All-Star Baseball 2002
Score: 90% ESRB: Everyone Publisher: Acclaim Developer: Acclaim Media: GCD/1 Players: 1 - 4 Genre: Sports
Graphics & Sound: The All-Star Baseball series was pretty much born on a Nintendo system, so it's rather fitting that it find it's way back home. The question is, does it return as a hometown hero, or will it end up to working at the local Piggly-Wiggly telling about how great it was in the past? All-Star 2002 is a poly-by-poly port of the PS2 version, which is a good thing since the PS2 version did not look all that shabby. Each of the players are modeled nicely, right down to the various batting stances of player and the stadiums look great. The presentation is definitely the best I have seen so far. It is very detailed right down to the mascots dancing on the dugouts and the umpires' 'waiting' animations. The player animations could use a bit of work though, especially in the transition animations. It may not seem like a big thing, but the presentation does such a great job of sucking you into the game that seeing a player jumping for a wild catch, and then stopping and switching into a throwing animation leaves something to be desired. The sound adds a lot to the overall presentation. The crowds sound just like they do on TV and even react to the games. The commentary, done by Thom Brennaman and Bob Brenly, is excellent and it was refreshing to see that Acclaim didn't go overboard and have them running their mouths off the entire game. Even my favorite peppy little 'Mexican Hat Dance' song is included. The only thing that could have improved the sound would be some fat, drunk fan in the stands yelling at the umpires. Maybe next year guys.
Gameplay: Unfortunately, things begin to fall apart in the gameplay department. The most noticeable problem I found had to do with fielding. For whatever reason, it just felt like no matter which team I was playing against, their fielders always played like all-stars while mine played like the Three Stooges. I cannot tell you how many times I hit a ball into an area with no players around only to have one come charging in from nowhere and the ball doing one of those Matrix-style slow down in the air things just long enough so he could get under it and catch it. I definitely recommend turning the Auto Fielding off. The base runners are just as stupid as your outfielders. For some reason, they would wait before running the base. What are they waiting for? I have no idea, but a majority of the time they hung around between bases while the other runner hit the base. This made doing things such as sacrifice bunts a pain in the ass to pull off. All-Star 2002 isn't all bad though, and has few features that keep it an enjoyable game. First off, this is easily the most feature-packed baseball game around. The sheer number of different features is mind boggling. They include Quick Play, Exhibition, All-Star Game, Season, Series, Home Run Derby and Batting Practice. To break those down even more you can customize them with features such as Stadium, Game Time (day, night, twilight), Weather (no rain, rain, snow), Sky (clear, fair, overcast, stormy), and game difficulty (Rookie, Pro and All-Star). As if it couldn't get any more ridiculous, Seasons can be broken down into 162 game unbalanced, 81 game half season, three game league round robin, one game league round robin, 87 game round robin, 29 game round robin, 162 game unbalanced non-interleague and 162 game balanced. If you can't find something you like, then maybe this isn't the game for you. If you think these are bad - wait until you see the Create-a-Player option and how detailed the game gets with stat tracking!
Difficulty: As I mentioned before, you can choose from three difficulty levels (Rookie, Pro, All-Star), although the computer does have a few cheap moments, as I have already illustrated. Batting is also a little tricky when you first jump in, but after a few minutes at batting practice, you will do fine. However, if you still have problems after that, or are just too impatient to practice, you can switch to Easy Batting mode and only have to worry about timing and power.
Game Mechanics: Like the batting, control is very awkward at first, but after a little practice, it becomes a piece of cake. The pitching system is standard stuff. After choosing your pitch-type and where you want to throw it in the batter's strike zone, you just press A and throw. The batting interface is very deep and tricky. A swings your bat, and the analog stick moves your cursor to where you want to swing. Using the camera button allows you to adjust the angle of your bat - it is hard to use at first, but adds a lot to the game once you master it. Speaking of batting, I think every baseball fan will be more than happy to know that All-Star 2002 definitely is not the home run fest other games are. I had a few problems with throwing to bases. In order to throw to each base, you press the corresponding face button. I would have preferred to press one of the directions on the D-pad and A instead. In order to save yourself a lot of frustration, I recommend sitting down and actually reading the manual before playing. This is the only baseball game available on the GameCube right now, so it could come as no surprise that it is also the best one available. I had more than a few problems with the game when I first started with it, especially since I am used to playing Triple Play. Once I got used to it, I found it an excellent baseball game and would definitely recommend it even if there were more baseball games available for the system.
-Starscream, GameVortex Communications AKA Ricky Tucker
xXx All-Star Baseball 2003