2016 and beyond

[Kccitystar]

Hi everyone.

I hope this finds everyone well and in good health. I just wanted to say thank you for being amazing members of this community. I remember 10 years ago being the 4th or 7th member of this site when Trues started it and thinking to myself that this would be my home for baseball stuff for a long time, even if I wasn't modding anything anymore. I've met a lot of great friends on this site and still have a solid friendship with them to this day as we still talk baseball but discuss other things as well. You know, when you communicate with so many people on a daily basis they begin to feel less like friends but more like family....

But anyway *waves hands* let's discuss some ideas for 2016. As we know, the site is over 10 years old and a lot of stuff on the web has been developed in the past 10 years: Facebook, Twitter, Youtube, Reddit, the loss of MVP as a series, the rise of MLB The Show, 2K making baseball games for a while then leaving the baseball gaming world altogether...it can feel like we're slowly fading into obscurity sometimes and turning into just a snapshot/archive of content for MVP Baseball 2005 and earlier games. I don't want that to happen to this community.

I think we should evolve into a community that covers baseball, period, while placing a focus on our bread and butter, the baseball games. I would love for the little quips that show up on our infamous shoutbox to become full fledged discussions on which team from which year was better than another team, discussions on possible expansion teams/cities, etc. I think we should be a community that fosters an environment where you can come for the discussions AND the content as well.

That being said, I would love to hear some input and ideas on what we can do with MVPMods moving forward past 10 years. It's been a fun ride, and I'd love to have some new music to keep this dance going.

Have a happy holidays and an epic offseason guys,
KC

[dennisjames71]

You brought up many tremendous points Kccitystar and I wanted to offer my input.  I agree wholeheartedly that we need to keep the focus of this website on Baseball, sports, sports game modding…past, present, or future.  I was getting sick to death reading the rhetoric-fest in the shout box about everything other than baseball and gaming and we need to realize that this site will not survive nor thrive if the majority of input equates to another bitch & moan session about politics, religion, nonsensical current events.  I think anyone with a nominal amount logic and common sense can realize that we can certainly go elsewhere for that content but it should not be MvpMods.  It’s gets to a ridiculous point when I, as a regular member of this site and contributor of content, visit the site to get a pulse for what people are wanting or perhaps creating themselves; and I have to read the CNN comment section impersonating as the MVPMods shoutbox.  I then get pissed and hop over the NBA2K modding site and work on modding my basketball games or something else entirely.

The bottomline is that it creates a disconnect and that is not conducive to helping this site grow, thrive, and, evolve.  Many members may not remember than in the fall of 2010; the MVPMods site almost went offline permanently.  I became a member that year, in the spring and learned how to mod the MVP game and was extremely bummed when the prospect of this community disappearing altogether became all too real.  What I’m trying to say is that the last thing we need to do is to take this community for granted and focus on keeping it strong as the world around us keeps changing and evolving, just as Kccitystar highlighted in his first post here.

Moving along to his other points; I am a believer that we should focus in getting members more involved with contributions of any sort.  I’m saying that everyone needs to become modders and start contributing that way; but posting a simple screenshot of the following ideas can certainly be an inspiration:

Screenshots of projects or ideas someone is working on or perhaps a request and visuals.

Screenshots of dynasty, franchise games or even a random exhibition game from any of the modern mods or the numerous Total Classics mods, and the 2K series mods.

We could revamp/reboot a “Mods in Progress” or “Ideas in Progress” thread to generate interest as well (with screenshots).

I know Y4L regularly updates his thread of MVP screenshots which is much appreciated because it creates an important aspect….interest.  Interest is what will inspire the core component of what we do here, and that’s modding these awesome games.  In addition to bhurt99’s Toronto Dynasty threads and JoeRudi’s dynasty threads in the past; my all-time favorite thread is the Share Your Game Images thread:

http://www.mvpmods.com/forums/topic/55431-share-your-game-images/

I can’t tell you how much these random screenshots can get me inspired to create something or modify something, or to simply try a different camera angle or style of playing.  I think that the more input we have in this area can help motivate someone into wanting or learning to create something “new”.  Back in late 2010, my entire idea for creating the Negro League Mod started out as random talk about Josh Gibson with a couple of members here in the shoutbox.

As far all modders, whether they are veterans or members just learning to mod; it’s important to creating an environment of encouragement; rather than being ultra-critical and dismissive about someone’s effort.

