New 1996 Mod Hype/Help Thread!

[Konoko]

Manami fans, alergies galore. The whole point with the Sakie/Hikari crew is that they SHOULDN'T be on the same level as the top workers, they supply a really consistent and oftenly very good accent to cards and sometimes are inserted into the main event pictures. I'm a bit back on my JWP, but Fukuoka may be a main-eventer at this point. Mariko Yoshida is a bit of a different case, as she was showing some massive potential even before this, but as of now, without the new "Potential" stat, there's no way to really set up her becoming one of the best mat workers in the world by 1998(which, while isn't a day, not so far away). I'd like to clear up the whole 4 Corners ratings ordeal. When I vision the greatness(or inaptness) of a worker from his real-life work, I usually translate it very badly to TEW simulation and it's processing system. I pointed out in the "top workers" post that while being quite cheeky when trying to actually outline by stats the Four Corners(and thus, I quickly evaded this path for the rest, as could be seen) they are very rough, instinctive and are less knowledgeable to the system rather than to the actual workers or their value in the actual wrestling world at the time(at least as far as work goes). When admitting to that, and admitting I'd find a bit toned down version of those stats more correct, I ask myself, by numeric rating, aren't the numbers that would comprise the rating of A+ would be most fitting(and if to be fully honest with you, 100 doesn't sound so dirty in this context) to attribute the Psychology and Selling of one Toshiaki Kawada at this time(especially off the exceptional 1995, as your start time is January)? Or wouldn't similar numbers rate one Rey Mysterio Jr.'s flying skills of the time practically well? One of the best aspects(in a game sense) of the DOTT worker stats is the balance made to even things out across the gaming world. You obviously are trying to include that into this mod, which I think is fantastic. The only question is though, would it be fair to sacrifice the actual quality of the real-life worker around the time(as some were that great even in an "all-time" sense) in order to finely tune this aspect here too? Well, that's up to you, the mod-maker, but I do believe that if you've got your ratings heirarchy sorted out, the mod will be successful in it's goal nontheless. EDIT: BTW, I really like the whole point of you evening worker balance out with Resilience and condition stats. Hopefully, that'll help some of the important veterans in the game keep their good-to-great Basics, Psychology, Selling, match skill(Brawling, mat work stats, all those) stats, and balance those out with inferior to their prime Stamina, Consistency, Resilience and condition stats. That'll help keep them relevant while somehow smoothing things out on them not being too valuable(in a "can main event any card" kind of way).

[BurningHamster]

Haha Konoko, my head is starting to hurt. It's awesome you are taking such an interest in this project though but please, can we keep it simple? I study enough as it is ;) Hmm, Kawada as good as he was at this time ... well ... to me 100 for any stat for any worker is dirty, very very dirty. To me, no worker is perfect in any field, there is always the chance that someone will be better. Plus, if I start giving out 100 to anyone, well ... Kawada would be carrying the crappiest of crap wrestlers to some unusually high-rated matches. Also, at the risk of giving you a heart attack I don't think Kawada or most puro workers are as good at selling as they are made out to be. But maybe that is how I view the different styles of wrestlers in this game. Puro workers are generally very stiff, have good physical skills like stamina, very high intensity but their selling is a touch below a US worker of similar quality who will try to make almost every move look painful. By the same token a US worker generally isn't as stiff or intense but a little better in looks and entertainment stats and excluding the big lumps of no-selling, they generally sell a little more than a Japanese worker. That is one of the other challenges with making a mod, realizing that there are many different styles of wrestler and trying to balance them so no style surpasses the others overall but they all have the potential to be effective within the context of the right promotion with the right product settings. I like what you say about the ratings hierarchy, it's something I guess I was doing without realizing it and probably haven't got right yet, but trying to find workers who set the standard as one of the best in a certain stat, then building the rest of the mod around comparisons between workers. It gets insanely hard and far less organised the more workers I add, but ah well, we'll see how it turns out.

[Konoko]

