Tech Me Out to the Ball Game
A Super Baseball 2020 Review
Genre: Sports
Number of Players: 1-2
Developer: SNK/Pallas
Publisher: SNK
Release Date: September 20, 1991 (JP)
Platform: Switch
Also Available On: Arcade, Neo Geo AES, Neo Geo CD, Super Nintendo, Sega Genesis
With the 2025 MLB World Series currently underway, there’s no better time to take a look at Super Baseball 2020. Alright, technically, it’s 2020 Super Baseball, but I won’t sweat its government name. On September 20, 1991, SNK — famed developer of such blockbusters as Metal Slug and Aero Fighters — released their spin on America’s favorite pastime in arcades via the Neo Geo Multi Video System hardware.
About a month later, it was ported to the Neo Geo AES, and again in 1995 on the Neo Geo CD, among other home console ports. In recent years, the original game has again been made available on all modern platforms via Arcade Archives. With its futuristic setting, easy controls, and even easier gameplay rules, Super Baseball 2020 offered a level of enjoyment missing from baseball’s more realistic interpretation in video games.
There are 12 teams divided into two leagues (six teams in each league). Both leagues are internationally represented with teams like the Aussie Battlers and the Korean Dragons. Players are a mixture of men, women, and robots, though there are also gender-specific teams. If you want an all-female team, go with the Battle Angles. Prefer a team of robots? Select the Mechanical Brains. There are also a few all-male teams, naturally.
In this alternate reality of 2020, the average batter can easily knock the ball into the stands thanks to the power-assisted armor they wear. As a result, the homerun zone has been reduced to only the scoreboard area, which means that players must hit the ball dead center to have a chance at scoring a home run. There are also designated zones in the outfield to assist the defending fielders.
As the name implies, red stop zones will stop the ball dead in its tracks, no matter the velocity. Yellow jump zones increase the fielder’s ability to catch a high fly. One such zone is placed right in front of the home run zone, giving an outfielder a chance to bring a possible score for the opposing team to a devastating halt.
Teams earn money with each successful play they make. For outfielders, extra money is awarded for flashy plays, like jumping to catch a fly ball or diving to catch a line drive. What’s funny is that I never noticed the difference all these years until recently, when I noticed the computer-controlled teams almost always jump for the ball instead of just catching it the normal way.
As your money increases, you can purchase armor upgrades that augment fielding, batting, and pitching abilities. Each upgrade category is divided into three tiers, A through C, with increased effectiveness (and cost) the higher the alphabetical letter. The upgrades wear down over time, as evidenced by electrical sparks and later spewing flames from the player’s armor. This introduces an added layer of strategic planning when deciding when to upgrade and how many within a given inning, especially early in the game.
Explosive mines called “crackers” are placed on the field at random intervals between innings. They can be quite calamitous if an outfielder steps on one. While the mines won’t seriously harm anyone, they will get blown sky-high, and it’s hilarious to watch, especially when it happens to the other team.
All these futuristic trappings of baseball are nice and all. But underneath all that, how do the basic gameplay elements feel? Pretty darn good, actually. When at the plate, lining up your batter with the pitch is super easy since you are never locked into a position in the box, even after the ball leaves the pitcher’s mound. Hitting the ball gives a satisfying crack of the bat, although most batters seem to hit a lot of foul balls or pop flies into the hands of the opposing team.
Pitching is equally as easy in terms of controls. Move your pitcher to either side of the mound, then press the button to start the pitch animation. From there, you just need to hold a direction on the d-pad to determine the type of pitch before the ball leaves the mound. The degree of control you have of the ball as it sails to the plate depends on the stats of the pitcher (the lower the ERA stats, the better skilled the pitcher).
Meanwhile, fielding is more or less automatic half the time. Fielders are often perfectly placed to intercept anything but line drives or a fast, high-flying ball batted well above the reach of the fielder. However, you can still take direct control of your fielders to reposition them as needed when the ball is in play. Throwing to each base corresponds to the directional buttons on the control pad, making it fairly simple for fielders to get the ball where it needs to go.
As good as the overall gameplay elements are, Super Baseball 2020 isn’t without its problems. When trying to field a quick line drive or a ground ball, you can’t select a specific outfielder to go after it. Instead, several fielders in the general area will all chase after the ball. Also, the pitcher will sometimes chase a ground ball well into the outfield, leaving the bases open for the taking if there are runners on base.
There are other times when a ball may stop just inches from your first baseman, but he won’t budge to pick it up, forcing another fielder to waste precious time going infield to pick up the slack, resulting in missed opportunities for a double or triple play. Sometimes, throwing the ball is hampered by your fielders’ line of sight. For example, if a second baseman throws down to home plate, the ball will get cut off by the pitcher before it can reach its intended destination. It’s annoying and can potentially ruin a good run you may have been having up to that point.
