What is your History with MLB The Show?

[mpulse24]

Being into this series for a long time now, I am just curious as to what other OS community member's history and jumping on point with this series is.

Ok, its story time lol.....

I have been into Sony MLB games for a long time, pretty much since the beginning. I was 14 on the day I convinced my Dad to head over to Funcoland (for anyone who doesn't recognize the name, thats Gamestop before it was Gamestop lol) and throw money in with me to buy a PS1, I was told that my 7 year old brother and I could pick out three games for it. Those ended up being Crash Bandicoot, Time Crisis and MLB '98. Out of the three, I played MLB the most. It wasn't the prettiest game ever, but it played better than any other baseball game I had been into prior and was my first glimpse at 3D sports gaming. On summer days, when it was too hot out for neighborhood wiffle-ball tournaments, my brother and I would invite some of our friends in and have single elimination tournaments.

In the few years that followed we would keep watch on the store shelves for the next entries. Those "Vin Scully Baseball games" became the only thing we would play during baseball season and I really wish that I had saved them just to keep on display as something to look back on.

Once the PS2 and XBOX years came around, I lost touch with the 989 series. I really liked the last couple of High Heat Baseball entries (2003 and 2004), that game's initial major selling point to me was that it hit shelves a good two to three months before their competition. (I was an impatient teen) lol But really, MVP Baseball was totally to blame for me jumping off the Sony Baseball train completely. With where 989 Sports was and how desperate I was for a change, they really just couldn't compete with EA's new MVP Baseball at the time and that series became my brother and I's series of choice for the rest of that console generation. Which is funny because MVP Baseball evolved from Triple Play Baseball, a series that I had grown to hate.

At that point I had become more of an XBOX guy, adopting the 360 over PS3. I was fully expecting MVP to make the jump to 360 with me, but then I got hit hard with the news of 2K Sports buying exclusive third-party rights to MLB games, effectively killing the MLB version of MVP Baseball. I was pretty crushed. While, I did get some enjoyment out of the earlier entries of the 2K Baseball series, it was never a series I embraced. The fact that I was now in a position where I was being force fed it, made me resent the game even more. Those were my "dark times" with Baseball gaming. haha

Being busy with work and my brother in his high school years and playing actual baseball, we had less and less time to devote to our gaming pastime. Around that point (2006-2007) I had stumbled on a site called Operation Sports, lurked there for a while and discovered that MLB was thriving on PS3 with 'The Show'. I researched and connected the dots a bit, figuring out that 989's games had evolved into 'The Show' and that 2K's exclusive MLB rights didn't extend to first party licenses, which made it possible for The Show to exist. All of this really began to pique my interest. The last straw for me came when comparing my copy of MLB 2K8 with the coverage of MLB 08: The Show. That made me realize that I had made a HUGE mistake in jumping on the 360 over PS3. lol

I began putting money aside through the fall and winter. By the spring I was in Gamestop picking out a shiny new PS3 along with a copy of the just released MLB 09: The Show. I came home and my brother was sitting there on the couch after his practice and saw what I brought in. I hooked everything up, we immediately jumped into a 2-player game and we were completely hooked! That summer even saw the return of our living room baseball tournaments.

Now, I am a devoted fan of 'The Show'. Even if MVP Baseball returned tomorrow, that wouldn't sway my loyalty to this series. My brother is now in the Army, deployed in Iraq (was stationed in Korea before that). Its tough being so far away from him, but we do get to shoot emails and texts back and forth every day. Lately I have been filling him in on MLB 16 news and coverage. I actually bought him a Vita and a copy of MLB 15 for his birthday in the fall and shipped it over to him. What little free time he has, he pops in The Show for a little taste of home. But needless to say, he is pumped to get home in a couple of months! Mainly to be back around family and friends, of course. But he also says he wants to get his hands on a console version of The Show again. haha He made a similar mistake that I did and bought an Xbox One over a PS4, because his army buddies all own an Xbox. But when hes back stateside and has some free time, we are going to trade it in for a PS4 of his own, then we will be able to play The Show together again online once hes settled back on base!

