A look back at MLB 2K7

by pastapadre
Posted December 3rd, 2007 at 3:00 pm

With the time for MLB 2K8 news approaching I thought it would be interesting to look back on MLB 2K7. Coming into the 2nd year of producer Ben Brinkman’s “three year plan” what is the series working from after last year?

A patch was released for 2K7 that addressed some of the issues including adding an additional fielding camera. Did you play the game after the patch was released? If so feel free to leave your thoughts on how much it improved the game.

Initially I thought 2K7 was a lot of fun but over the weeks a few issues ate away at that. Despite the problems it was easy to see the potential in the game in the same way that you could with MVP 2003. That was first year of Brinkman’s three year plan when he worked for EA on the MVP series.

So based on the default game this is how I laid out 2K7:

Positives

Overall huge improvement after 2K6.

The graphics still hold up as the best 2K has offered in any of its “simulation” games.

The presentation and commentary may be the best of any sports game to date.

Breakpoint pitching makes it more challenging and forces you to strategize.

Online play offered a smooth experience and lots of stats and tendencies are tracked.

Negatives

Framerate. The game really needs to move up to 60fps this year.

Although fielding had been improved it still needed work especially due to the single camera angle which made it very difficult at times.

Hit variety. This may have been my biggest issue. The majority of runs were scored off of home runs. Rarely would you see any hits get through the infield. It was near impossible to string together a series of hits and score runs, it all came down to hitting it out of the park.

Home runs were robbed seemingly several times a game.

Online leagues were broken.

I hate the swing stick. That is just personal preference though.

Following the release of 2K7 Brinkman talked with IGN to give his thoughts on it and the future. I found his honesty to be refreshing. He definitely has a grasp on what would need to be done to get the franchise to the level that gamers expect.

Year two for the MVP series brought about one of the worst glitches in the history of sports gaming. MVP 2004 had the “lefty glitch” where left-handed hitters had little to no power. I remember running leagues with that game and analyzing the stats. You had to go over 80 players deep to find the first left-handed batter on the home run leaders list. Right-handed pitchers were more likely to hit them than left-handed power hitters. It really ruined what otherwise was a very good game.

Now with the ability to patch games it isn’t as big of a concern. No matter, as long as something like that can be avoided this time around MLB 2K8 is shaping up to be a very impressive offering.

Tags:

Scott

pitch counts will always be low in any baseball game because human gamers are WAYYYY too impatient - i know i am - if it's close, i'm swinging - and that's how most gamers are IMO. stop swinging at everything and pitch counts go way up, but so does gametime.

Anthony

[quote comment="6980"]
Pitch counts can be saved, by slowing down the pitch enough. That way players can actually see the ball approach the plate, instead of flat out guess. I slowed down the pitch delivery on the sliders and was able to have at least 4-6 pitches seen on most at bats if not a few more pitches, with walks and strikeouts both occuring. If they implemented a slower visual speed in the pitch as standard this could easily fix all problems, because then you can safely extend the stamina rating of pitchers as well - knowing people will be watching for balls.[/quote]

I never tried that, but that's an interesting point of slowing down pitch speed. I play exclusively online so I'm playing with the online defaults. But I like your idea. Too many pitches you have to guess at. While real baseball players guess pitches, you don't see real baseball players swinging at pitchouts which is something I did regularly since you can't tell where the pitch is until it's by you. Somewhere in the middle of swinging at pitchouts and not having a pitch be too slow that you always hit it would be a good thing.

Phil

I don't necessarily have a problem with 5-6 HRs a game, because it does happen in real games - I'd be afraid that they'd tweak it so low it becomes a near impossibility to hit them (I remember that being the case in one of the ASB games I believe). An average of 2-3 in a good hitting game is fine, with the chance of not having a game like that or hitting a couple more than that.

The fact that you pretty much had to swing for the fences irked me the most I guess. It was way to tough to score runs the natural way, though as I got better at the game I could do this more - but still not as often as would be expected.

Pitch counts can be saved, by slowing down the pitch enough. That way players can actually see the ball approach the plate, instead of flat out guess. I slowed down the pitch delivery on the sliders and was able to have at least 4-6 pitches seen on most at bats if not a few more pitches, with walks and strikeouts both occuring. If they implemented a slower visual speed in the pitch as standard this could easily fix all problems, because then you can safely extend the stamina rating of pitchers as well - knowing people will be watching for balls.

