Overview

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Review

Release Date: 04.11.2006
Platform: Xbox 360
Developer: Kush Games
Publisher: 2K Sports

Reviewed by Ryan Dean on 5.24.2006

Review Rating: 2/10

User Rating: 8/10

Boy, how do we start this off? Well, being a member of the Red Sox Nation, I can tell you I love baseball, baseball movies, and baseball video games. Well, some baseball video games. I liked MVP Baseball. I liked Sony's franchise, MLB. Heck, I even liked All-Star Baseball (though definitely not as much as MVP). However, this all changed on April 11th, 2006. Welcome to MLB 2K6 for 360.

Like most 360 sports games, Major League Baseball 2K6 is simply a "pretty" version of its current generation brothers (meaning MLB 2K6 for Xbox and PS2). If you're lucky enough to have bought a current generation version of this game, you're done; there's no reason to play MLB 2K6 for 360 if you've already got one of the superior versions. Derek Jeter again finds himself on the cover of the game, and that's incredibly fitting considering both he and the game are full of errors.

That's right, the gameplay isn't that much different than the PS2/Xbox version; in fact, it could very well be a step down. The mechanics, the player movement - it just doesn't seem, or play, right. The smallest things in the game seem unrefined and unpolished, starting off with hitting the ball, probably one of the most basic parts of baseball. When hit, the ball in MLB 2K6 can sometimes move too quickly, making it near impossible to get doubles, unless the AI runs into the wall and falls, which luckily (?) for us, happens a lot. And if the ball happens to go that extra distance, nothing can be done about it. It almost seems like too many home runs are hit. Now, this might seem like a small complaint, but when eighteen home runs are hit before the 8th inning, these little things start to matter. The exaggerated ball speed wouldn't really matter if the players moved quickly, but in fact the opposite occurs. Instead of sprinting as fast as they could, the players seem to run far too slow. This could possibly be because the controls are slow to respond and lag seems to run rampant. You only start to notice the lag after the 2nd inning, but getting past that in itself is hard.

Sounds pretty bad, huh? Well, there's more. The game locks up. Not once or twice, but 75% of the time you play. If you have a memory card, we've been told that this problem will stop; however, if you're a smart consumer and bought the 360 Premium Pack, you're going to be punished. That's how they roll at 2K Sports. Now, 2K will be offering a fix for this error sometime in the future, but without a date there isn't much to look forward to. If you want to enjoy this game as best you can, you'll not only need to fork out the 50 dollars for the game itself but an additional 40 for a memory card. I like it!

Besides the freezing, the lag, and the insane amount of home runs (What, is everyone juicing now?) the game is actually pretty fun. Well actually, franchise mode, the main attraction of all sports games, isn't that great. The player ratings are very inaccurate and trades that wouldn't fly in real life just seem to work out in the world of MLB 2K6. Ideally, if you're a smart guy, you should be able to make trades that get your team to the top. But no, that won't happen. Now, you have to play stupid and propose silly trades to have success. If you try to make a realistic trade, you'll be told that your offer is terrible and that you're "insane." Awesome, thanks!

Also, the game has multiplayer. This new feature has never been implemented into a baseball game before. In all seriousness, the multiplayer is pretty fun. However, some of the cutscenes have been taken out to save time, so the whole experience can seem a bit awkward. I don't know if it's just me, but multiplayer also seems to be less laggy and doesn't freeze up (assuming you and your opponent both have decent connections).

Now, because this is the pretty version, you'd expect the game to look better than the current generation versions, and for the most part it does (if you don't count the lagging animations). Stadiums look real but all seem too small and cramped. Players in the game don't look too much like their real life counterparts, except for a few like Derek Jeter. But that's no surprise, he's on the cover! If you've got all that power with the 360 there's no reason the cover athlete shouldn't have a realistic player model. So unless you plan to somehow create a new team called the Derek Jeters, I can't say this game looks all that "next-gen."

MLB 2K6's audio is pretty good (no really, no sarcasm here!). The crack of the bat and pounding of dirt sound pretty crisp, and the commentary is a lot better than any sports title I've played in a while. However, just because it sounds nice doesn't mean you'll like it, much like many things in life.

All the nifty little gameplay features like Swing Stick, Hitter's Eye, and Inside Edge scouting are basically old features with new names. Whoa, exciting. Instead of coming up with cool names for existing features, how about you fix the lag, Kush? I'm sorry, but it's incredibly hard to care about all your gameplay additions when I can't even take the time to enjoy them because the game is constantly freezing. How could this possibly be overlooked? There isn't one reason to play MLB 2K6 expect to see how much worse it can get over time.

Really, MLB 2K6 serves two purposes. Not only is it a game, but it also provides a deep commentary and look into the league itself. Much like the Yankees, Take 2 spent the big bucks to get exclusive rights (in their case, to creating baseball games) but couldn't produce a winner in the end. I just don't know how to explain this enough for those who could potentially buy this game in the future. Okay, here it is. 2K Sports' betrayal of baseball game fans is almost as bad as the betrayal of Damon to the Red Sox. Much like Jaret Wright, MLB 2K6 didn't live up to the hype, and in the end was just plain bad.

When looking for the baseball game to get this season, look no farther than your PS2 collection. Take out MVP 2005, update the rosters, and enjoy. If you need a game specifically for your hot new 360, you'd be better just waiting for the exclusitivity deal to end and picking up the next Electronic Arts baseball title.

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5.22.2006 - Screenshots (4)