earlier baseball games

[Mitch McQuick]

I played a Stratomatic board game for one year in the early 1980's (Ryne Sandberg and other Cubs were on the box with their team identifiers blanked off of their unis and caps) then quickly transitioned to my 1st computer sim on the Commodore 64, Strategic Simulation's "Computer Baseball" (screenshot here: GB64.COM - C64 Games, Database, Music, Emulation, Frontends, Reviews and Articles).

In the mid- to late 1980s, I took up MicroLeague Sports Association's MicroLeague Baseball (GB64.COM - C64 Games, Database, Music, Emulation, Frontends, Reviews and Articles) on the C64 for a couple of years. There you could purchase accessory software that allowed you to create your own teams and players and also compile stats (it may have been the 1st sim game to give the lay user those options). I can remember creating new season disks using The Sporting News' or USA Today's season stats immediately as seasons ended and adding rookies' stats as seasons wore along (I actually downloaded a C64 emulator and played a few games of MicroLeague a few years ago for old times sake).

During college, I didn't really play any sim games, as I mostly played RBI Baseball II on the Nintendo with my roomies (that game and Tecmo Bowl probably lowered my GPA by at least a half a point). I had an original Mac then and I don't remember there being any sim games for it.

Once I got my first PC in the mid 1990s, I played a few versions of Miller Associates' APBA Baseball for Windows for a handful of years (really liked the later Broadcast Blast version with Ernie Harwell's spoken play by play), then I basically stopped playing baseball sims (really all computer games) until I purchased OOTP11 in July of 2010.

[edog23]

As a kid growing up in the early 80's, this was my very first hand held baseball game. I wish I still had it, damn.

[chezboots]

My first baseball simulation ever played was myself. I would take a wiffle bat and ball and a glove and tennis ball in the back yard usually with a New York Mets yearbook for players names and play the game myself. When batting I'd run through the line up with wiffle bat and ball teaching myself to switch hit so I could hit lefty for lefty hitters, then after 3 outs I would get my glove and tennis ball and pitch against a wall fielding the comebackers or throwing a ball in the air for fly balls, and running up to my deck to rob Homers. I could not get switch throwing down though so everybody was righthanded. I had notebooks with line ups stats, standings etc. it was very detailed and I think the Mets won every game. I remember one crazy inning where the Mets hit 13 straight homers! But if I only had a short time to play I would sim my own highlight show instead.

Then a trip to the Hall of Fame I scored Pursue the Pennant which I modified to use real baseball cards, then I moved on to Commodore 64 and Microleague - Every console from NES to PS2 - Baseball Mogul, MVP 2005 for PC and finally Season Ticket into OOTP and haven't looked back since.

My favorite though was playing out games in my back yard, but I think a 35 year old man playing baseball with himself in the back yard would not be accepted by my neighbors. Sometimes I have some nice flashbacks playing wiffle ball with my son though.

[BIG17EASY]

Originally Posted by edog23

As a kid growing up in the early 80's, this was my very first hand held baseball game. I wish I still had it, damn.

Wow! I had forgotten all about that game. I used to play out the Mets season and keeping scores on a tablet.

[eriqjaffe]

Originally Posted by edog23

As a kid growing up in the early 80's, this was my very first hand held baseball game. I wish I still had it, damn.

I picked one of those up at a garage sale a few years ago. It was the Sears-branded version, though.

[robc]

Originally Posted by chezboots

My favorite though was playing out games in my back yard, but I think a 35 year old man playing baseball with himself in the back yard would not be accepted by my neighbors. Sometimes I have some nice flashbacks playing wiffle ball with my son though.

I am 41 now and when I see my freind who lives in a diffeent state we will still play whiffle ball. That was my all time favorite past time. When I was younger and needed a HR I would sometimes get into an awkward Oscar Gamble crouch to get my out of my hitting slump.

[griffeyin98]

Originally Posted by Afino

I played something similar. I actually created one myself from scratch when I was like 10 or 11 years old. Should have marketed it

We did this too, made all our favorite players and gave them walk/hr/k ratings of 1-12 then had 1-12 all equal different stuff, 1-sing, 2 double, 3-triple, 4-homer (then you rolled for the players "power" rating, etc..)

