A Gaming Diary
Posts tagged baseball
MLB 07: The Show (PSP)
Feb 26th
After only a month in the minor leagues I got promoted to the majors. Fantastic. Playing for the Atlanta Braves felt very special, which wouldn’t have happened if I’d gone straight there.
I’m not doing as well as I did in the minors. I’m hitting about 0.300, which isn’t bad, and I’ve got a few runs, but my batting average was about 0.475 when I was playing for Richmond. I’m also getting fewer games and a lot of times I’m only being put in as a pinch runner or pinch hitter late in the game. (Which makes the load times even more unbearable.)
Still, I think I’m doing well enough to stay where I am. It would be most dispiriting to get shunted back to Richmond after a taste of the big time.
MLB 07: The Show (PSP)
Feb 24th
Back to a career I started last summer with the Braves. I finished spring training and got offered a contract. Wasn’t good enough for the majors, but I’m now designated hitter for the Richmond Braves and doing really, really well… in terms of hit percentage. I can get on base. I still don’t understand the base running controls, though, and keep over- and under-running. I think I’ve only got one run myself so far this season, which isn’t good. Doesn’t help that the rest of my team is rubbish.
Still, having a good time with the game. If only the load times were less terrible. Hopefully 08 will be improved in that regard.
MLB 08: The Show Demos (PS3 & PSP)
Feb 24th
Both seem to play a decent game of baseball, but the PS3 version also has gorgeous graphics and presentation. Really very good stuff.
MLB 07 The Show (PSP)
May 27th
Well, MLB 08 The Show should be fantastic.
This almost is – I’ve just started playing and the only reason I’ve stopped is that my PSP battery has run down – but it’s spoiled by some very rough edges. I’m playing The Road to the Show mode, where you create a played and play as that player alone. I’m a second baseman on the Braves and I hit when it’s my turn, control my baserunning and if the ball comes near me when I’m playing defense I’ll have to get the ball and throw it. The rest of the game isn’t shown – it just jumps to those moments where I’ve got something to do.
It’s almost great.
The first trouble is the load times. They are truly atrocious and quite possibly the worst I’ve seen yet on the PSP. You simply can’t just sit down and play this game. You need something on TV to watch while it loads, or a magazine, or some cake, or something.
The second problem is that there’s not a lot of feedback. If you go for a double play when you’re fielding then you’ll know if you got the first out, but not the second. Without pausing the game and waiting for a text display to scroll across the screen you won’t know whether the last pitch was a ball or a strike while you’re on base. (This may possibly be better with sound, but I’ve been playing with sound off and I think all handheld games that aren’t music-based should be designed with silent play in mind.)
The third problem is that sometimes rules don’t seem to be applied properly and now and again the post-game box score won’t agree with what’s displayed on your stats for that game. I’m sure I’ve had a run credited before that shouldn’t have counted and in my last game the box score said I had an RBI, but the summary screen after that said I hadn’t. Odd.
Still, despite all those problems, it is incredibly addictive. The PS3 version might fix a lot of these flaws and be a good buy and, as I said, MLB 08 should be great. They can’t keep those load times in the next version, they just can’t.
MLB 2K7 (PS3)
May 25th
Played two excellent games.
First up, I played an exhibition game as the 1946 Red Sox against the current Astros lineup and won 4-2.
After that I decided I should start a season. Might take a while, as there are 162 games in the standard season and each game takes over an hour to play. And that’s ignoring all the time spent doing all the managerial things I’ve not worked out yet. I’ve set it to automate as much as possible, as I just want to play to ball.
Anyway, I’m playing as the Astos and I’ve played one game so far this season. A win at home against the Pirates, 6-4. Was looking bad until a three-run homer in the sixth and then a solo homer in the eighth to take a two-run lead going in to the ninth.
