MLB The Show 20 is another marvel for San Diego Studios. The tweaks they implemented and the gameplay options they have provided only stand to improve the product. They own baseball in gaming and it looks like they’re not ready to give it up anytime soon.
Year in and year out, the folks at San Diego Studios put out the best sports game to start a fresh year. I know that might seem like a ‘hot take’ (looking at you Alex Tudor) about sports, but it’s honest to God truth. They have a knack for refining a series, adding features that make sense, adjusting how the game works from the previous year, and then bumping up the visuals to put you there. There is no other studio on the planet that actually gives this much effort and meticulousness to a series that would be a cash cow without the above. When you’re the only true baseball game in town, you don’t really have to do much to sell your product, and yet San Diego Studios pushes their efforts into producing the most accurately fun baseball experience every year with MLB The Show.
You have to admire that a bit. It’s as if they fully understand they want to keep a top-shelf product always top-shelf.
It’s like Weller Bourbon, baby.
With a new year, a new game, MLB The Show 20 is an updated gem from the previous year. With that said, let’s get right into it.
There are several gameplay improvements in MLB The Show 20. While the game has notoriously always undergone new ways to tweak and perfect how fielders and batters operate, they may have gotten it incredibly right this time around. That’s not to say that it was wrong prior, but sometimes you just don’t know what you’re missing until you’re presented with it.
The first big tweak in MLB The Show 20 was the inclusion of what is called Perfect-Perfect indicators for batters. As you make contact the right way and hit the bat on the sweet spot, you are rewarded with more successful hits on the field. If you need an example of how this works, think about guessing the pitch in previous MLB iterations, where the batter’s box would blink red when you’re correct about the pitch, thus giving you a better chance of being successful with the contact and results. Perfect-Perfect rewards you for being accurate and powerful and gives the player a solid hit in return. This might seem a bit arcady to some, but making baseball exciting through good offensive skills is what makes video games exciting. Including this tweak for hitting is a HUGE plus in my book. Baseball needs to be exciting because, well, it isn’t the most exciting sport in real life. Anyway, I loved this tweak for the game. It made it more fun.
Along with batting, there is also a first-step gameplay option for outfielders, as well as a meter to show the effectiveness of fielding a ball. While the meter is pretty self-explanatory on its own, meaning you have to hit the right point in the meter to throw successfully around the field while playing defense, the first-step option is a challenge, and a welcomed one. The first-step for an outfielder is having a first-step when fielding a ball. If you do it well, it ends well for you. If you don’t do it well, and your reaction time is off, then you have a chance of not making the play. It’s a neat option and leaves chance out of it, rather pushing for improved skill as you continue to play the game. Anytime you can make a player get better in order to hone a skill in the game, you’re doing a good job as a game. First-step is a good addition to the game and one that makes out-fielding a bit more exciting and dramatic.
Tweaks like the few above are what makes this year’s game worth digging into as soon as you can. It simply makes the gameplay a lot more exciting.
From tweaks, we move to changes in modes. There were a few changes this year and starting with Franchise is the best way to dig into it all.
The Franchise mode has brought a few things with it, most notably the ability to customize your character and the team. This is probably my most favorite part of this year’s game. Having the ability to change a team’s uniform, this year I brought the Reds into neon colors, and then add a customized logo of whatever you want on the front/hat/helmet was oddly satisfying. Most certainly this ability will turn into a beautifully offensive use of innocent items, much like when Call of Duty introduced logo customization in its games. The fact that you can color customize the uniform, change its style, and logo customize your uniforms, hats included, is a huge deal. It’s a no brainer for sports games, so I’m not sure why it took so long to get here. Probably the previously mentioned offensiveness that can be created with them. That hotdog logo is going to be abused but beautifully abused. I abused the hell out of it on my neon uniforms. It was so worth the hour of effort that I put into it. I suspect we will see a lot of streamers going hog wild on this part of Franchise mode, as they should.
Moving along…
Road to the Show has brought some interesting items to the game and perhaps made the gameplay a bit deeper than most sports games will travel. The first addition to the Road to the Show is the ability to build relationships with your teammates. As you win games and work with your fellow ballplayers to achieve goals, you will gain their trust and eventually go from being good teammates to being ‘bros’. The players will work harder with you to win and the team itself can become closely knit in the process. I mean, not Houston Astros closely-knit where they’re banging on trash cans and cheating, and probably not feeling much guilt about it, but rather building an actual team that actually plays hard for each other. You build that and you become a better ballplayer. Simple, yet neat things.
On top of this, the Road to the Show actually features, wait for this — I’m dead serious here, an actual skills tree for your player. It’s like you’re playing a baseball RPG (write that down), where you can improve certain attributes to make you a better teammate and give your team the best chance to win. The skills tree is made up of four different types: Captain, Lightning Rod, Heart and Soul, and Maverick. Each one of those types has certain specific attributes that you can unlock and attach to your player as the season/road goes on. For example, in the Heart and Soul type, I opened up a ‘heart-warmer’ attribute that, when attached, gave me the ability to play better during day games. There was another in the same type called ‘expanded mind’, which allowed me to have a larger strike zone. You have more than a dozen of these attributes to unlock in Road to the Show and they are a VERY welcomed addition to the overall game. San Diego also added four tiers to the process, which allow you to carry a certain amount of those attributes at a time. The first tier gets you one attribute, the second two, and so on and so forth. It’s pretty freaking sweet — for a baseball game. It’s still crazy to think about.
Another mode that is still intact is March to October, which was great last year and still is solid this year. You get to play key games and moments to help get your team to the postseason. Sometimes people don’t like playing nine innings of baseball. It took me an hour and some change today to get through one game. Sometimes you just want to play for the moment and March to October allows for this to happen. For example, I (the Reds) played against the Blue Jays in the top of the ninth with Joey Votto coming up to bat. If I get a hit and drive home a run, I can give the Reds a chance to win. I did get a hit, I did tie the game, it went into extra innings and I won 8-5. In the end I won momentum points and rewards, which is what March to October is all about. I actually like this mode a lot. It reminds me of how much fun baseball games can be without a large commitment of time.
Another mode that has been improved is Custom Leagues. This looks really quite cool, though having enough people to play it and keep it interesting would be the biggest trick. I know three people who like baseball, and maybe two of them have PS4s (I know, I need better friends). Anyway, the ability to customize your leagues to pretty much any way you want and play the game any way you want is a HUGE deal for me in order for this title to maintain longevity. I would love to play this game with friends during our current non-sport time period thanks to this stupid virus hanging around. It would be fun and competitive.
As has been the case with most MLB The Show titles, San Diego Studios finds great ways to improve their work and make the improvements meaningful. They don’t seem to throw in crap that detracts from their plan, rather they seem to methodically decide on what improves their title and keeps it fun/fresh. They definitely found a few things this year and baseball has become more entertaining because of it.
Overall, MLB The Show 20 is another marvel for San Diego Studios. The tweaks they implemented and the gameplay options they have provided only stand to improve the product. They own baseball in gaming and it looks like they’re not ready to give it up anytime soon.
