BREAKING... (The official RBI '14 Thread)

[Beefjerky26]

I'm thinking maybe Red Baron. Who looks like the most powerful hitter in this game? Edwin Encarnarcion takes the cake for me. That's a fearsome back to back duo, Batista and Encarnarcion.

[BeefMaster]

I think Miguel Cabrera homered the first two times I faced him, so I am leaning toward him, but Encarnacion does hit the snot out of the ball.  Chris Davis theoretically should be high on the list, but I haven't faced the Orioles enough times to see his big power displays.

On the Twins, Alex Presley is the guy who I hit the most homers with compared to how many I'd expect him to hit.  Chris Parmelee has pretty decent power as well.

Note that neither of them should be on the Twins' roster - they were both waived during Spring Training, with Presley getting claimed by the Pirates and Parmelee making it through to AAA (he's back with the Twins now thanks to a series of injuries).  We're at the point where I'm not positive whether the roster update should be Opening Day or All-Star Break rosters - the Twins' Opening Day roster would contain Jason Kubel, who was released, and Aaron Hicks, who was so bad that they sent him all the way down to AA.

[Beefjerky26]

There are inconsistencies with many teams right now, since there hasn't been a roster update, on the iphone, at least.

Davis is theoretically more powerful, but he doesn't scare me as much. The right field porch at Camden Yards is perfectly tailored for his swing, so he probably wouldn't have hit as many if he played at say, Target Field. Man, that's a terrible name for a baseball field.

[BeefMaster]

Also, I just completed the World Series in my season with the Twins, and the "Win the postseason without losing a game" achievement didn't trigger despite the fact that I went 11-0 in the postseason.  I also didn't get the achievement for making it to the postseason.  Achievements are silly, but still...

Decided to fire this game back up the other day and go for some of the RBI Challenges - I'd already done the Twins' while going through the season, and over the last few days I've finished the Rays (8K in 5IP), Royals (come back from 4 runs down), Reds (4 HR in one game), and just finished the Blue Jays (8K/5IP) over lunch.  The achievement for 5 RBI Challenges was not triggered; apparently achievements in general are broken on my game (the last one I got was in May, for the first RBI Challenge I finished).

[BeefMaster]

Also, the roster update + online play scheduled for "end of summer" never materialized.  I am assuming it was abandoned and will be sending an email to ask about it, but I am guessing it will get no response.

[BeefMaster]

FYI for Xbox owners: RBI '14 is half-off through Xbox Deals with Gold on both Xbox One and Xbox 360.  $10 is much less egregious a cost for this game, particularly given the fact that they never delivered online play.

[BeefMaster]

CONFIRMED: Online multiplayer ain't gonna happen.

Thank you for your inquiry. Unfortunately multiplayer and updated rosters will not be coming to R.B.I. 14 for the Xbox 360 due to technical issues. We apologize for the inconvenience and value your passion for the game.

Regarding your question about achievements, we have been unsuccessful in replicating the behavior that you have reported, however, we will continue to investigate the behavior in an attempt to identify the cause.

[Turd]

Gah! What a craptastic little nugget of info.  They freakin' dropped the ball, no pun intended.

[TempoGL]

- As mentioned above, the tag animation is really slow.  Expect a lot of "OH COME ON!" reactions on close plays.

[BeefMaster]

 

[Gantry]

Griffey is one of those games I never really played much, remember once at Satori's house in high school and that's it.  Does the game still hold up? 

[BeefMaster]

Played a TON of it in college (we had an SNES but not an NES).  It holds up quite nicely, and it was one of the last baseball games with the old-school feel of NES games like RBI and Baseball Stars, until RBI '14 showed up.

Gameplay-wise, Griffey was almost as simple as RBI - two-button gameplay, same set of commands for sending/holding runners, same basic pitching setup other than the lack of a drop ball.  The big difference was fielding - you only controlled one fielder at a time, and the camera was really zoomed-in.  Fortunately, there was a radar in the corner that tracked the ball, the player you controlled, and the projected spot where a fly ball would drop, and it wasn't too hard to get decent at it once you figured out how to use the radar.

The game was made back in the era when games would often get either the MLB or MLBPA license, but not both, and this one just had MLB, so the only "real" player in the game was Griffey.  Players were modeled on existing players and had real stats, and there was a "team editor" mode that allowed you to change their names, so you could put in the real player names if you really wanted to.  The fake names often had a team theme (the Twins were classic film actors; the Mets, I think, were musicians), so it was sometimes entertaining to just leave the fake names in place.

One of the things that helped me warm to RBI '14 was to realize that it was more of a spiritual successor to Griffey than to the original RBI - the fielding, especially, was a lot more Griffey-like.

[Gantry]

So is it good for both two and one player modes?  I recall a home run derby

[BeefMaster]

There is a home run derby mode, which I think always takes place in Camden Yards (the game was based on the '93 season, and that's where the All-Star game was that year).

Single-player is good - computer doesn't cheat, but it also has really competent AI, and it won't screw up in the field or run itself into outs.  Unlike with RBI 1-3 (where you can take advantage of out-of-place fielders) or RBI '14 (where the Retreat makes your team way more powerful), there's no magic bullet you can use to win games, so you'll still lose occasionally even when you've figured out what you're doing.

It's a spectacular two-player game, right up there with RBI.

[ryno]

I played multiple seasons on that game  with the cubs and tigers.   

I still play it and super batter up