urethra franklin
March 12th, 2007, 01:34 PM
How is it possible that for 2 years now, 2k sports has actually made the MLB series progressively worse? I first got into these games at 2k5 - hardly perfect but a very enjoyable game. We were promised huge upgrades with 2k6 but instead got totally unusable fielding, and every kind of bug imaginable. The ratings seemingly hadn't been updated since 1999, the rosters almost as far back, Jon Miller and Joe Morgan stumbled over their words, repeated themselves, announced that virtually every player had "no homeruns last year" or "no runs batted in last year" or that they had "been thrown out trying to stretch a single into a double" in their last at bat when none of these were factually accurate. I know I'm also not the only one who was thrown out after my baserunner took an EXCEPTIONALLY large turn around 1B....even on a BUNT SINGLE! Trying to cut off throws from the outfield usually resulted in the ball rolling to the backstop as every one of your fielders suddenly became catatonic mongoloids. The in game replays showed video of spots on the field where no action was taking place and attempting to manual view replays was impossible. All of this after the game's release was pushed back almost TWO MONTHS!!! I'd love to have seen what they had working at the anticipated release date.
Aside from all of that, it was still slow and prone to crashing for absolutely NO F#% reason. The directional sliding was nice, as was the throwing/pickoff system for the catcher. I always thought the swing stick interface was horrible so I've never used it, but I know other people like it.
Now fast forward a year, they've got people from the MVP series working on it, the design team is "admitting" 2k6 was a mistake and that everything would be perfect in this years version.....
So for the good:
1) The fielding is better (not much better)
2) It came out on time
For the worse:
1) The baserunning is horrible, the old system worked just fine....and there's no way to speed up runners in this version which I REALLY hate.
2) The ratings are absurd, although the system hasn't changed at all. Anyone who has ever created a player or tweaked the ratings in a past 2k game (even a 12 year old kid) could have clued the game's designer's in on how to do this.
3) The player names and faces are all messed up, we got black guys who are supposed to be white, white guys who are supposed to be black, names changed for no reason, guys who bat left batting right and all sorts of anarchy. There have always been name screw ups in past games, so that's no big deal....but a black Mike DiFelice or Jayson Werth is non-repairable. I know most people won't care since they're not big name players, but for a lot of us who play franchise mode it's pretty annoying/stupid.
4) Jon Miller and Joe Morgan still have no clue what's going on. I don't have to hear "he was thrown out trying to stretch a single into a double!" anymore, but anytime a ball is fielded by a rightfielder you have to hear "....aaaAAANNNDD HE BOOTED IT!!!" regardless of whether the ball was fielded cleanly or not. There's other voice goofs too, but none of them have been engraved in my f@#% consciousness and will give me nightmares yet like the 2k6 voiceover problems.
5) Moving players between AA/AAA/MLB freely is impossible, and if you try to update your rosters too quickly (which is very necessary since 2k didn't bother with it) the game will start making players on your roster free agents or assigning them to random teams. The only way to get around this is to move ONE player at a time, assign them to AA (because there's no free slots on AAA) then move them UP by sending minor league players down. This is annoying as hell but at least theres a way around it unlike most of the other problems.
6) Balls that are OBVIOUSLY CAUGHT go over the fence for home runs, all in all this game seems a lot more catered to people who enjoy football scores than baseball simulation fans...no small thanks to nearly every borderline decent offensive player being rated 100 or more.
I know 2k's focus was on the next-gen systems, which is fine....but I feel like I was completely lied to and wasted $30 on a non-playable piece of junk, and I've done this for TWO YEARS NOW -- except it was more expensive last year. Not only that, but having a little bit of a programming background, it's just absurd how easy it would've been to have just FIXED ALL OF 2k6 PROBLEMS which is what this game essentially is supposed to be (note: it has none of the advanced features of the next-gen versions).
I really think 2k just crippled this game on purpose in order to make all of us move to the next gen systems and game versions, considering I hear that The Show for PS2/Xbox isn't too hot either, it'll probably work too.
Screw you 2kSports, you know I'm right.
Aside from all of that, it was still slow and prone to crashing for absolutely NO F#% reason. The directional sliding was nice, as was the throwing/pickoff system for the catcher. I always thought the swing stick interface was horrible so I've never used it, but I know other people like it.
Now fast forward a year, they've got people from the MVP series working on it, the design team is "admitting" 2k6 was a mistake and that everything would be perfect in this years version.....
So for the good:
1) The fielding is better (not much better)
2) It came out on time
For the worse:
1) The baserunning is horrible, the old system worked just fine....and there's no way to speed up runners in this version which I REALLY hate.
2) The ratings are absurd, although the system hasn't changed at all. Anyone who has ever created a player or tweaked the ratings in a past 2k game (even a 12 year old kid) could have clued the game's designer's in on how to do this.
3) The player names and faces are all messed up, we got black guys who are supposed to be white, white guys who are supposed to be black, names changed for no reason, guys who bat left batting right and all sorts of anarchy. There have always been name screw ups in past games, so that's no big deal....but a black Mike DiFelice or Jayson Werth is non-repairable. I know most people won't care since they're not big name players, but for a lot of us who play franchise mode it's pretty annoying/stupid.
4) Jon Miller and Joe Morgan still have no clue what's going on. I don't have to hear "he was thrown out trying to stretch a single into a double!" anymore, but anytime a ball is fielded by a rightfielder you have to hear "....aaaAAANNNDD HE BOOTED IT!!!" regardless of whether the ball was fielded cleanly or not. There's other voice goofs too, but none of them have been engraved in my f@#% consciousness and will give me nightmares yet like the 2k6 voiceover problems.
5) Moving players between AA/AAA/MLB freely is impossible, and if you try to update your rosters too quickly (which is very necessary since 2k didn't bother with it) the game will start making players on your roster free agents or assigning them to random teams. The only way to get around this is to move ONE player at a time, assign them to AA (because there's no free slots on AAA) then move them UP by sending minor league players down. This is annoying as hell but at least theres a way around it unlike most of the other problems.
6) Balls that are OBVIOUSLY CAUGHT go over the fence for home runs, all in all this game seems a lot more catered to people who enjoy football scores than baseball simulation fans...no small thanks to nearly every borderline decent offensive player being rated 100 or more.
I know 2k's focus was on the next-gen systems, which is fine....but I feel like I was completely lied to and wasted $30 on a non-playable piece of junk, and I've done this for TWO YEARS NOW -- except it was more expensive last year. Not only that, but having a little bit of a programming background, it's just absurd how easy it would've been to have just FIXED ALL OF 2k6 PROBLEMS which is what this game essentially is supposed to be (note: it has none of the advanced features of the next-gen versions).
I really think 2k just crippled this game on purpose in order to make all of us move to the next gen systems and game versions, considering I hear that The Show for PS2/Xbox isn't too hot either, it'll probably work too.
Screw you 2kSports, you know I'm right.