Made family vacations to Florida in the car much more fun

[griffeyin98]

Originally Posted by robc

I am 41 now and when I see my freind who lives in a diffeent state we will still play whiffle ball. That was my all time favorite past time. When I was younger and needed a HR I would sometimes get into an awkward Oscar Gamble crouch to get my out of my hitting slump.

I agree, nothing wrong with 35 or 41 year olds playing wiffle ball. Probably don't have the hand/eye to play like we did as kids with those wiffle golf balls and a 12" wooden Detroit Tigers bat from Tiger Stadium. Still can't believe we ever made as much contact as we did with that

[spitfire]

Originally Posted by edog23

As a kid growing up in the early 80's, this was my very first hand held baseball game. I wish I still had it, damn.

I had that game as well and used to play it. Kept it for years even though it had stopped working at some point, but finally threw it out when I moved house. Please don't tell me it's now worth small fortune .........

[1998 Yankees]

Originally Posted by spitfire

I had that game as well and used to play it. Kept it for years even though it had stopped working at some point, but finally threw it out when I moved house. Please don't tell me it's now worth small fortune .........

I just searched eBay. There's one of them up there, all right. Current bid is $7,695.






























j/k

[spitfire]

Originally Posted by 1998 Yankees

I just searched eBay. There's one of them up there, all right. Current bid is $7,695.

I ASKED you not to tell me that!!!! Anyway, that bid probably won't even make the reserve .......

[perfectDARK]

As a kid I played around with old NES and SNES games but never really got into baseball until my teenage years. The first game I really played out was High Heat, then I found Mogul in my local library. I then stumped on the OOTP forums and have been in heaven since.

I was actually quite the gamer in my past but lately I've only bought two games for my dusty PS3. OOTP is literally my dream come true. I'd probably be more active on these boards if I wasn't playing so much

[Chicagofan76]

my 1st Addiction was 1 where u put the players baseball card in a slot and then, moved them throughout the field or hit using dice.

Favorites for PC best game play wise was Tony 3, but prior to buying OOTP11 earlier this yr i was still playing High Heat 2003, but the gaming community for that has been virtually dead for the past yr.

While I would love for OOTP to eventually have graphics, this is my new fav game, I am still in the process of finishing my EBL league which i have played on Tony 3, Hardball and High Heat. This is the only game where i can have my actual cities be real cities on Endor. Thanx to Vimage and others I have 30 logos/uniforms of the 35 teams that have played on Endor.
Plus I have semi historical MLB going on with EBL since players jump from league to league often, and I can create my Coriellian, Coruscanti, Tantooine and Outer Rim Leagues as well (all fold during the Yuzhong Vong War)
Being able to see what Wilbur Duggleby actually does in a good game is amazing to me. I use his career stats from the game listed above as my base he was a .368 with 1068 HR 2567 RBI 2809 R 1004SB
7 time Triple Crown Award winner and 12 time MVP of 2 different leagues and was a 3 time MOTY of the 2 time World Champion Cooperstown Quest.
look for more on Wilbur Duggleby in the Dynasty forum soon.
With Facegen i can use actual faces to fictonal ppl such as Bo Duke, Luke Skywalker, Chewbacca, Wicket, Harry Potter, Dottie Hinson and Billy Chapel.

I will play OOTP til a better PC game comes out that has everything OOTP has + what HH was.

[chezboots]

Here's one I just thought of Starting Lineup Talking Baseball. Classic.

[JTSMOOTH]

Originally Posted by chezboots

Here's one I just thought of Starting Lineup Talking Baseball. Classic.

That was a good one that I had forgotten about. That was a good one.

I started my baseball "Sim" career back on Computer Baseball by SSI. Started out playing with some of the teams already on the game, which included many of the all time great teams, then we picked up the 1984 season disk. Eventually myself, my brother and a few other kids in the neighborhood would draft teams from the latest baseball magazine, I would spend hours entering in their stats and we would play seasons off that.

Spent a lot of time playing Micro League Baseball as well. I'm still hopeful that OOTP will one day have animated graphics similar to what Micro League had.

