Initial Team Ratings for MLB 2K10 Revealed [Mlb 2k10]

Game Informer has been posting a running hands-on blog with MLB 2K10 and the game’s initial team ratings are revealed within. Boston and the New York Yankees are tied for first at 97 overall. Here’s what we’ve got right out of the box. Bear in mind these will probably change with a roster update on or very soon after the game releases March 2. Which is good because Chien-Ming Wang signed with the Nats today and I’m thinking they just dealt for the pennant. Boston Red Sox 97 New York Yankees 97 Philadelphia Phillies 91 Los Angeles Angels 91 Los Angeles Dodgers 90 Texas Rangers 90 St. Louis Cardinals 90 Tampa Bay Rays 89 Minnesota Twins 89 San Francisco Giants 87 Colorado Rockies 87 Milwaukee Brewers 86 Chicago Cubs 86 Atlanta Braves 85 Arizona Diamondbacks 84 Chicago White Sox 84 Baltimore Orioles 83 Seattle Mariners 81 New York Mets 79 Kansas City Royals 77 Oakland Athletics 77 Florida Marlins 76 Washington Nationals 75 Cincinnati Reds 75 Detroit Tigers 75 Houston Astros 75 Toronto Blue Jays 74 Cleveland Indians 73 Pittsburgh Pirates 73 San Diego Padres 72 When I ran these by a pal in Boston (a non-gamer) his first reaction was “That game must be pitching heavy.” That’s a reasonably perceptive remark and based on my time with it , he may have the explanation. Boston’s hitting lineup doesn’t look as good as the Yankees, nor would I say it beats the Phillies. They picked up Adrian Beltre in the offseason but he spent most of 2009 hurt and he hasn’t sniffed a prestige number in any hitting category since a bust-out year in 2004 to get him a huge contract in Seattle. Mike Cameron is no Jason Bay, who departed for the Mets. Ortiz faces questions after last year. Also, Marco Scutaro. But again, this doesn’t count for much right now. Game Informer notes Kansas City’s 77 and wonders if it’s the team’s highest rating since the days of Kevin Seitzer, Mark Gubicza and Bo Jackson. I’m not even sure what game in the 1980s we’d use for comparison. Did RBI Baseball supply team rankings? I can’t remember. A Live Journal of MLB 2K10 [Game Informer]

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Initial Team Ratings for MLB 2K10 Revealed [Mlb 2k10]

Tampa Bay’s Longoria is — Officially — MLB 2K10’s Cover Man [Mlb 2k10]

2K Sports announced today that it’s chosen Evan Longoria, the All-Star third baseman for the Tampa Bay Rays, for the cover of MLB 2K10 , and will put six designs up to a vote of fans of the series. Ten days ago Kotaku obtained and published a confidential marketing survey showing that Longoria, the 2008 American League Rookie of the Year, was 2K’s choice. Today’s announcement confirms the decision but also shows the covers leaked out were mock-ups and not at all the final design. “Being on the cover, right now, it’s a process, and we’re working on the game and trying to get things going, we’re focused on bringing out the best in it.” Longoria told Kotaku today. “I won’t get to step back and really appreciate this until down the line, when maybe a 10-year-old kid brings a 2K Sports box to the field and asks me to sign it. Then it’ll hit me.” Longoria’s selection is somewhat of a departure for the series; from 2002 to 2008, its cover athletes were all New York players, including the Yankees’ then-first baseman Jason Giambi, and Yankees shortstop Derek Jeter three consecutive times each. Last year’s cover athlete was Tim Lincecum of the San Francisco Giants, still a large-market franchise in close proximity to 2K’s Marin studio. In Longoria, MLB 2K10 is selecting an up-and-comer from one of baseball’s smaller market clubs – albeit one that stunned bigger spenders in 2008 to win its division and the American League pennant. Longoria has been selected to the AL All-Star team in both of his first two years in the league, and two weeks ago picked up his first Gold Glove award. His role is not purely promotional; Longoria, an avowed sports gamer going back to Ken Griffey Jr. Major League Baseball on the Super Nintendo, will consult on the game’s development and work on components such as its situational authenticity. “When we met with Evan at the (2009) All-Star Game, we hadn’t gotten to the short list about who we wanted on the cover,” said Chris Snyder, the 2K Sports director of marketing. “When we met with him, he said he loved the (MLB 2K9) commercial with Tim Lincecum, but he said, ‘You know, in it, I hit this home run and Torii Hunter robs me. Can we maybe cut back on that a little?’ He was joking, but we caught notice of the fact that he paid close attention to detail, that he saw it was him in the footage int was Torii who robbed him.” Below is a gallery of all the cover options. Don’t vote on them here in our comments; head over to the 2K Sports official site if you want to be heard. The game is scheduled for a March 2010 release.