Eski

I agree the hit variety was a tad weak. I hated to have to adjust sliders to get the game to play the way I wanted it to. It took time. I would find a way to have the A.I. hitting to be realistic but the A.I. pitching, regardless of how much I tweaked it, never panned out. Either too many meat balls or too many walks...

The graphics were incredible. I would like to see weather play more of a role. Also, would like to see real classic rosters and stadiums.

Paul

I thought 2K7, besides the graphics, was an unmitigated pile of garbage. The hitting and pitching interfaces had absolutely no challenge to them whatsoever. "Push up, hit a homerun". That's all the game was.

The problem is that EVERYONE has done nothing but praise MLB 2K7 as the best baseball sim ever created. I am afraid that this will stifle the progression of this title to become a true simulation. I hope that I am wrong, but I feel 2K8 will be basically be Mario Baseball with a realistic coat of paint. Oh boy... it's great to be a baseball fan and a 360 owner.

Jonathan

I look at only get pitches about 20- 50 pitches all game , look team stlyes like angels relies on speed get runs or Mil Brewers don t really have good contact hitter to put ball in play they are homeruns. I change making spectpular plays click button is easy then show the replay like thats is amazing i only push x to first base . The stealing base is to hard when you have fast guy , like the catcher make mistake.

GO Detroit Tiger Roar!

Jonathan

i played game about 3 months because no other games played. the hitting is lucky in MLB 2K7 , the cpu only can hit homer runs so easy and the franchise get stale really quick

pastapadre

[quote comment="6959"]Yeah, the pitchers stamina would be way down even in the 3rd inning. That's another thing that needs to be more realistic.[/quote]

Glad you guys mentioned that, it was something that irked me too. I wonder if they did that to appeal to the crowd that probably throws almost all strikes and doesn't work the pitch count at the plate. I know there are people like that, although I think with baseball there is a higher % of hardcore realism type fans playing than you see with the other sports.

Anthony

Yeah, the pitchers stamina would be way down even in the 3rd inning. That's another thing that needs to be more realistic.

BoSox5s

[quote comment="6956"]I really hope the pitch count is more realistic now. Starting pitchers would tire after about 50 pitches. I know it's probably because foul balls are not very common, so that means they will have to tweak that as well. Baseball games have yet to come out with a way to have a good 10 pitch battle and not let it happen every at-bat. Hopefully they can incorporate that.[/quote]
Pitch counts have been a problem in any baseball game ever made...maybe someday they'll get it right.

BustyBuffet

I really hope the pitch count is more realistic now. Starting pitchers would tire after about 50 pitches. I know it's probably because foul balls are not very common, so that means they will have to tweak that as well. Baseball games have yet to come out with a way to have a good 10 pitch battle and not let it happen every at-bat. Hopefully they can incorporate that.

G-Love

I went into openminded. Although, it was not a perfect game and no game is, I came out of it with a sence of where the developers are trying to take this game. I see lots of potential in this game.

beau21

oh man i can't wait for the first info and screens to start!
we're already about a full month behind last year as far as info/screens go!!
what gives???

Anthony

"Negatives

Hit variety. This may have been my biggest issue. The majority of runs were scored off of home runs. Rarely would you see any hits get through the infield. It was near impossible to string together a series of hits and score runs, it all came down to hitting it out of the park."

This is exactly what killed the game for me. Doubles and HRs were too common. Far too often there were more doubles than singles in any given game. Most hits were HRs, or in the LCF or RCF gap for a double. I don't recall many balls hit down the RF or LF line either.

I also thought this was caused by poor spacing in the infield. I'd like to have ripped a ground ball through the hole between either the SS and 3B or 1B and 2B, but it seemed like there was no room to do this. Any single seemed to have it's first bounce in the outfiled.

I really hope hit variety is changed in MLB 2K8.

Kmart2180

The game was pretty good with sliders. Without sliders unplayable with all the home runs. But I think that they are goingin the right direction and if not this new one coming out then the next addition will be the best baseball game ever.

If they can just fix the framerate , tweak the Ai a bit, and fix the fielding then this game would be great.

Bukktown

I loved it for about 1 month and then I started to see the major flaws in the hitting game. There was no risk/reward . ie Hitting a weak grounder if you try to pull an outside pitch.

BoSox5s

"Initially I thought 2K7 was a lot of fun but over the weeks a few issues ate away at that. Despite the problems it was easy to see the potential in the game in the same way that you could with MVP 2003. That was first year of Brinkman’s three year plan when he worked for EA on the MVP series."

I agree 100% with that statement. the more and more I played 2K7 the more I became frustrated with little issues, but the potential was clearly there.

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