like sweeping all 16 wins in the playoffs, winning a title with a low payroll, and winning multiple consecutive titles. See them all here.
What do "skills" mean?
In Basketball GM, "skills" are the little labels you see next to a player's name, like "B" for a good ball handler and "3" for a good 3 point shooter. But what do they actually do? Well, that's changed recently, so let me explain.
New Improved Trade AI
The trade AI in Basketball GM has never been that bad, but people still found ways to exploit it. As I fixed those exploits, the code grew and grew and grew to the point where it was too confusing to manage.
So I ripped it all out and started over. Now, there is a new and (hopefully) improved trade AI. It was always decent at valuing current player production (that's easy, just look at the stats), but my main goal here was to improve how it valued other things. Like draft picks, overvalued/undervalued contracts, injured players, etc.
New Team Regions and Names
As I described in my previous post, Basketball GM needed some new cities and team names. Thanks to your great suggestions, we narrowed it down to a short survey that got over 100 responses (thank you to featherfooted for setting it up). You can view the final survey results here.
The Great Realignment
The fact that by default Basketball GM uses the same cities as NBA teams is not very fun. I'm going to change that some time soon, but I want things to go as smoothly as possible. Here's what's going to happen:
Anyone want to beta test new draft scouting features?
Usually I'm the only one to test things before features go live, but let's try something different...
I'm working on adding draft scouting to the game. Basically, the game pre-generate 3 years of draft classes ahead of time so you can get more of an idea about what a high draft pick in a certain season might get you. You can view future draft classes at any time, but the further into the future, the more uncertain the ratings.
Performance Issues in Old Leagues
On my computer, I can simulate a week of games in a new season in 20 seconds. For a league 20 seasons in, a week of games takes about 45 seconds. This is unacceptable, especially since I know that some people play literally hundreds of seasons in the same league.
Development History
I wrote the first line of code for Basketball GM back in 2008, after I had graduated from college but before I started grad school. That code was C#, which I had never used before. My primary goal was to learn a new programming language and learn how to make traditional desktop GUI software, as previously I had only made software with either command line or web UIs. I was not sure if I was a good enough programmer to complete such an ambitious project, but I figured I'd give it a shot.
Welcome to the Basketball GM Blog!
Welcome to the Basketball GM Blog! The main purpose of this blog is to write about the development of Basketball GM, a free online single-player basketball management simulation game. Additionally, there will be some other basketball-related posts here from time to time, such as the two posts below this one. Those are old posts from my personal blog that I decided fit better here, so I moved them. Also, it's nice to start a blog with at least a little content already posted, right?
The effect of a blocked jump shot on future jump shots in the NBA
If an NBA player gets a jump shot blocked, does it change the way he plays the rest of the game? You can imagine there could be a psychological effect like a loss of confidence, or a conscious/subconscious decision to try harder to avoid being blocked again which could harm shooting efficiency. Basketball statistics legend Dean Oliver recently Tweeted the claim that it has a big effect on Steph Curry and basketball players in general. But is it actually true? And how big is the effect? Let's look at some data.