No one wants to be hit by a wayward pitch, especially not one launched at 100+ MPH. If such is the fate of the batter, a medical drone descends and teleports the injured player off the plate, replacing them with a robot stand-in. I love the ambulance siren blaring as your player is taken off the field. After striking out, the person at bat might tilt their head in annoyance or break the bat in frustration. A robot pitcher falls apart on the mound if the opposing team scores a home run. These little extra touches helped this game to stand out from the typical baseball simulations of that time.
In addition to the releases on SNK’s Neo Geo platforms, Super Baseball 2020 was also ported to the Sega Genesis and Super NES. While not quite arcade-perfect on either of the 16-bit platforms, both come pretty close in some ways and fall short in others. What’s interesting is that both versions’ strengths and weaknesses are nearly opposite of each other.
Super Nintendo
Two years after the arcade release, Super Baseball 2020 made its way to the 16-bit home console front when Tradewest ported it to the Super Nintendo sometime in July 1993. This version is very similar to the arcade original in terms of visual presentation, with its vibrant colors and soundtrack (though slightly less bombastic with the music). However, the game deviates in a few notable areas.
Hitting the ball doesn’t feel quite as satisfying most times. Even when you visually see the ball flying full force outfield, the sound of contact with the bat doesn’t convey a convincing feeling that I smacked it into the stratosphere. It’s also strangely missing the explosive crackers, taking away one of the more unique aspects of the game that made it so appealing previously.
Gone too are the voice samples heard in the arcade version during closeups of the fielder catching a ball or when a pitcher throws a fastball, just to name a few. Also gone is the ambulance sequence when hit by a high-velocity ball. Sure, you can still get hit, but it’s sadly missing that comical flair of seeing the batter teleported off the field. Overall, the Super NES version looks pretty and plays alright. But it’s also a noticeably muted experience due to it missing those small details that gave the game more personality than most of its kind.
Sega Genesis
Three months after the Super NES release, the game was ported to the Sega Genesis with NuFX and Electronic Arts handling the programming and publishing, respectively. This was the version I was initially introduced to, sometime in the summer of 1995 on a late weekend afternoon. Coincidentally — or perhaps serendipitously — I went to a family friend’s house after playing softball at a nearby park. The son was already buddies with Big Brother and Big Sister, but this was my first time meeting him.
At the time, our family hadn’t had a modern game system in the house since the early ‘90s, so I would always take advantage of even the most minuscule of moments I could spend playing a video game in the wild. All that to say, I jumped at the chance when our friend offered to let me play Super Baseball 2020! It was a fun first-time experience that left a big enough impression for Big Brother and me to remember when we got our Genesis (mine) and Super NES (Big Brother’s) and subsequently purchased both versions of the game.
With the benefit of having played both the arcade original and the Super NES version over the years, I must concede that the graphics on the Genesis aren’t the greatest. The color palette is rather drab and washed out compared to the other versions. Where the audio presentation held up pretty well on the Super NES, the Genesis version doesn’t fare as well.
It’s immediately noticeable when you hear the music after starting a match. The main themes barely resemble those of the arcade original. The instruments sound like a jumbled mess of synths and drum beats. It doesn’t ruin the game, but it’s not the Genesis’ finest hour in the sound department.
However, it is much more faithful to the arcade version aesthetically. The intermittent setting of crackers between innings is there. The ambulance beaming up the batter smited by a pitch is present and accounted for. The sound cues of the athletes’ grunts and exhalations when performing high-intensity moves are here as well. From a gameplay standpoint, I would consider the Genesis port as the one most faithful to the original.
In conclusion…
Overall, Super Baseball 2020 is a fun sports game, no matter your platform of choice. The controls are easy to learn, there are enough unique features to keep each match interesting, and none of these changes were so over the top that they would drastically alienate the average player. It’s fast-paced and doesn’t feel like it’s dragging on indefinitely. If you like baseball but don’t feel like being bogged down with the simulation rules of the sport, this game is your ticket to enjoyment.
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I haven’t tried this Arcade Archives release, have only played this on SNES. I agree that it’s a cool game, and I remember enjoying it as a rental as a kid.
I’m a fan of this sort of rules innovation in video game sports. I took my boy to a Banana Ball game (Savannah Bananas) and I’m thinking now there needs to be an official video game adaptation of those rules.
However, I notice that when I play retro baseball games in emulation these days, I’m really bad at batting. Far worse than when I was a kid, on basically every console. I’m not sure to what degree this is being caused by small levels of input lag or my own slowing reflexes. But I don’t generally notice much of a problem in other genres with my emulation setup.
Super Baseball 2020 emulated on SNES stands out to me as a game that’s sort of ruined because my hitting is so bad.
Have you noticed this at all?