WMMA2 Developer's Journal

[Adam Ryland]

The WMMA2 Developer's Journal is an ongoing series of posts in which I talk about the new game, including descriptions and chat about new features and concepts and also information on the release date, etc. A new post will be made on almost every weekday between now and the release of the game.

For ease of use, the thread will be closed to the public and so will only contain official posts by me. If you wish to discuss anything, please post in the forum.

[Adam Ryland]

January 1st: The Basics

This first journal entry will cover the basics via a FAQ.

Q: What is WMMA2?
A: WMMA2 is "World of Mixed Martial Arts 2", a PC management game set in the world of MMA. It is the sequel to the original WMMA which was released in 2007.

Q: When will it be released?
A: There is currently no official release date. We are tentatively aiming for around March 2009, but could go as late as June depending on how the remaining development goes. Any change to that estimate will be announced in the journal.

Q: How similar to WMMA1 will this game be?
A: WMMA2 is being built on top of WMMA1, and so will be quite similar in terms of "feel" and organisation. I felt that the original was quite a solid product, and so didn't see the point in "reinventing the wheel" by rewriting all the basics. Instead, the focus has been on adding a whole host of new features and improving \ modifying \ removing those parts that received criticism in the original. For those who have played my other games, the jump is similar to the one from TEW07 to TEW08; similar on the surface, but the latter being considerably improved and enhanced.
There has been a slight shift in the emphasis of the game though. Compared to the original, WMMA2 will revolve more heavily around your dealings with fighters (i.e. match making, talent acquisition and contract negotiations) and less about the administration of the organisation. This has been done in an effort to enhance the fun and ease-of-use of the game.

Q: Will this work better on Vista?
A: Yes. The same techniques that were used to make TEW08 infinitely faster and more stable than TEW07 have now been applied to WMMA2 too.

Q: "Has the suggestion I made in the forums been used...?"
A: I have been through every single post in the WMMA forums. Not every suggestion has been used, but during the design stage an emphasis was placed on trying to use as many as possible. I will not answer individual questions on what has or hasn't been used, features will be revealed as the Developer's Journal progresses.

Q: How much will the game cost?
A: In line with Grey Dog's usual pricing, WMMA2 will cost $34.95. The original game will drop in price once WMMA2 has been released.

Q: Is there any discount for WMMA1 customers?
A: No. GDS has never operated such a policy.

[Adam Ryland]

January 2nd: Play-By-Play

One of the biggest changes to the game is the switch to full play-by-play for match reports. Rather than seeing the entire fight report at once, it now unfolds on a line-by-line basis, simulating two announcers calling the match.

The user can skip forward one line at a time to see the fight unfold dramatically, or can choose to skip straight to the end to see the result. Using the Next and Previous buttons provided, the user can move back and forth through the commentary at will.

Unlike WMMA1, where round descriptions were pre-written, in WMMA2 they are created dynamically, meaning that it is rare for any two fights to be identical. For example, if two fighters are standing facing each other, the computer does not know what will happen next - that will be decided by the two fighters' skills and AI. This makes for more realistic matches and fighter behaviour.

[Adam Ryland]

January 5th: Fighter Tactics

Tied to the new play-by-play system are Fighter Tactics. There are fourteen different sets of tactics, including Counter Striking (let opponent come to you and try to pick him off with counter strikes), All Out Ground (aggressively push to take the fight to the floor), and Smother (use your wrestling and ground game to try and keep the opponent from doing anything of note). Each fighter can be rated on each of the fourteen tactics to say how good he is at executing each one.

Tactics are dynamically used during a fight, based upon the fighters' ratings for each, his skills, his opponent's skills, and his situation. So, for example, a fighter who is good at All Out Ground but who knows that his opponent has good takedown defense may use one of his other tactics to begin with, then switch to All Out Ground later in the fight when the opponent is tired. Similarly, a fighter who thinks he is 20-18 behind in the final round of a three round fight is unlikely to use Smother tactics as he knows that winning the round alone will not win him the fight, instead he would likely go for a tactic that will give him a chance of a knock out or submission.

Tactics play a huge part in how a fight unfolds. Some tactics are riskier than others, but come with bigger rewards. Some are more cautious. Picking the right tactics can mean the difference between a win and a loss. They are of course noticeable in the play-by-play, as you will notice people using the Smother tactics try to keep things very close, for example.

