Major League Baseball 2K5

"An excellent first try for Kush Games and 2K Sports"

Compared to the years before, last year's release of ESPN Major League Baseball was lacking compared to the other Sega Sports titles released last year. There were very few improvements from the 2003 game, and there were a number of bugs and game-ending glitches. Many people were disappointed with the release. However, that looks to change with the release of Major League Baseball 2K5. The entire game has been revamped, gameplay, graphics, and audio-wise. For 20 bucks, there is no reason to pass this game up.

Back from last year are the season, exhibition, tournament, and GM Career mode. There are two new modes: In Your Face and the Home Run Derby. In Your Face mode is an exhibition mode where you can lock certain abilities against your opponent. Like, if you hit a home run, you are given a choice of locking something the computer or your friend can do. If you decide to get rid of their ability to make diving catches or a power swing. Home Run Derby replaces last years Home Run Challenge. There are a few different modes you can choose. Normally, you pick your player and your computer opponent. The game goes in to a split screen view, so you can see every home run that is hit. After a few minutes, the scores are totaled and the winner is crowned. But, there are a few more modes than just that. In Team mode, you pick three sluggers. Each player begins with 1000 points. You face a team of three players. If you hit a home run 400 feet, then 400 hit points will be taken off the other team's life bar. The game ends when one team is knocked out. A very fun challenge. Also of note is that First Person Baseball is gone. It will not be missed.

While batting has essentially stayed the same since last year (with the True Hit Batting system, which is basically a cursor batting system where you cannot see the cursor,) the default pitching interface has been completely changed. Instead of just picking your pitch and throwing it somewhere, there is a little bit of skill involved. Once you decide where to throw your pitch, a crosshair appears, with the middle where you exactly wanted the pitch to be. A dot moves across each line, and you must be able to hit the X button near where you wanted to hit your pitch, or else it goes off target. Depending on how badly you missed, the ball could move only a little bit, or the pitch ends up being a real fat one, and the batter can see where the pitch is going to be. Also, serving up a fat pitch really hurts you if you have the Slamzone ability turned on. Whenever the pitcher serves up a bad pitch, the game slows down, and a small meter appears on the screen. If you can fill up the meter before the pitch gets to you and swing, a home run is guaranteed. While it may be a godsend at first, the Slamzone gets boring quickly. Luckily, you have the ability to turn it off to play a game that is more like a true simulation than an arcade style game of baseball.

MLB 2K5 has the best base running system on any game to date. In other games, you can only have a few options on how to steal a base. In 2K5, you get a view from behind the baserunner. You can choose if you want the person hitting to bunt, swing away, swing cautiously, or to not swing at all. With this, you can choose if you want to put on a hit-and-run, sacrifice bunts, or to just normally steal a base. The system works perfectly, and hopefully other baseball games should take notice of it.

There are two problems with the main game: the fielding and strange default gameplay sliders. Each fielder can have a small turbo boost, and that may help them make it to the balls put in the holes or near the warning track. While it is nice to get balls that you usually would not be able to reach, it gets rid of some of the realism the rest of the game has. Also, it is much too easy for even the worst fielders to make spectacular diving plays. Just by a simple press of the right analog stick in that balls general direction can make even the fattest, slowest outfielders jump in the air, spear the ball, and be ready in less than a second to throw it back to the infield. Also, most pitchers are like human vacuum cleaners, able to catch anything up the middle, instead of moving out of the way, like most pitchers do.

Every single part of the game can be retooled to your liking. The power the batter has, the overall running speed of the fielders, anything. However, under the default set-ups for each difficult, the computer AI has one terrible problem: they could throw two or three wild pitches…in one inning. For every inning in the game. While this usually happens because there is pressure on the pitcher (if it is late in the game, extra innings, has a small lead with runners on base, etc) but three wild pitches an inning? That is just too much. All of this can be changed by changing the sliders to the type of game you want, but most people are going to spend the time and effort in doing that. However, if you spend enough time, you can create the perfect baseball videogame.

