User Reviews (1 - 11 of 28)

Show these reviews first:

Highest Rated
Lowest Rated Newest
Oldest Most Helpful
Least Helpful

good game could be better

4 Rating: 4, Useful: 0 / 0
Date: April 19, 2003
Author: Amazon User

i think this is the best baseball game out right now. i've tried mvp, which is a good game just some things i don't like about it. you're not able to dive on your own in mvp like wsb, and you don't have to worry about hitting because you just leave the bat in one place and just time the pitch. unlike wsb where you have to move the bat around. i think if we combined these two games together we would have the ultimate baseball.

A GREAT game, but probably should be 4.5 stars...

5 Rating: 5, Useful: 0 / 0
Date: July 18, 2003
Author: Amazon User

World Series Baseball 2k3 is really a great baseball videogame. It is far from perfect, but the overall package is quite good. The game builds on the base and engine of last year's title, and is for the most part a very similar game, but it makes a couple of absolutely crucial improvements.

The first of these improvements is a large selection of gameplay sliders you can tune to your preference. There should hopefully be even more customization avaialable in next year's title, but you can still adjust things independently of each other like CPU pitching skill, how often the CPU pitcher will throw strikes (vs. balls), CPU batting eye, the CPU batting average, and how often the CPU will try and steal. Of course you can still adjust things like your batting cursor size (or you can opt to not use one), pitch speed, and a host of other in-game options. It may take you some time to find the optimal settings for your skill level, but you will eventually be able to turn out very realistic box scores and season stats across the board with the one exception being stolen bases. It is ridiculously easy to steal a base in this game, so you basically need to use the honor system or you will shatter all kinds of records. Otherwise though, after some work, you can play a really good baseball game where walks and pitcher inaccuracies are big factors and you won't get twenty hits or hit ten home runs every game. It is unfortunate that the game requires so much tuning, but the end result is what counts and it is fantastic. Fielding is much better in this year's version as well. Double plays are much easier to turn and the players generally feel more responsive. There is a new jump command as well which can allow you to "rob" homeruns if you time everything right. The move is quite tough to pull off, but quite rewarding when it works. On the whole, the outfield plays pretty well but it does take a while to learn how to take the right angle on a ball and until you figure it out, it can be really frustrating. The second main improvement is much better stat tracking. In last year's game, you lost all record of a season's stats once the season was over. Now you can keep full career records and even get your players into the Hall of Fame.

There are, however, still a few things that really need to be fixed. First, the game has some buggy audio. It's not a deal-breaker, but it is annoying when the announcers make serious mistakes or break-up in mid-sentance. Also, the announcers really need to learn how to say the names of created players if another player in the game has the same last name. And speaking of the announcers, where the heck are Jon Miller and Joe Morgan? If we are forced to put with the special ESPN interface (which really just feels like a commercial to me), then we should at least get the very best ESPN broadcasters. There are a few more stats which should be tracked. For example, pitches per plate appearance (for hitters) and average pitches per inning (for pitchers) should be tracked. It would be neat to have access to the real MLB managers to use as coaches, and it would be neat to see the effects of different organizational philosophies and the quality of the coaching a little more clearly in both user and CPU controlled teams. Also, it would be really nice if the minor league system were fleshed out a little more. You should be allowed to keep more players in the system and you should be able to look at minor league stats as well. It would be really great if you even had A, AA, and AAA teams you needed to fill the rosters out for. Expanding the minor leagues would require the draft being expanded beyond seven rounds, but that would be a bonus in every sense anyways. Finally, the game should be compatible with XBox Live. At the very least, you should be able to download roster updates.

These complaints, however, don't keep WSB 2k3 from being a great game. If you enjoyed last year's version as well and are wondering whether it is worth picking up this year's, I'd say yes owing to the really well executed customizable sliders.

Beware of the season-killing bug in this game!

