Tag Archive: baseball


Better than a Babe Ruth League

Filed under: Video — Leave a comment
June 6, 2010

Originally Published: May 28, 2010, on Examiner.com, PlayerAffinity.com, and ESPNNewYork.com

I still reminisce every now and then about the glorious springs of my youth when baseball season would start and once our local organized little leagues were finished, my friends and I would head down to the park and play stick ball on abandoned tennis courts, wiffle ball on side streets, or home run derby on empty diamonds. Something that’s going to make me reminisce a little bit more about those days is the latest entry into the Backyard Sports series, Backyard Sports: Sandlot Sluggers.

Before reading my full review of the game, be sure to check out my interview with the producer of Sandlot Sluggers, Roland Lesterlin.

The first thing you notice about Sandlot Sluggers is how great looking this game is, especially for the Xbox 360. The graphics are bright and colorful and the cut scenes for the story mode (more on that in a second) are done in stylized outlines and shadows that give it a unique and pleasing visual presence. There are a couple of glitches when you’re playing sometimes, but other than that the game is just plain pretty.

The audio is also very solid and rounds out the peripherals nicely. With cute commentary from the local old men who serve as the announcers for your games to the simple menu instrumentals, the game isn’t an audio revolution, but it works and is probably what you would expect from a game geared more towards teaching kids about sports and sportsmanship.

The biggest improvement to the series though comes with the brand new story mode (told you I’d get to it) that helps to deviate this game from your normal baseball sim. Playing the role of the new kid after fully customizing your look from the color of your glove to your head shape, it is up to you to unite the local kids into a team of superstars to take down Jimmy Knuckles and his squad of bullies who have pummeled all other teams into submission. Only by beating the teams of the eight other good kids can you recruit them onto your squad and gain access to Knuckles’ diamond behind the local school. Coupled with mini-games after every couple of victories to improve your squad’s equipment, the story mode is a great way to give life to the characters as well as to teach your little one the ins and outs of the game of baseball.

The gameplay is solid baseball action mixed in with the classic power-ups and special abilities you’ve come to expect from the Backyard Sports series. From booger balls that cover the screen and make it impossible to see the ball to icicle bats that freeze the first fielder to touch the ball, the new power-ups add a great element of randomness and a true sense of “it ain’t over till it’s over” to the game. And they might just help mom or dad keep them even with their little slugger.

Each field you play in also has its own unique qualities that add to the gameplay. From Pablo’s dog grabbing balls that go near his doghouse for ground rule doubles to balls bouncing into the playground’s sandbox for automatic triples, the field you play in adds to the unique strategies that can come into play.

There were a couple of negatives I saw to the gameplay as well though. The most obvious negative is the fact that a run doesn’t count if the final out is made on the base paths. The baseball rule is that if the run scores before the third out, the run counts. It was very irritating to get into rundowns trying to stretch a single into a double and then find out that the runner from third crossed home, but it never counted because I made the third out.

Speaking of running blunders, another glitch that drove me nuts was if I got caught stealing for the third out of an inning, the batter at the plate would be skipped over instead of leading off the next inning. This glitch baffled me and really made me think twice about when and whom I would run with. These glitches took away from the experience some and made me a little hesitant when it came to showing little kids this as a tool to teach them about baseball.

Another positive for the game though is the replay value. Along with the story mode, there are your typical season and playoff modes to continue taking on the local teams, and access to the mini-games including a baseball themed version of hot potato and a Simon-esque game of throwing the right pitch when it is called for. This should keep your little one popping this game back into their system for a while.

For what it is, Backyard Sports: Sandlot Sluggers is probably the best game yet released by the folks behind the Backyard Sports franchise. It probably won’t hold the attention of an older and more hardcore baseball fan for very long, but is perfect as an introduction into baseball and baseball video games for younger kids and for parents to relate to their children. Include simpler one-button modes for even younger kids and this game will definitely appeal to every pre-pubescent little leaguer out there.

Backyard Sports: Sandlot Sluggers is available now for Xbox 360, Nintendo Wii, and Nintendo DS.

Ratings are based on a scale of 1 to 10 with 10 being the best.

Graphics: 9.0: Bright colors, stylized graphics for cut scenes, and a minimal of glitches make this a beautiful looking game for kids.

Audio: 7.5: Nothing groundbreaking in the audio department, but nothing sub-par either. The announcers end up repeating themselves like in every other sport game ever, but aside from that the audio is solid.

