First Impressions: MLB Front Office Manager - BlyGilmore's Blog

BlyGilmore's Blog

First Impressions: MLB Front Office Manager

Posted on January 31, 2009 at 12:15 PM.

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So I picked up MLB Front Office Manager yesterday and gave it a test drive for a few hours - taking the Pirates through the offseason up to the beginning of Spring Training.

So far I'm pretty underwhelmed by the experience.

The navigation in this game is frustrating. The audio is bland. And Billy Beane brings nothing to this game other than some pretentious photos and tips like "have a plan" and "know your players."

So far the biggest "you have to be kidding me" moment came during the free agency period. There was no dialog between you and the players you were targeting.

Sure if they rejected your bid out right you got an email, but if some other team jumped in you didn't find out until getting a "So-and-So got a better off from another team" email and that was that.

You would figure a game about running a baseball team would have a robust free agent system, full of discussion between you and your players agent, perhaps media reports of rumors about what certain players are thinking, etc.

I'm also not a fan of the ratings system this game is using. For a game titled "Front Office Manager" shouldn't we be getting scouting reports on players? Coupled with stats to analyze? Last time I checked Brian Cashman didn't sign Sabathia because of his great overall rating.

With that said the game does get into the nitty gritty of general managing a baseball team with things such as Arbitration, a Rule 5 Draft, as well as the construction of your 40 man roster and minor league rosters.

The RPG-like style of creating your general manager persona and earning experience you can spend in several categories also is interesting.

Right now my only question is, will I stick with the game long enough because of the other flaws to find out how it works?

Comments

# 1 rworth88 @ Jan 31

I agree with pretty much all your comments, I bought it 3 days ago expecting a little more, I do like the depth of the managing aspect but all the other flaws make it hard to keep playing, the stats engine is the big one for me, very unrealistic, they give the decisions to the wrong pitcher ALL the time, but I will probably keep playing it until spring when the other baseball games are released...