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bug-ridden piece of crap

1 Rating: 1, Useful: 0 / 3
Date: May 23, 2005
Author: Amazon User

the game play is good and the game itself is just beautiful to look at, but all of this is will quickly be forgotten when the game locks up for 2 minutes after every other play. take your money elsewhere

MVP Baseball is so much better then this game.

1 Rating: 1, Useful: 0 / 6
Date: June 20, 2005
Author: Amazon User

I fell for the hype and got this game . My son hated it. We got the MVP 2005 Baseball game from Ea Sports.

SO COOL YET TOTALLY BLOWS.............

2 Rating: 2, Useful: 4 / 5
Date: April 12, 2005
Author: Amazon User

I'm sure you guys are wondering how a cool game can blow so here's the word. I play the games and I play franchise mode. Here's my response on both issues....

Gameplay: GREAT. K-Zone is so awesome to use. You can use pinpoint accuracy in throwing your pitches. To balance this out, when the pitcher starts getting tired or a big slugger is at the plate in a pressure situation in a close game, the cursors go faster. To throw the ball, you must first move the cursor to the desired location. Then you hit the corresponding button. Y may be for a slider, A for fastball, B for cutter and so forth. You pick your spot, hit the button and a horizontal cursor moves across the screen and you simply hit any button (A,B,Y,X) when it lines up with the initial location and then vertically the cursor moves and you again hit a button to line it up. If you miss too far left, the pitch will go left. If you miss high or low, it will go higher or lower. It makes it fairly tough at times to be accurate which is how it is in real life. If that was confusing, if you've played basketball and used the free throw system, this is exactly the same but it's not as frustrating as in basketball where Shaq NEVER makes one.

Turning double plays is easy. Fielding can be a challenge at times if you don't get your player in proper position but overall, very easy to do. You shouldn't make too many human errors with the controls. Batting, depending on the difficulty level. Don't use legend at first or you will be frustrated. Start off with rookie and develop your swing and PATIENCE and work your way up.

Graphics, pretty life like. Very nice overall. Great part of having an Xbox, you can add your own stadium music, batter intro's etc. Takes a lot of time but it's worth it if you are into that kind of stuff.

When playing with two friends, it's easy to see the pitch with the K-Zone. To solve this, simply, change it to a meter system and the K-Zone disappears. You lose total precision yet with the vibration on which tells you when you are out of the strike zone, you can still get your pitches fairly close without your opponent knowing where the pitch is coming. Very nice they added this. Makes playing with others fun.

Overall 5 stars.

Now, onto the franchise mode.

Totally freaking blows.

Contracts: Not real amounts. Some players make more and some less than their real life counterparts.

I played a game three times and it wouldn't save. I HAVE to have accurate stats and I don't want the CPU to have to simulate a game for me. I had to. It wouldn't save. Also, you can't save a game in the middle of it as in Madden 2005. You must simulate it or shut your Xbox off. I suggest, shut off the Xbox. When you simulate and then reload the season without saving, that's not fail proof. I lost once through simulation (I accidentally hit simulate instead of play game) and reloaded and play the game later. I really did lose. It was the fourth game of the season and I should've been 3-1. The standing showed 3-2. It somehow counted the loss that never was. Very homosexual. One time I had to quit a game midstream because I wasn't ready for legend mode. I was losing 6-2 in the 7th. I ended up winning 10-4!!!!! Tell me where that teams two runs went? To top that off, it mysteriously saved it. I simply simulated and quit the season WITHOUT saving because I simulated and then shut the Xbox off. Suggestion, NEVER simulate regardless.

CPU ALWAYS tries to screw up your lineup no matter what you tell it. If you don't keep a good memory on who last pitched, CPU will try to pitch someone twice. If you make a trade, it's over with. Your whole rotation is in shambles. CPU is just ignorant.

There are a few good things however in the franchise mode. You can do a GM franchise season or whatever and you have to choose a team and work for the GM. Depending on his managing style will depend on what tasks you must perform. Money grubbing owners (Royals, Pirates) who care nothing of winning will want you to keep costs and complete minimum even if it means trading your best player like Beltran to the Astros for minor leaguers or whatever complete rip off occured a few season back with the Royals. Of course, the Yankees want nothing short of a championship or you'll probably get fired really quick. It's cool to mess around with until the GM tells you to axe your favorite players because he's overpaid. You won't always get fired if you ignore his wishes as long as you do the most important one. In my case, it was winning and I won several titles so who cares if I got to keep my favorite player if I won a World Series. The owner wasn't too pissed.