I know that modding a 10 year-old baseball game and the 2K baseball games may not seem too hip and exciting to most but I agree with Kccitystar in that we should really utilize the social media tools to promote interest or wider spread interest.  Perhaps, regular and relevant updates to the Facebook page could be a good start.  It took us 10 years to get a snippet of public interest, in regards to the Grantland article this year, thanks to Ben Lindbergh…but we are certainly capable of generating our own interest outside of the MVPMods forums by spreading ideas through these other forms of social media.   

For the members who were here in 2010; the lesson to be learned was that we simply don’t know how long our online communities will last.  As much as we tend to take things for granted, we have to realize that we need to take a pulse once in awhile.  We have a strong community of talented and motivated modders and contributors and there’s no excuse not use the tools and social media sources which are available.  Most of all, we cannot lose focus….the focus on baseball and baseball gaming.

[Fiebre]

I really agree with both of you, also my point of view is that for questions the most common answer are:  find by yourself or just no answer with some exceptions of people who really want to help, that I can count with my fingers of one hand.  People use pc games to relax but when you receive aggressive answers what kind of inspiration to mod here can they have?  

 

I think we need:

1) A guide about the most relevant mods by topic, for example OBT Booths of The Legend is awesome and probably most of the people just don't know about it.

2) FAQ about the most common questions.

 

3) POLLS about interesting topics.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[Yankee4Life]

21 hours ago, Kccitystar said:

it can feel like we're slowly fading into obscurity sometimes and turning into just a snapshot/archive of content for MVP Baseball 2005 and earlier games. I don't want that to happen to this community.
 

I don't want that to happen either.

21 hours ago, Kccitystar said:

I think we should evolve into a community that covers baseball, period, while placing a focus on our bread and butter, the baseball games. I would love for the little quips that show up on our infamous shoutbox to become full fledged discussions on which team from which year was better than another team, discussions on possible expansion teams/cities, etc. I think we should be a community that fosters an environment where you can come for the discussions AND the content as well.

 

I think that is a good idea and at the same time I don't believe anyone would have a problem with this. I know I would welcome it.

However, you are overlooking something very important in order for this to happen.

Nobody posts in here anymore. NOBODY. We are lucky that we get ten posts per week in here and that includes the posts from the people who ask for help downloading the game for free. And please, don't tell me because it's the off-season that's the reason for the lack of posts. This place wasn't on fire in June or July either.

I don't know why people do not come in here and post anymore. I have talked about this in the past. I made a thread out there about this same subject a few years back and I have talked about this privately with some people. I don't get it.

And you want people to discuss baseball? So do I man, so do I. But let's look at the past season. How many threads were made to talk about it? How about over this past World Series? Not one. When Dylan was around here he would make a thread with a poll about what team you wanted to win the Series and then we'd have some Series talk in that. But we had nothing like that. If it wasn't for occasional comments in that chat box you'd have never known the Royals were playing the Mets.

To successfully have people come in here and talk baseball you need a group of people that will do it. You can't have just one person or else he'll just end up talking to himself. I'm not saying the people we had here years ago were better than the ones we have here now as regulars but I am saying they were different. At least they came in here and posted about anything and everything. Go back and look at some of those threads in the Left Field section. Some of them look pretty funny but they got people talking. That's because everyone contributed.

Let me give you just two examples. There was a group of us hanging out here when the 2008 All-Star Game was going on. That was the game played at Yankee Stadium that went fifteen innings. We stayed around talking baseball to the very end of the game. Mark watched the entire game with us and he was five hours ahead of us in Scotland. When the game ended the sun was coming up over there. But a whole group of us including him stayed here until the end watching the game together and talking about it. You think that would happen again. And we are not talking about a long time ago. That was only seven years ago.

The second example in a way touches on what Dennis James said about reading the comments in the chat box that had nothing to do with baseball. Non-baseball threads and posts in the chat box about that stuff is as old as this website. We had some knock-down fights about the presidential election back in 2004 and again in 2008. Things really got heated at times but it was always secondary because at the same time we were still talking baseball. In 2012 there really wasn't a lot of people talking about anything in here so that election came and went without any of the drama we had in previous years. The reason why talking about ISIS and Muslims and current events got so much attention here recently is because it overshadowed everything else here because nothing else goes on here.

This site is big enough to have us talk about everything. From opinions about ISIS, to what your favorite music or movies or TV shows are, etc and anything and everything that has to do with baseball from the start of spring training to the final pitch of the World Series.

But nothing will get done when there are ten or less posts a week in here.

 

 

[Jim825]

Personally, I think that topics like politics, religion, etc. should stay out of the discussions here.  Every time these topics have been discussed on this site, it has ended badly, with name calling and insults, followed by closed posts and admin warnings.  With the number of members here and the wide range of ages, life experiences, beliefs, etc. someone is bound to get pissed off by an opposing viewpoint or comment and direct the discussion in the wrong direction.  I also disagree that "opinions about ISIS" is a safe topic.  Do I need to remind you what happened when that can of worms was opened?  Even now, some of the generalizations made in the shoultbox are bordering on offensive.  I'll leave it at that.