The ability to rate each fighter on his tactics allows for a fighter to be more realistically created. For example, to take a real life example, Jorge Gurgel is noted for his habit of standing and striking rather than going to the ground, despite the fact that that plays against his strengths. This can be correctly simulated by rating him highly on his strike-based tactics.

When creating a fighter, there is also the option to "ignore tactic settings". This is the default. If this is set, the fighter's tactic levels are set by the AI when a fight starts, based upon his skill levels (i.e. someone with weak striking and awesome BJJ will have high ratings for the tactics that will take the fight to the ground, but low for standing versions). This is done so that mod makers will not have to set the tactics for every single fighter in the game, but can use them only on people who they have specific ideas for.

[Adam Ryland]

January 6th: Split Pro Records

To increase the realism of the game, each fighter's pro record can be further split by promotion. This means that as well as being able to see their overall career record you will also be able to see how they have done in a specific promotion.

For example, to take a real world example, when viewing a story about Dustin Hazelett being booked for a match with the UFC, rather than just seeing "(12-4)" after his name you would see the more complete "(12-4, 5-2 UFC)". This makes the game in-line with how records are reported on most sites.

The editor allows mod makers to specify both overall and promotion-specific records, but they are not mandatory - the AI will start a new record from 0-0 if no promotional-specific ones exist.

[Adam Ryland]

January 7th: Contracts (Part I)

The contract system has been greatly expanded from the original WMMA, and now features much more depth. The next few journal entries will be focus exclusively on the changes. Today's entry will begin by looking at the parts that make up a contract.

Basics

The basics of a contract consist of two parts. The first is Base Pay, which is the same at it was in WMMA1, the amount of money the fighter gets for showing up and fighting. The second is Performance Scale. This is a percentage that describes how the Base Pay is altered by wins and losses. So somebody who has a Performance Scale of 5% would see his Base Pay increased by that amount after a victory. There are two types of Performance Scale; the percentage can either be a "+" (which means that only victories trigger it - in other words the Base Pay can never go down) or a "+\-" (which means that losses actually reduce the Base Pay by that percentage).

Bonuses

Each contract can have any (or all) of several bonuses. These are also in percentages, and raise the fighter's purse if they are triggered. The bonuses are Win, Main Event, Pay-Per-View, Title Match, Title Victory, and Successful Title Defense. All are pretty self explanatory. As an example, if a fighter has a Win Bonus of 50%, Base Pay of $100,000, and wins the match, he'd go home with $150,000 in total.

Terms

There are three types of terms in each contract. The first is to specify the fighter's Matches; this both confirms how many matches in total he is contracted for, and also how matches he is guaranteed (so if a fighter is contracted for 5 matches in total but only has 3 guaranteed, the promotion can cut him after the third fight without paying anything extra but if they cut him after the second fight they'd have to pay him for the one remaining guaranteed fight that he didn't get). The other two terms specify the fighter's cut of any merchandise he sells, and also the percentage of any medical bills the promotion will pay.

[Adam Ryland]

January 8th: Contracts (Part II)

Today's entry will discuss some of the changes to the contract negotiations section. This will be continued in tomorrow's entry, before the fourth and final part of the contract changes comes on Monday.

Those who have played TEW08 will already be familiar with the most obvious difference in contract negotiations between WMMA and WMMA2; the popular "pressure \ timed" negotiation system that debuted in TEW08 will be included in WMMA2.

For those who haven't played it, this is a two-tiered system designed to make negotiations a battle of skill and nerve. The first tier is the timer; every time an offer is made some time will be taken off the negotiation counter - if it reaches zero before you complete the deal, the negotiations collapse. This adds an element of pressure onto the user, and can result in risky last-minute offers. The second tier is that negotiations are broken down into separate contract elements, and some are inter-linked. This means that you can balance certain elements to gain advantages (such as offering a little bit extra money in order to complete a longer-term deal), and can see exactly on which term the negotiations are being held up if they are rejected.

[Adam Ryland]

January 9th: Contracts (Part III)

A further change to the way contracts work is in the Types available. The "rolling" contracts from WMMA1 have been removed entirely as they did not simulate reality well enough, and have been replaced by three new types that will be described below.

The big difference is that all fighter contracts, no matter what type, now specify a certain amount of matches and an expiry date. This is more in line with reality.

