[Zitofan75]

For the original question, I'll put down money the day it opens for pre-order. I like the game Markus puts out and I like supporting small developers. Personally I'm glad he's no longer associated with SEGA. I really like the strides that he made with OOTP7 and saw it as realizing the promise found in OOTP6. OOTP8 has been nice too, milestone tracker was a needed addition.

OOTP7 has gotten me interested in historic play more than ever. I was never excited about having to remember when to add a particular team for example. I also like to play with multiple leagues, something prior versions of OOTP wouldn't allow at all and OOTP6 wouldn't allow you to add as you went on. I look forward to more of this in future versions and hope for more realistic treatments of the minors (a huge task I know) with hopefully independent minor leagues slowly being enfolded into MLB over time.

I hesitate to enter the interface debate as A) it still raises some hackles and B) it's probably pointless. However I would point out that when they announced their split from SI and mentioned OOTP9 they stated that the current interface will stay. So unless they have a secret plan in the works to bring the old interface back it's a moot point. Anyhow, the criticism of the interface and the game itself was much more intense a year ago after OOTP6 then it is now. The mood was alot more pessimistic back then that OOTP would do well in the future and there was much tentativeness about OOTP7. If there was ever going to be a time when Markus might've been tempted to "change back" it was probably then when such a change would've been met with a more favorable response from the boards. Now, with the success of OOTP7 it seems alot more people have moved on from that issue and changing back now would be unecessarily disruptive IMO. We've had two versions of the game with the interface and many people are structuring their games around it and looking forward to OOTP9, often with the assumption that the interface will remain. Swinging back to the old ways to please some of your customer base (and it's not clear how large that group is compared to those who prefer/like/or are satisfied with today's version) is simply messing with the rest of your customer base and that's not a good idea. Anyhow, Markus has tweaked the interface over time to make it more functional. The bookmark feature is a good example of that. I imagine it will continue evolve in the future.