The OOTP franchise celebrates 25 years in 2024, a historic number that most gaming franchises can only dream of reaching. Since its release, OOTP has been considered by many the best baseball game in the market, and one of the best sports simulation video games, being the only game to win "Metacritic’s PC Game of the Year" on two separate occasions.
With OOTP 25 celebrating such an important milestone for the Franchise, the game wants to provide players with the most realistic and immersive experience ever. To do that, it's introducing many new features while adjusting some already existing ones.
I had the privilege to speak with Rich Grisham, Director of Business Development, who explained why OOTP 25 is so important for the franchise and talked us through all the new features in this year's edition.
A game that wants to leave its mark
OOTP 25 aims to take the franchise to a new level, introducing several major improvements.
While most franchises would play it safe for such an important edition of their game, OOTP 25 takes the challenge to substantially improve the game and bring to players everywhere in the world a realistic baseball experience like never before.
OOTP 25 wants to make justice to its name, hitting the game out of the park and providing a great experience for newcomers, while still challenging veteran players.
What makes OOTP 25 so special and unique?
"Well, the short answer is, several major new improvements. The first one is really under the hood of the engine, where the development teams as significantly expanded the ratings for all of the players in the game. So there is a lot more data to work with.
Baseball is probably the most data-driven sport there is, so in an effort to continue to make the results of the game as realistic as possible. A whole bunch of new players' ratings have been expanded in terms of the range to give more dynamic values as well as expanded new types of ratings.
Something that really separates OOTP 25 from 24 or other early editions, is that we have a brand-new partnership with the National Baseball Hall of Fame, which is going to allow us to do some really fun and unique things that really no one else has ever done, in terms of digitally representing really cool things from the National Baseball Hall of Fame all season long. It's almost like doing exhibits in a museum, and that's a cool new thing for baseball fans to explore. It also expands our ability to produce interesting new content in Perfect Teams.
There is also going to be a brand-new mode in the game that we are looking forward to being a real game changer, no pun intended, in this mode, which is called "Drive for the Pennant", when it's released, a couple of weeks after launch, will give every person that plays OOTP a brand-new way to experience it, almost like a choose your own adventure type of experience, where you will be inserted into big moments during a baseball season and you will have to make a choice, or manage a part of a game, or make a big trade, or not making it, or call up someone from the minors.
You will almost be pulled along for the ride, it will only be probably a few hours of an experience, and you will get to slowly but surely get introduced to a lot of different aspects of OOTP baseball.
It's a way for people who might be intimidated by how big OOTP is to try it in a different way and is also something that I think everyone who has played OOTP will have fun doing because it’s new, it's different, you don't have as much responsibility at your fingertips, but you still get to experience the rollercoaster of what it is like to be in charge of a team over the course of a season."
OOTP has reached the silver jubilee, and there aren’t a lot of gaming franchises that have reached this amazing milestone, what does this mean to you and everyone involved in OOTP 25?
"It means everything. Making video games has always been challenging and the industry has always been challenging. In these days if it's not the most challenging it's certainly up there. So it just means everything to be able to make the game.
Markus Heinsohn, who is the leader, has been here since the beginning and is still the leader of the group. It's an amazing accomplishment that he is proud of. I've been associated with the franchise for nine years now, and it's hard to put into words how special it is to be able to be a part of a team that makes a game like this.
My whole childhood I loved baseball, and if you had told me I would be able to be a part of a game that is an MLB licensed game, where you can literally pick up anywhere in the history of baseball, I would have been a much happier kid, not that I was unhappy, but it's almost surreal.
The community and the fans are the only reason we get to do this, so what it really means to me is that I'm just thankful, I'm thankful to everybody who helps us make this game because it's hard to do it and it's hard to run a video game business so we are just very thankful."
Do you believe OOTP will still be going as strong as ever 25 years from now?
"I do. Because I think MLB will still be the best sport in the world and is something I would love to continue to be a part of for the next 25 years. 25 years is a long time, but I don't see video games going away and I don't see baseball going away. So to me as long as there is baseball and there are video games we will strive to make OOTP, and every year make it better than it was before."
Is it fair to say OOTP 25 is the most realistic and immersive baseball simulation game ever?
"I think so. Now, we are still working on it, but between the expansion of the ratings, which really produces even better results than ever, as well as just our continuous dedication to making sure all of the player information is accurate, not only for the upcoming season but for every season in the past, yes I do I think it's absolutely the most realistic and I think the fans will see that and believe in that themselves. "
What new features is OOTP 25 introducing?
"A game like OOTP has multiple sections, some people play all of the parts others just play some, and we try to make sure that everybody gets something good.