The three types are:

Exclusive: The fighter works for this one promotion only. He is tied to the promotion until the contract expires and cannot be "stolen", but can begin negotiations with other companies when he either has one match or one month remaining. (This is the sort of contracts that major stars and big promotions will primarily use.)

Associate: The fighter works for the promotion but the contract can be broken by either party at any time and so is essentially a temporary agreement. (Due to the low security this sort of contract would be used by small promotions, and also fighters who want to fight without tying themselves to a specific promotion for any length of time.)

Standard: This works in the same way as an Exclusive contract with the difference being that the fighter can also work for other promotions on Associate deals too - his Standard employer is his main concern though. This has the advantage of security for both parties, but allows enough flexibility that the fighter can also earn extra money by working elsewhere. (This sort of contract is ideal for mid-level fighters who want to have plenty of matches but also want the security of working for a medium-to-big promotion.)

[Adam Ryland]

January 12th: Contracts (Part IV)

The final new major change to contracts is the concept of bidding wars. Simply put, when a fighter gets multiple offers he will no longer only accept the "best" one for negotiations, instead he can pick up to three at once. If one of them is a user-controlled promotion then negotiations begin with all the interested promotions at the table, meaning that the player not only has to worry about completing negotiations in time (see January 8th's entry) but also counter-offers from rivals.

[Adam Ryland]

January 13th: Booking Multiple Shows

A shorty but a goodie - you can now book up to three shows in advance, meaning the long-term planning is easier and it is more in line with how UFC works in reality.

[Adam Ryland]

January 14th: Quick Sim

An extra feature that has been added to WMMA2 is Quick Sim. This option, available from the main game menu, allows the user to put together a match between any two fighters in the database and see the resulting fight's play-by-play.

This is particularly useful for mod makers who want an easy way to check out what will happen with certain stats, but can also be used as to attempt predictions on real world fights to see how accurate the results are, and also to try out certain fights in advance of doing them in a "live" game.

[Adam Ryland]

January 15th: Medical Area

As requested by several people, a new section has been added to the user's "office" called the Medical Area, which gives a quick overview of which of your fighters are currently unavailable. Technically the name isn't 100% accurate as it also lists people who are away through non-medical reasons, but it remains a screen that will come in useful in organising your roster and booking.

[Adam Ryland]

January 16th: Game World

WMMA2's game world is significantly bigger than the one found in WMMA1.

Firstly, there are three brand new areas; Russia, Central America (also including Caribbean) and Africa. These contain 4, 3, and 5 regions respectively. It was felt that Russia should be separate from Europe due to its size, the amount of small promotions it has in reality, and its location. Central America was added as a couple of shows have been held there in reality. Africa has been added due to its potential for MMA in the future.

There are also two changes to existing areas. Asia now has an additional two regions; China and Western Asia. Europe has been completely updated so that rather than including the more generic regions like Western Europe, Southern Europe, etc, it now breaks them down into more recognisable countries \ groupings; including France, Netherlands, Mediterranean, Scandinavia, Germany, and others.

The rest of the game world remains the same.

[Adam Ryland]

January 19th: Purse Calculator

A handy new feature is the Purse Calculator, which is available for each fighter in the booking screen.

When activated, it opens a pop-up that tells the user how much the fighter will be earn from the fight in base pay. Underneath are a series of tick boxes, listing things like "Win Bonus", "Title Victory Bonus", etc - each referring to one of the possible bonuses in a fighter's contract.

Ticking a box causes the amount the fighter would earn to be recalculated to take into account that particular bonus. This allows the user, in a very quick and convenient manner, to find out what sort of money he can expect to be paying out. This makes financial planning much easier, as the user no longer has to load the fighter's profile, find his contract terms, and then work everything out in his head. Instead, the value is available instantly, and can be reworked to take into account "what if" situations like if the fighter wins a title in the main event (i.e. potentially triggering several bonuses).

[Adam Ryland]

January 20th: End Of Year Awards

Rather than just the Fighter Of The Year award that was in WMMA1, the sequel offers several new categories. These are now stored too, and can be viewed at any time as well as appearing in the Award section of each fighter's profile.

The new End Of Year categories include Rookie, Female Fighter, Fight, Worst Fight, Card \ Event, Knock Out, Submission, Upset, Promotion, Rise (the fighter whose reputation has soared the most) and Fall (the fighter whose reputation has taken the biggest battering).