MLB 11 The Show News Post

Four Keys to Success for MLB '11: The Show

07:14 PM - September 2, 2010 by RaychelSnr

Baseball's pennant push is in full swing, and several teams are feverishly trying to claw their way to a division title. For those of us whose teams have already been eliminated from postseason consideration (my beloved Tigers included), the only baseball we really have to look forward to right now is next season's entry of Sony's stellar MLB: The Show franchise. While this year's title was an excellent addition to the series, there are definitely some nagging issues holding the game back from the elusive "GOAT" status.

With plenty of time still left in this year's development cycle, I figured I would put together a couple critical aspects of the game that should be altered for the upcoming season.

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# 81 moemoe24 @ 09/17/10 03:02 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by heroesandvillians


	If "solid" contact, more often the not, resulted in base hits, simply mastering the timing of how to hit would pillage the game of all statistical realism for hardcore players. These hardcore players are certainly the demographic MOST looking for realism. We can't have it both ways. A purely timing based hitting system, and statistically solid long term play. I don't know, maybe it can be done. All I know for sure is that to baseball fans, numbers matter.

I'm not saying timing should be the only factor in hitting, of course players ratings need to have a lot of influence. My beef with the hitting system or the one mentioned in this article is you shouldn't be able to flick your stick(that sounds funny

) up or down and be able to hit a fly ball or ground ball based off that. Your timing and left stick should determine the balls flight. The way it is now, I can flick my r stick up and hit a ball at my shins in the air or vice versa and hit a ground ball.

If you are talking about realism, a hitter goes up to the box needing to hit a fly ball he is going to be looking for something up...... he needs to move a runner over he's looking for something on the outside part of the plate. The right stick just makes it too easy to manipulate where you are hitting the ball.

# 82 countryboy @ 09/18/10 07:49 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by MLB01


	That's an option you can turn off though. it's called " swing influence ". i play with it off.

I just simply don't use it.

# 83 delija66 @ 09/18/10 01:00 PM

hitting should be like pro yakyuu spirits 2010
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fCdv8xmWmr0

# 84 delija66 @ 09/18/10 01:01 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by delija66


	hitting should be like pro yakyuu spirits 2010 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fCdv8xmWmr0

also we definitely need new commentary... 2k10s is perfect

# 85 Knight165 @ 09/18/10 03:37 PM

IMHO..
No and no.
Neither are perfect(I don't think either is even "better" than MLB's current status) and as for wholesale changes to those. .....most definitely not.

M.K.
Knight165

# 86 HustlinOwl @ 09/18/10 07:49 PM

hitting like Yakuu spirits god no most successful baseball game and people are asking for changes for simply a change no thanks

# 87 BobSacamano @ 09/18/10 09:09 PM

Hitting's fine. The hit variety out of the box is a little weak (lasers, and lots of them) but with some slider tweaking it's totally fine.

If they should overhaul something for the sake of overhauling something, make it pitching. Pitching is outdated and, after being the same since '06, pretty boring. The only way to make it interesting is to make it random (i.e., take control away from you) by lowering pitch control or going to "classic" pitching (shudder...).

# 88 HustlinOwl @ 09/18/10 09:55 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by baseball66


	I'd take the cursor hitting in PYS over the random stat based hitting in the show any day.

random lol

# 89 HustlinOwl @ 09/18/10 10:01 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by baseball66


	cpu basically decides when you should or shouldn't get a hit

lies, are you being serious right now?

# 90 Joey @ 09/18/10 10:46 PM

See, this is another example of different strokes for different folks. I exclusively use classic pitching & you shudder at the thought of it. Not saying either is right as it's just a matter of preference, but I find classic plenty interesting.

Quote:

Originally Posted by BobSacamano


	If they should overhaul something for the sake of overhauling something, make it pitching. Pitching is outdated and, after being the same since '06, pretty boring. The only way to make it interesting is to make it random (i.e., take control away from you) by lowering pitch control or going to "classic" pitching (shudder...).

# 91 countryboy @ 09/19/10 07:57 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by baseball66


	I'd take the cursor hitting in PYS over the random stat based hitting in the show any day.

the hitting in the Show is anything but random. And using anything but timing based hitting is cursor hitting.

Play with the PCI on if you want true cursor hitting...meaning you can see the cursor on-screen.

# 92 NAFBUC @ 09/19/10 09:10 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by countryboy


	the hitting in the Show is anything but random. And using anything but timing based hitting is cursor hitting. Play with the PCI on if you want true cursor hitting...meaning you can see the cursor on-screen.

^

What he said. Hitting is not random. Nuff said.

Go Twins!

# 93 BobSacamano @ 09/19/10 11:11 AM

The hitting system in the Show is far from random but I think people get frustrated when they get different results doing the same thing. There are times that I get a "perfect" timing and hit the ball right in the middle of the PCI cursor and I hit a routine fly ball. There are other times where I'm early and miss the ball by a little but I hit a no-doubter. It's just a little inconsistent.