In any case, these are just my opinions, and I'm only one member here.

[mee]

On some sites there are the 3 nos. Religion, and politics are 2 of them.

[Guest]

ive here a long time to and have enjoyed it all. and made some friends that are still here and some that have gone to others thins. enjoyed te work and ideas, and talk with all shared over the years.

[Yankee4Life]

3 minutes ago, Jim825 said:

Personally, I think that topics like politics, religion, etc. should stay out of the discussions here.  Every time these topics have been discussed on this site, it has ended badly, with name calling and insults, followed by closed posts and admin warnings.  With the number of members here and the wide range of ages, life experiences, beliefs, etc. someone is bound to get pissed off by an opposing viewpoint or comment and direct the discussion in the wrong direction.  I also disagree that "opinions about ISIS" is a safe topic.  Do I need to remind you what happened when that can of worms was opened?  Even now, some of the generalizations made in the shoultbox are bordering on offensive.  I'll leave it at that.

In any case, these are just my opinions, and I'm only one member here.

 

Jim I see what you mean all too well. I remember those political threads and how they escalated quickly. You remember Rolie, right? He left in 2008 due to some kind of political disagreement then. I don't know what it was because I didn't get into those threads.

But you are right and we've both seen it. These topics lead to name calling because people got passionate about what they were talking about.

[Gordo]

I would like you guys to institute a buffet at some point, too.

[sabugo]

2 hours ago, Gordo said:

I would like you guys to institute a buffet at some point, too.

Does that include an open bar?

Seriously now, this is where I come for baseball talk.
You guys are my baseball buddies.

I believe I started the latest arguments on the shoutbox when I mentioned what happened in France. It was not intended that way, I was just shocked at what was happening. But I agree, this is a place for baseball, and baseball games.
I also agree that not enough people post here. Maybe if we had more baseball related topics, more people would post. But even then I don't know. There is this 'Yankee news for Yankee fans' thread that only two or three people visit and post it. And that is a Yankees topic.

Most of you have been here longer than I have, so your suggestions are probably better than mine.

[Yankee4Life]

55 minutes ago, sabugo said:

I also agree that not enough people post here. Maybe if we had more baseball related topics, more people would post. But even then I don't know. There is this 'Yankee news for Yankee fans' thread that only two or three people visit and post it. And that is a Yankees topic.

Most of you have been here longer than I have, so your suggestions are probably better than mine.

 

This just confirms what I was saying.

 

59 minutes ago, sabugo said:

Most of you have been here longer than I have, so your suggestions are probably better than mine.

Your opinion is just as good as anyone else's.

[MercyLord]

I been around along time myself and i think things are fine ... just need a new game out there is the problem kids these days just dont play/like sports like they did in the past ....

 

My idea is to get this into the Teamspeak/vent a little bit .... more into a gaming group ! push it to all sports or maybe just keep it baseball i would be cool with that  , but i believe if you do that you can grow the member count again from recruiting in the games ... VOICE coms is a must in my opinion . Keep this is mind you have to have some kinda freedom of speech or people will think your a joke .... i been doing the Group/Guild/clan thing for 15-20 years so i can tell ya all about what works and what not works .. still remember when i tried to argue a bit about sport here on the forums and i was threaten to be banned years ago so i kinda stayed away from the forums ever since ... i guess that  admin been removed THANK god but still those are some of the things that damages a group ... makes people not wanna post or come on vent/TS/foums and after a while they find a new home .You have to Stay away from the BIG SHOT admin crap as much as possible , not saying people do it here anymore but if people do that is a major major problem that can slowly kill something like this ... like i said we should start with VOICE coms it will also help clear up what people mean more on forums and save people from getting mad and going away .... maybe meeting online and talk about all this with the old school/new school members would be a start ....  Trust me on this one gentleman ! i believe it might be the only option

 

thanks

mike

 

ps. I will never stop coming to this website , im too big of a baseball fan for that

 

[BigRog]

Ive been here since i think 05 or 06.  I was a junior in hs and was finding a baseball game for pc because mvp was over and 05 was the last and best game at the time for baseball on my xbox.  I remember the old triple play before it was mvp, sitting in the living room in my boxers as a kid 7am playing baseball ln the weekends.... This site was an amazing place to come to when i was a teen after school.  I would talk to KC.. he used to help me mod on the side, unis... portraits.. etc.  He was usually my guide for everything tech savy... and DAFT PUNK.  KC got me into daft punk lol and techno music hahaha.  I remember sean, mark, totte, dj, kraw, y4l.. this site was so hot, You could poat a topic and it would be buried in less then a min or two of no one responded...(and remembe  no bumping of double posts).  But sadly as the product dates itself we've lost these guys, lives happen.. on site politics and/or butting of heads between people of rank.  That hurt us because we lost good modders that way.