Then Graduated onto EWBB, loved the ability to edit stadiums. I had fun making quirky stadiums. EWBB2 was pretty good as well.

Front Page Sports Baseball by Sierra was the next game I played and I thought I was in heaven. I loved that game. It's too bad they abandoned their sports franchises, I really enjoyed them.

Then I moved onto High Heat, played in various online leagues with that game. During one my online High Heat leagues, a fellow league member had mentioned something about a game called OOTP and tried to convince me to migrate over there, but I didn't really put much stock into it, I mean how much better could it be than High Heat?

Well awhile after 3do ceased making the High Heat series, I was browsing around a game shop and I came across a box for a game called Season Ticket baseball. It was only like 10 bucks and being a baseball junkie, I had to try it with it only being 10 bucks.

The rest is history. Been hooked on OOTP ever since.

[Dreifort]

Originally Posted by klonewarrior

I played Earl Weaver Baseball and Earl Weaver Baseball 2. Tony LaRussa and Old Time Baseball. Front Page Sports Baseball, High Heat Baseball, and now OOTP.

all those great games and no mention of Hardball?

Hardball was on the right path until they disolved... great graphic and game play with indepth stats and team management.

I use to spend many hrs at night with Old Time Baseball (Tony LaRussa game modified).

I miss those days.

[Chicagofan76]

This is way I love baseball so much compared to football and basketball. The gaming community for baseball is/was so much greater then the other sports.

Taking a baseball card or stats out of a magazine or playing a pc or a console game.

This is what makes baseball great.

[DesktopDynasties]

This is a great thread.

One game I didn't notice mentioned was Talking Baseball. I played this about 1971-72? You had a hand held device with a speaker that you put little disks into and you heard the play call come through the speaker. At 9 years old I'd geek it up and create a line up card with my favorite players and run through a game.

After that it was All Star baseball with the round cards and spinner. Played the crap out of that until I discovered Strat in high school. A girl friend bought me Statis Pro when I was 18, but seemed a little awkward. You had to literally move your players around the board to field batted balls.

In the late 80's I got suspended from work for playing a baseballgame on my work computer, but I can't recall the name of the game. All I can remember is that it had historical teams and that you could edit the rosters in DOS.

I loved Earl Weaver -- the stadium disks was awesome, but really thought that Tony LaRussa and Old Time Baseball rocked. A guy named Nick Keren had a set of killer utilities for the game that made up for the allowances. One thing i found odd was that if you played out your dynasties long enough you'd get players with female names.

When Tony Larussa went away it allowed me to focus on my real life and career until I stumbled on OOTP around version 6. It's been downhill ever since.

[macfly]

Well the game i used to love was baseball stars for nes.. loved playing it for hours on end... rbi wasnt bad either.. moved up to other systems in time.. but never really got into much .. until i found baseball mogul ... have bought like 5 versions of that game.. then oneday i was walking in walmart and i saw a game called ootp 11 .. of course i picked it up .. and was like wow .. a better more indept version... i delayed on buying it .. but finally i broke down and havent looked back.... i couldnt believe that it had been out for yrs.. never heard of it but wish i had.... i am now playig online and having a blast... would love to learn the commish aspect of the game but in due time maybe next edition... haha

[JTSMOOTH]

Baseball Stars was awesome. I still break out my NES every now and again just to play it.

Was if not the first, one of the first to allow creating your own teams and playing out seasons with them along with stat tracking.

Baseball Stars 2 on the other hand was a huge disapointment for me.

Originally Posted by macfly

Well the game i used to love was baseball stars for nes.. loved playing it for hours on end... rbi wasnt bad either.. moved up to other systems in time.. but never really got into much .. until i found baseball mogul ... have bought like 5 versions of that game.. then oneday i was walking in walmart and i saw a game called ootp 11 .. of course i picked it up .. and was like wow .. a better more indept version... i delayed on buying it .. but finally i broke down and havent looked back.... i couldnt believe that it had been out for yrs.. never heard of it but wish i had.... i am now playig online and having a blast... would love to learn the commish aspect of the game but in due time maybe next edition... haha