Improptu Sports Video Game Review: Baseball Advance
Since I’ve been playing this game for a few days now rather than finishing up the NL predictions post, I thought I’d just go ahead and write about it instead. Can we call it even? Well, probably not. But whatever. I’ve been doing some work with my video game collection, mostly my ROM’s, and this game has caught my eye. The batter interface is actually really intuitive, the graphics are excellent for a Game Boy Advance game, and it actually plays really well.
As with most baseball video games, it has a major flaw: the superstars are simply overpowered. This was also seen in the much more acclaimed MVP Baseball series, although it doesn’t have an accompanying bug about left-handers being unable to hit home runs. I’ve ran about 27 games with the 2001 Texas Rangers, ARod is hitting .530 or so with 40 homers, Pudge is hitting .500 with 25, Palmeiro and Frank Catalanatto also are putting up insane numbers.
However, despite this flaw and the fact that there are only four ballparks, no trading, and no minor leaguers, this game gets acclaim from me for being able to do what seems to be IMPOSSIBLE for most developers to get right. YOU CAN ACTUALLY DRAW A WALK IN THIS GAME. Yes, thats right, the CPU will actually throw more than three balls in an at-bat, and the statistics that come of it actually make the game realistic when you aren’t playing with overpowered players. The game gives everyone letter grades, and essentially if you have a big hitting circle (an A, B, or C with big power), you are unstoppable. Otherwise, the statistics turn out really well. Rusty Greer is at about .290/.370, rookie Michael Young is at .250/.330, it’s an astonishingly good system for a portable baseball game.
The batting interface triggers with timing, you have to start charging your swing at a different time depending on the velocity of the pitcher. They can catch you thinking fastball and get you to mistime your swing and hit a weak popup. You can go from facing a soft tossing lefty to a righty with a 97 mph fastball and have to change timing completely, which can throw you off for a few at-bats. Most importantly, theres no amount of directional aim involved for finding the pitches, which is always murder on a 4 button control pad. You position your hitting circle before the pitch, and if the pitch is going to land in it, it automatically focuses you on the ball. From there, you just have to guess speed.
It’s not a video game without warts. There are very few baseball games that actually deliver a solid experience, but this one is really really good at the few things it gets right, and those are a few things that happen to be really rare in the grand scheme of baseball video games. A nice change of pace, well-deserving of the 8.0 it got on MetaCritic. Do check this game out if you are a sports fan with a few hours to kill. Just don’t be surprised it it turns into more than that.
