Death by a 1,000 Cuts

[Holy Toledo]

In my opinion, MLB the Show's gameplay on the field is as good as anyone can realistically expect. But in order to enjoy the gameplay you have to force yourself to ignore the seemly endless amount of tiny errors or inaccuracies in the game at every turn.

-After playing Madden, NHL and NBA 2K this past year The Show's graphics are lightyears behind every other sports game.

-I wanted to run a franchise with the Padres or Brewers and attempt to win their first world series. But their fans only wear gear that was changed 3+ years ago. I cant play as the Padres with all their fans wearing blue and white or watch Bernie Brewer go down the slide in a uniform that hasn't been worn since before COVID.

-The Tigers and A's are rebuilding and seem like a fun challenge. But the Tigers stadium has a forest growing in front of the right-field bleachers and the A's third deck is black. No stands or tarps, just black. I cannot unsee this so I moved on to another team.

-The Marlins have great uniforms and a nice stadium so I tried them. But every time Sandy pitches the game cuts to fans holding up a sign saying "Let's Go Sixto". And their two championship banners hanging above left field are blank. How could they not realize this when adding this to the game this year?

-I want to only control my team and let the CPU run their teams independently. But the AI bullpen management is atrocious and long relievers seem to pitch in every game I play and over the course of a season they pitch in 90+ games and 150+ innings while the 2nd SU pitcher will pitch 30 games and 30 innings. The lineup management is also not even close to realistic and bats so many all-star hitters at the bottom of the order.

-If you can ignore the bullpen and lineup issues the CPU makes many questionable trades at the deadline. Bobby Wiit and/or Pasquanitino seemed to get traded for a prospect every time which makes no sense.

-When you get to the off-season the free agency seems strange. I simmed free agency 3 times and twice the Cardinals signed Matt Chapman and the other time the Braves signed him. They seem to be the last two teams to need a 30-year-old 3B making $150M+.

-And let's say you can ignore the visual errors, bullpen/lineup management, strange trades and free agent signings and play multiple seasons. You then see the issue of progression of top prospects. 2-3 seasons in top prospects like Elly de la Cruz or Jackson Holliday are still average players. No top prospect has become an all-star or franchise player.

I want nothing more than to play multiple seasons of franchise mode and this to be the only game I own but SDS makes that almost impossible. And what makes it even more frustrating is watching their latest commercial showing they had added giant insects and partially damaged buildings to the stadium creator.

[djflock]

Quote: Originally Posted by Holy Toledo

In my opinion, MLB the Show's gameplay on the field is as good as anyone can realistically expect. But in order to enjoy the gameplay you have to force yourself to ignore the seemly endless amount of tiny errors or inaccuracies in the game at every turn. -After playing Madden, NHL and NBA 2K this past year The Show's graphics are lightyears behind every other sports game. -I wanted to run a franchise with the Padres or Brewers and attempt to win their first world series. But their fans only wear gear that was changed 3+ years ago. I cant play as the Padres with all their fans wearing blue and white or watch Bernie Brewer go down the slide in a uniform that hasn't been worn since before COVID. -The Tigers and A's are rebuilding and seem like a fun challenge. But the Tigers stadium has a forest growing in front of the right-field bleachers and the A's third deck is black. No stands or tarps, just black. I cannot unsee this so I moved on to another team. -The Marlins have great uniforms and a nice stadium so I tried them. But every time Sandy pitches the game cuts to fans holding up a sign saying "Let's Go Sixto". And their two championship banners hanging above left field are blank. How could they not realize this when adding this to the game this year? -I want to only control my team and let the CPU run their teams independently. But the AI bullpen management is atrocious and long relievers seem to pitch in every game I play and over the course of a season they pitch in 90+ games and 150+ innings while the 2nd SU pitcher will pitch 30 games and 30 innings. The lineup management is also not even close to realistic and bats so many all-star hitters at the bottom of the order. -If you can ignore the bullpen and lineup issues the CPU makes many questionable trades at the deadline. Bobby Wiit and/or Pasquanitino seemed to get traded for a prospect every time which makes no sense. -When you get to the off-season the free agency seems strange. I simmed free agency 3 times and twice the Cardinals signed Matt Chapman and the other time the Braves signed him. They seem to be the last two teams to need a 30-year-old 3B making $150M+. -And let's say you can ignore the visual errors, bullpen/lineup management, strange trades and free agent signings and play multiple seasons. You then see the issue of progression of top prospects. 2-3 seasons in top prospects like Elly de la Cruz or Jackson Holliday are still average players. No top prospect has become an all-star or franchise player. I want nothing more than to play multiple seasons of franchise mode and this to be the only game I own but SDS makes that almost impossible. And what makes it even more frustrating is watching their latest commercial showing they had added giant insects and partially damaged buildings to the stadium creator.