So yeah, thats my little story. haha and I am really looking forward to this year's release of The Show for more reasons than just the game itself.

So what is everyone else's history with our favorite Baseball game series?

[Gagnon39]

Re: What is your History with MLB The Show?

I was an MVP fanatic and majorly depressed after the series was ended after MVP 2005. I refused to buy a baseball game in 2006 because 2K's game was garbage. I only had an Xbox at the time and in 2007 I caved and bought 2K, hoping to get my video game baseball fix. It took me all of a day to realize that it was horrible, especially compared to what I was used to with MVP 2005. The next year I had essentially gone two years without playing a baseball video game regularly. I had read a lot about MLB The Show and decided to finally give it a go. I went out and bought a PlayStation 3 and MLB The Show '08. Having never even played the game I was hoping that my investment of over $400 just to play a baseball video game would pay off.

Let's just say it was a good decision.

[huskerfan4life]

Re: What is your History with MLB The Show?

when I first started playing baseball games I was hooked on triple play on the PS1, I broke my neck and damaged my spinal cord in 1994 and thus couldn't work any more due to my spinal cord injury and that becgan my gaming history and I have been in love with mlb the show since 08 the year after mvp died, I never got in to the 2k series, I bought 2k7 and then played for a few months then put it away when madden came out, so I to found OS and started reading about the show and bought the 08 copy and have been in love with it ever since.

[mpulse24]

Re: What is your History with MLB The Show?

I was an MVP fanatic and majorly depressed after the series was ended after MVP 2005. I refused to buy a baseball game in 2006 because 2K's game was garbage. I only had an Xbox at the time and in 2007 I caved and bought 2K, hoping to get my video game baseball fix. It took me all of a day to realize that it was horrible, especially compared to what I was used to with MVP 2005. The next year I had essentially gone two years without playing a baseball video game regularly. I had read a lot about MLB The Show and decided to finally give it a go. I went out and bought a PlayStation 3 and MLB The Show '08. Having never even played the game I was hoping that my investment of over $400 just to play a baseball video game would pay off.

Let's just say it was a good decision.

when I first started playing baseball games I was hooked on triple play on the PS1, I broke my neck and damaged my spinal cord in 1994 and thus couldn't work any more due to my spinal cord injury and that becgan my gaming history and I have been in love with mlb the show since 08 the year after mvp died, I never got in to the 2k series, I bought 2k7 and then played for a few months then put it away when madden came out, so I to found OS and started reading about the show and bought the 08 copy and have been in love with it ever since.

I was the same way with MLB 2K in my 360 years. I tried so hard to like it, buying 2K7 and 2K8, but neither of them grabbed my attention and I was done with them after maybe a month. That never happened with me and baseball video games before, and I had just figured that maybe I was losing my interest in baseball gaming altogether. But thankfully Operation Sports' coverage of The Show helped me realize that my lack of interest was just because MLB 2K was just so second rate, to put it kindly. haha

And sorry to hear about your injury, man. But I am glad sports games helped you out the way they did.

[ShowTyme15]

Re: What is your History with MLB The Show?

Been playing this series dating back to when it was MLB Pennant Race. Owned every copy up to this point. Owned all the other baseball games as well.

[mpulse24]

Re: What is your History with MLB The Show?

Been playing this series dating back to when it was MLB Pennant Race. Owned every copy up to this point. Owned all the other baseball games as well.

Holy crap! I didn't even realize that the 989 MLB series/The Show was once MLB Pennant Race! I remember renting that game a few times from Blockbuster Video when I was in Junior High and being a bit indifferent towards it.

But now after justing looking up video gameplay of it on youtube, I can tell the link between the series just by the sound of it. haha

[Jeffrey Smith]

Re: What is your History with MLB The Show?

