High Heat Major League Baseball 2003
Score: 60% ESRB: Everyone Publisher: 3DO Developer: 3DO Media: CD/1 Players: 1 - 4 Genre: Sports
Graphics & Sound: Contrary to what the box says, the graphics in High Heat Baseball 2003 are far from stunning. Character models are sharp edged and very glitchy, and emotionless faces do little to absorb you in the experience. The stadiums are equally impaired, with extremely blurry patrons and hordes of other pixilated features. You'll realize this is no EA title the second you hear it in action. Shoddy commentary and lackluster sound effects constantly hound this game. Even the clarity is poor at times, usually because more than one person is talking at the same time. The music adds even more dead weight, offering very little in the way of audio enjoyment. Definitely a very far cry from the other top of the line sports titles out there.
Gameplay: High Heat 2003 boasts a lot of different modes and superficial options. With 7 different actual game modes, every player currently in MLB, and accurately modeled stadiums, this cannot be argued. But while the options may seem deep, the gameplay is actually very shallow. None of the modes are very unique when compared to each other, except for the Home Run Derby. The Season, Exhibition, Career, and Playoffs are all basically the same - you just have to play a different amount of games in each. The last two modes are simply Batting and Pitching practice. There is also an option where you can edit players, but only in the stats area, and if you don't know what you're looking at, there's going to be a lot of trial and error. The game tries to bog you down with a lot of bells and whistles, options on top of options, and complete stats for every player in the league. It also offers scouting reports at the start of every season, allowing you to restock your team with new players. But when you get right down to it, this game is just baseball and nothing else. I'm not slamming the sport itself, but this game just doesn't stand out from the rest in any way at all.
Difficulty: If you've never played baseball before, there could be some difficulty picking this up. But how hard is hitting a ball with a stick? In this game's case, not very hard at all. Sure, it will take a little while to really master the batting or pitching, just as it would to master any other game's system. Different batters bring different challenges, and you have to learn different pitching styles, but it all boils down to timing. Besides the horrible controls for the infield and outfield, there's really not that much difficulty to it.
Game Mechanics: The control on High Heat 2003 couldn't be much worse than it already is. Hitting and pitching are pretty easy tasks, but when the ball is hit, you'll be hard pressed to actually get a man to it. No matter how hard the ball is hit, your players depend on you to move them to the ball. A ground ball hit three feet the shortstop's right will roll right on past him. The transition from pitching to controlling the rest of your team is where most of the turbulence happens. Even though all of the keys are located on the num pad, the various schemes for each position are too different to allow for a smooth change. Trying to go from pitching to diving for a ball in half a second just doesn't work. High Heat 2003 lacks in just about every aspect when compared to other top of the line baseball titles. They made the effort, they just didn't make the grade. Steer clear of this one when you want to play ball.
-Snow Chainz, GameVortex Communications AKA Andrew Horwitz
Minimum System Requirements: Windows 98/Me/XP, 200 MHz processor, 110 MB Hard Disk Space, 64 MB RAM, 4X CD-ROM, 16 MB video card, 8 bit sound card, 56K modem for internet play   Test System: Windows 98, 1.4GHz AMD Athlon, GeForce 2 mx 32MB video card, 40 gig hard drive, 56x CD-ROM, 256MB DDR Ram, Sound Blaster Live! sound card, T1 Internet connection
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