What Was The Best Baseball Video Game Of All Time? The Answer Is Easy.

RDT9/15/2018 4:35 PM

May be suspended on twitter, but that doesn’t keep me out of the loop. I saw this tweet pop up and oh boy did this bring back feelings. It was National Video Games Day yesterday and Cut4 decided to mess with my heart. What is the best Baseball Video Game ever? All 4 they threw out are great choices, and I’d understand you if you picked any of them, but to me, there is one clear answer. Let’s look over all 4 choices first.

MVP Baseball ’05

Oh boy what a game this was, I spent countless hours in my basement playing this game and was rewarded with back-to-back-to-back-to-back-to-back-to-back World Series Championships for my Baltimore Orioles. It was a lovely time in my life. I couldn’t tell you how many hours I spent playing those mini games where you got to hit the balls up the ramps on those minor league fields.

Nailing the cars beyond the outfield fence with guys like Jay Gibbons and Rafael Palmiero was a must do activity for me when I was 15. I was king of the mini games, the pitching one was fantastic too. Everything about the game was great. It NEVER got old or tiring. For my money, Tim Wakefield was the best pitcher just because of that damn dancing knuckleball, unhittable. I would be EMBARRASSED if I didn’t talk about the intro to this game. Almost brings tears to my eyes just watching it. Take a look.

READY????? 1,2,3,4!!! Oh baby do I feel 15 again. That first song triggers all the emotions, but we can’t stop there when talking about the music, because the whole damn soundtrack was a beast.

Favorite song off that is EASILY “You Owe Me An IOU“, such a banger. I’m fully debating going to Gamestop and buying an old PS2 and this game so I could drop moonshots with Jon Dowd, only the real ones know who that is. I’d have no problem getting hurricaned in this weekend and play a full season with the O’s.

Backyard Baseball

This was probably the first baseball game I played, and they say you never forget your first. I think I got this for Christmas in a bundle pack with Backyard Football and Backyard Basketball too, I played the baseball version much more than the other ones. You already know who I’m gonna talk about. Pablo Sanchez (buy a shirt!!!). Arguably the GOAT of all video game characters. He’s up there with Madden Vick, Bo Jackson, guys who were just absolutely unstoppable when they got on the field. Pablo was basically Tiger Woods before Tiger, he was THAT dominant. He could do it all on the field, basically Mike Trout before Mike Trout. This game was made by Humongous Entertainment, same guys who made Putt-Putt saves the Zoo (CLASSIC), and Freddie The Fish, if you know about those, we would be good friends.

This was another game where you could sit there for hours and play, and boy did I do that. I did like being able to pick the childhood versions of MLB stars at that time, I obviously always picked Cal Ripken to be on my team. Pete Wheeler was a guy I trusted a lot too, along with the kid in the wheelchair, speed demon. I will say, the older I got the more I got pushed away from the game, just because the whole cartoon aspect of it. That and the balls that literally did cartwheels in the air. I’m sure if I played the game now I’d be happy just sitting here and clicking a mouse on a ball for hours, and who’s to say I won’t do that. An all-time game for anyone over the age of 25. I actually think I had this on my old Mac? I believe someone on reddit helped me get it, now I can’t remember. If this is available to get on Mac’s hit me up.

The Show

The newest franchise in the choices, The Show has been fantastic since it was released. This game alone is the reason I switched from Xbox to Playstation. I was heavy into Xbox in college but then I just got an itch for an awesome MLB game, The Show fulfilled that for me. They have Road To The Show game mode which I love, big fan of it. Not a big deal, my shortstop, Eroc RDT drafted late by the Marlins just made his MLB debut, has a handful of 2-homer games in his first MLB season in 2020, again, it’s not a big deal. The RTTS pitching is fun too, that’s always a good time killer late on the weekends. My favorite part of this game was always hitting Jose Bautista in the head when I faced him. Didn’t matter who was on base, who was up next, how many outs, I’d have my pitcher hit him in the head.

Obviously the best part of this game is the graphics and how it looks. I mean it’s unbelievable. I have plenty of hilarious celebrations from this year’s edition. Sometimes the graphics are too real, and look too scary, but that is for another day. I love that they have been adding in the legends into gameplay, as well as the old stadiums. Recently I started a season with the Giants and did a fantasy draft. Ended up with guys like Lou Brock, Fergie Jenkins, Ken Griffey Jr, Rod Carew, and Cal Ripken Jr. Love that you can mix them into teams with today’s players. Their franchise mode is awesome too, really interactive and fun to play. Again, I have won MULTIPLE World Series Championships with the Orioles, so again, it’s very realistic. If you’re going off looks, obviously this game is the best MLB game ever, gameplay has it up there too. No complaints from me about The Show.

Ken Griffey Jr Presents MLB

I’ll be honest with you. I never played this, never had SNES. I was strictly a GameBoy and Nintendo kid until my first Playstation. Never SNES. And if we’re being honest, when I first saw the list I thought they were talking about the all-time classic, “Major League Baseball Featuring Ken Griffey Jr”. You know the one with the banger of a song.

If I could get this as my ringtone right now, I’d do it in a heartbeat. But I digress, I’ve never played “Ken Griffey Presents MLB” so I don’t have much background on it. I did watch some videos and read about it. It sounds like a good game, but not anywhere close to the top 3 already mentioned. Apparently they had rights from the MLB to use team names and stadiums, but they didn’t get rights from the MLBPA to use players, the only guy they could use was obviously Griffey. Kind of weird, takes all the fun of playing the MLB games then if you’re using randos. Graphics look up to par with SNES, so you can’t really take points away there.

Don’t get me wrong, I’d play the hell out of it, but it would be new to me, but if you’ve got an SNES and some brews I’d play it for sure, just can’t say it is one of the best baseball video games every.

So there you go, which baseball video game do you like best? If I had a gun to my head and could only play 1 of these games for the rest of my life, you bet your bottom dollar I’m taking MVP ’05. It’s a classic that will never, ever get old. Now if you’ll excuse me I need to use Albert Pujols and Vlad Guerrero to hit balls up ramps.

PS. I’d be remiss if I didn’t mention some of my favorites that missed the cut.

MLB Slugfest

This was back before people would get mad if your player was on fire and dropkicked someone. And I’m not going to lie, I don’t remember the guys being Bison while at the plate, or why Ichiro is dressed like a ninja, gonna leave that alone.

NCAA Baseball