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There is a reason that you do not see many companies attempting to put out sports titles on the Game Boy Color; it’s darn hard to do correctly. From time to time there has been a decent title, but for the most part sports are left to the more powerful home consoles. Despite this, Acclaim Entertainment has continued to bring their highly popular All Star Baseball franchise from the Nintendo 64 to the portable machine. For the 2001 incarnation, the general gist has not changed all that much – leaving us with basically the same as before but slightly improved. All Star Baseball 2001 is by no means attempting to pull off a full-blown simulation of the sport; it simply isn’t possible or practical on the GBC, and it’s doubtful that even if they did that it would be at all entertaining. Instead, this title is all about fast-paced action. Batting is handled by moving the batter to a location prior to when the ball is pitched to the plate, and then it falls to slapping the swing button at the proper time. It takes a little practice to get down, but you’ll be hitting doubles and triples in no time. When it comes to pitching, you select the area that you would like the ball pitched at and then pick what type of pitch should be done (fast, split, change). And when it came to fielding, there are no complaints here. It’s all a matter of lining yourself up to where the shadow of the ball is on the screen.
Don’t expect an impressive eye show from All Star Baseball 2001 during your play, since the visuals are nothing special. They are able to adequately show off the players, stadium and action, but none of the actual players are at all distinguishable from each other except for face and arm color. You’ll be concentrating on the gameplay most of the time, but it would be nice if KnowWonder had taken the time to spruce things up a bit during the dull moments. You have the option of playing a single exhibition match up or even taking a dip into the Playoff, Season or Home Run Derby modes, but I ended up coming to the conclusion that if I was going to take a significant chunk of time to play through an entire series of games with a team that I would do so with a far superior machine (and game in general) in front of a large television. The Home Run Derby can be entertaining once or twice through, but the most playability comes from simply hopping into the exhibition mode and blowing through a game during your free time. Playing baseball on a handheld should improve as technology steps forward (the Game Boy Advance should throw up things significantly, both in terms of visuals and complexity of gameplay), but for the time being baseball is rather unappealing. Pick up All Star Baseball 2001 if you’re interested in playing catch on the run, but it is recommended to seek out something on the PlayStation or Nintendo 64 instead.
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