For example, in our Perfect Team mode, which is our online competitive mode, we have leagues and we have tournaments. The tournaments are an area where a lot of people have a lot of fun, you can use thousands of cards and players, and we have this new Tournament Sandbox, which allows you to construct tournament rosters for all the different kinds of tournaments.
The Tournament Sandbox allows you to configure the roster and get a validation that the roster will work for that specific tournament. If you don't play Perfect Team that might not sound like a big deal, but if you do play Perfect Team it's a huge deal."
Another big deal is player development. So a big part of running a baseball franchise is trying to develop your young players into serviceable MLB players and then into superstars.
The new player development feature allows you to significantly influence what you want the players to focus on. It doesn't guarantee that you will get the results you want, but for the first time ever you can sort of say to your pitcher, I want you to develop a new pitch or I want you to increase your velocity, and you will give them instructions on how to do that.
If you want a batter to increase their contact you can try to influence them. It won’t always work but sometimes it will. Regardless, your ability to communicate exactly what you want to happen is a big deal, so I know players are going to love that.
In terms of just something fun, we have these new visual immersion tools that allow you to play a game and watch a game in very different visual methods. So if you want to watch a game like it was shown on TV in the 1950s you can do that, or on a big bright colour TV from the 1970s, you can also do that. Things like that are really fun.
We also have a couple of brand-new licensed leagues. In addition to the MLB and the KBO licenses we now will have the officially licensed leagues of the Honkbal Hoofdklasse (Netherlands), which is a big-time baseball league, as well as the British Baseball Federation. These are two very different leagues, with two very different sets of players, but every little bit of licensing authenticity that we can get into the game we love to be able to do, so we are really excited about that as well."
Why did you decide OOTP 25 was the right time to introduce the Tournament Sandbox feature?
"The short answer is, we knew it would be a big hit. But we have a very small development team, there are less than ten people and only four people who actually write code. So it really came down to, we would have loved to have done it sooner, but we didn’t have the resources and we also knew it would take a significant amount of time.
This isn’t something you can do in a day or two, it takes a significant amount of time and it involves a lot of integration from a lot of pieces. We knew it was something players wanted, and while we had batted around the idea of creating it earlier, this was the first time where we really had enough time to plan it, develop it, and put it into the game."
Some new players have a hard time picking up OOTP since it’s a complex game, at least compared to other baseball or sports games. Do you think OOTP 25 is friendly to new players?
"We certainly try our best to make it that way. At the end of the day, it is a baseball simulation game that strives to have everything in it that a baseball general manager would need to do. So because of that volume, if we didn’t have international scouting, or the finances, or the minor leagues if we didn’t have all of that then we wouldn’t have the fans that we do.
But on the other hand, we do recognize clearly that when you have such a big game it can be intimidating to new users, so in the last few years we added in-game tutorials to make it easier
Our Perfect Team mode wasn't created as a way to bring in new players but it has certainly served as one. That’s because the Perfect Team mode has a lot of the things that everybody who loves baseball understands, how to put together a lineup, a rotation, a bullpen, understanding strategies for the game, but it doesn't have some of the more complex aspects of running a franchise, like free agency, trades, international scouting, domestic scouting, finances, you don’t have minor leagues and major leagues you just have one club.
So we certainly believe there are a number of ways for newcomers to enjoy the game right off the bat. There isn’t just one way to play the game, there are many ways to do so.”
What did you do to make the game feel more accessible to new players while still feeling challenging for veteran players?
"The answer is we just do our absolute best. We always have a list of things that we want to do and we sort of understand that these are aimed at people who have been playing the game for 10, 15, or 20 years, while others are aimed at people who used to play or are brand new.
We also ask for a lot of feedback from our community, and we get a lot of feedback from the community. Our forums and our discord are always busy with people asking questions and providing feedback. So it’s a never-ending cycle, you are always seeking information and feedback, and you are always asking yourself “What can I do”.
Some things you have on your list for years to do and you haven’t been able to do, and some things you have on your list for a while and you were able to do it. It’s not a science it’s an art, and it’s just something that we work on every day, we try our best to make sure we balance delighting our long-time fans and also bringing new fans to the table."
What are the main goals of the Player Development Lab feature?
"One of the biggest changes in the real sport has been the increase in off-season training, focusing on increasing velocity and spin rates. What player development does is, it's looking to replicate that.
50 or 60 years ago these things didn't exist, so player development would happen much more organically, based on whatever the player wanted to do. This really allows us to represent the real sport and basically say, okay I want to send a few of my guys to this lab where we are going to specifically focus on working on these two or three attributes for these players and then see what happens as a result of that."