My first taste of baseball on a console was the Griffey Jr. game on the Nintendo 64 in 1996/97(?)and I played the hell out of that game. Flash forward 10 years and I bought my son a PS2 and while he chose which game he wanted I came across MLB 07 The Show with David Wright on the cover.

Needless to say but within a month or two I took over the PS and my son ended up moving on to Xbox. I've been with The Show ever since.

I was fine with the default rosters (and unrealistic trades to stack my team )for the first 5 years or so but since discovering OSFM I've been hooked on trying to keep things as real as possible.

My love for this game continues to grow every year.

I'm HOOKED!!!

[My993C2]

Re: What is your History with MLB The Show?

I was playing MLB 2k12 on my XBox 360 thinking "This game is awesome compared to the last time I played a console baseball game which was MLB 2k07". But then I saw the light. I came across a YouTube video of MLB 12 The Show. I ran out and bought a PS3 console not knowing if MLB 12 The Show was better than the 2k games. But yeah we all know it is better and the rest is history.

Oh but I am no spring chicken. The first console baseball game I remember playing was the Intellivision Baseball game from back in the early 1980s. Computer sports games have come a long way since those days.

[tessl]

Re: What is your History with MLB The Show?

I'm strictly manage mode and I was still playing high heat '02 with dated graphics until the show came along with a manage mode.

I bought a ps4 specifically for the show.

[huskerfan4life]

Re: What is your History with MLB The Show?

I was the same way with MLB 2K in my 360 years. I tried so hard to like it, buying 2K7 and 2K8, but neither of them grabbed my attention and I was done with them after maybe a month. That never happened with me and baseball video games before, and I had just figured that maybe I was losing my interest in baseball gaming altogether. But thankfully Operation Sports' coverage of The Show helped me realize that my lack of interest was just because MLB 2K was just so second rate, to put it kindly. haha

And sorry to hear about your injury, man. But I am glad sports games helped you out the way they did.

some people think that it is weird that a quadriplegic uses video games as therapy on hands rather than conventional therapy but I do think that my hands but in the 22 years that I have been injured dr's say that I have movement in my hands that I should not have, and when they ask me how I do therapy I respond I play MLB THE SHOW on my PS4 and they think its just great.

[TheWarmWind]

Re: What is your History with MLB The Show?

While I've been an athlete for most of my life, I've been somewhat sporadic about watching sports. Still, my first memories of sports are of baseball, and the first team I cheered for was the Jays.

In fact, I cheered for the Jays all the way up to the player strike. Then I, like many baseball fans in Canada, completely lost interest in baseball.

I was always a big gamer though, and my love of the PS2 drove me to get a PS3 in university. While there, I roomed with a guy who was a huge fan of all sports. I had recently got more into hockey, but since he cheered for the Leafs and I cheered for the Sens, there was little common ground to find there, even in video game land.

However, when MLB The Show 09 came out, they released a demo on PSN. We played through it a few times, and it was enough to convince my friend that he wanted to buy it, even thought the PS3 was mine. He played it religiously, I played it occasionally. It was slow and subtle, but I was drawn in more and more because the Show taught me so much about modern day baseball. It filled the gaps in my knowledge and helped me catch up with what had happened since the player strike.

Baseball became a much more interesting game to me, and soon enough we would pile into a car together to make the trip to Toronto to watch the Jays. My love of baseball rekindled, my interest in playing the show grew, and so on and so forth.

When we parted ways, I bought his copy of the show off him. The positive cycle of baseball feeding my love of the show and the show feeding my love of baseball continued, at a slow but notable pace. Soon enough it was 2012, I was living in Toronto and had just bought my first of many flex packs to see the Jays more often. My 09 copy was starting to show its age a bit, so I decided it was time to upgrade to 12 (didn't hurt that Jose Bautista was on the cover, at least up here in Canada).