Plot/Plot Development: 7.5: Predictable, but perfect for children as the story mode touts lessons of teamwork and understanding. Jimmy Knuckles never saw it coming.

Gameplay: 7.0: Good for the most part, but running glitches will really take away from the baseball experience for people who really know the game. The power-ups and unique stadiums though help to cover up some of those shortcomings with the unpredictability they inject into the game.

Replay Value: 8.0: Average replay value for a sports game gets bumped up due to the inclusion of a story mode. Coupled with mini-games and a season and playoffs mode and this game will keep your youngster entertained for a while.

Overall (not an average): 8.0: Due to some glitches and a lack of true mass appeal, I can’t give this game a perfect score, but for what it is and the audience it is targeted at, Backyard Sports: Sandlot Sluggers is a sure fire home run. Your little ones will love the characters and swinging for the fences in this family friendly baseball sim.

-Ray Carsillo

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Buy Me Some Peanuts and Crackerjacks

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Originally Published: April 15, 2010, on ESPNNewYork.com

In honor of the Yankees’ home opener this week, I felt it would be fitting to take a look at the premiere baseball series out there. Of course, I am talking about the PS3 exclusive, MLB: The Show, and it’s latest edition, MLB 10: The Show.

It would have been easy for Sony to sit back, update some rosters, get a new cover athlete, and ship out the best baseball game that is available for purchase on any system, but they had a different idea in mind. Listening to some of their critics and fashioning a few new ideas of their own, there are two new key modes that have been added to the MLB 10: The Show.

The first new addition is something fans have been clamoring about since the first inception of The Show and that is a Home Run Derby mode. Set up in your standard three rounds with a limited number of outs, the Home Run Derby has been a staple of America’s pastime for decades and was a favorite feature of many fans of what are considered some of the best baseball games of all-time. The addition of this alone raises the level of The Show to an entirely new stratosphere.

But, Sony wasn’t done. Included with Home Run Derby and their standby “Franchise” and “Road to the Show” modes where you can take control of your favorite MLB club or create an individual and try to have him rise through the AA, AAA, and MLB ranks, they have added the new “Catcher mode”. Not only can you select the pitch and location now, but deal with the frustration of having your diva number one starter shake you off three or four times. Or maybe that’s just me. I said throw the heat!

Whatever mode you decide to play, it is easily the most realistic baseball experience you can expect on a console. The A.I. adapts and changes to the moves you make on even the easiest of difficulties and challenges you at every turn. Although frustrating at times, it shows how far baseball games have come and that there are no glitches in the A.I. where a low and outside fastball will always be swung and missed on or every seventh pitch will be a meatball that you can belt out of the park is a huge accomplishment.

Not to say the game is without glitches. Already Sony has had to release two patches for The Show and the game still freezes at some of the most inopportune times. Aside from this though, the game is relatively flawless.

The game doesn’t just wow you with gameplay though. The graphics are tremendous and take full advantage of the power of the PS3. Add in great play-by-play from Matt Vasgersian and color by Dave “Soup” Campbell and Rex Hudler and the peripherals are near top of the line. I could’ve used a larger music playlist on the menus considering how much time I spend tweaking my franchise (I’m a virtual George Steinbrenner, very much a hands-on owner).

With all these game modes and the high quality of play, if you’re a baseball fan, you’ll have plenty to keep you coming back for more here. Throw in a revamped online multiplayer and matching system and this is probably the pinnacle of baseball games. My only other knock on this game is that Joe Mauer is the cover boy. Come on Sony! The Twins?! The Yanks are the defending champs!

Ratings are based on a scale of 1 to 10 with 10 being the best.

Graphics: 9.5: A few stray polygons here and there are noticeable and shock you out of your simulation revelry, but not enough to keep this from being a top-notch gaming experience.

Audio: 9.0: From the crack of the bat to the roar of the crowd, the SFX are perfect. Vasgerian, Campbell, and Hudler all sound great and don’t repeat themselves as often as you see in most other sports simulations. The only knock is that I could have used a lot more music on my menus as I tweak the defending World Champs as they move on their way to back-to-back titles!

Plot/Plot Development: N/A: It’s a sports simulation.

Gameplay: 9.0: A couple of glitches keep this from being a perfect score, but Sony is usually right on top of their patches, and with two already being released, I’m sure the few times the game tends to freeze will be fixed in no time at all.