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Tampa Bay’s Longoria is — Officially — MLB 2K10’s Cover Man [Mlb 2k10]

No Less of a Memory — The Human Drama of Video Game Sports [Stick Jockey]

Some video game sports moments are so indelible we remember and narrate them the same way we do the ones from real life. I’m not saying we confuse the realities, necessarily, although anyone who’s completed his third season of a dynasty in any simulation can be forgiven for wandering into an alternate reality. “My star linebacker, Rocky Doss, was lost for the season with a broken leg today,” my friend Dav, playing his fifth season as Air Force’s head coach, told me a few years ago. “And honestly, I really felt sorry for the guy. He was in the second game of his senior year.” Andy Hutchins, who writes The Arena sees things in just such a way. I went to him a week ago with this Greatest Sports Moments idea. He immediately rolled off an AP-style lede, complete with a quote. And to be fair, if I took Northwestern to a national championship, I’d probably be hallucinating, too: The nation’s top two scoring offenses entered the BCS National Championship Game expecting pyrotechnics. But it was Tim Vincent and the Northwestern defense that proved more explosive, leading the Wildcats to a 17-14 win and their third straight national title. Vincent, the NCAA’s all-time sack leader, harassed Oklahoma’s signal callers all game, sending two to the sidelines with injuries on his two sacks, and the Wildcats’ defense gave up no points after the first quarter, holding the Sooners to just 143 yards of total offense. “I’ve been a part of three special teams and three special defenses here at Northwestern,” Vincent said. “What this defense did tonight makes this the sweetest win we’ve had.” So in this spirit, I asked around for some folks’ top moments in sports video gaming. They follow below, with mine going last. Of course, feel free to share your own in the comments, and I’ll excerpt some of them into this column in an update later today. Steve Noah, Operation Sports (MLB 09 The Show) I like to create myself in a lot of games, just to see how accurate the game is, compared to my real life, uh, non-existent professional career. This time it was baseball, playing MLB 09 The Show. Building myself into a cyber-steroid emerging uber-talent was hard. But after a few years, I was eventually plugged into the starting lineup of the San Francisco Giants. Even though I had a great average with good power and speed, I wasn’t what you’d call clutch. It seemed like every imaginable time I had runners in scoring position, during the season or in the playoffs, when the team needed me the most, I would choke, crumble and let them down. Every single time. I’d dribble it off the plate, pop it up or just strike out at the most important time of the game. That is, until Game 7 of the World Series. Steve Noah, “Mr. Choke Job” himself, stepped up to the plate, bases loaded, bottom of the ninth with one out, trailing 6-3. It was something kids daydream about when growing up. On a 3-1 count, the count that I would usually jump all over, only to see disappointment, I hit a 390 foot home run to win the game! I was jumping up and down, screaming and yelling like I actually did this in real life. Like I was a kid again, like a professional baseball player, living a dream. OK, maybe not. But damn, did it feel good, and to do it against the Yankees was icing on the cake. Commenter “Michael Dukakis” (MLB 08 The Show) It all began as a baseball conversation among friends. With two Mets fans, two Yankees fans, and a Red Sox fan no matter how civil the discussion began,it always quickly devolved into something similer to the Dawn of Man scene from 2001: A Space Odyssey. So as our “discussion” continued it came to a bet. Me and one of the Yankee fans 1 on 1 MLB 08, $10 to the winner and of course, bragging rights. I, the Mets and he of course, the Yankees. Before I was even settled in the La-Z-Boy a Derek Jeter home run makes it 1-0. No biggie, Carlos Delgado immediately homered and I was right back in it. The 1-1 tie held until the top of the 8th, when Jeter smacked a two-run double (Pixelated Aaron Heilman, my starter, was just as bad as his counterpart apparently). Mariano Rivera began warming up, due to face the bottom of my lineup. My first two batters were retired on strikeouts. But a walk to a pinch-hitter