MLB 09 The Show was a fantastic game, but as with most great games, there were some small nagging issues that annoyed me. One of them was a presentation thing: you’d often see multiple cuts of the same in-game event (and I’m not talking about replays). That really took you out of the broadcast-style presentation that The Show is known for.
This year, with MLB 10 The Show, Sony San Diego is rectifying that situation by introducing real-time presentation: every single camera cut you see will happen in real time, so there won’t be any cries of, “Hey, I already saw that a second ago!” If I’m not explaining it well enough, watch the trailer above for details. The picture-in-picture shot is what you’ll see in the game; the “production fly” camera is there to give you an overall shot of the stadium (in this case, Minneapolis’ brand-new Target Field) from behind home plate. The PlayStation.Blog provides some more background information:
Once the ball clears the right field fence and the play ends, the jumbotron flashes “Joe” and the Real Time cameras cut to the dugout (out of fly cam view) as they react to Joe’s solo shot. Next, the Real Time cameras cut to Joe as he nears second base and follow him using different camera angles, as new animations blend to let him round the bases in continuous fashion. One more thing to notice would be the defensive players maneuvering into an extreme right shift in preparation for the next batter, Jim Thome.
It may sound inconsequential, but it’s this kind of attention to detail that helps The Show stand head and shoulders above all baseball games before it. I can’t wait to check out the full game in a few weeks: it’s due out on March 2nd for PS3, PSP, and PS2.
MLB 10: The Show – Real Time Presentation Mode [PlayStation.Blog]