Replay Value: 10.0: A must have for baseball fans. The revamped online matching is a huge bonus, but when you throw in the new Catcher and Home Run Derby modes to compliment the Road to the Show and Franchise modes and you could live in an internet bubble and still have enough to keep you busy for a long time.

Overall (not an average): 9.0: A few more loose ends than previous versions, MLB: The Show is still the premiere baseball franchise out there right now and this new iteration is still top of the line. With all the new features for MLB 10: The Show, it is no surprise that a couple of new glitches have come up. Yankee Stadium wasn’t built in a day after all.

MLB 10: The Show is available now for the PS3 with slightly less awesome versions out for the PSP and PS2 as well.

-Ray Carsillo

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To Be A Kid Again

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April 20, 2010

Originally Published: July 6, 2009, on 1050ESPN.com (now ESPNNewYork.com) and Lundberg.me

With steroids, luxury taxes, and overpaid, under appreciative players usually being what people first think of when they think of modern baseball, it is easy to forget the beauty in the simplicity of this child’s game.

When people think of baseball games for the Wii, they usually think of glitchy, unresponsive, second-rate games that don’t compare to other systems’ exclusive franchises.

Both of these problems are solved with Activision’s Little League World Series 2009 for the Nintendo Wii and DS.

Little League World Series 2009 allows you to take control of an already established little league team, or create your own, and try to guide a young group of dreamers to a title run in Williamsport, Pennsylvania.

If you choose to take a pre-loaded team, you can choose from teams from 16 different regions: eight American and eight from the rest of the world.

If you choose to create your own team, you can customize everything from the state or country your team hails from to the color of your catcher’s mitt. Batting stances, equipment brands, hair, eyes, and more are all customizable to the point where you’ll feel like you were playing with the little league team you played for when you were 12 years old.

After selecting your team, you can then take them through the extensive World Series mode as you can go from the regional championships all the way to Williamsport. This is a much more difficult task than it sounds due to the fact that it is round-robin play meaning it is one-and-done for your team if you lose.

To try to help stack the odds in your favor, the game does include two things that can make your team more competitive against the top-tier squads. First, depending on how well your team performs, you can earn attribute points to assign to your players after each game. A little extra juice on your starting pitcher’s fastball or a little more pop from your second baseman could be the difference between a stalled run in the regional tournament and immortality.

The second helpful feature harkens back to the old days of the Madden football games. Stellar performances can earn you special trading cards that can be played in the middle of a game to boost your stats or diminish your opponent’s. Having trouble running the bases? Play a card to boost your team speed for an inning. Need that fly ball to sail over the wall? Play a card to boost your power for an at-bat. This old-school, sports-game feature is a nice addition and will surely change the tide of a game if played properly.

In addition to the World Series mode, there are also a plethora of mini-games and the standard exhibition mode if you want to play a friend in a Midwest versus Mid-Atlantic grudge match.

After playing through a couple of tournaments, I can say that if you only have a Wii, this isn’t a bad way to get your baseball fix, considering your only other option is the abysmal MLB2K9. The controls are simple, but respond well to the Wiimote. If you’re more comfortable using both hands while playing your games, Little League World Series 2009 is also classic controller compatible.

When it comes down to it, if you are looking for just a pure, fun baseball experience on the Wii, this game is probably your best bet. Fun mini-games, a competitive A.I., and none of the superfluous trimmings that usually come with the pro-based games leave this as possibly the best baseball game on the system. Plus, who wouldn’t want to pretend to be a kid again?

Ratings are based on a scale of 1 to 10 with 10 being the highest.

Graphics: 6.5: The cartoony look will turn a lot of people off because it looks like another game for the Wii that is meant to appeal to only younger players. The vibrant colors and over the top animations do play well and without a glitch, but I think a lot of people would prefer a more serious looking game.

Audio: 8.0: The clang of the aluminum bat and the snap of the catcher’s glove after pouring in a great fastball over the outside corner are sweet sounds to hear that define Little League baseball. Add in Gary Thorne and Brent Musberger for authentic play-by-play and the only thing the audio lacks is a decent soundtrack.

Plot/Plot Development: N/A: It’s a sports simulation.

Gameplay: 8.0: If you play the game without any assists, the fielding can be a bit difficult if you aren’t used to playing with just the Wiimote, but with the game being classic-controller-compatible, it provides a way to remedy this problem. The pitching system could also use a little tweaking since there is a minimum of control over where you can aim the pitch. Otherwise this is a solid baseball game in terms of controls.