2 Rating: 2, Useful: 0 / 0
Date: November 07, 2003
Author: Amazon User

There's much to be said about the good things in this game, the beautiful graphics, the variable AI sliders (High Heat anyone?), and the franchise mode, but here's my problem, and I've verified with other gamers that I'm not alone here. This game has a killer bug in franchise mode that can make your entire franchise worthless. I was headed into September and on the verge of making a great run for the postseason when I suddenly encountered a bug that caused the game to freeze up everytime I tried to play past a certain date. When this happens, there's no way of salvaging the season as the file has become corrupted. You have to start a brand new season over again. Talk about a turning someone off to a game. I promptly sold the game away because of this. The frustrating thing is that it doesn't necessarily happen to everyone, but it's happened to several people I've talked to in various forums. So while this game is still fun on several fronts, it's still a risk if you choose to invest in a season.

I think this game is comparable to ASB2K4, except for that darned bug!

Great title

5 Rating: 5, Useful: 0 / 0
Date: June 08, 2005
Author: Amazon User

I admittedly haven't played any other baseball titles for the XBOX (as I just bought my XBOX itself), but I've played a few titles on other platforms and on the PC. This is one of the best baseball titles I've played so far. I'm not really a sports fan in general, but sports video games have always been really enjoyable. This game does what I need it to do, and I haven't noticed any flaws so far.

It feels like it doesn't have all the major league teams, but maybe I'm just thinking it doesn't and it really does? Not sure. It does have the classic uniforms (home and away) for every team in the game, and that's interesting...tho, you can't always tell they're "classic" uniforms (at least I can't for a lot of the teams.) I also like the fact that each team's stadium is present, and they're all really beautiful in their animation/rendering (the fans aren't rendered anywhere near the way the players are, of course, but it's all really nicely done either way, and it's not hard to imagine being right there at each ballpark with each park's different setup.) It's interesting to check out each team's stadium, and compare them with the real life stadiums. You can also choose between day and night, which is cool.

The gameplay is fairly simple, tho I had to check the manual to see exactly how baserunning works and sometimes I still find it a bit confusing getting the baserunners to go to each base and stop. You have to point toward the base you went the player to run to and hit one button to advance, one button to go back to the previous base, and a third button to stop (and instead of stopping at the base and not continuing, the runner just stops in the middle of the bases wherever he was when you hit stop.) That gets confusing when you have 2 or 3 runners you're trying to deal with seperately, but it's no big deal usually. The fielding is fairly simple as well, tho you might want to make sure you know which button dives for the ball (still haven't been in enough situations to figure out how to try to jump to get a homerun or near homerun.) Throwing the ball to each base is very simple (1 button for each base, on the controller as a diamond, the right button to first, the left button to third, etc.) I've played some games where this common sense setup isn't in play and it get's really confusing, but this game (like most) has it setup properly.

The batting and pitching I like...you can set it up to show exactly where the pitcher will throw the ball, but it's rather difficult sometimes trying to set the cursor right on the pitch in time and keeping your focus on the timing of the pitch as well (the computer can easily strike you out if you time pitches wrong...and if you swing late, it'll often go foul as it would in real life.) I've never played with that strike zone area turned off, so I can't rate the other method. Pitching is set up the same way, with a few pitching choices (it seems as if the pitching choices for each pitcher are very slim), you hit the direction of the pitch you want and then use the cursor to set a path (I think there might be another option where you don't use the cursor with pitching as well, but I've never used it...always keep it, or I'd probably never get it in the strike zone.) One thing that's weird is, most of the time, you choose a pitch, but the pitcher shakes his head and refuses to throw that pitch- I've no idea what the deal is with that, but it's weird to say the least.

There are the common options with season play (162 games would probably take forever), and others such as quick start, whereit starts you off with two random teams just so you can start playing without going thru any choices or options...exhibition play, make your own team/rosters, etc. I've only used the exhibition mode so far and started a season (set it to 20 games only) but haven't started it yet. The nice thing with the XBOX is the hard drive that allows you to save these games without needing a memory card you'd have to pay extra for...with the hard drive, you could save numerous seasons with created teams/rosters, etc and never run out of space.

So, a great game overall...enough choices to keep most sports fans happy, realistic stadiums to choose from, what seems like full major league rosters with stats and different abilities for each player, season and exhibition modes to choose from, classic uniforms, a homerun derby mode, and a "legends" team with all the greats of the game- there's plenty here to keep most people playing for a long time. One of the best baseball games I've played on any platform.

