Favorite Games Played in 2022 | #2 MLB The Show

In 2022, we purchased and played a lot of games for a lot of different systems. From current generation Xbox Series S, Nintendo Switch, and PlayStation 5 to retro games on the NES, Famicom and Genesis, there has been a lot to enjoy. I haven't played a lot of the 2022 new releases, slacker I know, but I did want to share my favorite games I spent time with in the past year.

Title: MLB The Show 22
System: PlayStation 4, PlayStation 5, Xbox One S|X, Xbox Series S|X, Nintendo Switch

Where I Bought It:
Gamestop & GamePass

Why I love it:
There's not a whole lot new under the hood once you leave the dugout here. You're provided a number of different graphical & gameplay tweaks you can make along the way, presentation changes, and things to help the game feel the way that you wanted to. One thing that I have not discovered as of yet is a roster of retired players that would be free agents that you could sign. This has been a staple of the series for the last few years, yet it is conspicuous by its absence.

Comparing the graphics between the Xbox One S & the Nintendo Switch is a shock. While not up to the specs of the Series x or Series S or the PlayStation 5, the Xbox One S version still looked very good. Flesh tones look good, the hair looked fairly authentic, colors looked vibrant & rich. On the Switch, oh boy, on the Switch the graphics look very poor in my opinion. The skin tones look plasticy, hair looks like a solid layer, especially with pitchers who have longer hair. It's just not a good look. The developers also did something weird with the scoreboard in the outfield, adding an extra layer of lens flare to cover up otherwise low-resolution graphics. I also thought it was weird that the scoreboard was a different size between versions. I don't know why they would have done this.

While the Xbox is vastly superior when it comes to the graphics, the Switch is vastly superior when it comes to play control. I like using the older MLB the Show 16 pitching & batting mechanics with the slider that you have to press the correct button & time it to get your pitch or make contact with your bat. On the Xbox version, it felt incredibly laggy, I never felt like I got my timing right. On the Switch version, it was amazingly locked in. I tried it first in handheld mode just to remove any television lag or delay from the equation, but it was just as good docked in TV mode.

One of the great things about the latest version of the show is the fact that you can save & play seasons across all devices. So I can start a franchise on the Xbox, continue it on the Switch, & finish it on the PlayStation, or any combination of this. Getting this cross-platform save working took me about 12 hours, it seems like there was some issue with clocks & dates & server syncing, but once I got it set up it has worked beautifully & I really appreciated it.

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