Replay Value: 7.5: No online capability is a serious downside for this game, but it is compatible for up to four players offline and has an abundance of mini-games and collectibles to keep you coming back for more.

Overall: 8.0: Considering all of the other options there are out there for the Wii, this is probably your best baseball bet. With the combination of solid controls, good atmosphere, and an authentic feel from professional play-by-play, you have an enjoyable experience on your hands. It could use online capability, less cartoony graphics, and just a little more overall refinement, but otherwise this would be a great pick up for the entire family or any pure baseball fan.

Little League World Series 2009 is out now for the Nintendo Wii and DS.

-Ray Carsillo

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How Sweet It Is

Filed under: Audio — Leave a comment
April 18, 2010

Originally Published: April 6, 2009, for 1050ESPN.com (now ESPNNewYork.com) and Lundberg.me

After two months of waiting through a sports drought, baseball season is finally starting. With it comes the smell of freshly cut green grass, warmer weather, and the feeling of rebirth that accompanies the game and the changing of the seasons. I recently had the opportunity to screen a movie that played on this theme of rebirth through baseball: Sugar.

Sugar was a 2008 Official Selection of both the Sundance and Toronto Film Festivals. It is the fictional story about Miguel “Sugar” Santos. Miguel is a Dominican league pitcher who gets signed by a fictional major league team and the struggles he faces in the minor league farm system as he chases after his dreams.

I had a chance to talk with the man who plays Sugar in the film, Algenis Perez Soto, and we discussed everything from his training to become a pitcher for the movie to the difficulty of playing such a complex, emotional, role on film.


CLICK HERE – to listen to my interview with the star of Sugar, Algenis Perez Soto.

The movie opens up on a baseball field where Sugar is pitching in the Dominican League where he is dominating. After the game, we follow Sugar to his home in a small village in the Dominican Republic where we find out that Sugar lost his father at an early age and is the main provider now for his mother, grandmother, younger sister and brother, and helps maintain the two room shack they survive in.

As the movie unfolds, Sugar ends up being signed to a small contract for the Kansas City Monarchs after a grueling tryout session. He is soon on his way to Iowa to join the Class-A affiliate of the Monarchs as a highly touted pitching prospect. He meets his teammates and quickly learns they are also his competition. He realizes, after speaking with older friends on the team, that not many prospects ever make it out of the minor leagues. Thus, the stage of self-discovery is set for Sugar to find out what sacrifice will truly mean if his dreams are to become reality and for him to find happiness.

What many people misunderstand about this movie is that this is not a movie about the process of how major league teams scout foreign players or how they can be treated once they arrive to the states. It is a story about one man’s unique struggles; the game of baseball is simply the vehicle for his journey.

What I loved about this movie is that it did not have the typical Hollywood ending-in-a-can that you all too often see with these fictional accounts. It had a sense of realism to see this man struggle, fail, pick himself up, and, in his mind, still succeed and find a semblance of happiness.

Sugar is a well-told story about the maturation of a young man and the pursuit of his dreams which forces him to leave everything he knows behind. It then chronicles his journey as the trials he face change his dream into something he wouldn’t have recognized at the start of his travels. It shows how time can change a person’s course in life and that in the end, being happy and satisfied with one’s self is all the matters.

This movie shows that not everyone who comes from the Dominican Republic ends up as Sammy Sosa or Pedro Martinez. For several scenes in the movie, real people who came from Latin America to chase a dream of playing baseball were introduced and it was revealed towards the end of the movie that many of them ended up doing something else, but they all cherished their memories playing for the minor league affiliates of the Padres, Mariners, Yankees, and many other baseball teams. It was a touching scene that gave credibility to this fictional account and reminds us that even though they may have failed at baseball, they are still people.

The only problem I really had with the movie was that it seemed difficult to follow Sugar’s thought patterns at times. The movie had a habit of showing Sugar doing things, but not always showing his reasons until well after he made his decisions and acted out on them. This made it a bit difficult to follow his character development and since the story revolves solely around that, I have to dock points from it.

When all is said and done, Sugar is the compelling coming-of-age story of a young Dominican man as he deals with problems many of us in the United States do not have to worry about (a language barrier, extreme poverty) through the game of baseball and how he finds himself in the end after being lost in this foreign land.

Sugar is out now in New York and L.A. and runs at 1 hour and 54 minutes.

Sugar gets 3.5 out of 5.

