The Eddie Cramm, Senior Designer for MLB 09, has posted some new information regarding the training modes that will accompany MLB 09 on the Playstation Blog.
"When all of this RTTS stuff started 3 years ago, the whole idea behind it was to give a unique career mode experience that focused exclusively on you. Initially that meant that we would fast-forward you to your events so that you only dealt with your fielding plays and your plate appearances, etc. Because lets be honest, who wants to sit out in RF during a career mode and watch three groundballs to the infield. It sucked in little league and it sucks in a career mode, too. But as RTTS progressed, our focus grew to be more than that. It became more about giving the user more control of his path to the majors."
"Last year really took a huge step in the goals and points system. The guys on the front-end team like Aaron Luke, Kolbe Launchbaugh, and Jeff Ullman have built a pretty nifty system."
There are two types of training. Batting training and Base Stealing.
Batting
You get 20 pitches in a training session, and you basically get to decide what you want your player to work on. If you want to work on bunting, you can do that. If you'd rather work on your power and contact, you can do that too... They've alleviated the need to pick what type of batting practice you have. You go in and do what you want.
Base Stealing
In this training, you will have full control of how far you take a lead and when you decide to take off. You have free reign to get a great jump or totally screw it up and get picked off. That's only half of it. New A.I. and pitcher animations have been added so that he will do his best to keep you off-balance, like mix up his pickoff moves to give you different looks or even slide-step to the plate to try to get an advantage.
Head over to the
MLB '09 pictures area to check out the new screenshots!