The End of an Era. MLB The Show 21 Ushers out the old....and In With The New. - Armor and Sword's Blog

Armor and Sword's Blog

The End of an Era. MLB The Show 21 Ushers out the old....and In With The New.

Posted on May 5, 2021 at 03:40 PM.

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For the last 7 years March was always a great time of anticipation. Baseball season starting, weather getting warmer and of course the arrival of MLB The Show and the chance to continue on our franchise on the latest and greatest version of the game. But something different happened this time around. MLB The Show 21 did not include their genre defining franchise feature of Year to Year Saves. It was a stunning revelation about the move to the new generation of Playstation and for the first time the XBOX consoles.

Shock, disbelief, sadness.....we are talking about 10�s of 1000�s of hours of time spent in various franchises and and personally several 1000 hours for me with 3 different carryover files plus a cool 1987 RTTS file I began back on MLB 14. Not only that. The Roster (Content Creators as I like to call them) creators of all the incredible classic, fantasy and fictional rosters were left in the dust. With no roster importing feature either (only appearing one time on MLB 20 after years of asking for it) only to disappear after one cycle of having that seamless feature.....things were looking murky. However lot�s of speculation about major changes to franchise mode and expanded rosters and maybe new ratings....oh the wheels were turning as we tried to rationolize why this feature was removed.

Then we finally saw the streams......and.....nothing. Nothing of real substance that would take away the sting of losing this fantastic feature that allowed us to get very deep into our franchises and RTTS modes and be able to enjoy all the new gameplay improvements each and every year. Then add the final death nail.....we found out 2 days before early release that Sounds of the Show another beloved, deep and immersive franchise feature will not be available on PS5. I mean what!!!!!!

So where is this going? I guess it is a eulogy of shorts that I have come full circle and to the realization that we have seen the end of an era when it comes to offline classic franchise players. No longer will we have the chance to move our files to the next version (yeah I am highly skeptical the resources will ever be put into implementing that feature again) which means rosters makers if they do not get a roster import feature back for 22 and beyond would�ve to start from scratch again each cycle. Things are looking pretty crappy. Now all that can change if SDS during the 22 hype train drops that Y2Y and roster importing will return. If so.....we could see the content creators return. With the new stadium creator it could open up all kinds of possibilities for future classic roster guys. But until we get any news....we are seeing the end of this great run we have had from MLB 14-20 of incredible content. But what about SOTS? If I see everything clearly Microsoft will not and does not allow 3rd party MP3 to be uploaded into games on their consoles. Period. So that feature looks like it has seen it�s days numbered.

But what else has changed? How about check swings not being ratings based any longer. Not a great move. They caved into online players demands. Bunting has never been right since online cheese dictated them to program in rocket bunts to reduce online exploits. What about the utter gutting of RTTS. The most popular mode ever on this game is a mere shadow of itself. Tied to online DD it reeks of grinding and is riddled with bugs still after almost a month of being out. There are other small things that really look terrible to me in terms of menus etc....color schemes and again....they basically did nothing of real impact to franchise mode. Depth chart? Budget screen? And don�t get me started on the supposed trade logic improvements.....it is actually worse.

Fortunately we have a stellar game (not perfect of course as nothing ever is) in MLB 20 with the most robust inventory of classic and fictional rosters ever created. It plays a great game of baseball on the PS5 (and still on the PS4 as well) and includes everything we had come to expect (SOTS, Great looking score bugs, and trade logic that functions and a RTTS mode that embraces offline single player to the max).

While MLB 21 has some nice gameplay improvements (OF routes and animations got some nice upgrades) for this classic pitching/directional hitting clean screen player......it is not an upgrade. In fact it is 3 steps backwards in terms of immersion and content. I am sure many are enjoying the game....but I am completely happy staying back with MLB 20. What is sad though is there is a clear changing of the guard and direction of the series. It is all about Diamond Dynasty, cards, packs, stubs, mission this, BR that. Franchise has been left in the dust. The Stadium Creator is great for those that wanted it....but the fact is they stared it 5 years ago....realizied they could not do it right on the PS4 and finished it for the PS5.....I highly doubt you see anymore resources put into it moving forward....much like franchise mode features that were introduced on PS4 and never ever worked on moving forward.

We are witnessing the end of an era in sports games. And MLB The Show was the last one to not become like other AAA sports games and fully cater to stick skill competitive players. Welp.....that is over. They are just like 2K and EA now.....and that sucks. Not that 2K or EA put out lousy games......they don�t. But The Show maintained that simulation first attitude until the move to 21....they are going all in with online modes and players.....and they should. They make up 99% of the player population now. Just go look on Twitch. 995 of the streamers are DD or online. rare is it to find a offline franchise player only......rare air these days.

Times are a changing.

Comments

# 1 THESHAMISASHAME @ Apr 5

Great blog I couldn't agree more but did scea ever say why it no longer will support carryover rosters or sots ? Yeah if it wasn't for nba2k23 eras I wouldn't have even bought a PS5 as all my games are PS4 mlb20, nhl22 and Madden20 , sad times and it will just get worse .

# 2 Armor and Sword @ Apr 5

Never got a single solitary reason from SDS. Despite what some may say....tey could not move franchise forward.....really? How much forward have we gotten since MLB 20....let�s be real. Not much.