Full Review: “You’re outta there!!”
EA sports. Renowned for great sports games worldwide, has created an excellent arcade-type baseball experience for the Xbox, and if you accept it as that, you might find yourself enjoying it. The only problem is that it seems to be an arcade game trying to be a sim, and failing miserably at that.
To be completely honest, the game can be pretty fun. Unfortunately, the fun moments are sporadic and never really something you can count on. The game’s depth is somewhat lacking, as the batting is far too easy, as is the fielding. The only time you really feel like you’re in control is when base running, but that can be a rare occurrence since homeruns are disgustingly easy to get. The pitcher/batter interface is decent at best, but somewhat oversimplified, and coupled with the fact that 99 mph pitches look like something my grandmother could throw, missing is rarely even conceivable if not done purposely once you get the hang of the controls. Pitching controls implement the pressure sensitive Xbox face buttons by allowing you to vary the strength of your pitch depending on the pressure you apply, but this seems unrefined and somewhat useless anyways, since the full-out fastballs are already too slow.
To add further to the arcade style are the roster options – you can trade any player for any other player with no restrictions, allowing you to create ridiculously horrible or talented teams, and the create-a-player option offers no restrictions or allocation points, letting you create players that are virtually perfect. Graphically the options are limiting, as with the player models in the game – though every MLB player is included, stats and all, they rarely look like who they should, as they are composed of smooth but seemingly disproportioned player models and blurry textures. The graphics in the rest of the game are mediocre as well – the stadiums are well done for the most part, but the crows are all blurry 2D bitmaps that rarely do anything other than cycle a short animation loop, and the character models animate decently, though I’ve never seen so many looping problems in a game before – the cycles will chop from one to another, leaving for a very unpolished look..
The audio is slightly better than most of the graphics, with decent and well varied running commentary, although, some of it seems random and out of place. The sound effects for the bat and ball can be cheesy as well, but let you know how well you’ve made contact with the ball or how fast it’s traveling. Sadly, the audience is generally just a generic roar, with the main exception being foul balls. You won’t hear a very wide variety of responses to your actions, which is a shame, as it would have dramatically increased the depth of the game.
There are only four game modes – Single Game, Season, Playoffs, and Home Run Derby, and though all of the above really amount to HRDs, there are a decent amount of options within each. However, the lack of a Franchise mode is somewhat disappointing (and surprising), and might have given the game a bit more replay appeal. The DVD Features included are all short but reasonably well done, though all feature clips from the PS2 version, so clearly we Xbox owners aren’t getting any extra features, as is with the rest of the game really – the graphics and audio appear moderately better, though not as much as you might hope.
