If the commercial isn't funny enough to persuade you to play World Series Baseball for Sega, then maybe this article will. Simply put, this is the most realistic baseball game for a game system that I have played. Granted it isn't perfect, but I doubt anyone can make a sports game that is. I will discuss both the pros and cons of this game.
First off, it does a real good job of combining statistics with graphics. Some games have too little of one or the other...and what graphics. This is the first game where you are looking at the strike zone from the catchers view. This is as close to a batters 'eye' view as you could get without making the game too difficult. This makes hitting genuine. You have about as much time to react tot the pitch as in the real game. Its real hard to tell what pitch is thrown, so you either have to guess right or have quick reaction time. Hitting has three level options: Rookie, Veteren, and All- Star. In Rookie, all you have to do is time the bat swing and you will make contact (bat goes to the ball automatically). This is the unrealistic part of the game as homeruns are plentiful and scores soar. This appeals to players that like offense and running up stats. Veteren is much harder. As the batter, you have an oval that you must place on the pitched ball to hit it. It other words you must time the pitch and have the right bat location. Swing over it...ground ball, under it...pop up...etc. Yet with power hitters and a power swng (before the pitch you must select your swing typr from contct, normal, or power) home runs are still somewhat easy. All Star is a different story. For contact swing, tho oval is big, normal it is the standard size like in Veteren, but power is a little circle. if you think its hard now, it is.
Pitching is similar to other games. You move the baseball around the strike zone (which can be toggled on and off) to the position you want and select pitch, then select speed. Each pitcher has three of the following pitches:fastball, curveball, changeup, slider, sinker, splitter, screwball, and knuckler. The hard part is throwing the pitch in the strike zone. One has to adapt the location indicator for certain pitches, so they break into the strike zone.
Like batting, pitching has the three ,options of Rookie, Vetern and All- Star. The difference lies in the maximum speed: Rookie: 70-79mph, Veteren: 80-89mph, All-Star: 90-99mph. Starting pitchers have a fatigue rating of 250 at the start. This rating goes down after each pitch. the result? As the innings progress, the speed differential among pitches begins to center around a common speed at the pitches become easier to hit.
So you can see that playing the All-Star level is the best simulation of pitching and hitting. The batter has to cope with direction, velocity, and break of the pitch, and decide where to swing all in a split second. If that's not like real baseball, I don't know what is.
That about sums up the hitting and pitching of the game. Here are some thoughts of the statistics portion of the game.
WSB has most of the recent transitions of players between teams and the new division alignments. Player's stats are his lifetime stats and not of one season or another and includes around 10 statistical categories to scroll through. The stats for a game lists players in batting order with: at-bats, hits, rbi's, hr's, and sb's. This is the same as in the paper except for runs scored. Season stats include standings of all divisions, and league leaders. There is not an option to view your team stats though! League Leaders include every category as similar to the newspaper version, plus more. However, you only see the leaders of the league you are playing in and not the other.
In conclusion here are a list of some more pros and cons of the game: PROS:
Overall its an enjoyable game. But don't get flustered if you can't hit or pitch at first, it takes awhile.
This review is Copyright (C) 1994 by Jason Hidek for Game Bytes Magazine. All rights reserved.