and a base hit gets me in business. Rivera goes to full count on my next hitter and then walks him. That brough up Carlos Beltran, with the bases loaded. Now this was a year ago so I can’t quite remember the exact pitch sequence, but I remember the last pitch. Oh what a shot it was, clearly into the virtual parking lot. The gloating and $10 mine. That is my greatest sports video game moment … and sadly, probably one of the biggest wins any Mets team has had in quite a while. Jim Harris, Operation Sports ( NHL 94 ) As a teenager growing up in Winnipeg in the early ’90s, to say we were preoccupied with NHL 94 would be the understatement to end all understatements. We played it when we were bored. We played it when we were avoiding homework. We played it to determine our social standing and our own sense of self worth. My younger brother and I were especially transfixed. We spent hours and hours battling it out in one fictional seven-game series after the next. Having played the game so much, we were essentially equally skilled. If we played 100 times, he might win 51 games to my 49 (but I’d probably win six of the 11 ensuing fistfights). One particular seven-game series still stands as my favorite sports moment. Having gone back and forth over the course of a particularly tense series, we finally entered Game 7. Much to my chagrin, my brother got the best of me that game, building up a comfortable lead over the course of the first two periods. When the horn sounded to end the second period, the taunting began. He started ripping into me like only a younger brother could. I was finally getting my comeuppance. Then something strange happened. Singing a happy victory song at the top of his lungs, he danced his way right out of the room. After a moment, I realized he’d mistakenly thought the game was over. At that point, I did the only thing that was right to do: I turned down the volume on the TV and played out the third period against an absent opponent. I called my brother back into the room to politely alert him to his oversight, just as the third period wound down. As I recall, he didn’t take it too well … Owen Good (Hardball!) This is from 1992, after my freshman year of college. By now I had been playing Hardball! on a Commodore 64 with a Wico Command Control joystick for close to five years. We’d gotten it from our next door neighbor, who was the software buyer for the catalog showroom store in town. He’d been sent a bunch of samples and regularly passed them along to us. Somewhere around my sophomore year of high school I began keeping box scores on notebook paper in a three ring binder. I could routinely log a 10-run, 20-hit game against the computer, and with the right pitcher, toss an 18-strikeout shutout. But never a no-hitter. I was Hardball!’s Dave Steib – the Toronto Blue Jays pitcher who twice took a no-hitter to the final out only to lose it. In this case, I was convinced the game’s AI was rigged to assure you never threw a perfect game against it. Repeatedly – it must have been half a dozen times, minimum – I would record the first 26 outs and get to two strikes on the game’s final hitter, who would then drop an unplayable flare just over the third baseman’s head. No matter where positioned the infield or the outfield, they couldn’t get to it in time. So that summer in 1992, I sat down to play Hardball! on a Saturday. I took the Champs’ screwballer, Pepi Perez (with the deceptive 5.47 ERA) up against the All-Stars (the only other team in the game.) Sure enough, I powered through the first eight innings without a runner reaching base. In the ninth inning, after getting two outs, I figured the perfect game had been proven an impossibility, but I was not going to waste a no-hitter. So I decided to pitch around the final batter and see if I could get the next hitter.I threw every ball out of the strike zone, just to see how committed the game was to screwing me. The computer swung at two pitches and looked at the rest, running the count to 3-2. I delivered the final one low and outside, absolutely intent on walking the computer. It hit the ball directly to my third baseman, who didn’t have to move. He caught the ball for the final out. I’d finally thrown a perfect game in Hardball! I turned off the computer and never played the game again. Stick Jockey is Kotaku’s column on sports video games. It appears Saturdays at 10 a.m. U.S. Mountain time.

