So I love baseball games. But the problem is, much like football games, I truly suck at them. I’m not very well versed in the subtleties of the sports and am more of just a general fan.
With that said, every year I buy the latest version of MLB The Show for PS3 and am excited by the awesome graphics and atmosphere. Truly like watching a game in real life. I promise myself “This is the year. This is the year I master the controls.” Then, a month later, I’m trading the game in because I just suck at it. It’s not the game. It’s the most highly rated baseball game around, and rightfully so. It’s me.
So anyway they have Rookie mode batting which is essentially just timing. No aiming or zone picking over the plate. No analog stick to push in the correct direction to push or pull your shot. I always avoid this mode every year because I feel like I MUST play with the main control scheme otherwise I’m a PUSSY and should punch myself. Even when I can’t play the game worth a shit I still force myself to struggle through the controls instead of relaxing with the dumbed down shit.
So this year, I’m going to use Rookie mode controls. I’m going to relax and stop worrying about what it may look like to other people (I know exactly zero other people who play this game). I’m going to suck up my pride and just enjoy the game. The atmosphere and graphics that make this the best baseball game out there. This is a serious struggle for me but it’s paying off as I’m actually paying more attention to other aspects of the game like substitutions, base running and what not that I wouldn’t have otherwise because I suck and get so focused on not striking out.
So does anyone else experience this? A reluctance to just give in to easier controls for the sake of enjoying a game you otherwise just CAN’T play? It’s fairly liberating to just say “Fuck it. I suck at this shit. I tried, and failed, to play the game with the proper control scheme. I give in. Uncle”.
I hear ya. I love single-player RPGs like Mass Effect and Dragon Age, but I suck at a lot of video games, especially shooter-style games. Often I have to play with the wussiest settings and even sometimes activate “cheats” (which were used during development and then switched off) to get through the game without utter frustration. I figure I’m not bragging about what I’ve done, I’m not playing with anyone else, so at least I get to experience the storyline.
That is the exact game I have played and refused to use Easy mode and am probably the worse for it. I don’t have this year’s version, but the 2009 version. No matter how many tips and hints I read I could never get the hang of hitting. I mean, I would hit alright. Score a couple of runs a game. But, I could never master it, like I could other sports games. (I don’t think I had it set at Rookie, but I did have it set way below expert.) And, it just got frusturating. It was like I had to pitch a masterpiece every time to hope to win a game.
I think I am going to follow your lead. The next time I get a baseball game I will turn off Defense and turn on Rookie settings for hitting and try it that way. I can never tell if a pitch is going to be outside, what type of pitch it is. Or anything> And, on top of that. There was no spring training mode that was in any way helpful.
Anyway. yeah. I have trouble using easy mode in baseball games.
Other games, I am stubborn about it, too. And, sometimes it is worth it, because it makes a fun game last that much longer. I am really glad I did that with Arkham Asylum.
You should get this years game. They really do have an honest to goodness training mode. Sure, I still suck, but I can hit the ball consistently in Rookie mode at least. Haven’t gotten to pitching yet
Add me to your playlist if you want. I’m beefchips. I suck big time so if you want to have an error filled game I can give it you!
Unlike a lot of gamers, I don’t particularly enjoy a “challenge” when I’m playing computer games- I’m playing them because I want to take over the world/save a post-apocalyptic nuclear wasteland/build a sprawling [City/Theme Park/Transport Network]/generally run around causing havoc and having a good time in a digital format. So I long ago made peace with defaulting to playing games on “Easy”; IMHO there’s nothing wrong with it and you shouldn’t have to justify your single-player gaming style to anyone else.
I like the first-person shooters too, but I usually can’t get through them unless I play in easy mode (as I just did with Bulletstorm) or activating the cheats (which I always have to do for Half-Life 2 and the sequels). My first-person shooter skills peaked with Doom and Doom 2; as the games have gotten more complex it’s been downhill for me ever since.
I used to love baseball video games. RBI Baseball, Bases Loaded, Baseball Stars(!) - those were great games.
Then they got realistic. MLB '05 was a huge leap forward, and once I finally got an Xbox, I clamored to get it. Then I found out I couldn’t hit a damn thing unless I dropped to down to one of the lowest setting ever (I’m not sure if I changed the overall difficulty, or messed with the sliders). Even then, there was a fine line between hitting .200 in a game and hitting .400 with 15 HRs (for the whole team). Oh - and no walks ever. I made it to the All Star Break and the only walks I had accumulated were when I just let the computer sim a game or two.
It was a fun game, but it was the last baseball game I’ve bought. Every year I’ll download the demo for the new one, and remember how friggin’ impossible they are now.