Do you expect players, especially new players, to have trouble figuring out how this new Player Development Lab feature works or will it be very easy to pick up?
"I think a lot of the long-time fans will love this because we already heard it, we have talked about it a little bit, and we have heard that a whole bunch of people are really excited about it. To me, this feels like this is something that we wanted to do for a long time, it’s a big feature, and it has been requested by people.
In the past, you could sort of influence how your players developed by hiring a coaching staff, but this is really you saying, I want you to add velocity, or a new pitch, or increase your contact. I think that’s an appeal to everybody, veteran players and newcomers.
Because, again, if you are a newcomer to OOTP it means you love baseball, and if you love baseball you are very aware of all of the tools at the disposal of clubs today to increase and improve their player development. So we think everyone is going to like it, we certainly hope so."
How important is the partnership with the Baseball Hall of Fame?
"It opens a door to the Baseball Hall of Fame in a way that I don’t think has ever been done before. If you haven’t ever been to the Baseball Hall of Fame, you will be able to look at some of the plaques and some of the pictures. You will be able to look at artefacts from the history of the sport.
If you like baseball it’s a way for you to get a taste of what is in the Baseball Hall of Fame, without going to Cooperstown, New York, which for some people it’s easy and for a lot of people isn’t.
So it was a really natural concept for us, as OOTP has the entire history of baseball in it, and the National Baseball Hall of Fame is really the most legendary Hall of Fame of sports. It just made a lot of sense for us conceptionally to partner with the Hall of Fame, and then the questions come down to, “What is the best way to do it ‘“, and we think we have found a really fun way for people to get a taste and experience what is in the Baseball Hall of Fame, as well as having some of these Hall of Fame players in the Perfect Team mode, with their real name and image likeness.
It brings a lot to the table, and I think it will evolve over time, it’s not all there right off the bat, but it’s going to evolve and I think it will be a whole lot of fun for a whole lot of people."
If you had to give people who aren’t familiar with baseball a reason to play OOTP 25 what would it be?
"I would say that there are very few games that have won the awards we have won, that have the entire history of anything in the game, whether it’s a sport, music, or TV, there are very few experiences that you can have that give you the option to have such a deep experience.
I’ve had plenty of people tell me that they really learned a lot about baseball by playing OOTP, which is awesome, because baseball has an incredibly rich history.
Every single time I start a new historic season, or I play Perfect Team, I will see a card from a player that I have never heard of or I will see a card from a player that I didn’t realize had the career that he did. So there isn't really anything quite like OOTP, and even if you're not a big baseball fan you can absolutely have fun, learn something, and your time will be well spent."
You mentioned you have two new partnerships with leagues outside of North America. One in the Netherlands and the other in the United Kingdom. So do you think that OOTP can help captivate new fans for the sport, and help promote baseball in continents such as Europe and South America where the game isn’t that popular?
"Yeah, that is one of the big reasons that we wanted to do these new leagues and have them in the game, for exactly that reason. We firmly believe that people who already play OOTP and know OOTP will have fun checking out the new leagues, will learn something, and be able to experience baseball in a different way.
We also believe that fans of the British Baseball Federation and the Honkbal Hoofdklasse will be like, “Oh my god, my favourite team is in this game that I have never heard of, let me go play it“. So we certainly believe it’s good for everybody, good for the fans, the new leagues, and good for the players and the teams in those leagues. We certainly feel like it will help promote those leagues and those regions, as well as those leagues will help promote our game in those regions. So that is what we are confident will happen."
How would you describe OOTP 25?
"I would say is the most authentic baseball experience that a person can have. It’s fun for baseball fans of all types. You can look to the future, you can look to the past, you can create your own world or you can jump right into the real one. You can play with friends, and make new friends, in what is the best community in video games, in my opinion.
There are a lot of people who start playing OOTP and stick around, for years and years. The community is what makes it special. The game is awesome, but the community takes it to a new level, and that’s why I think we have a special connection with our fans. It’s a small, compared to big video games, but it’s a passionate fan base."
Is there anything you want to say to the OOTP community Richard?
"I just want to say thank you, because without them we wouldn’t be talking right now, we wouldn’t be shipping out OOTP 25 on March 15, and I would be doing something very different in my career. This is the best thing I have ever done and I hope to do it for a long time, and without the fans, none of this would be happening. So thank you."
I hope this interview answered all of the questions you had about OOTP 25, a game that is very important for the franchise and everyone involved in it.
So if you are looking for a baseball simulation game, make sure to check out OOTP 25.