From: GRS00010@APPSTATE.EDU (Shannon R. Adams)
Subject: Micro League Baseball 4
Organization: Appalachian State University
Date: Wed, 9 Sep 1992 21:33:02 GMT
X-News-Reader: VMS NEWS 1.24

     I just forked out 40 bucks for Micro League Baseball 4.  The
game comes on 5 360k disks.  It requires 640k (580k free) and
takes up about 2.2 meg of space for regular installation and an
additional 3.1 if you want to see digitized animation.  It
supports most sound cards.  The game is protected and uses the
doc-lookup scheme.
     I tested this on my outdated 286-16 with VGA and a Sound
Blaster.  It took me about 8 minutes to install it.  I was
impressed with the opening screen.  It showed colorful VGA
graphics and had a very impressive animation screen.  Having been
a disappointed owner of MLB2 and The Manager's Challenge, I
thought this had a lot of potential.  So far, so good.  The main
menu gives the following options:

     A - Exhibition                     F - Playbook Editor
     B - League                         G - Manager Profile
     C - League Utilities               H - Gen. Manger/Owner
     D - Reports                        I - System Settings
     E - Schedule Editor                J - Exit to DOS

     I really liked all the options.  This game has more
utilities than any other baseball game I have played.  You can
even call the USA Sports Center and downloaded updated stats.  I
really liked the game before I even played it.
     After setting up a league, I was ready to play.  Argh!  That
field looks familiar.  The field is only shown from one angle
just as in version 2 and Man. Challenge (from above).  The only
thing that looks better is the resolution.  You can pick from
many stadiums, but they sure don't look as good as the stadiums
in Hardball 3.  As I started to play, I noticed many more
distractions.  The game is VERY SLOW on my 286-16.  On certain
pitches and plays a box will pop-up with animation of the play. 
Again, this is very slow and reminds me of those old XXX
animations.  The digitized photos look like they were shot in the
60's.  All the players are white and the uniforms look like the
old St. Louis Cardinals.  Yeah, I am picky.  Maybe it is better
on a faster machine.  Also, my hard drive light is constantly on
throughout the game.  The game is constantly reading data from
the hard drive.
     Well, this game has a lot of potential.  All the utilities
are there, but the graphics are lacking.  This would be the
"perfect" simulation if the utility features could mixed with
Hardball 3 graphics.  I just bought the game this weekend, so I
have not had time to thoroughly test it.  I WOULD NOT recommend
this game.  Get Hardball 3 and wait for Accolade to put out the
auxiliary disks.  On a scale of 1 - 10, I would give it a 5.


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           | (o)(o)      _____________________________________
           C      _)    /        Shannon Adams                \
            | ,___|    /         Appalachian State University  \ 
            |    /    \          GRS00010@appstate.bitnet      /
           / ____|     \         GRS00010@stat.appstate.edu   /
          /       |     \___________________________________/
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