World Series Baseball 2K1

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You can't play defense. You must wait for the fielder to catch and then you get to control where to throw. Whoopee. I could forgive them for this if the auto-fielding looked realistic. But, inexplicably, it's so lame. You see, pitchers don't field six or seven pop-ups a game by making over-the-shoulder-catches. Every throw to first isn't a leaping toss off the wrong foot. Catchers don't wait three seconds before gently tossing to second to throw out a would-be base stealer. It's like the fielding was programmed by someone who doesn't understand the kinesics of real baseball players.

It makes matters worse because it's not a matter of technology. Sega just doesn't appear to have the baseball smarts to capture the feel of the game. Really. When was the last time a pitcher fielded a grounder in short left? I've never seen that. Oh, and you can't check the other team's line-up during a game. I'd like to know who to expect up at the plate in terms of reliever match-ups. The play-by-play announcing pre-dates the PlayStation's capacity. The pitching is the only redeeming feature of the game. But it's not worth it. Sega has not delivered on the promise of this system. After the PlayStation 2 converts the Dreamcastaways, we may never know what the system was truly capable of.

20 of 23 found the following review helpful:

eye-candy, that's it!Jul 24, 2000

Well Sega Sports did it to me again, after waiting close to 5 1/2 months for this game to come out , I was a very disappointed overall with this game.

While the graphics of the players and the renditions of the 3-D stadiums are the best in the video game industry, that's were the fun factor ends for this game. That's roughly right after the introductions. If you have .... to shell out without hestitation then go ahead, however if you have played other video baseball games such as EA Sports Triple Play 2001 or MLB 2001 on the playstation this game doesn't compare for the true feel of baseball be leery, of wasting your hard earned money.

What are the flaws? Too many to list, to be honest with you. Here's just a few. In season mode you choose only one team to compete for an either season unlike in NBA 2K when you have the option to choose as many teams as you like. 120 blocks of memory for one team, come on Sega?

Lac k of stats, the programmers forgot to put in a spot to let the viewer know what the particular is doing in the current game, it's not visible on screen or in any sub menus. All other baseball games on the market do this, why not Sega? The Computer controlls all the action from running to fielding at one speed, you can't control the speed of the player to overrirde and take control another major flaw. Only one boring announcer repeating the same phrases over and over again, if they would have spent more time like in NFL 2K on getting non-repetitous phrase it just adds to the realism. No errors, no injuries and weather effects, they claim are on the box I played for 6 hours and nothing ever changed.

The pitchers never tire, really no need ever to replace them, the pitching is a joke, using line icons you must memories represent s the type of pitch to throw rather than using the a,b x,y buttons. X and Y are never used in the game. Why? Seeing that you really never control the players there's no scaling the walls or making diving catches. The baserunners automaticallly run which becomes a chore to remember to press the "b" button to return to the base. Other wise it's a quick doublplay. I had a hard time hitting the baseball as well, you have to hold down the "R" trigger and then with this little bulleye icon chase the baseball within the strike zone to make contact. If you get it right the baseball is hit solidly however to many times it's popped up or ground out to the infield. The Crowd is a wallpaper of 2D people, what happen to the 3 -D rendered people that would react to the situation to the game like in NBA 2K? More realism lacking.

If you want true baseball fan stay away from this game you will truly disappointed, I like stats and the realism of warming up pitchers, knowing Sammy Sosa is 2-4 in the game. That my pitcher is getting tired. All the things that makes spending .... well worth the money. This game should cost .... for what it has to offer as a baseball game If you like slick graphics then this is your game. It's just not a baseball game.

In closing Sega better regroup it's sports games, because if they don't Playstation 2 is right around the corner and if they keep producing garbage like this, NHL2K was a bust , also they will I feel, be out of business (see Sega Saturn). Right now noone else can produce the quality of the graphics they are producing but they must remember that once the novelty of cool graphics run off the gameplay is what takes over. Withoutit, it is just a boring game. This review was written by an adult of a 12 yr old.

10 of 10 found the following review helpful:

WSB 2K1 delivers.... something that all gamers will hateAug 10, 2000

A week ago, I saw a commercial for WSB 2K1. It looked awesome. Since NHL2K, NFL2K, and NBA2K were all pretty good games, I figured that the latest one from Sega would be even better. So last night I rented it. I admit, WSB2K1 does have the best graphics of any game I have ever played. But everything else just plain sucks.

Before I actually played a game, I went into the Customize menu to make my team a little bit better. The set-up to trade players, was not good at all, however. It took me about a half hour just to put together a pretty good team. At least I hoped they were good. After this, I went looking for the options menu in order to configure the controller. But wait... there wasn't any controller configuration option. In fact, there were barely any options to choose from. At this point, I was beginning to feel distraught. Hopefully, I could figure out how everything went together after a few innings of play. So I set the difficulty option to "amateur", and I put my loaded team up against the Marlins. The opening of the actual game was impressive. I hoped that the gameplay would be of its equal. Pedro Martinez was my pitcher, and the first batter up was Luis Castillo. But what.... what do I do to pitch? I noticed a little analog stick picture with lines pointing out it. I pointed the analog in one of their directions, and then hit the red button. Ba-boom, Pedro winds up and the picture disappears, but wait, a new thing appears. It is rectangular power bar. When the power meter got up to the top, I hit the red button again. Luis takes a swing and delivers a hit. I figure that now I have to make my closest fielder run and catch the ball. But I'm wrong. After almost 5 seconds of delay, I guess the defense realized the ball had been hit and reacted. Too late though, the ball had already slowly rolled through the infeld and past the infielders. Three more Florida Marlins come up, each one getting a hit similar to this. I think to myself, "what is wrong with my fielders.... they are moving really, really, slow. Even I could've caughten those balls." Now I was starting to think that something was wrong with my pitching. I might've actually been right.... I was able to get the next two guys to pop out. But the seventh batter of the inning came up, and, well he popped it up, way up, in the infield. It was almost perfect for the first baseman to catch if he had just stood there. But wait, he wasn't moving to catch the ball. And then he took off for first base, leaving the ball dropping onto the infield! I couldn't believe it. I was screaming at him to catch it. And then I realized that the second baseman was slowly running over to catch it. I was now, very, very, upset.

