Re: What is up with the strike zone?
With regard to the strike zone, I love the variability. It is realistic. It gets me complaining as much as an umpire can get a batter complaining.
However, I must agree wholeheartedly with the comment about the CPU not throwing high. I have been torn between ASB (the best 'feeling' sim) and ESPN. However, after playing both extensively, I have to go with ESPN and here's why:
Power pitchers in ESPN will smoke you with high fastballs and you will wonder why you ever took a cut at that unhittable pitch. Then, when you finally develop the patience to lay off it, Mark Prior will throw that same fastball high in the zone but just enough to be a called 3rd strike. Conversely, in ASB you know that the 2 strike pitch will always be low.
Someone earlier pointed out that you can draw walks in ASB and I agree that you can draw more walks than MVP but not nearly as many as in ESPN (the sliders actually have the proper effect). Also, the pitchers in ESPN (both user and cpu)can really miss their spots, which I love. Not that they don't in ASB but in ESPN, after the pitch, you can see the yellow dot that represented where you aimed it and see an overlay of a white ball trail where the pitch actually went. I can't tell you how many times I tried to throw a slider way down and away only to have it hang over the plate and get crushed.
My biggest problem though, is that I still LOVE ASB and feel like I'm cheating when I play ESPN. It does so many things right. My only hangups are the hitting models (I hate cursors) and the lightning fast way relievers tire and the fact that to get deep in counts I have to use a generated 1-0 or 2-0 count.
So, I'm currently playing both games.
With regard to the strike zone, I love the variability. It is realistic. It gets me complaining as much as an umpire can get a batter complaining.
However, I must agree wholeheartedly with the comment about the CPU not throwing high. I have been torn between ASB (the best 'feeling' sim) and ESPN. However, after playing both extensively, I have to go with ESPN and here's why:
Power pitchers in ESPN will smoke you with high fastballs and you will wonder why you ever took a cut at that unhittable pitch. Then, when you finally develop the patience to lay off it, Mark Prior will throw that same fastball high in the zone but just enough to be a called 3rd strike. Conversely, in ASB you know that the 2 strike pitch will always be low.
Someone earlier pointed out that you can draw walks in ASB and I agree that you can draw more walks than MVP but not nearly as many as in ESPN (the sliders actually have the proper effect). Also, the pitchers in ESPN (both user and cpu)can really miss their spots, which I love. Not that they don't in ASB but in ESPN, after the pitch, you can see the yellow dot that represented where you aimed it and see an overlay of a white ball trail where the pitch actually went. I can't tell you how many times I tried to throw a slider way down and away only to have it hang over the plate and get crushed.
My biggest problem though, is that I still LOVE ASB and feel like I'm cheating when I play ESPN. It does so many things right. My only hangups are the hitting models (I hate cursors) and the lightning fast way relievers tire and the fact that to get deep in counts I have to use a generated 1-0 or 2-0 count.
So, I'm currently playing both games.
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