As the fans file into the stadium, players are warming up, the coaches talk to various players, trainers giving last minute treatment to players, and then everything settles in, and in a few moments, the umpire will yell, “PLAY BALL” and the first pitch will be thrown! I give you Sony’s exclusive Major League seasonal game, MLB 13: The Show. I’ll preface this review as; I haven’t played a baseball game since MLB All-Star on the N64 back in 99 or 2000. So I can say, without a doubt, definitely a fresh look on it. And I can say I love this game, and all its 9 innings of glory. I don’t exactly enjoy watching baseball, unless its in-person, but this game makes playing, whatever position you fancy, as simply just down right fun.
I’ll start off with what everybody wants to do, play baseball. Be it defense or swinging the lumber. The game makes each experience, be it, in the regular season for the majors in a franchise or minors with Road to the Show, or playing with a RTTS player in the majors, a fluid and seamless experience. The game just makes everything fun. For playing a team versus team game, pitching, if you haven’t played any of the previous The Show games, it takes some getting use to. But once you find the one that suits you, you’ll love it. I’ll say this, Pulse pitching, which entails, a circle around a smaller one, that pulsates, and its fun, but it can be annoying to get the mechanics down, especially with the lower rated pitchers. Fielding is easy, with various indicators for the ball while it’s in the air, and easy to use controls for getting the ball to the necessary cutoff man or base. And also, controlling multiple runners on base is simple and easy. Also, a great note you can customize the game to all the mechanics of gameplay, to fit our style and need. Going along with that, you can run an franchise controlling every aspect from bring guys up from AAA to postseason runs, the game will have you playing hours, and potentially years if you choose.
Let’s move onto the gameplay of the mainstay and titular of the game, Road to the Show. This is the bread and the butter, super fun, and amazing. You start with creating a baseball player, with all the sliders to your content. And then you can either choose, to get put onto a MLB teams AA or AAA, or allow yourself be drafted. As I said, up above, you have settings that you can change to fit your play style. As you progress in your career, you get monthly goals, experience for playing and various correspondences between you and your management. But the gameplay remains the same, as if you were playing a team versus team, but you’re locked into a single player, your player. As you play, the game allows you to fast forward through games, and only playing in plays that you can directly affect or while batting. This cuts down on the time of watching or playing 9 whole innings. The base running is simplified with an up or right to advance running, and down or left, to return to previous base. As you play, you’ll learn nuances and baseball related skills to continue to progress. Its solid, and minus a few camera problems, like when you’re running to snag a fly ball in the outfield, and its over your head, the camera naturally, get closer to your player, but sometimes, when you’re running, the camera will have a slight seizure and cause you to miss an easy out.
The presentation and the sounds of the game are simply astounding and full encompassing. Three of the best instances, when you play RTTS as a Minor League player, the stadiums aren’t full, the atmosphere isn’t all encompassing as I said before, but you get the feel of being, in the start of your career. While when you get to the “Show” it’s simply loud, you hear the crowd, and when you make a play or an amazing stand as a team, you’ll hear the roar of the crowd. And when you’re playing team game, you can hear that same in a team versus team game. The commentators: Matt Vasgersian, Eric Karros, and Steve Lyons are great and talk about the action, either in RTTS for just you, or end of inning recap or during your full game, but they tend to get dry rather quick. But as you play, in whatever mode, you get the atmosphere of being at the park, from the sounds of the ball being hit, the glove catching the ball, the umpire making a call, and the roar of the crowd after a bad call.
The game’s graphics are great, and look amazing, minus the grass, which looks like a weird version of astro-turf for gaming. But player’s faces, those of the professionals look like they’re real counterparts. I’ll admit, if they could add in the ability to see uniforms ruffling from movement, and also, the crowd… the day I see a crowd, that actually look like people and not some weird, graphical code dump for the crowd, it’ll be the day. But the game and its graphics, to its gameplay and its fun, to climbing your way up either in a Franchise or RTTS, MLB 13: The Show is worth the price tag and just simply fun and amazing. And I’m happy I picked it up!