Community Forum

I think they also need to provide commentary for more big milestones. For example, I hit Ohtani’s 40th home-run of the season to join the 40-50 club in franchise mode, and the commentators didn’t even mention that. No mention of him joining a 40-40 club that only had five players in it entering this season. You’d think they could mention it and show a list of the players, maybe even along with their teams and the years they did it. If it’s done at home, I believe a curtain call would even be appropriate.

First, this mode really needs to give us the option of playing with a current MLB player. There’s absolutely no reason we should have to labor through the minor leagues as a position player with some random guy while, for lack of a better term, absolutely sucking because of the game requiring you to go through a bunch of hoops to boost your various player ratings that aren’t even good to begin with. Not to mention that there’s no guarantee you’ll even get called up to the majors. That really makes the mode feel like school homework, not something that’s actually enjoyable. Now I know there may certainly be some who enjoy the grind, so I’m not necessarily saying to change it so that you can no longer create a player. But I do think that we should have the option of playing as a real life major leaguer. Another potentially cool addition would be having brief interviews with media members at certain times throughout the regular season and playoffs, such as after big games. They could be in the locker room at times, but they could be at the podium other times, just as they are at times in the playoffs.

I’m not sure, but I started noticing this yesterday for the first time. It has happened often since it started for me. For example, at different points, Jon has talked about Profar, Correa, Muncy, Alonso, and Semien as if they were all hitting at one point. Yet none of them have even played in any game I’ve played in since yesterday. I sure hope SDS fixes this at some point. It’s kind of a laughable part of this year’s game unfortunately.

I do get that hitting is supposed to not be easy, but I truly believe that it is just too hard in this game. I’m not one whose hitting exploits I would consider to be among the elite in this game, but there has been a huge difference in the amount of run scoring I’ve had offensively in franchise mode in The Show 23. I always play on the all-star difficulty level. SDS claimed before release that hitting would really be better, but there appears to have just been way too many times when I’ve made good timing on a good pitch to hit, only to end up with weak contact. And yes, I understand that zone hitting gives you more control over where the bat comes through the zone, but that also takes a lot of practice to get good at. I’m not asking for this game to provide tons of offense every game for me and the CPU. Frankly, that wouldn’t be fun either, but I do believe good timing needs to get rewarded way more than it does. I played through every pitch of four seasons in The Show 21, and in every season, my offense was much better or at least a little better that it was in the one season I’ve played in this year’s game. In two of those seasons, I hit at least .250 as a team. In one of them, I hit just under .250. The best offensive season I’ve ever had with a player was with Cody Bellinger. I hit about .290 with him, with 54 doubles, 28 homeruns, and about 90 RBI. I had another season with him in which I hit 27 homeruns. As a team in The Show 21, yes, I wasn’t exactly good, but I wasn’t nearly as bad offensively as I was in this year’s season, a season in which I only hit about .218 and only averaged a little over 3 runs per game. I also only hit 102 homeruns in the regular season. That was despite playing as the Braves, one of the best home run hitting teams in baseball. At least in 21, even though I wasn’t good as a team offensively, I had some players who had legitimately good seasons. In two of those seasons, I averaged roughly 3.5 to 3.8 runs per game. In one of those seasons, I would’ve averaged exactly four runs per game if I had scored just one more run. Also in one of those seasons, I ranked in MLB’s top 5 in doubles as a team. I would think that SDS would want to make hitting a little more reasonable in this game. I would think that SDS would actually realize that putting up good numbers, whether it’s as a team as a whole, or just with three or four players, is a way for people to enjoy the game, as well as something that would increase sales. Oh, and did I also mention that I hit 16 homeruns with Chris Carter in only 48-56 games in MLB The Show 19? Had a high batting average of as high as .330 with him deep into that season too, not to mention finishing with a .302 average with Justin Turner in The Show 21.

@AdeptOfMemory_PSN
I like your points.

Based on my experience, I do like the hitting more than last year.

But the game definitely does have times when it can drive you absolutely crazy.

Sometimes there just seems to be too many times when you get a great pitch to hit with very good timing with a hitter who has very good power and contact ratings against the handedness he’s facing, only to make contact and not even get a hard hit ball.

And that hitter might even have a good plate vision rating (like 80+) and not even make contact even though all those other conditions are met.

I’d even be fine with the game being just a little different if more of my own mistake pitches hurt me. I don’t think much is desirable about a pitcher making a hitter’s pitch and the hitter missing it. That’s just bad on both ends and not a compelling product.

So it just feels like a little too often that the game doesn’t provide authentic results.

I’d rather win 5-3 than 3-0 if the game is fair. Yeah, it might be frustrating to give up hits on hitters’ pitches, but no one can really complain if those hits are indeed on hitters’ pitches since hitters are supposed to take advantage of those pitches anyway.

Just thought it would be cool if some of the walk up songs that players use in real life got added so that they could be used for walk up songs in the game too. I know there may be some hindrances to that, but it would be pretty cool if that happened. It would definitely add some realism to the game. For example, “Baila Conmigo” has been Freddie Freeman’s walk up song for a while now, and that’s one that definitely resonates with me as a Dodgers fan.

Has anyone noticed that for years now, if you’ve had runners on the corners with two outs while pitching that the game doesn’t let you have your first baseman play off the bag as if no one is on base? I was recently in this situation as the away team with a tie game in extra innings, and it was just a little frustrating since there wasn’t really any point in trying to hold on the runner who was on first and since his run was meaningless. I pitched out of trouble, but it would be nice to be able to have the first baseman play under a normal alignment so that he can cover the holes better.

As much as I’d like to buy 25, I definitely won’t be. I’m 73 games into a season in franchise mode in 24, and I’m definitely not buying the game if I’m just going to have to start over.

I think SDS really needs to add a new home run celebration in the future in honor of that grand slam. You can have him turning around like he did right after making contact before holding the bat up high and then gently dropping it. It would be great for a walk-off bomb, just like it was absolutely amazing for the real one. Then in the game he could turn to the Dodgers’ bullpen and flex like he did soon before touching third base.

I hope to see more realism in the future. For example, the bullpen actually trying to move out of the way of a foul ball instead of acting like statues. Maybe even have a player occasionally break his bat out of frustration or slam his helmet in the dugout. You could even enable the ability to cancel a steal with R1 right after the player takes off. I think that last thing did exist in the series years ago.