Maxflier

Same here.

DJariya

Picking this up later today. Pre-ordered it from Gamestop. Trading in my 2014 version and apparently it's only worth $6.60. Shows how much sports games depreciate in value.

Decker

Still no reviews up. Must have not given out review copies.

BearFan

This is the reason I am seriously thinking about getting a PS4

musick

that is what I saw on IGN the other day, that they did not provide pre-release review copies
not that I need reviews ... user impressions are good enough

picked mine Anniversary Edition up this afternoon and will fire up tonight

Emperor Charon

I picked up my copy, and played it a little bit already. If you like The Show series, I really don't see what one could find to complain about, or need a review for. It's an MLB The Show game. A few comments, though, from a long-timer to the series, but one who skipped the first "next gen" edition:

---They keep messing with the batting interface. The whole directional/hold the stick thing just seems "meh". I miss the classic timing interface. This one isn't totally crap, but they just keep adding stuff onto the old, tried and true.

---Highlight mode is GONE. This is a minor complaint about presentation, that doesn't affect the gameplay, but I liked that. You don't get the automatic wrap up show you once did.



Those are my early, quick impressions. My only complaint so far (missed my quotation marks) is that you start off as the dirty, awful Giants during the training game, while the game installs!

Emperor Charon

Thanks for the response. I am fine with that stance, I just wanted to know. I know that the fantasy option exists, but then, you can end up with power teams, assuming that people have varying knowledge of baseball.

Let me know if anyone starts a league up!

musick

early impressions: everything is better than last years edition and last years was great

now can SCE San Diego Studio please get the rights to the NHL

Rob V

I'm assuming you can still do "classic" timed hitting?

BearFan

So, I went out and bought a PS4 and this game. I recently got a bonus and was going to spend part of it on something fun. No Kris Bryant? I assume because he is not on the Cubs 40 man roster?

bluthswede6

I played in our one and only league a few years back and had fun when it worked. I'd be interested if we are bringing it back.

Emperor Charon

avsfan and I tried to play 2 exhibition games tonight, around 6pm Pacific. We had the game freeze in the top of the 2nd the first time, then, right before Kershaw got the last out in a CG victory for me, it froze after 8 2/3 innings. What a travesty. I hope that this isn't what you guys were talking about when discussing last year's online being a shit storm.

dsa_shea

Pretty much. That and the fact that when you pitch and are trying to hit there is a terrible amount of lag that makes batting even more difficult than it already is.

Gooter

Yes, I believe that is correct. Chris Sale was not on the Sox either, unless I didn't see him, as he is hurt (though pitched yesterday in minors).

I'm enjoying my first experience in the Show series. It literally is like watching a live game. I don't understand the 'card' part of the game though I won't really play that anyway. Will give RTTS a spin and then focus on Franchise mode.

Any tips for a first time player?

I'm using the buttons + stick to influence the ball (forgot what it is called in game). Is there a better option, the analog sticks maybe? Still working on swing timing. And, playing on Beginner.

musick

best advice I think I can give is what I already told you .... try and be patient and not swing at everything

also doing the batting practice mode to get comfortable isn't a bad idea

anyway I haven't found hitting to be that difficult

19K

I downloaded it this morning. This is my first console baseball game since Baseball Stars on the NES. Its a lot different

I assume I'm still waiting for it to install because I just finished the Giants vs Royals 'introductory' game and I cant do anything other than view stats and restart the game.

Early impressions from a total newbie:

The tutorials (or lack of) stink. I pretty much had no idea what I was doing for that introductory game. I ended up restarting it since I was down 9-0 after 3 innings. But after the restart, I started figuring some things out and was able to finish the full 9 innings and win 1-0.