Great baseball game in my collection

4 Rating: 4, Useful: 0 / 0
Date: August 15, 2006
Author: Amazon User

I love baseball! I love it probably more than anything, besides videogames. This game is really good, and deserves an MVP. I think Jason Giambi is guilty of taking steroids. Who here thinks that he won't be asked to be a cover athlete again?

MC White

Great game

4 Rating: 4, Useful: 0 / 4
Date: May 19, 2003
Author: Amazon User

This is the best game for mlb...In the game you can play a season,Playoffs,And more.THis is the best game ever.You could do a homerun thing and the most hmeruns wins.I play this game all the time.Some do not like this game but I do.So you should buy this game.Come on get out there and buy this game.

ABSOLUTELY BASEBALLS BEST GAME ENTIERLY!!!!!!!!!

5 Rating: 5, Useful: 1 / 4
Date: March 19, 2003
Author: Amazon User

WHEN I SAY TRUST ME U CAN TAKE IT TO THE HEART THAT SEGA HAS DONE IT AGAIN PUTTING OUT THE BEST BASEBALL GAME IN THE WORLD.WHETHER YOU ARE A TRUE BASEBALL NUT TO THE CORE OR U JUST SIMPLY LIKE PLAYING SPORTS GAMES WORLD SERIES WILL NEVER LET YOU DOWN. BELIEVE ME WHEN I SAY I ALWAYS TRY ALL THE NEW BASEBALL GAMES EVERY YEAR THIS IS THE SECOND YEAR IN A ROW SEGA HAS HAD THE BEST WORLD SEIRES BASEBALL WAS EXCLUSIVE ONLY TO XBOX LAST YEAR WHITCH WAS A BAD MOVE BUT NOT THIS TIME U CAN PLAY ON PS2 AS WELL.I HAVE TO SAY THE CLOSET RUNNER UP IS EA VERSION OF TRIPLE PLAY MVP BASEBALL WAS A CLOSE SECOND BUT STILL DOSENT HAVE THE SHARP GRAPHICS WORLD SERIES HAS AND THE ESPN PRESENTATION IS SIMPLY AWESOME ITS LIKE WATCHING MAJOR LEAGUE ON NATIONAL TELEVISION . THE PITCHING ENGINE IS THE BEST AND MOST OF THE OTHER TITLES ARE ALSO USING THE SAME TYPE OF FORMAT I MUST SAY THOUGH UNLESS U LIKE WINNING 17 3 IN THE SECOND INNINGH
SIMPLY SWITCH TO PRO OR ALLSTAR FOR A REALISTIC BASEBALL GAME IT DONT GET ANY BETTER THEN THIS MY FRIENDS.ALSO THIS YEAR U CAN CHARGE THE MOUND AFTER 3 BEANED BATTERS AND IT HAS THE BETS FIELDING ENGINE ITS SO COOL TO ROB HOMERUNS AND STOPPING A BULLET FROM GOING INTO THE OUTFIELD FOR A BASE HIT OR MORE.OTHER TITLES DO ALL THIS FOR U AND ITS NO FUN TO LET THE COMPUTER GRAB A FLY OR A TOUGH OUT.AND YES CERTAIN BALLPARKS HAVE SPECIALTY HOMERUN ANTICS JUST LIKE IN REAL LIFE .TRUST ME DONT EVEN BOTHER WITH ANY OTHER BASEBALL TITLE THIS YEAR WORLD SERIES IS A CHAMP.

Simple Review.

5 Rating: 5, Useful: 1 / 4
Date: March 22, 2003
Author: Amazon User

Best baseball game ever. If you are into baseball you should really enjoy this game.

Best Baseball Title this year

5 Rating: 5, Useful: 1 / 2
Date: March 15, 2003
Author: Amazon User

Best graphics of any baseball game.
Totally customizable with sliders and editing.
Great gameplay that's not arcadey but not boring. The perfect mix.
Buy this game!

Sega Sports Rules

5 Rating: 5, Useful: 1 / 2
Date: March 21, 2003
Author: Amazon User

Best baseball game out there...most complete and fun

Review Page: 1 2 3 Next 

Actions