That certainly makes sense. But I’d like to see more/better AI on the lower difficulty levels. My friend who I play FPSs with isn’t very good (he has mobility issues in one of his hands), so we nerf it down. Nowadays it seems like you get to see the cooler AI on the harder levels. I know it’s a mix, but…
Also, how good can the AI really get these days? I’ve been really impressed with the AI in Mass Effect 2 (I finally got flanked the other day - I was so proud of the little bots…).
I’ve been using The Show’s rookie mode ever since I started playing (2K7 and 2K9 on PS2; 10 on PS3). I do OK with the next higher level during batting practice but not during games.
Cubsfan, did you ever try adjusting the game sliders to allow greater tolerance for making contact?
I -do- like a challenge in my games, but the kind of challenge I like is not the “learn how to master the controls” (controls that are hard to master are just bad, generally), but rather, the challenge of beating the game once I can do pretty much whatever I want.
Doesn’t feel much like overthrowing the evil wizard if he’s a total wuss, you know?
That said, it’s been a long time since I met a game that I legitimately struggled with. Well, I lie, Hard Corps: Uprising is pretty hard. But it’s not a control issue. Sooo…
With MLB The Show, hitting and pitching were the easiest (and most fun) parts for me. Fielding and base-running? Not so much. So I set those to Auto and let the game play those two aspects for me. Much more fun and much less frustration that way.
Back in my day, timing of the swing was all there was to any baseball video game. We weren’t playing easy mode; that was just the only mode available. If it was good enough then, it should be good enough now.
Sure, having to aim your bat also is more realistic. But is “more realistic” really a reasonable goal? If the game were really realistic, then you’d need to be as skilled as an actual professional baseball player to ever have a chance of getting a hit. And if you were that skilled, why are you wasting your time with a video game?
I suppose it depends on what kind and how tough the game really is. I usually play on “realistic” if that setting means realistic fuel, ammo and physics; there’s something just unutterably lame about playing some kind of military sim with unlimited ammo, nerfed physics and no fog of war.
However, in most RPG type games, I play on “normal” or “regular.” I don’t necessarily want the game to be so easy that I just roll through the storyline without having had some challenges, but neither do I want to repeat every single story point 5 times, and the harder ones 15 times. I don’t mind having to do some things over a lot, as long as I don’t have to do everything over a lot.
I don’t play a lot of sports games, although I will admit that they tend to make them a little more complicated in some cases than actually playing the game is, so I tend to play on “normal” on there as well, if I’m playing the computer.
The closest thing I play to a “FPS” these days is Mass Effect 2.
I just want to check out the plots of the RPGs. At least with games that have a pause button, I have a better chance!
I don’t really go for the actual “cheats” until I’ve already finished the game and want to replay to see how different choices affect the outcome, but would rather not invest another 40 hours or whatever of serious struggle. So I’ll equip the character with nice gear and try again.
Without a shared stash and little time to play with others, I did that sort of thing with Diablo II starting at Act II or so. Used the Jamella hero editor to deck out my characters in appropriate sets then went bashing evil.
I’m not really a gamer. I play video games, but I peaked out about Super Mario World and Sonic the Hedgehog. I did OK with the last Zelda for the Wii, but I never finished it. I enjoy playing, but I’m definitely not hardcore.
El Hubbo wanted a PS3 for his birthday. Since our DVD player is old anyway, it was a pretty good twofer gift, so I got it for him, along with Call of Duty: Black Ops and a couple other games. He wants me to play CoD with him in their challenge modes - sure, I can do that. It’d be fun.
It’s the exact opposite of fun. There’s no way I’m ever going to learn how to operate my body separately from my head - I certainly can’t work out how to do it together. I’m always either looking at the sky or running somewhere and then looking. It’s impossible. Maybe I need to change the controller around, I don’t know. All it does is frustrate me and make me angry, so I don’t want to play, and that just makes my husband sad. I want to try, but I don’t know if it’s worth the frustration.
FPS controls on consoles are…uhm… the opposite of intuitive. Heck, they’re not exactly super intuitive on the PC either unless you grew up with them. This is a major problem in the video game industry - if you didn’t grow up with a controller in hand (Or shooting stuff in Doom) there’s a whole lot of “tribal knowledge” that you don’t have that most games assume you do.
So… accept that if you want to be able to do this pretty much at all, it’s going to take some time. Start simple; Just move forward. Stop when you need to turn. You won’t be competitive, but you’ll spend less time running into walls. Take a deep breath. Ask some special favors from your husband, because you’re doing him a big one by learning this stuff. (Or at least, get him to a play a game you like with you.)
Oh, and don’t feel bad - “super easy” difficulty level doesn’t change the controls at all, as a rule. It just makes the enemies less fierce.
Oh man, this brings back memories of my dad playing Goldeneye with me. This was him to a tee. I never could understand at the time how he managed to suck so royally. Errr, no offense. Airk’s post makes it all make sense. It’s not really you who sucks, it’s just a matter of getting used to something totally foreign and kinda counter-intuitive.