I agree with everything except for one point, the graphics. I think with the 2d grass/dirt and the uniform physics from ps3, it doesn't compare to 2k at all.

The actual gameplay on the field is the only redeemable quality of this game.

That early 90's lineup management forces me to control every teams lineup. Their roster management is non existent. Progression is not dynamic at all. Even if you look at how their roster updates, players get promoted and gain like 7-8 points in overall in just a couple weeks at times. In game, that's like a year or two of progression.

[Ghost Of The Year]

I died with just one cut. I hated that I couldn't get over a minor annoyance being a deal breaker for me but the blue circle under fielders fiasco left me no alternative but to shelve 23 and return to 22. Other than that one thing, I was enjoying 23. Thanfully 22 played fantastic that I never really needed 23 in the first place, I wish now I had held off on that purchase. I won't make the same mistake next spring.

[DL1287]

The bad player progression is one of my biggest problems with the game. All of the prospects start off with too high fielding attributes and way too low hitting attributes. Even if they do well hitting wise in the minors, their attributes don’t go up very much. I had Volpe, Termarr Johnson, and Druw Jones all batting around .200 at 85 overalls because their hitting attributes were still in the low 60s.

The teams also don’t value their prospects at all. I did a trade finder with 82 ovr Chris Sale and 67 ovr Justin Turner and got offered 81 ovr Grayson Rodriguez as the first trade. After a couple years, most teams have traded their top prospects away for who knows what.

Teams in free agency always lowball the top free agents. Juan Soto’s best offer was 5 years $90 million after a .300 avg, 35 homer season. Vladdy and Bo always sign for way too low after great seasons.

They also need to increase the quality of the draft classes, it’s basically impossible to find good position players after the first round. The only ones with high potential are 50 overalls with high speed and hitting attributes in the 30s. The generational prospects are cool but all the position players have the same attributes every time. It’s way to easy to scout all the starting pitchers in the class but really hard to scout a lot of position players.

I’m having a lot of fun playing franchise but it’s hard to ignore these issues.

[ty5oke]

I find it a lot of work to try and make franchise an enjoyable experience these days. Sometimes I'm not sure if it's worth it.

[sheredia]

Quote: Originally Posted by ty5oke

I find it a lot of work to try and make franchise an enjoyable experience these days. Sometimes I'm not sure if it's worth it.

reading these comments, it almost seems like they do give more attention to diamond dynasty (which i love) but at the expense of franchise mode. wish they could find a happy medium between the two modes.

[ajra21]

The original list to start this thread has lots of comparison to the other sports games. Similar complaints. Not saying they are justified or not, but the similarities are obvious.


One difference: Graphics.


The graphics in 2013 were superb. Today they’re still good but they don’t wow me. Ten years apart, there not a huge difference.

[GOBLUE_08]

The AI roster management and trading is abysmal if you don’t control every team and allow them to trade. I don’t have the time for that kind of investment anymore, but I can’t take seeing Ohtani, Soto and whatever other stud the Twins managed to trade for in my franchise and RTTS. The only option is to turn trades off, then that leads to the stars of the league signing garbage $5 mil a year offers. I was able to Tim Anderson, Pete Alonso, Tyler Glasnow, and Teoscar Hernandez to the Pirates for absurdly cheap contracts with trades off. Like platoon player contracts lol. All coming off good seasons. At this point if there is no fake majors roster this year, I dont think i can do it.