The task of generating site traffic is tough.  I think a lot of that has to do with mvp being so old... i think that has to also do with 2k being older as well.  I remember back in 07 or 08 when kraw made eamods and it had madden as well as his mvp stuff.  It became the alt site for people to run to if mvpmods was down or you got banned from this site. Ultimatly  I think his idea of all sports modding under one site was clutch though.  I think if we were a site of dedicated modders for all sports games we could generate a lot more traffic and interests.  We can still always talk about baseball and mod mvp but eventually comes a time for us all to adapt so we can stay a family talking under one site..  i for one am willing to help however i can if i am asked to because this site got me through some rough teen years just wasting away time enjoying everyones company ten years ago

 

 

[Kccitystar]

I just feel like the site could be much more.

[Gordo]

5 hours ago, Kccitystar said:

I just feel like the site could be much more.

Something I brought up with several ideas months ago.

[Fiebre]

IMO we have to understand that we have 2 kinds of people here (and in almost all similar sites):

- the ones who are interested only about updating their game.

- others (minority) who want to discuss about baseball and even less with mod abilities.

 

The first ones would be always the majority but as we keep the second group interested we'll add more people.  This site about fifa  ( http://www.moddingway.com/forums/thread-28351.html)    it's incredible how many people participate for day, but they are almost as the group #1, we have here more interaction no matter we are a few ones.

 

[BigRog]

16 hours ago, Kccitystar said:

I just feel like the site could be much more.

it could be more. we need to embrace the masses

[sabugo]

A newer game sure would help, but that doesn't seem like it's going to happen.
You can only re-invent MVP a certain amount of times, no matter how great it is. It's just not going to appeal to the younger fans, sadly.

Either we talk more about real life baseball here, or we're going to be extinct sometime in the not so distant future.

[Yankee4Life]

1 hour ago, sabugo said:

Either we talk more about real life baseball here, or we're going to be extinct sometime in the not so distant future.

When you get past everything else that has been brought up here this is what it is really about. Sorry to say I have no idea how we would go about changing this.

[puma91]

Yeah its very sad to see the changes and less interest. Programming and changes/mods to a game can only go so far before it becomes repetitive. For me I love and appreciate all the work everyone has done here. Wondering if maybe getting folks together on creating and placing more complete Majors-A roster on some of the total conversions and total classics might appeal to more folks weather it be golden oldies like myself or mid generation folks who enjoy gaming but prefer the more simple gaming. I love history especially the 90's. I'd love to help what I can to keep it alive but I limited knowledge of programming and editing myself, I'm more of a research and history person.

[Yankee4Life]

18 hours ago, BigRog said:

it could be more. we need to embrace the masses

Let me tell you something. When you are not trying to be a smartass you really make a lot of sense.

And this is no knock on you. I'm complimenting you.

Now, here is my question for you. How would you go about embracing the masses? You joined here back in 2006 and that was still the time when this place had a heartbeat. You know how much everyone posted back then. No one ever had to bring up the subject about asking people to talk about things. They did it all by themselves. These days, not counting the occasional mod announcements, all the posts we get are "how do I..." or "fix this problem for me..." or "can you make me this?"  These people bring nothing to the table here except for what they want and when they get it nine times out of ten they don't know how to say thank you.

I have no idea how to go about reaching them.

 

 

[Kccitystar]

I think the site is much better prepared now if a new PC baseball game was released, to be honest with you

[sabugo]

1 hour ago, Kccitystar said:

I think the site is much better prepared now if a new PC baseball game was released, to be honest with you

Unfortunately, that doesn't seem to be happening anytime soon.

[terential]

I've only been on this site a couple of months, but I have to say how grateful I am for this website.  I love baseball, and there aren't a ton of options to play with throwback teams/players.  I'd rather play an old game that has classic teams and current, than splurge out 60 bucks for a current one.  It sucked when Ea no longer could make a mlb game.  I even bought the triple play baseball games.  

I can't thank the modders and community enough for the their tremendous work effort and help to resolve issues.  There's so many classic/total conversion mods available that I've still yet to try.  I really don't know what I'd do if anything happened to this site.  There's nothing for me that could fill that baseball gaming fix.