After a few more minutes, I was able to get the third out and now I was up to bat. The score: Marlins 4, Tigers 0. The best players in baseball absolutely sucked in the field. At this point I was still optimistic. Maybe my inexperience was my problem, and that with some patience I might become good at this game. My first guy up to bat was Alex Rodriguez. The pitch came, and I hit the red button. A-Rod didn't do anything. What the heck? The next pitch comes and I tried the same thing. Still nothing. On the next pitch, I tried the other buttons, including the R button. Now I had figured out what button to use to hit. Using my experience from previous baseball games, I swung at the next pitch when you actually are supposed to swing. Swish- a strike. A-Rod had swung about 2 seconds after the catcher caught the ball. My next two batters did the same thing. My next time up at bat, I actually got a hit. However, I am pretty sure that it was pure luck that had gotten the bat to hit ball. But yet, my players still sucked and I failed to even foul off the ball the rest of the time I played. This time, though was only for another five minutes. Because when I was playing defense in the top of the third, I got so fed up with the extremely poor gameplay capabilities that I threw the controller on the floor and it broke. I turned off the Dreamcast in disgust and threatened the game cd's life. I finally coaxed myself into letting it go. It was a rental, you know, and I would've had to shell out a lot of money for it.

Later in the day, I brought myself back up to trying WSB2K1 again. This time though, I decided that I would just simulate a season. Besides the graphics, this was the only other good feature of the game. Each time you simualte a game, it shows you a nice box score that includes the winning pitcher, the losing pitcher, who recorded the save, and who hit home runs, and actually the number of home runs those players had hit so far in the season. But yet, I was still disgusted in the fact that almost every game, the score was 3-0, 1-0, 2-1, 4-3, or something really low. And that winning pitcher almost always pitched a 5-hitter or lower. I ended up winning the world series, but after my previous experiences with playing the game, this accomplishment seemed diminished.

I have now been writing this review for almost one hour. One hour is how long it took me to realize that whoever thought up the gameplay function for World Series Baseball 2K1, didn't like the people who would be playing the game. The graphics are outstanding. The gameplay makes you want to kill yourself. Sometimes in a game, the positives will outweight the negatives. ......And this is not an understatement, this is the plain truth. This is the worst game I have ever played. Please, don't buy it. Don't encourage Sega to make more games like this. This game brings shame onto everyone who made it, and especially to those who promote it. Do not buy it. Do not rent it. Do not believe the hype or the commercials. This game... sucked!

Graphics: A+ Gameplay: F Fun/Excite.: F Overall: D- (The graphics give it a passing grade... barely)

13 of 15 found the following review helpful:

AverageJul 24, 2000

The graphics are exceptional, hitting and pitching are tops in the market. However, why would anyone design a game where you can't control the defense. Who's ridiculous idea was it to have the computer make the plays for you and only allow the game player to throw the ball. Stupid! This could have been a great game, but instead it's all but average. Cool graphics are great, but they don't make a great game. The game needs to be played, both offense and defense. Back to the drawing board for Sega.

6 of 6 found the following review helpful:

Hype does NOT deliverJul 28, 2000

The hype, the anticipation, the letdown, and that's the nice version. I reviewed ASB2000 for N64 at 2 stars, but now I've learned to appreciate the quality of that poor game. WSB2K1 is so far below expectations that I'd rate it as the biggest letdown in the history of video games. This is coming from a guy who felt that no baseball games have even compared to the previous WSB games for the Saturn and Genesis. Those games are better games than the latest installment. This game doesn't even deserve a star, and don't make the mistake of ordering it like I did. The game looks very good to the naked eye, the stadiums are all beautifully rendered in 3D and the rosters are current, but that's about it. Let's start with gameplay, and I'll give you the abridged version since I could have written a 100 page book about how poor the game play is after the first time I played this game. The batting mode is peculiar to say the least as it involves holding down a trigger until the ball comes. On defense, the problems really begin to multiply. You do not even have the option to field manually, so you're at the total mercy of the computer, which to me, takes half the fun out of the game. You can, however, throw the ball, but it must be thrown to a base, so there are no cutoffs, which are helpful in other games. The throws also always get to their destinations on the fly, another unrealistic aspect of the game. In terms of the defensive controls, 2K1 reverts back to the Nintendo style of freezing the players in place until a button directs them to run or throw. This can be a headache on close plays and could have been easily remedied with a little more production time. The baserunning style is also similar to that of Nintendo games and it's hard to control multiple runners. While you're getting frustrated with the very poor gameplay, you're forced to listen to the annoying drone of the announcer, whose voice you don't have the option to turn off. This no name announcer is easily the most annoying I've heard on a video game as there are clear gaps in his speech and he's very repeatious; in one game, he'll say the same thing at least 10 times. In terms of in game options, WSB2K1 most closely resembles the early versions of RBI Baseball. You can't warm up pitchers or make any complex switches. I could go on and on, but I think you get the point: WSB2K1 uses the facade of good graphics to disguise shallow programming, limited options and poor gameplay (and the graphics aren't even that good, just look at the crowd). Don't buy it, it would be more fun to put your $40 in a toilet and watch it flush down than it would be to play this game.

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