While I hold much respect for you in the field of mod-working(as creating a mod is a big project as any), your insight on Japanese workers couldn't be farther off than the perspective shared era by countless fans, and your mate of discussion, on (Japanese) wrestling from this . At this point in history, the atrcious modern "no-sell"(which pretty much was popularized by All Japan around 1998) was pretty much non-existant in Japanese pro wrestling. That's not every worker labled as Japanese is great but this is where we get to the next part. Your second paragraph comes off as a very shallow view(in my opinion) of both US and Japanese pro wrestling, especially of the time. To explain to you why Kawada was, for our discussion's sake, perhaps the greatest seller wrestling has ever seen around this point of time, would get into me giving you much more headache with match listings, sequence descritptions and step-by-step analyzing of what makes me think what I think about this subject and the same would go to any. Wrestling is form taken into context. Using phrases like "they generally sell a little more than a Japanese worker" would be like saying Luchadores don't know how to sell because their approach to transitions between offense and defense is different than a US-bred worker, or that their lay-out of matches is "bad" because it's just "different" to them. "That is one of the other challenges with making a mod, realizing that there are many different styles of wrestler and trying to balance them so no style surpasses the others overall but they all have the potential to be effective within the context of the right promotion with the right product settings" - This sentence loses it's potency if someone who's noted for selling(when they'd actually mean bumping) by too many net fans like a Michaels or a Hennig, would get a high rating based on his will to wave bodyparts left and right upon impact but not to actually carry a hard-case story within a match(such as Michaels selling dead from the first impactful move he'll recieve, Hennig generally being anemic with his approach to leveling the damage done) using the art of selling as much even a Shinya Hashimoto(who isn't particularly noted on this as much as Kawada, who I thought even Stevie Wonder could visualize the genious), who has the "champion-selling" down to a tee. The stats work within the context of styles and attributing it's preseting to a stereotyped view on the general way of working in a certain nation may help balance the mod, but it shatters some of the mod's credibility. "Puro workers are generally very stiff, have good physical skills like stamina, very high intensity but their selling is a touch below a US worker of similar quality who will try to make almost every move look painful." - I just felt obligated to quote this to point out what I feel is a blatant example of what would be withdrawl of context. While points about stiffness, would be true, there ARE some US workers who are intense, while the selling part would be a(and I'm really sorry, I'm only saying so for discussions sake) novice overview of selling, especially in All Japan, but in Japanese pro wrestling regardless. Flailing your body and stooging more wouldn't necessarily mean that you're selling something better(you'd have to establish it in your form of context, so for good stooge selling see Funk or Steamboat for instance). New Japan selling at this point was generally not great, with their Strong Style of the time going the "Choshu-ism"(wrestlers bombing each other left and right with signature strikes, also Riki was great in the 80's just over the hill by the point of our discussion) way, but this doesn't mean the those who sold good or better should be held back by it. All Japan selling at the time, mostly, was the fine art of selling pro-wrestling. Body-part selling at the highest levels, multi-layered layout of presenting the damage assimilated throughout the long grueling process of the match, and when the occassional fight-through-the-pain was done, it wasn't yet the point of "German Suplex on the head to Lariat" nonsense, thus being done with simple things like a face-kick into an elbow, workers extorting their final ability to accomplish their current point within their match. I could go on for days on this, but I'll try to go back keeping it simple, although I'm not a big fan of keeping things simple only for them to be summarized shortly and unsatisfeingly(as in grouping in whole nations based on pre-established, sometimes sadly wrong, perception). While once again, no stat-maker could ever nail his mod down to everyone's taste, I was actually worried from an approach like this. I just hope Mexico's not "Great flyers who can chain wrestle, but don't know lick about basics, psychology or selling". Thing about Japanese wrestling, is that for our current decade, it's perhaps the worst of the big 3(US, Japan, Mexico) and is horrendous beyond any belief, the decline of wrestling habits in Japan turned wrestling into a novelty based bravado contest or masturbatory acrobatics pretty boy showdowns(not too elaborated upon on my part, as for now but it'll have to do. Seriously, just watch a NOAH/NJPW or a Dragon Gate main event. Beyond stories fans of modern Japanese pro wrestling, god bless them, try to cling to, that's the main impression I usually get after every try at contemporary products.). If one is portraying the times when it featured some of the best wrestling in history(and opinion which some may differ on, while lot's of others share, and I'd also like to comment that I mainly focused on All Japan when there was awesome, diverse wrestling all-around) I personally think it would be a bit unfair to present a jagged picture of things based on a pre-sought perception. Perhaps that's a guarantee a mod has to fulfill in order to balance things out. EDIT: While I did fairly wander around in my post, I tried not getting into wrestling tastes and watching habits, but still try to find an area where I'll feel like I'm getting across points to keep my end of discussion relevant.

[BurningHamster]

[QUOTE=Konoko;404058]Kawada is good at selling[/QUOTE] Succinctly put old bean.

[Konoko]

Kawada is better than great at selling would be a well more fitting title, but I guess it'll have to do for the moment. Anyhow, not only him(the "good" part). :p

[BurningHamster]

I am so depressed. I need a drink. EDIT: Okay that was a good drink, I feel much better now. Konoko, your enthusiasm is heart warming but I am not getting into any smarkish broken English debates with you. No offense, it's just that life is too short for me to get into too lengthy a discussion on the merits of a particular workers selling ability. Any opinions people express to me will be taken into consideration though, but at the moment I feel that advice on other aspects of the gameworld such as what TV and PPV companies were most of the shows broadcast on during 1996 would be more helpful.