Last year, MLB 2K4 did not look so good. The stadiums did not have any real-time scoreboards or real looking fans. This all changed this year, as everything was remade. Each stadium actually has real time scoreboards, the first in the series. Also, all the fielders now have realistic shadows on them depending on if it is a day or night game, and during the late day games, there are shadows that go across the field, just like in real life. Each stadium looks very nice, and when you shoot off a homerun, fireworks come out. There will also be times during the game when the camera goes to the fans sitting in the seats (like in the other games in the 2K line-up,) and they will be 3D models, instead of simple 2D sprites, which is nice. Even though all of the fans look like they have huge black circles around their eyes, and when they get up in the 7th inning stretch, they move around like zombies…but it is a good start.

Player models have improved since last year's edition. This year, most players that played during the 2004 season have their actual faces in the game this year, and not just a map of their face put on to a body that is nothing like them, like last year. Each face looks like…wait for it….a real face! Is that not just the darnest thing? While most rookies have a pre-made face (along with Barry Bonds and others who are not in the baseball union…who are not in the game, but replaced with different people with the same skill) Kush picked faces that were pretty close to the real people.

However, while the player models and stadiums look great, the animation suffers. Each player moves are too jerky out on the field, and the way that each throws the ball is not very realistic. Running is also very stiff around the bases, and it really takes you out of the game. There is also a small problem in reading the small windows that appear on the screen during a game. On the bottom of the screen, you see the match-up between a pitcher and a hitter. For the batter, it shows their batting average, home runs, and RBIs. For the pitcher, it shows their ERA, strikeouts, and win/loss record. It also shows the confidence of each. If a hitter gets a home run, their confidence will go up. And if they strike out, it will go down. Same thing for a pitcher, except the other way around. While it is nice to have all that information on the screen, the text is very small, and almost unreadable when far way from the TV. Also, when there are multiple runners on base, they each have a window on the screen, showing you where they are and what they are doing. While this is nice, putting all the windows, information, and box score on the screen at the same time makes it look cluttered, and hard to see the action at some times. Overall though, MLB 2K5 is the best looking baseball game out today for player models and stadiums, but it could use some work on what do on screen graphics.

ESPN has brought in two respected commentators to do the play-by-play: Jon Miller and Joe Morgan, who usually do the Wednesday Night Baseball games on ESPN. Miller and Morgan have great chemistry together, having been working together for the past decade. Just like in real life, Miller does the calls and Morgan does the color, and there are enough lines to make every game interesting. Also, while in the pause menu, you may hear them talk about fan mail (usually about what baseball terms mean or what is the different between pitches) and that is a nice extra. Overall, Miller and Morgan are very competent on what they do. Along with them, Karl Ravech (who hosts the ESPN program Baseball Tonight) is in the game, and provides information about the pitchers and other match-ups before each game. Together, they give the game the look and feel of a TV broadcast.

Crowd noises and fan heckling is also present in MLB 2K5. Unlike last year, when there would be strange, eerie silences during the game, this crowd never dies down, which brings the atmosphere of a real game to 2K5. Most many players, they might be heckled during the game. Most of them are recycled from the previous games, and they are very corny. But hey, heckling is a part of baseball.

In MLB 2K5, you can play the game (as in on the field) or you can play the game (from a manger's point of view.) Using the Gamecast option, you can go through any game that you could play in just a few minutes. Each at-bat is detailed and recorded, and you can decide when you want to warm up pitchers, put in a pitch hitter or runner, etc. The only thing you cannot do in Gamecast is control what your players do on the field. However, at any time, you can step in to the game and start playing normally. By playing with Gamecast, you can have a pretty good managerial simulation.

Present in MLB 2K5 is The Skybox, a place where you can look at your overall stats, watch videos, or unlock extras. By using stat points that you get by playing the game, you can unlock old stadiums (like Ebbets Field or the recently evacuated Olympic Stadium,) cheats, classic jerseys, or classic teams (though most of the players on said classic teams just use their numbers, not their names.) You can also take a look at your picture collection. While looking at a replay in the pause menu during a game, you can take a picture of the frozen play. You can save the picture, and put it on a wall in your Skybox. There is also air hockey, darts, and a trivia challenge.

Reviewer's Score: 9/10, Originally Posted: 04/05/05