Minor leaguers: You can promote, demote and check out stats for your minor leaguers. At the end of the season, a progress report is issued and shows how your players are doing. When making trades, be sure to click with the analog stick to check out the players profile and his potential. It's always good to sneak in a minor leaguer or two in a big trade as they will be the future of your franchise. Especially the Kansas City Royals or someone like that. They can't afford anyone but minor leaguers and seem to be a farm team for the Yankees and the rest of the MLB.

Overall, with the stats errors, CPU retardation and stupid fake contracts, it's a 1.

Balanced out, I give the game an overall three. It's fun, until you run into problems (all the time).

Disappointed

2 Rating: 2, Useful: 3 / 6
Date: March 24, 2005
Author: Amazon User

First off, I have the XBox Version, so I cannot say whether PS2 Version has the same issues.

After getting NFL 2K5 and rather enjoying that, we were excitingly awaiting the Baseball equivalent.

(1) Baserunning is difficult to pick up on. All of your guys want to stop at the same base. I finally got around this by finding an option to let the computer handle the majority of baserunning (advance more than 1 base). That in itself would have been ok, I probably could eventually get smooth with it.

(2) But now 6 days into the schedule, my team is 8-0. On two separate games, after I completed my game and saved it, I went back to the schedule to see who I played next. Turns out the day did not advance. I was credited with a win, but basically the same starting pitchers are thrown up against each other again on the same day of the week (not a scheduled double header either).

There is nothing more frustrating than playing a close game, only to have to replay the game (albeit with an extra win). To top it off, after I have the computer simulate the replayed game (and luckily have won both sims), the player profile shows my starting pitcher exhausted. Well, duh! He just threw both ends of a double header! And yes, it does show all the innings he pitched combined in the played and simmed game.

So I'm assuming, even if this doesn't happen again (and believe me it will), that my team will play 164 game season. But that quirk is so annoying, I doubt I make a full season anyway. I don't consider the stats "true" if part of my games are simmed.

How disappointing...

It breaks the heart to write this review...

2 Rating: 2, Useful: 0 / 4
Date: February 26, 2005
Author: Amazon User

I find the 2K5 sports games the hands down best sports simulation games out there. So naturally, MLB 2K5 was a much anticapated title for me. Unfortunately, I have been disappointed by the latest installment from 2Ksports. Graphically, the game is stunning, uniforms, player models and stadiums look great. But the lack of depth in the franchise and owner modes not to mention the choppy game play make this year's game less than stellar. If you can get past the lack of fluidity in the fielding and batting, you will thoroughly enjoy the K-Zone pitching. It is far and away the best idea for pitching simulation yet. You cannot beat the 19.99 price, and all things considered, for the price it is a good game. But we have come to expect a lot more from 2Ksports this year for the small price tag. I am not going to say run out and buy MVP by EAsports, because I have not played it. But overall, a very disappointing installment of the 2K baseball series. Now that they are the sole possesors of the MLB license, hopefully this is not a forshadow of things to come.

graphics are awesome, gameplay suks

2 Rating: 2, Useful: 2 / 5
Date: March 20, 2005
Author: Amazon User

mlb 2k5 is a game for anyone who cares only about graphics. I dont care what any other reviews say, you gotta believe mine!
when i first bought it, i expected it to be much like last years versoin, but with all the improvements needed. i was amazed at the superior graphics. every detail was put in, it was amazing. then i started playing.
everything suked. it was impossible to hit, let alone get homers. the pitching was alright, but i prefer it in MVP any day. baserunning is so confusing and theres nothing explaining it well in the manual. also it has lots of pointless extrtas like In-your-face baseball and the skybox. it just wastes memory. trust me, it is advertised really well but they only trick you. dont be the next person to fall for it. go with MVP baseball 2005. its a little more pricy, but its so worth it!

would be great if...