[D16NJD16]

[QUOTE=BurningHamster;404089]I am so depressed. I need a drink. EDIT: Okay that was a good drink, I feel much better now. Konoko, your enthusiasm is heart warming but I am not getting into any smarkish broken English debates with you. No offense, it's just that life is too short for me to get into too lengthy a discussion on the merits of a particular workers selling ability. Any opinions people express to me will be taken into consideration though, but at the moment I feel that advice on other aspects of the gameworld such as what TV and PPV companies were most of the shows broadcast on during 1996 would be more helpful.[/QUOTE] I already got this covered, just sit tight

[BurningHamster]

An update on how work is coming along on this one ... My main man D16NJD16 did some work on TV networks for me, which I am incorporating into the mod and will see how it plays. At the moment I think the sizes of networks might have to be taken down a notch to stop shows getting dropped too soon, but it's all solid work which I am thankful for and saved me a ton of time. Magnus D has been throwing some WCW roster info my way which I am slowly adding, it's pretty detailed stuff which fits right in with the way I am trying to make this mod. Rosters continue to be updated and played with. I am finally getting around to writing some of the bios I have been putting off. ECW had a pretty huge roster around this time considering they were pretty much a regional promotion. Looks like a few guys are going to be dropped straight off the bat unfortunately, no matter how high I set Todd Gordon and Paul Heyman's roster size preferences. But that's no biggie, ECW had a pretty high turnover rate apart from a select few. I have also been bringing in some new gimmicks and the like. Anyone want to hazard a guess how to best describe Raven's ECW gimmick in 1996? I know what it was, but am having trouble coming up with the words to describe it. I would like to apologize for how slowly this mod is coming along, I knew it would be a huge task but it's way more work than I thought it would be, especially since I am not taking any shortcuts. I hope it will be worth the work.

[D16NJD16]

[QUOTE=BurningHamster;411497]An update on how work is coming along on this one ... My main man D16NJD16 did some work on TV networks for me, which I am incorporating into the mod and will see how it plays. At the moment I think the sizes of networks might have to be taken down a notch to stop shows getting dropped too soon, but it's all solid work which I am thankful for and saved me a ton of time. Magnus D has been throwing some WCW roster info my way which I am slowly adding, it's pretty detailed stuff which fits right in with the way I am trying to make this mod. Rosters continue to be updated and played with. I am finally getting around to writing some of the bios I have been putting off. ECW had a pretty huge roster around this time considering they were pretty much a regional promotion. Looks like a few guys are going to be dropped straight off the bat unfortunately, no matter how high I set Todd Gordon and Paul Heyman's roster size preferences. But that's no biggie, ECW had a pretty high turnover rate apart from a select few. I have also been bringing in some new gimmicks and the like. Anyone want to hazard a guess how to best describe Raven's ECW gimmick in 1996? I know what it was, but am having trouble coming up with the words to describe it. I would like to apologize for how slowly this mod is coming along, I knew it would be a huge task but it's way more work than I thought it would be, especially since I am not taking any shortcuts. I hope it will be worth the work.[/QUOTE] Raven would fall under Cult Leader. If it's not in, you should make it.

[BurningHamster]

Thanks bro, yeah I was kind of tossing up between cult leader, unique charismatic or making a new gimmick. Cult Leader does seem the most apt.

[D16NJD16]

Konoko isnt the psycho from a year or two back who tried to move heaven and earth to make sure no one would use his Japan data regardless of anything is he? I couldnt stand that guy. Anyway why dont I get guys like this in my mod thread, I cant even get someone to help me name the thing :o Plus I actually have the time to debate such things.

[BurningHamster]

Hey, I'm sure if you asked nicely Konoko would jump across and help you. Don't get me wrong, I appreciate Konoko's input and have been listening to him to an extent, but if I debate with him then the mod will not get done and the last thing a full time student wants is an essay on the socio-political implications of Kawada's selling during the mid-90's. Although if Konoko wants to write that for me, I'll hand it in to one of my classes just to mess with them. And I am pretty sure he isn't the "psycho" with the Japan data, that was Lukie from my recollection. I don't agree with the way he acted about his data, but I ain't gonna diss him.

[Konoko]

I HAVE to write up an essay on the socio-political implications of Kawada's selling during the mid-90's sometime around. :D

[BurningHamster]

Quick update. Been working on this again after a tough run of study, trying to get as much of this done before my final around of assessments for the semester kicks my arse for the next 2-3 weeks. After that I hope to finish this mod in the break between semesters. Number of workers is now approaching 700 as I continue to add WCW guys and some more US indy talent. I'm now thinking the final count will be somewhere between 800-850 workers.

[BurningHamster]

Okay one big question here and I want people's opinions. With the release of the editor for '08 and seeing the number of differences with '07 I can see that updating any '07 data to '08 will be a pretty big undertaking in itself. So I wanted to ask ... you guys think it's worth finishing this data as a playable mod in '07 then converting it and altering it for '08 if that is more time consuming, but at the end of the day mods are created for '07 and '08, or would you guys rather I concentrate on '08 and get this mod out for the new game sooner?

[troy10]

Get it out for 2008, it just seems better overall.