MLB 2K7 (PS3)
Apr 19th
Ah, but I love this game. I’ve taken the difficulty down to Rookie from Pro and decided to play against the Pirates, rather than the Giants. (The Pirates aren’t quite as good as the Giants, to put it nicely.) I won 7-1, which was nice. Six of those runs came in the 6th inning, from three home runs. In fact, all my runs came from homers, now I think about it. Ah well, I’m not complaining. I earned enough Tokens to unlock a classic team. The 1946 Red Sox, I think.
I’ve not got the hang of baserunning yet – last time I tried it I wanted to send a man to second, but he carried on and tried to run for third and I’m not sure why. And fielding really seems to be clumsy compared to the rest of the game. Not sure if I’m just rubbish at it and maybe missing something, or if it really isn’t as good as the rest of the game. Sometimes my fielders just don’t seem to want to pick up the ball.
But, still, I love the game. The presentation is just wonderful and really helps me get my fix on those evenings when NASN is just showing stinky old ice hockey.
And once this season is over – eep! – I’m sure I’ll treasure it even more.
Sony may have made mistakes lately – many, many mistakes – but making the PS3 region-free was not one of them.
MLB 2K7 (PS3)
Apr 16th
Okay, a note for anyone searching Google: the US (or USA) version of MLB 2K7, also known as Major League Baseball 2K7, on the Playstation 3 video games console does work fine on a UK console. I know there have been conflicting reports online. General opinion seemed to lead to the conclusion that it would work, but I could find no confirmation. And some people were assuming that 2K Sports would lock it, as they did with the 360 version. So, if you’re searching Google looking for confirmation, here (probably on page 132 of your results) is that confirmation. It’ll probably only work if you’re using HD, so anyone stuck with an old standard-definition set might be out of luck, but anyone with an HD-Ready television is all set.
Right, okay, that’s my good deed done for the day. It’s very good indeed, too, by the way. Changed a bit from the demo. Seems to look a bit nicer, some options that were on by default in the demo are off in the full game, but it’s basically the same. Which should be pretty obvious, I suppose.
Anyway, I set up a profile and set my options. Played as the Astros against the Giants. I lost, badly. 15-0, I believe. Oddly, my pitcher, who pitched until he was nearly dead because I forgot to warm up anyone to relieve him, never got tense like all the pitchers did in the demo. I wonder if that’s something I need to turn on? But I wasn’t so bad at pitching really. Fielding was more the problem there. I just kept stepping over the ball and throwing to the wrong base. But I was okay. Batting was where I was really awful. One base hit in the whole game. One. In fact, I was so bad at hitting the ball that I thought I might be missing something, so after the game I tried a couple of home run derbys. I didn’t have any trouble hitting the ball there, even with Astros players.
I think I might need to turn the difficulty down a bit.
Anyway, the game’s great (apart from an odd lack of autosave and a million different save files – profile, options, game, even a separate save for the bloody music settings! – that all have to be dealt with in different places) and I’m very glad I can play it. I know the 360 version got (slightly) better reviews, but that’s not region free, so for UK baseball fans PS3 1 – Xbox 360 0.
MLB 2K7 Demo (PS3)
Apr 7th
Tried this again this morning. It really is brilliant. I was maybe a little harsh about how it looked last night. The presentation is great and generates just the right atmosphere and the player models and clothing are okay – it’s just the textures and lighting that really lets things down. It’s very much stuck between generations.
As for how it plays, I enjoyed it much more this session – and not just because another home run won the game for me, in the bottom of the eighth this time.
MLB 2K7 Demo (PS3)
Apr 7th
I set up a US account to download this one. Was very much worth it. It looks appalling, but it plays brilliantly. I do love being able to buy Inside Edge info so my catcher will give me tips on how best to pitch to certain players.
I couldn’t get the hang of batting using the motion-sensing capabilities of the SIAXIS at all – I just kept bunting – but I found the option to change it back to the classic “hit X” method in the bottom of the ninth, hit a home run with a man already on first base and won the game.
Awesome.
I do hope the full game is region-free, because 2K Sports never release their baseball games in the UK. I cuss them bad.
