Major League Baseball 2K6 [GC]

Offline, the mode selection is similarly robust, with new player morale considerations bolstering the Franchise mode and extra manager duties to occupy players in GM mode. The World Baseball Classic is one hand, although with only a fraction of the real players and without international stadiums.

Those standout additions to the game are undermined by a texture and animation set that actually seems like a step back from last year. Player motions feel repetitive and routine, as if every play was the same. With the intricate variance of detail provided by Inside Edge, it's a shame to feel like we're watching the same game over and over.

In addition to the weak animations, there's a retuned physics engine, which provides hit and miss results. It seeks to account for player movement based on weight and more 'real' laws of dynamics and inertia. In the best circumstances it works quite well, putting nice movement on the ball and lending a sense of actual physicality to the game.

But the new physics engine isn't always your friend. In the outfield, you'll lose far more balls than usual, as players now turn like Caterpillar tractors. Slightly overshoot the target area as a fly is coming down, and instead of nimbly bouncing back to the target, you'll have to watch the fielder slow down, hop a couple of times and try to reverse into position. That's not how we've seen most players move, and it's frustrating to lose a simple fly due to a lack of utter precision.

That behavior colors pretty much every action in the field, making anything that doesn't involve pitching or batting a potentially frustrating situation. Fielding in any baseball game seems like an awkward approximation to begin with, and this just adds a level of difficulty to the game that feels arbitrarily tough, not to mention unrealistic.

MLB 2K6 tries a lot of new things, and it's bound to happen that some, such as the physics, don't succeed. We applaud the effort. But most games will have you shaking your head (if not cursing) at the fielding. That's a huge letdown when the pitching and batting interaction is as strong as that of MLB 2K6. Inside Edge is such a fantastic addition that fans have to see it in action. Just don't expect this one to be knocked out of the park.