Anyone play Strat-o-Matic Football?

Grim.Reaper · August 14, 2016, 02:00:47 PM

With football season upon us, got the itch to get back to football games...since there isn't a new serious football career games on the horizon (unless FOF8 makes an appearance), I am going back to my season replay games, which I know is not everyone's favorite type of game. Just like earlier this year when I tried Strat Baseball, I am getting the itch to try Strat Football since it will be released this week, tried it about 5 or 6 years ago and was reasonable. Although in season replay games, I find myself playing ActionPC Football and Second and Ten Football more.

Just curious if anybody out there is a regular player of Strat Football and especially over the last 5 or 6 years would like to know if any major improvements worth getting.

And yes I know people will respond wanting a career game or a front page football clone, but there are room for these types of games too:)

GJK · August 16, 2016, 10:01:12 PM

My brother just bought it and is awaiting the release. I'll let you know his thoughts once he has it in hand and has given it some playings.

Nefaro · August 17, 2016, 12:41:49 AM

This thread made me go reload Second And Ten.

Well played, sir. Well played. O0

Grim.Reaper · August 17, 2016, 04:47:07 AM

Quote from: GJK on August 16, 2016, 10:01:12 PM
My brother just bought it and is awaiting the release. I'll let you know his thoughts once he has it in hand and has given it some playings.

Thanks...the game is still delayed, but they hope to release sometime this week.

GJK · August 17, 2016, 06:45:24 AM

My question is though, in any of these games - do you do much more than just picking a play and reading the scrolling text to see the outcome while playing an actual game?

Nefaro · August 17, 2016, 07:31:49 AM

Quote from: GJK on August 17, 2016, 06:45:24 AM
My question is though, in any of these games - do you do much more than just picking a play and reading the scrolling text to see the outcome while playing an actual game?

That's pretty much it on these "season replay" types. No trading in flesh over multiple seasons as a career GM. :-\

But Grim had this same complaint in his OP. Not enough career type football games out there, and the ones that occasionally get done.. aren't quite done.

I end up playing a game or two in SAT. Then switch over to actual long-term campaigning in OOTP, Football Manager, or (now) Eastside Hockey Manager. American Football is the only major sport that doesn't have a decent Career sim, so we complain about it every year in the hopes someone will actually finish one, or update their ancient core games to something new & full-featured.

PanzersEast · August 17, 2016, 11:36:04 AM

I still go back to Front Office Football...... still the only multi-season option. >:(

PE

Grim.Reaper · August 17, 2016, 05:24:01 PM

Quote from: Nefaro on August 17, 2016, 07:31:49 AM
Quote from: GJK on August 17, 2016, 06:45:24 AM
My question is though, in any of these games - do you do much more than just picking a play and reading the scrolling text to see the outcome while playing an actual game?

That's pretty much it on these "season replay" types. No trading in flesh over multiple seasons as a career GM. :-\

But Grim had this same complaint in his OP. Not enough career type football games out there, and the ones that occasionally get done.. aren't quite done.

I end up playing a game or two in SAT. Then switch over to actual long-term campaigning in OOTP, Football Manager, or (now) Eastside Hockey Manager. American Football is the only major sport that doesn't have a decent Career sim, so we complain about it every year in the hopes someone will actually finish one, or update their ancient core games to something new & full-featured.

I don't know, I think that is a bit of over simplification for season replay games. Yes, it does not have any features like career games (i.e. trading, multi year, finances, progression, etc.) have, but these type of games can't be compared......season replay games focus on the individual game management and typically are much stronger in that category that career games. Usually in these games, you have good options to call the plays and impact the games, some more than others. So if your into coaching, these games are actually better in that regards, at least today. Season replay also have pretty strong support for draft leagues and cater to people who love to see their stats.

I completely understand some people don't like season replay games and that's fine, but they are pretty solid for people who enjoy that part of a sports game.