-Ray Carsillo

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Stepping Up to the Plate

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Originally Published: March 4, 2009, on 1050ESPN.com (now ESPNNewYork.com) and Lundberg.me

For many the wait is torturous. The gap between the Super Bowl and the beginning of baseball season is like a walk through the Sahara of the sports world in which basketball and hockey simply serve as a reminder of a once full canteen now vapid of nourishment.

Don’t fret, though, the gaming world has attempted to provide an oasis to fill our needs for the next month. Just released this week was MLB2K9 for all systems and MLB: The Show ’09 as a PS3 exclusive.

Normally, MLB2K sets up 2K sports for the rest of the year since they have coverage of all three systems and their competition has only the PS3. You would figure that 2K would attempt to provide the best gaming experience out there as they need these sales to get through the fall when they typically get punished in sales by EA Sports in hockey and basketball. You would figure.

Unfortunately, that is not the case. MLB2K9 is as sad an attempt at a video game as Street Fighter: The Legend of Chun Li was as a movie. 2K is blatantly taking advantage of the fact that they control the market during this time of the year as they are the only MLB title that reaches all three systems, a combined total of 97.29 million hardware units, which gives them a far more reaching audience than MLB: The Show, which only reaches the roughly 7.98 million American PS3 owners, which also happens to be the worst selling of the three main systems. (Numbers provided by http://www.vgchartz.com/ and accurate as of February 28, 2009)

Knowing they have the baseball game market cornered, 2K’s oasis is simply an illusion. This game has more glitches in it than New York City has potholes. While playing the game, I would position my outfielder directly in the circle censor to mark where the ball will fall only to have the ball literally fall through my glove. No error animation, no misjudging the ball, it falls through my glove and this happened several times a game.

And this is only the icing on the cake. The player animations are unrealistic and many stances and motions are recycled from player to player. The graphics are poor to the point that players look blocky and unrealistic, a problem that was corrected in the last generation of video game systems.
Even the menus on the pause and start-up screens are difficult to navigate. You have to go through multiple sub-menus before you find the game doesn’t even have the options you were looking for to begin with. Then again, that might have just been the difficulty in navigating the menu. After trying three different sub-menus looking for controls, I just gave up and played with the game’s defaults.

This game is an abomination and will sell well only because for about 75% of gamers out there, it is their only MLB option.

On the other side, MLB: The Show ’09. This game teleports you out of the Sahara to the French Riviera. And there are no French people around. That’s how good this game is.

First off, the basics are all covered. Smooth mechanics and animations, solid graphics, easy to navigate menus, and good gameplay. From there, The Show ’09 takes you above and beyond your typical baseball video game.
The greatest aspect of this game is the overall accuracy to real life. Every player’s stance, motions, and mannerisms have been emulated in this game to at least some degree. The batter’s hot and cold zones have been mapped out accurately and strongly enforced. If you connect with a fastball in one of your cold zones, it is a lot less likely to travel out of the ballpark than if one floated into your wheelhouse.

Add in a batting reticule that you have to maneuver to aim your swing and then watch it contract depending on your skill as a hitter makes offense a lot more challenging than in previous games.

Amidst a plethora of new features and innovations for The Show ’09, the most impressive easily has to be the one called “Sounds of the Game”. This is one of the most exciting features in any sports game to date.

The “Sounds of the Game” feature allows you to download 30 second music clips for everyone in the game. In other words, the music accompanying every at-bat as each individual player approaches the plate, every reliever entering from the bullpen, even hecklers in the crowd can be customized to your liking. You want an authentic Mariano Rivera entrance? Metallica’s Enter Sandman is there. You want Neil Diamond’s Sweet Caroline after every Red Sox game? Not a problem. And yes, Yankees fans, the Bleacher Creatures are available as well.

Of course, you don’t have to have it be authentic either. You can have Mariano come out to AC/DC’s Highway to Hell if you prefer. The possibilities are near endless and allow you to truly customize the game to your liking and give it an authentic feel you just don’t see in other sports games.

Even though MLB: The Show is far and away the best baseball game out there, it’s a stretch to warrant going out to buy a PS3 for this alone and that forces most people to end up having to settle for MLB2K9. This is really a shame because the only thing that MLB2K9 has better than The Show is their cover athlete. Tim Lincecum over Dustin Pedroia. I’m a Yankees fan, what can I say? I despise the Red Sox.

Whether you have a PS3 or not, both these games are out now and will hopefully provide you with enough sports nourishment to last you another month before baseball season finally gets underway.

-Ray Carsillo

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