If you played last year’s game, you know what to more or less expect from 2003. The basic engine is still apparent with a few new graphical quirks. Players now look frighteningly similar to their Major League counterpart. Faces have now been digitally mapped and look fantastic. As do the hundreds of batting and pitching stances as well. The ballparks have once again been faithfully recreated to the fullest degree, complete with full 3D modeling that allows the balls to bounce of walls, scoreboards, etc. instead of passing through them like a ghost. The crowd is still a digitized mess with only 5 or 6 characters to represent the crowd, though it will be forgotten about after a few games. If the game has a big graphical down point, it is that the ball still doesn’t always hit the players gloves, sometimes actually it can be way off. Fortunately this graphical oversight doesn’t affect game play. Add some dancing mascots, planes and blimps that fly in the background, and some well done camera effects, and you have a well rounded package in All Star Baseball 2003. Some may ask for more flash, but die-hard fans will like the commonness of the way All Star looks and feels. I only wish they’d dump the player trotting celebrations to make way for actual stadium celebrations. (i.e. the Mets apple rising, fireworks, etc.)

Audio has definitely “stepped up to the plate” this year. The commentary is now richer and more dynamic with information and chatter. Your play-by-play man never really misses a beat and most, if not all calls are on the money. To add to the luster, the crowd can really live or die depending on the game’s atmosphere. Has your pitcher gotten himself into a jam with runners on the corners? With two out and a man at the plate, you get him down 0 and 2 and the crowd will applaud wildly in appreciation. This also happens in save situations and even when your pitcher is on a roll (say having a shutout or 10 + strikeouts going into the 7th or 8th inning.) Finally throw in some heckling and vendor chatter and you have a very atmospheric sound engine from this year’s game.

Game play for this year's game is very good if not extremely accurate, especially on All Star mode. What’s especially nice is even on All Star mode you can still get strike outs, pitch shutouts and even blow away the CPU, but you must expect this to happen to you from time to time as well. More and more though, I’m finding the box scores very spot on. Again, this year, the game features the batting cursor option. I like this option, as it really gives me the chance to pick and choose my possibilities of hitting a fly ball or a ground ball as you can tilt the batting cursor into various positions. This is very effective in the overall strategy of the game, especially when having that man on 3rd and one out, and needing to hit a fly ball to the outfield to try to score the runner. You can’t get that kind of accuracy with other batting styles. Pitching is also very cool as well, giving you a multiple variety of pitches, the ability to warm up pitchers, and watching your guy lose his “stuff” when it’s either in late innings or he’s giving up lots of hits or runs. There are a couple of major complaints I’d like to see addressed for next year. Please, for the love of crumb cake, get rid of the “future throw” technology. While it’s not as delayed as last years, it still has that pause that can really cause you to blow plays on occasion. Secondly walks in the game are to few and far between if you are pitching. Other than that the game plays very solidly and I wouldn’t be 62 games into my season if I thought it sucked okay?

Options, options, options, oh boy where do I begin? Well for starters you have 10 game play modes including, Exhibition, Season, All Star Game, Home Run Derby, a 20 year Franchise mode, a 20 year Expansion team mode, a trivia game and much more! Most of the modes are self-explanatory, but the Expansion mode needs to get a little attention, as it’s not been done before in a home baseball title. What it comes down to is that you have the 20-year Franchise mode, but you get to choose an Expansion team to run for the pennant with. Not only do you get to choose the city, stadium and logo, but also you draft from the free agent pool and your team gets added into the MLB scheduling without sacrificing another team to include yours. This mode can be a real challenge as you must take basically a scrub filled team and turn them into a dynasty over many years. You’ll accomplish this feat by picking up the right prospects, making the right trades, bringing up spectacular minor leaguers, and just doing a fantastic job at the GM position. There are things that can easily be added to the Franchise/Expansion modes, but for a first time effort, a lot has been implemented and I for one am happy with what they’ve accomplished in a short year. If you can’t find a mode that suits your taste in All Star, then I can’t help you to find the baseball game that will satisfy you.

I can’t say enough about good about this title to give it the props it generally deserves. Baseball is my favorite sport, and I’m glad to have finally found a console baseball game that delivers in not only rock solid game play, but depth and variety as well. Good job Acclaim, and keep it up. I can’t wait to see what you have in store next year. Back to my season…go Cardinals!!!

Click Here to purchase All Star Baseball 2003 from Amazon.com