MLB 2K6 Hands-On

Baseball fans--real baseball fans--are amateur statisticians at heart. They like nothing better than analyzing the pitch frequencies of middle-relief hurlers during night games in August, or arguing over which Kansas City Royals outfielder likes to chase balls high and away the most. For years, baseball video games have sought to satiate the stat geeks with detailed stat-tracking over numerous categories. All previous console efforts will likely pale in comparison to 2K Sports' upcoming MLB 2K6, a game that looks to take stats-tracking to an entirely new level. We got a hands-on demo of the game, courtesy of the folks at 2K, and came away impressed with what we've seen so far.

Inside Edge scouting will give the inside info when facing batters...

The two biggest areas of statistical focus are the integrated Inside Edge scouting technology and a VIP system that has exploded in detail since last year's ESPN MLB 2K5. We've seen a bit about how the Inside Edge scouting service makes its way into the game in a previous preview, but today was our first look at exactly how it has been implemented for both pitchers and batters. We were also introduced to the many ways effective scouting can benefit you.

Inside Edge is a scouting service used by MLB teams to provide incredibly detailed and accurate scouting reports on every team and player in the big leagues. With the introduction of the Inside Edge service to MLB 2K6, the 2K Sports team has collected three years of hard scouting data on every player and team in order to give you some of the most detailed scouting reports ever seen in a baseball game. You'll be able to make use of Inside Edge services both in quick pickup games against the artificial intelligence-controlled opponents, and in the franchise mode. In quick games, you'll have 350 Inside Edge points to spend on scouting particular players. Certain players will cost more to scout than others, depending on their position and skill. A starting pitcher, for example, might cost more than 100 points, while you'll only need to shell out around 50 points for a middle reliever. With 350 points to spend, you'll want to make sure you spend wisely. You'll typically want to scout the starter on the other side, and a handful of their most dangerous batters as well.

Once you have your chosen players scouted, it's time to enter the game. When facing scouted batters while on the mound, your catcher will be calling for pitches. He'll call the pitch type and, based on the location of his glove, he'll give you an idea of where he wants it to land. By illuminating his requested pitch, your catcher will even let you know if he wants the pitch in or out of the strike zone. Assuming your catcher can call a good game, you have the choice of either taking his advice or ignoring it altogether. Look out though--just because the catcher is calling the shots, doesn't mean you'll hit your mark. Defensive alignments will also shift automatically to coincide with a scouted batter's placement tendencies.

When you're in the batter's box, facing a scouted pitcher will give you information on his ball-placement tendencies, as well as percentage numbers on each pitch in his arsenal. The higher the percentage, the more likely he is to throw that pitch in a given situation. It's important to note that all the percentages are completely dynamic based on strike count and the number of men on base, and it will change throughout a single at-bat.

…and is a great way to check out a pitcher's tendencies as well.

As handy as Inside Edge services are when playing pickup games, they are even more valuable when in MLB 2K6's franchise mode. Here, the number of points you have available to you for scouting is a function of how large your overall team budget is. Just as in the real big leagues, scouting services come from the same money pool that player and staff salaries are drawn from. So while it may be tempting to buy full reports on every club out there, it's just not conceivable financially. To add more depth to the system, some teams are more expensive to scout than others. A full team report on the Oakland A's, for example, will run you about $870,000. Scouting the Yankees, on the other hand, will set you back a cool $1.14 million. Luckily, you don't need to scout an entire team to benefit from the services available. You can choose to only scout pitchers, or just batters, or just the stars on a team. You can even pick and choose which players you wish to scout on an individual basis. Smart players will quickly figure out that they'll need to spend the majority of their budgets on teams within their own division, while also saving up enough cash in reserve to scout playoff teams should your team make the postseason.

In all, Inside Edge looks to add an entirely new set of depth, strategy, and realism to MLB 2K6. But it's really only half the statistical story here. After all, it's all well and good to use the Inside Edge services to scout AI-controlled teammates. But what about those times when you take the game online and face real-life opponents? 2K6 has you covered there as well, thanks to an incredibly in-depth VIP system that tracks practically every conceivable player statistic and tendency. Consider this partial list as a representative sample:

• Swing timing
• Outfield/infield shift usage
• Substitutions by position
• Pinch-hit frequency
• Bull pen usage
• Runs scored for and against
• Pickoff attempts
• Pitch guess tendencies
• Pitch location tendencies
• Pitch selection