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Microsoft Baseball 2001 (PC) ReviewRelease Date: April 2000 Background Info
Graphics : 90
A side note here worth mentioning. The Padres' stadium, Qualcomm Stadium, which was not accurately portrayed in the MS Baseball 2000, is still not accurate. I have been to a few of their games and I know there is a mini-scoreboard in right field. Maybe the guys who worked on the game are not Padres fans. As far as the accuracy of other stadiums in the game, I cannot say since I have only been to Qualcomm.
Audio : 50
The audio portion of the game has many problems that should have been worked out before the game hit the store shelves. First, the announcer constantly stutters. Second, the play-by-play guy kept on referring to my team by the opponent's team name. For example, I am the Padres in my season. I was playing the Diamondbacks and the play-by-play kept on saying, The Diamondbacks' Tony Gwynn or whatever Padre player he was referring to.
The sound effects do not do a good job of portraying baseball. The crowd noise needs to be tweaked as they were cheering on random occasions sometimes.
Interface/Options : 80
The simulation engine seems accurate for the most part. I simmed a couple of seasons and nothing out of the ordinary happened. The leading homerun guys usually had around 48-53 homers with the RBI leader knocking in approximately 130-150 runs. The pitching stats also were right on track with a few pitchers getting 20 wins and the leading saves leader racking in saves in the mid-40s. One thing I noticed since my hometown team is the Padres, Tony Gwynn had 40 strikeouts in the seasons I simulated. Gwynn usually gets only around 20 strikeouts a season.
The interface is pretty much the same as Microsoft Baseball 2000. It remains easy to navigate around the game and is not the least bit confusing. While Microsoft probably did not want to fix something that wasn't broken, they could have at least allowed users to double click players displayed on the league leader screen to bring up their stat card. The new feature allowing users to view 'scout's grades' is a welcome addition. Instead of having to double click on all the players to check their rating in the roster screen, a user can just choose to view grades.
For some reason, the minor leaguers' stats are not shown. How are we to determine if someone deserve a call to the big leagues or not?
Gameplay : 60
Defensive players did not charge grounders no matter how slow the ball was rolling. With that in mind, it is nearly impossible to beat out any infield grounders, no matter how fast the runner is, and/or no matter how slowly the ball is hit. Also, I noticed how many liners were hit directly at the infielders. While on defense, I tried throwing the ball directly to home plate on a sacrifice fly attempt, but my shortstop cut the throw off. This kept on happening to me.
With questionable AI base running, fielding, and substitution, the game is far from being realistic.
The computer-controlled outfielders constantly overplayed what would be singles turning them into doubles and triples by letting the ball roll right past them. Errors occur way too often for the computer. On one play, a total of four errors were charged. Started with a grounder to the second baseman that went through his legs. The centerfielder let the ball go through his legs. The right fielder picked it up and chucked it over the second baseman's head, with the balling rolling all the way to the dugout near third base. At this point, another fielder picked up the game and threw it into left field. Although this only happened once, I did not go through any games where I did not go through at least 2 multi-error plays by the computer. Luckily all this did not happen to my fielders. I had the occasional error but nothing strange.
The game still does not factor in wind. The same goes for wild pitches. Both are absent. Those two features are key to providing a realistic baseball experience.
All in all though, the actual physics of Microsoft Baseball 2001 is perhaps the most realistic out of the baseball games released this year on the PC. Microsoft needs to revamp their AI for next year's game in order to compete with the other baseball games.
Replay Value : 50
Overall : 60
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