This has been the best baseball game of this generation every year, but there's nothing new in this version.
The main thing that MLB: The Show seems to have done in recent years is to add more and more different ways to control the game. It seems like every year, there's a new default pitching meter or way of batting. But, to be honest, these core mechanics were fine to begin with, and really didn't need to be changed. Having more options is nice in the abstract but, I suspect, to most gamers it will mean nothing. The average MLB: The Show purchaser has likely had the game before, and they have an established favorite among the two or three options.
One area where the game could have used some improvement is franchise mode progression and player scouting. To its credit, MLB 13 did attempt to overhaul its scouting system. To be honest, however, it didn't do a perfect job of it. Scouting is confusing and needlessly difficult, and the payoff is quite small versus letting the computer simply draft for you. One problem with this game's conception of scouting, which may be realistic but is not at all fun, is that many of the players you scout won't show up in the draft at all. That is because some of them are too young or choose not to leave school. To be sure, this is realistic; players drafted out of high school go to college, and those in college choose to stay for one more season. Nonetheless, it's very frustrating to see these players fall through the cracks, and a more streamlined scouting system could at least tell you which players seemed likely to enter the draft. Or, to make it even more realistic, the game would truly replicate real life, and a team would be allowed to draft a high school player and attempt to sign them, taking on the risk that they would decline to sign and cost the team a wasted draft pick.
Ultimately, since this is the single biggest change I noticed from MLB 12 to MLB 13, and since -- to put it in baseball terms -- the game takes a big hack and whiffs, I have to downgrade this game's rating since last year. I hope that next year will provide a more compelling experience in franchise mode, and that with the move to the next generation of consoles, the developer will finally streamline and cut down some of the many, many useless options or modes that have accumulated over time.