Baseball Stars is my favorite game ever. I can't believe that in the past 14 years no one has managed to build upon the groundwork that Baseball Stars laid for a baseball franchise. The control that you have over your team including the hiring and firing is unparalleled by any game to date. When I was younger I would spend hours beating The Lovely Ladies over and over trying to save up enough cash to upgrade my clean-up hitter. Occasionally I'll still pick up this game and get hooked for a week or so. Best baseball game ever, hands down.

You have to wonder how a game of this quality came around so early. It is obviously the most thought out and replayable NES game ever. I remember getting deeply involved in this game trying to keep my average around .400. Of course I made myself in the game as well as my cousins, and together we would take on the computer or each other. You may not know this, but Soda and I both grew up playing baseball so there is special connection to this game that to this day I have yet to feel with another baseball game.

I had my cousins and myself in this game as well. Eventually though I ran out of cousin's names and had my cat catching and my dog playing right field. I'll tell you what, my cat could freaking slug. For this NES the graphics in this game were pretty sweet as well. The pitching motions were pretty fluid and it was the first game that I can remember that included different arm angles for the pitcher. Additionally this was the first game that I can remember having the ability to dive for a foul ball or climb the fence trying to bring back a homerun ball. One thing that was lacking was the MLBPA license though. There were no real teams included in the game and what replaced them was a very odd cast of characters. Oc casionally a team would have one or two girls on it, but there was also the all girl team, The Lovely Ladies. The girls were kind of funny. You could bean them with the ball and they would fall down and cry. When you're nine that never gets old.

First of all the diving and leaping the game had was gold. I remember bringing back homeruns with a leap at the wall. As far as game play is concerned the game was smooth. The pitching and batting were tight all the way around. The field however seemed like it was a mile long, but your guys could run down the deep fly ball with relative ease. The ladies teams were classic, but my favorite was the Ghastly Monsters team. Everyone on the Ghastly Monsters had the name of some old school horror flick. I mean how much does it suck to have to pitch against Jason batting clean up. I would hate to be the coach and have to post the starting line up for that team…shit you will literally get a knife in you back.

No kidding I can see it now, "Allright Jason, we're looking to up the defense for today so we're going with Cyclops for the start." Seconds later the sound of a chainsaw firing up fills the clubhouse. Also cool in Baseball Stars was the team called the American Dreams. They were the best team by a mile and were all named after some baseball greats. Lou, Babe and Joe were all players on this team. One thing about the game that really bothered me is when the view switched from the batters box to the field. All the girls would turn into boys. At nine years old I wasn't quite prepared for a subliminal sex-change lesson.

You want to know the best thing about this game…it was not a home run derby, hell you were lucky to park one out the mile long centerfield. The game was a true to form baseball sim. No crap to deal with, just you and your team in a league. You were able to raise your player's stats and help bring you team home some jack. I am so disappointed in the lack of any good baseball games now. It really is frustrating to get a new baseball game it be some homerun derby or a game that is so out of control you cant do jack crap. I tell you what I really want for a change, Baseball stars repackaged with a MLBPA license. I guarantee that it will sell like hotcakes and be a damn good game. I suggest to the new game developers to build upon the foundation of Baseball Stars. Everything about the game was great, from batting to pitching to fielding. Long live SNK and Baseball Stars!