The Show doesn't need to revamp their hitting engine but I do think it could be tightened up. You should get pretty much the same results by doing the same thing, subject to player ratings.

I think my biggest complaint with the game is how driven it is by pitcher confidence. I would scrap that entire aspect of the game, as it seems to have way too big of an influence on the game's results. I'm pretty sure, though not positive, that many of "inconsistencies" that I have noted are a result of the pitcher having no confidence or the pitcher have confidence maxed out.

# 94 BobSacamano @ 09/19/10 11:43 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by MLB01


	I believe SCEA did that on purpose to emulate the uncertainty of batting in actual baseball, but I agree with you that it could use a little adjusting.

Yeah to elaborate I think that's generally a GOOD thing - there's gotta be some randomness to make it a baseball game. However, I agree with you that it could use some tightening up. As it is I think it feels a little TOO random. It's still a video game, after all, so it would be nice if it rewarded the user a little more.

I also have a sneaking suspicious that the randomness is more due to pitcher confidence than any other in-game factor. I seem to notice that balls fly out of the park on swings that the CPU was late/missed, my pitcher was "rattled" before throwing the pitch. This is probably okay but pitchers get "rattled" early and often, like after giving up a couple bloop singles or walking a batter. That could use some tuning. No pitcher gets rattled after giving up a single run, especially when they were cruising for a few innings prior.

# 95 countryboy @ 09/19/10 01:23 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by baseball66


	The pci is far to big in this game to be called cursor hitting. In fact many on here play w/o even using the L stick and say that it's not even necessary so how is that cursor hitting?

you play on the upper levels and its absolutely necessary. Cursor hitting is nothing more than zone hitting, just the cursor provides a visual aid to help the user.

# 96 HustlinOwl @ 09/19/10 08:32 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by baseball66


	The pci is far to big in this game to be called cursor hitting. In fact many on here play w/o even using the L stick and say that it's not even necessary so how is that cursor hitting?

play Legend then come back and post

# 97 Heroesandvillains @ 09/20/10 05:15 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by MLB01


	I'd honestly like to know his opinion after he did that cause it's a lot different on Legend.

Agreed. When I played on HOF, I was swing only, and hardly ever saw my team batting average below .280. Heck, you can look through my old posts from a few months back. I'm sure I was convinced the PCI covered too much plate back then.

I'm on Legend now. All default minus contact at 4 and strike frequency at 4. I'm 44 games in, using the L-Stick, and hitting .266.

# 98 swaldo @ 09/20/10 06:21 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by baseball66


	The cpu basically decides when you should or shouldn't get a hit.

Quote:

Originally Posted by HustlinOwl


	lies, are you being serious right now?

How can you call this lies, have you ever looked at a replay? Let's take balls morphing through bats (with good aim and swing timing) as just one example. If that's not the CPU dictating results then what do you call it?

The first videogame I ever played was Pong, and every time the ball hit my paddle it was returned to the other user. EVERY TIME. Now imagine someone playing that game for the first time and watching the ball morph through their paddle. The user would be confused and ask why is this?

"Well, that paddle in particular is not very good, sometimes you cannot hit the ball even though your aim was right on the mark."

Hmmm....well how about just making the paddle smaller to increase the challenge?

And if that's not enough there are other things you can do, such as tweaking the balls size, speed or movement. Whether it's positive or negative most users want feedback EVERY TIME and that's the problem with The Show because there's a disconnect there.

I remember reading a blog from a guy who played a whole season and made it to the playoffs. He went into batting practice to scout the Game 1 starting pitcher so he was fully prepared to kick some nuts. During the game he said he was making good hacks but just wasn't connecting with anything and lost the game. In the end he felt kinda cheated, and after 162 games that's really disappointing because he should've been rewarded for doing his homework and making good swings.

The bottom line is that if you think it's ok for balls to morph through bats then you're just lying to yourself. Justify it however you want but I think a truly rewarding batting system has to be better than that.

# 99 countryboy @ 09/20/10 06:25 PM

replays are compressed thus meaning they have missing frames, which result in morphing and other things happening that don't actually take place during the gameplay.

Also the outcome of an at bat is determined by several factors/attributes. IMO, its basically:

user input + pitcher/batter attributes + pitcher confidence + luck = result.

Lets face it....sometimes in real life you can hit the ball right on the sweet spot and get that beautiful sound, only to make an out. Sometimes you are fooled, flip the bat at the ball and end up with a hit. Its baseball.

# 100 42 @ 09/20/10 06:46 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by countryboy


	you play on the upper levels and its absolutely necessary.

I play on Legend (Hitting) and don't use the PCI/Left Stick.

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