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No Less of a Memory — The Human Drama of Video Game Sports [Stick Jockey]

You Came, You Saw, You Critiqued [Feedback]

Last week I mentioned that Kotaku readers in New York City would have the opportunity to go to a local game development studio, play a new game and tell the developers what you thought. Some of you did that. I didn’t give you all enough time. Only a couple of hours’ notice. And it was the night the Yankees would win the World Series, a feat that tends to distract New Yorkers. But I did mention free pizza and free beer. I spoke to Muse Games creative director Austin Lane today to find out how it went, and to discover if he’d recovered from whatever you may have done to him a week earlier. As a refresher. the event was one of Muse Games’ monthly game nights, and the company’s new browser game, Guns of Icarus , was available for people to play — as were Wii games, Street Fighter IV and some tabletop games. Lane told me that about 100 people showed up, including a young guy who showed up with the 45-year-old man he was teaching English (the man would tell Lane the game was funny; the teacher would correct him and say he meant “fun”). Also attending was a woman who Lane said made sexual moans whenever she threw punches in Wii Sports boxing. Most gratifying for him, a group of girls showed up early, and one of them became hooked on the game. She’d never played a shooter before, she said, but stayed on Guns long after her friends wandered away. Ah, but none of those fine people was from Kotaku. “A few Kotaku people came and they were pretty normal and enjoyed the game,” Lane said. But not all, it seems. “This one kid came over and said, ‘Oh, I saw the Kotaku post. Yeah, so I’m here to give you my feedback.” Lane grabbed a pen and jotted a few things down, a little sheepishly, it sounds, because the game is complete and he isn’t sure he can incorporate the feedback. “The two things i wrote down is he wanted to see my more motion in our sky effects,” Lane said. “Our sky box doesn’t change enough, and he’s right about that…. And he said our rain effect is not particularly believable.” Lane said he’d love to make those changes but time constraints prevent him and his small team. That said, he was able to show some other attendees the results of some of their feedback, including an option to let players move with the WASD keys instead of just the arrow keys. The game has been played about 8000 times online in the last week — it’s free here — and the full version is selling “better than expected,” according to Lane. Game Nights at Muse happen the first Wednesday of the month. Thanks, for not wrecking the place, Kotaku.

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You Came, You Saw, You Critiqued [Feedback]

Tretton: What’s Good for Sony is What’s Good for Gaming [Scea]

File this also under “What they say when we’re not listening.” Speaking to Forbes, the SCEA chief Jack Tretton answers a few softballs about the PS3 Slim, then says, “the environment where PlayStation wins is best for this industry.” To use a sports metaphor, we hear the same thing every time the Lakers, the Yankees, and the University of North Carolina suffer a couple years of disappointment and then come back to contention, as if their rising tide really lifts all boats. But in this case, while Sony might be an overdog brand, the PS3 Slim has definitely provoked a price drop on the other two consoles, and that is objectively a good thing for the video game consumer. Tretton then gets a little punchy and positions Sony as out-monied by Nintendo – but only because it’s the people’s choice. “We don’t have unlimited money, we cater to a more mass market audience,” he says. “I think we’re willing to take a little bit more risk than a competitor like Nintendo is and ultimately we deliver to the masses on a worldwide basis and that’s what we’ve done for the last 15 years.” We’ll go with Tretton as far as the PS3 Slim – or at least its price – driving competition to the benefit of the gamer. Portraying Nintendo as a risk-averse console without a mass market, no. Watch the entire video here. Sony Winning is Best for the Industry [Destructoid]

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Tretton: What’s Good for Sony is What’s Good for Gaming [Scea]