I'm still not sure how I feel about the fielding... it seems like its psuedo-automatic. Sometimes they fielded the ball, sometimes they didn't. Any groundballs to infielders, if I tried to control the player, he would boot the ball, so I'm assuming you're supposed to let them field it. After 1 and ahalf games, I'm still not sure. Throwing to a base after fielding it must be a timing thing. Evry time the CPU team fielded the ball, they scooped and threw in nice fluid motions. My guys kinda stumbled all over the place. When I threw it, he took a lot of extra steps in whatever direction he was running, and then usually threw an errant ball that was in the dirt or off the mark. The CPU players beat out a lot of throws that should have been easy outs. Like I said, must just be a timing thing. I made a lot of errors with either poor throws or not picking the ball up, so I'm not quite sure how much control I'm supposed to provide. For fly balls, you just need to get in the vicinity and its pretty automatic. The ground balls, not so much.

I think I got the basics of pitching after my first game though. One question, there's a box above the plate that is shaded with red and blue colors. Im assuming its a hot and cold zone for the batter? When I'm pitching, should I be aiming for the blue parts? When you're batting you have the same box, so I'm not sure what its supposed to be indicating.

Any tips would be appreciated.

musick

yeah meat the Giants/Royals game serves as a intro to what is new this year while the game installs

the interface isn't the best for a newbie or even an experienced player but with a game with so many options it is difficult to please all

fielding by default is, as you mentioned, semi-automatic .... I don't recall but there probably are adjustments you can make to make it less automated .... you can also pre-load your throw to a base before you have the ball to make the throw more fluid (they even introduced a cut-off man feature this year)

blue is the cold zones for a hitter and red are the hot zones
so yes, when you are pitching you want to aim for the blue zones .... when you are batting you want to try and get pitches in the hot/red zones

I really don't bother with some of the more advanced features (maybe I will when I have more time and don't want to just pick up and play), but yeah the amount of options can seem overwhelming
kind of miss the days where you had to read through a manual to see all features but these days the manuals would be like novels ... I guess that is why they are all done digitally these days

19K

Thanks for the info.

I'm absolutely loving the game for what little Ive played of it so far. I just created a player and am doing RTTS mode. I picked a starting pitcher because that seems to be the least complicated for just starting out. Like you said, the amount of features is mind boggling.

Also, the graphics and player animations are incredible. It literally took over an hour to create a player with all the customization options you can choose from.

musick

yeah, it can definately be overload but you don't even need to touch most of that stuff for the game to play amazing and yes, it does look absolutely incredible

to think how far we have come since this ......


RTTS is the same thing I do every year I have played and also pick pitcher as well since it gives you more to do consistanly ..... only thing that I get frustrated with is it seems like I am almost always drafted by a AL team so my at bats are limited to interleague play only until I possibly get traded

I've said this before, but I don't even follow baseball anymore but this franchise is still a blast to play
I can only imagine the game is even more fun for those who follow the current teams/players

musick

that sucks
I saw you guys had a 0-0 game going in the 8th I think
I had an issue where the game didn't show me as signed in the PSN but I was so I don't know what the online issues were but given the history I'm not surprised

Emperor Charon

The first game was a 0-0 tie in the 2nd when the first freeze hit. The worst part, of course, is that the first person to XMB out (quit) gets tagged with the loss, even if neither of us had another option but quitting, given the circumstances. It should have been washed out of our history.

The second game was a 3-0 game, 1 out away from my win, and it freezes. Thankfully avsfan quit first, so I could get my proper win.

I've had the same issue, too, where it randomly says I am booted from The Show servers, as well as not signed into PSN...when I am. I've had a few Diamond Dynasty games not get the stats counted (batting average, HR, RBIs), but have the result recorded, because of this.

Maxflier

Wow, I remember missing the bus for school one morning because I spent too long playing this at my neighbors house.

musick

long load times right?

dsa_shea

Online lag.

19K

So I'm browsing the Diamond Dynasty section because this is my first MLB game and I want to see what else there is... I'm thinking "OK, this is kinda cool". Its like fantasy baseball where you collect baseball cards, and whatever players you have collected, you can make a team out of and play online with. That's pretty clever. Wait, what's this 'Customize' button? You mean I can completely customize my team uniforms and logo and there's a built-in logo creator/editor?!? I don't even like fantasy baseball, but that's just a phenomenal feature. I love those emblem creator features (Battlefield has it too).

This game has the potential to literally suck my entire life away. I could spend hours upon hours just in the logo thing.

We need to start a league.