I started chugging away at my Jays franchise, but there were a few things about the Jays team of that year that didn't jive well with the way I like to play and manage a game. So I started to trade. Things weren't working out and I was starting to lose interest. But my interest in baseball still stayed strong. Then I started a new, fresh franchise doing something I'd never done in a sports game before: Fantasy draft.

Researching and preparing for that draft again had that positive feedback of helping me learn more about real life baseball. I was a baseball freak now. Even though it's long gone, I loved that fantasy draft team to death.

Now I'm hooked on the Show. Year to year saves make it easily my favourite sports game ever. My franchise that I started in 14 is going to be my most memorable. I think the biggest thing about my story though is that baseball didn't bring me to the Show, the Show brought me back to baseball. And I couldn't be happier about it.

Go Jays Go

[nolberto82]

Re: What is your History with MLB The Show?

I have been playing The Show since the very beginning. Every console I owned had a baseball game with it. My first baseball video game was RBI baseball for the NES.

[takki]

Re: What is your History with MLB The Show?

I'm not a huge baseball fan. The only baseball games I've enjoyed in the past have been arcade titles (Ken Griffey's Slugfest on N64, The Bigs 2 on 360).

I think I first rented MLB 11. The graphics and gameplay blew my mind but I'm an online player for the most part and the online portion of the game did not work and was unplayably laggy until MLB 14. I also hated sim baseball games because I cannot hit to save my life, both in real life and video game. I cannot tell if offspeed pitches are going to be strikes or not and the MLB The Show is very simulation so you have all of a split second to tell.

They introduced Diamond Dynasty last year so I decided to finally purchase one and I loved it as the online was silky smooth and DD is a great game mode. It took hours of batting cage practice before I became even halfway competent at hitting but now I enjoy the series alot.

[mpulse24]

Re: What is your History with MLB The Show?

some people think that it is weird that a quadriplegic uses video games as therapy on hands rather than conventional therapy but I do think that my hands but in the 22 years that I have been injured dr's say that I have movement in my hands that I should not have, and when they ask me how I do therapy I respond I play MLB THE SHOW on my PS4 and they think its just great.

Well, thats pretty awesome. It just goes to show how video games can be therapeutic not just for the mind and soul (what I usually use video game therapy for) but also for the body. I am really happy that the game we all love helped you take back some control of your hands again.

Now I'm hooked on the Show. Year to year saves make it easily my favourite sports game ever. My franchise that I started in 14 is going to be my most memorable. I think the biggest thing about my story though is that baseball didn't bring me to the Show, the Show brought me back to baseball. And I couldn't be happier about it.

Go Jays Go

Being a life long Red Sox fan, I have also been very familiar with the Blue Jays franchise and have seen them many times at Fenway Park. They usually weren't the best team around, but I always liked them, maybe it had something to do with the uniforms (not those 2004-2011 unis, mind you lol) or something, but I always took an interest to them had a respect for them as a team. Seeing the Skydome/Rogers Centre on TV, close to deserted on game days year after year was kind of sad to me, because there were years there where they had an interesting mix of players. The Sudden resurgence of the Blue Jays over the last few years has been really refreshing, partially from a competitive standpoint and just being a fan of baseball in general, its just great to see.

So its awesome that The Show helped you reconnect with your Blue Jays. Now your boy on the cover all over the world! Not just in Canada!

[eric7064]

Re: What is your History with MLB The Show?

I'm another 2k Cliché guy. I was about 11 when I got my 360. I played the hell out of MVP Baseball 05 on the gamecube. I was itching to play baseball. Got 2k6, 2k7, 2k8 which imo weren't BAD games. They had good things going for them. Then I looked a the show and wished upon a ps3, but I still got 2k9. A few seasons into my franchise, it crashes, wont load, freezes every time. Went out and bought a ps3 the next day along with MLB 09 the show. Been getting every edition ever since.

I will say I also solely bought a PSP when RTTS was introduced to play it on there. Thought it was an awesome mode.