Grim.Reaper · August 17, 2016, 05:25:16 PM

And by the way, Strat Football did release today:)

vyshka · August 19, 2016, 01:10:00 PM

I was a fan of Statis-Pro Football back when it was a thing. I'm not sure if they ever made a computer version of that. I played in a league at the local hobby store when I was jr. high & high school, and we carried teams over season to season. We'd have a draft for new players a couple weeks after the new card set would come out. I remember having an awesome draft one season that would've turned into a great team in a year or two, and then I traded most of it away in a huge trade that landed me Vinny Testaverde a couple weeks before he went color blind. Tim Brown blew out his knee not long after as well. It was my greatest and worst gaming moments happening in the span of about a week.

Grim.Reaper · August 19, 2016, 04:20:07 PM

Yes, they have computer version of it.

GJK · August 19, 2016, 05:22:50 PM

My brother's initial report was very favorable. If he puts it down for long enough, I'll see if I can get some more of his "likes" and "dislikes" about it. I'm still curious to see if it's more than just picking the right play to call at the right time and getting a good dice result or not. He did say that it has a built in league management system so that's a big plus. We also enjoy playing Blood Bowl (my vassal module via pbem) and while it's definitely not NFL football, it's cool to actually play out the actual "plays". It'd be cool to have something like that for pro-football but it would just take forever to play a full game (remember SPI's old mag game "Scrimmage"?).

Grim.Reaper · August 19, 2016, 05:40:42 PM

Quote from: GJK on August 19, 2016, 05:22:50 PM
I'm still curious to see if it's more than just picking the right play to call at the right time and getting a good dice result or not.

Not sure what you mean....the game does allow a full season replay which entails playing out the entire season...while your doing that, you setup team strategy, make roster changes, have injuries, decide lineups, depth charts, etc...during an actual game, you do choose your offensive/defensive play, but there is more than just the play itself....you choose formation type, play call, primary target, and alignment of your players. The game results are largely based on the "player cards" which have each player rated for various things....basically the game's secret sauce in what makes it good in the eyes of the fans.

If your looking for career play type features, then this is not that game....has no trading, multiple years, progression, training camps, etc.

vyshka · August 19, 2016, 05:53:33 PM

If you were playing with others you could add that on as we did with Statis-Pro football. I imagine Stratomatic sells card sets separately for seasons right? IIRC they used to for baseball at least.

So new set of cards come out, people get the updated cards for their players and then hold a draft for players that are available.

Don't mind me, I keep thinking about the boardgame, not the computer game.

GJK · August 19, 2016, 06:09:56 PM

Quote from: Grim.Reaper on August 19, 2016, 05:40:42 PM
Quote from: GJK on August 19, 2016, 05:22:50 PM
I'm still curious to see if it's more than just picking the right play to call at the right time and getting a good dice result or not.

Not sure what you mean....the game does allow a full season replay which entails playing out the entire season...while your doing that, you setup team strategy, make roster changes, have injuries, decide lineups, depth charts, etc...during an actual game, you do choose your offensive/defensive play, but there is more than just the play itself....you choose formation type, play call, primary target, and alignment of your players. The game results are largely based on the "player cards" which have each player rated for various things....basically the game's secret sauce in what makes it good in the eyes of the fans.

If your looking for career play type features, then this is not that game....has no trading, multiple years, progression, training camps, etc.

Me? No, I don't care for career play type features. You keep bringing that up as if though you feel that you need to defend this game because it doesn't have that. :)

Good to know that you have some decisions to make during a game. I'm used to NFL Strategy and Pizza Box Football (yes, lightweight games for sure) that present nothing more than "pick a play and roll the dice, get your outcome". Good that there's different personalities and their skills on the teams. So I gather that if you have a star running back, you can gear your play calling decisions towards getting him more touches than you might normally see a HB get. Question on the play selection though - can you make adjustments or is the formation dependent upon the play called? You mentioned being able to change formations and alignments- how does that work in the game?