For My Next Project......
Posted: January 21st, 2024, 10:06 am
My first ever post on this forum was the thread below explaining my PGA Tour replay. That replay is 100% my motivation for playing links still and the reason I ended up figuring out the animation stuff, creating apparel and golf clubs. I enjoy playing Links, but no other golf game allows you to create AI players with different animations/avatars with such a wide range of ratings you can assign. That's the best feature Links has in my opinion because it's so unique. That feature allows the user to always have a playing partner for someone that hates online gaming like myself. I used the feature to create pro golfers and then had them compete in a PGA Tour replay. Anyway, you can read the post below if you want more info on that.
https://www.linkscorner.org/phpBB/viewtopic.php?t=1741
Now for my next project. In my real life I work 2 full time jobs and have for the last 25 years. I've been in the IT industry doing hardware, networking, desktop support, application support and helpdesk type stuff as my "real job". I use that skill set with Links every day. My other job though is running a travel baseball organization. I played college baseball and have been coaching baseball and running a travel baseball organization since the early 2000s. My true talent in baseball is player development. My organization has one of the top player development models in the country. In this next project I'm going to use that skill set with Links.
The PGA Tour replay was fun, but after spending the last 18 months on it, it needs a little twist and some excitement injected into it. So, my next version will be using players with randomly generated names and a player development algorithm/process I came up. I will put each randomly generated player into the algorithm and it will spit out all the players initial ratings. I then assign that player a randomly generated age between 20-45. I do this 64 times and I have my field of players. These names are deliberately created from a DB that allows me to pick the country or origin of the name so I have diversity in my field of players.
I then play out my season just like I did in my original replay. This time though, at the end of the season instead of pulling the PGA Tour stats to determine my next year's field, I will run those 64 players through the player development algorithm and they will get better and worse in each category. I will then create a "next 100" list of players that I also create initial ratings for. Each year the bottom 10 from the field of 64 get kicked back to the next 100 list and the top 10 from the next 100 list join my field of 64. I then rinse and repeat that process for as many years as I wish. Tonight I finished building out the ratings for the original 64 players. The next 100 list always has 100 golfers waiting (think Korn Ferry Tour) to get in to the field of 64. That means that each year players that don't cut the mustard on the next 100 list go away forever.
This process allows me to see a players career from beginning to end while I'm also testing my player development model to see if it functions how I expect it to. For those that do a career mode in Links, this could serve that purpose as I could certainly play along if I chose to. I could also use a lot fewer golfers if I wanted less work or didn't want the season replays to take as long. In other words this could be tailored to the desire of the individual.
So how will I do the anis for these? I just created a superani that has 14 faces and over 20 pairs of pants and shirts and hats that I will assign random diverse faces to. If I create 4 or 5 of those superanis I will have plenty of variety to get me through. I think I'm going to go LIV style this time around too so I might create some more anis with shorts, which is something I've not tinkered with at all to this point.
https://www.linkscorner.org/phpBB/viewtopic.php?t=1741
Now for my next project. In my real life I work 2 full time jobs and have for the last 25 years. I've been in the IT industry doing hardware, networking, desktop support, application support and helpdesk type stuff as my "real job". I use that skill set with Links every day. My other job though is running a travel baseball organization. I played college baseball and have been coaching baseball and running a travel baseball organization since the early 2000s. My true talent in baseball is player development. My organization has one of the top player development models in the country. In this next project I'm going to use that skill set with Links.
The PGA Tour replay was fun, but after spending the last 18 months on it, it needs a little twist and some excitement injected into it. So, my next version will be using players with randomly generated names and a player development algorithm/process I came up. I will put each randomly generated player into the algorithm and it will spit out all the players initial ratings. I then assign that player a randomly generated age between 20-45. I do this 64 times and I have my field of players. These names are deliberately created from a DB that allows me to pick the country or origin of the name so I have diversity in my field of players.
I then play out my season just like I did in my original replay. This time though, at the end of the season instead of pulling the PGA Tour stats to determine my next year's field, I will run those 64 players through the player development algorithm and they will get better and worse in each category. I will then create a "next 100" list of players that I also create initial ratings for. Each year the bottom 10 from the field of 64 get kicked back to the next 100 list and the top 10 from the next 100 list join my field of 64. I then rinse and repeat that process for as many years as I wish. Tonight I finished building out the ratings for the original 64 players. The next 100 list always has 100 golfers waiting (think Korn Ferry Tour) to get in to the field of 64. That means that each year players that don't cut the mustard on the next 100 list go away forever.
This process allows me to see a players career from beginning to end while I'm also testing my player development model to see if it functions how I expect it to. For those that do a career mode in Links, this could serve that purpose as I could certainly play along if I chose to. I could also use a lot fewer golfers if I wanted less work or didn't want the season replays to take as long. In other words this could be tailored to the desire of the individual.
So how will I do the anis for these? I just created a superani that has 14 faces and over 20 pairs of pants and shirts and hats that I will assign random diverse faces to. If I create 4 or 5 of those superanis I will have plenty of variety to get me through. I think I'm going to go LIV style this time around too so I might create some more anis with shorts, which is something I've not tinkered with at all to this point.