3 Rating: 3, Useful: 0 / 3
Date: March 04, 2005
Author: Amazon User

This game has the better gameplay between this an MVP, but they need to fix the glitches. Just having this for a day, I have already noticed in Franchise mode closing pitchers do not get recorded saves. This gets really REALLY annoying. Anyone else notice this? If the glitches are fixed with a patch like in the past this game will be the best.

Pretty good, but too many glitches and horrible stats

3 Rating: 3, Useful: 2 / 3
Date: March 19, 2005
Author: Amazon User

I purchased this game because of the amazing quality of the ESPN NFL 2K4 and 2K5 games that I own. I figured that the 2K5 Baseball title would live up to the "2K5" name. Don't get me wrong, this isn't a terrible game by any means. However, in the few days I've played I have already gotten sick of some of the glitches and mostly of the terrible stats.
I've only played the game in Franchise mode, but pretty much all the player/pitcher stats are useless. After playing 3 games, it listed 2 of my players as having played 5. It also had just plain wrong stats for batters such as how many home runs, RBI's etc. My pitcher ERA's were also hit and miss (I pitched a complete game which was a shutout and my ERA jumped to something like 4.00).
If you are really big into baseball stats in games (like Baseball Mogul for the PC), you will be VERY dissapointed! I haven't played MVP so I can't say how this compares.
The gameplay of 2K5 is actually okay for me overall. The new pitching interface is ok, but I set it to classic mode instead (you can choose between 4 pitching interfaces I think and 2 batting interfaces). Batting is easy enough and, except for the unrealistic sound the bat makes, it feels good enough.
People have raved about the graphics, and they're pretty good but not amazing.
The announcers tend to get out of sync with the action pretty bad sometimes which is pretty annoying. It certainly doesn't flow like NFL 2K5 does in that regard.
Another annoying thing is that the computer seems to throw a lot of wild pitches past the catcher... I'm talking 1-4 times per game on average for me.
The controls are as good as any other sports game although I'm not sure I like the base running controls too much (I guess that's just a personal thing). I tend to make my runners all advance or go back at the same time instead of being able to choose only 1 easily. Oh well.

I haven't played the other game modes or Xbox Live so I'm not sure if they would improve my opinion of this game... I like Franchise modes in sports games mostly so stats are very important to me more than the other features. So while playing 1-on-1 baseball on Xbox Live would surely be a blast, the horrible stats engine keeps this at 3 stars for me.

Overall I'm dissapointed. Like I said, I thought I would get the same enjoyment with Baseball 2K5 like I have with NFL 2K5. This isn't in the same league.

As far as value, for $20 I think it's appropriately priced. I think the developers threw the stats engine together quickly and it shows. I did notice you can pick up MVP for $20 here on Amazon (at least when I purchased 2K5 it was the same price). Maybe I'll pick that up and give it a go.

MVP 2005 Much, Much Better!!

3 Rating: 3, Useful: 2 / 3
Date: July 15, 2005
Author: Amazon User

This game has so many glitches and flaws that it is dominated over by MVP Baseball 2005 so much, that it's not even funny. 2K5 has poor baserunning, hitting, fielding, throwing, and menu setup. The only good part is the highly accurate stadiums and rosters and the ESPN announcers that make it sound like a real baseball game. The graphics aren't even good! Other than that, the game lacks in so much that it cannot really be considered a great baseball game. MVP 2005 on the other hand is a fantastic game and if ur looking for an awesome baseball game with great graphics, color, gameplay, sound and just about everything else...then MVP Baseball 2005 is the game for you, not 2K5.

MVP is better

3 Rating: 3, Useful: 2 / 5
Date: July 19, 2005
Author: Amazon User

MLB 2k5 is a big disappointment. the faces are bad in this game, bad! triple play 2002 had better player faces than 2k5.

game play also is worse than from 2k4. 2k4 was easy to play, and 2k5 they got very complicated. you have to use so many buttons and do so many things just to run the bases.

on the upside, the crowd is awesome. the stadium music, the piano is awesome, and the graphics are amazing. they also captured the true dark blue of the atlanta braves, which MVP failed to do, but that's about all. what i also like is the weather factor. you can put it cloudy, cold, day and warm, twilight or nighttime.

in MLB 2K5 the batting stances are to generic and fake, too glitchy. it's not smooth like MVP.

the biggest difference between MVP and 2K5 is smoothness and realism of the game, which MVP nicely accomplishes.

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