CloudFantasy - Fantasy Football

Summer officially begins today since the two hottest baseball video games just dropped, MLB 2K10 and MLB ’10: The Show.  Cloud Fantasy is here to review MLB 2K10 today and MLB ’10: The Show tomorrow.  So you can rent or buy the right one.

The second you see the opening shots of MLB 2K10 you can tell 2K is using the same engine as in NBA2K10.  All the menus and graphics are the same.  Even the options on all the pages before you get to the game are the same.

I started off with a match up of the San Francisco Giants vs. New York Yankees.  The graphics looked crisp and realistic just like if the makers of 2k10 made a baseball game, which is exactly is what they did.  I felt like I was really at the home of the Giants, SBC park, yes, I had to double check the name since they keep changing it.

In general my only problem with baseball games is their pitching setup.  In this one they show you on the left hand side all your pitches.  You have to pick one then with the right analog stick follow the particular motion they show you.  For one of the pitches you have to push forward and then do a half circle from 3 o’clock to 9 o’clock on the joystick. The success of the pitch is determined by the timing and motion of your movements.  If that sounds hard to you, good news, it is hard.  This will take time to master.  I would say at least a solid hour till you get it down.  After you throw a pitch, Pitch Analyzer, will pop up on your screen and show you the speed of your pitch, how it traveled and how good your gesture of motion was so you will know what you did right or wrong.

Fielding takes some getting used to.  After about 10 minutes you should get it down.  Catching the ball isn’t hard at all but throwing it to the right base gets complicated.  Then again I was playing as the National League All Stars Vs the American League All Stars and I had Shane Victorino make a double play from center field.  He caught the ball at center field and threw a rocket to home to get the base runner out who was running from 3^rd.  They even showed a replay afterwards.  I guess it didn’t hurt that it was an inning ending double play.

Then we come to hitting.  To hit you use that right analog stick again.  When you see the ball you just swing the stick, not too complicated.  I was hitting right off the bat, literally.  There was even a Hit Analyzer that replayed your hit and the trajectory of the pitch.  For some reason I spend most of my time fouling off pitches.

Base running is really easy.  Only problem is if you are using a rumble controller then you will feel the hit as you go crashing into the base.  Always hated when base runners would run all over the place and you have no control in previous baseball video games.

A nice touch is when you press the pause menu Pepsi shows you their Pepsi Win% Prediction for the game shown inning for inning.  So if you score a run, your percentage for winning the game goes up.  I think other games should try this as well.  Could you imagine this feature in Madden while you are playing with friends?  Just the thought of all that trash talking is making my head spin.

One of my favorite parts of baseball video games is the home run  derby and this MLB2K10’s didn’t disappoint.  I started off with Alex Rodriguez and Albert Pujols going head to head.  Hitting home runs as A-Rod was a breeze, hit 10 in the first round compared to Pujols with his 2.  In the second round I couldn’t even hit one home run while Pujols hit 10 home runs.  In the third round A-Rod hit six home runs compared to Pujols with his five.  The scoring was done overall so Pujols won 17-16.

Wasn’t a big fan of the music choices in the game.  I looked over the 2K Beats Playlist and saw nothing but white people.  I realize that baseball is only 8% black now, but damn.  All they got is the Sugar Hill Gang’s Rappers Delight and Black Sheep’s The Choice is Yours.  Come on now, 2K.  Where is the rap music?  Hell I would even take r&b or jazz.

The commentary was done quite well.  There was Gary Thorne, Steve Phillips and even fat man John Kruk for a few laughs.  I mean as long as they don’t have Joe Buck I am happy but John Kruk has to be my favorite baseball commentator.

I would consider you rent MLB2K10 if you’re a baseball fan.  I give the game an 8.  The graphics are a 10 but the game play is a 6.  The reason for the low score on game play is due to the steep learing curve for learing how to pitch.  You have to be able to control all elements of a game, not the game controlling you.  Wondering if MLB ’10: The Show is better?  Stay tuned for tomorrow and the MLB ’10: The Show Review here on Cloud Fantasy.

Farhan Latif writes exclusively for CloudFantasy.  Email him here

Editors Note:  The music is so bad, you might not believe it, so here is the complete tracklist so you to can feel the horror.