MLB The Show Disappoints Playstation 4 Owners with May Release Date

The news broke today about MLB the Show ’14, and to be clear it was not all that positive. The PS3 version will come out on April 1st. And for all of you that shelled out $400 for the PS4 like we did? You were given the worst news of all. There was no clear date, and the rumors of April 1st were likely at least six weeks off. The game will be announced sometime in May for that console.

This is a real bummer. Instead of SCEA Studios capitalizing on fans who are excited about the start of baseball season, they’ll be getting the game out to people when the season is six to eight weeks in. And by then the real season will be in full force, so many people will be so tied up with you know; following real actual baseball each night that they’re not going to have as much time to spend on the game. I have to give the creators of this game a huge thumbs down in this department. It’s always been great to get the game in March and have it during the dull spring training period. With any video game created now, there are numerous bugs that probably won’t be addressed until baseball is past it’s All-Star Break. There’s really nothing positive about this late release aspect.

Other things being reported that we don’t really care about (much of this isn’t breaking news):

• Facial hair and whatnot will be more detailed.
• You can play a game faster now with “Quick-pitch”. Bleh.
• There are 1,000 unique fan models instead of the usual 42.
• All scoreboards are actual 3D objects.
• Commentary will have some new wrinkles – we’re sure it will still be somewhat recycled.
• There are ballgirls and ballboys. Who cares.
• Leather actually looks like real leather now. Again, oh boy.
• Here’s the big one I guess, if there is a big one: if a player gets hot, fans will hold up signs for him. This is somewhat dynamic at least in how it is sounding.
• Fans will actually react to and catch foul balls. Pretty cool.

As a whole, I would be happy with a few less fan models and the leather still looking like old leather to have the damn game out when I want to play a baseball game. Madden sucks as per usual, and I don’t know how much more NBA2k14 I can realistically play. My PS4 is basically a $400 paper weight (sorry, I am not a big Blue Ray guy).

SCEA Studios, Ramone Russell, and the MLB The Show team, you did your loyal fans a huge disservice by deciding to release the game months in and have all info on an embargo. We still don’t know a lot about this new game outside of the big new leather and facial hair features, which makes me think the first version of this game on the new console will be largely a port with some new lighting. It’s still a really good game, it’s still always a buy for me on a count of I am a baseball addict. I will give you my money.

But a lot of people out there bought the Playstation 4 specifically for this game in mind. Making them wait until almost June to get it is a load of crap. Especially when all we heard all along was that you were working on this build in the early part of last year. You should have been working harder apparently. And bring back the damn hot zone guessing – quit removing features that people like just because you want to.

UPDATE: Here’s the game’s head developer Ramone Russell showing people what a jerk game developers can be.

Russell_SCEA “likes” the post meaning he agrees with the take. Really? So you don’t owe people anything? People who spend money hand over fist to buy your game and put food on your table. This reminds me of Josh Looman, the head developer of the nightmare that is Madden. And that guy is a major dick.