Eikan Nine coming to smartphones and home consoles
Konami has announced another new Pawapuro spin-off game (link in Japanese), this time a free-to-play version of the Eikan Nine mode. The game is expected this summer on Japanese smartphones, and on home consoles at an undetermined future date, similar to the already-existing Success Special free-to-play game.
Eikan Nine is a high school manager mode with some board game elements. Eikan means “championship laurels,” what you presumably get for winning the Koushien national high school baseball tournament. This would be the second Eikan Nine-only game in the Pawapuro series, after Nettou! Powerful Koushien for the Nintendo DS.
The Eikan Nine mode looks impenetrable at first if you don’t have much Japanese reading ability. But put in a little bit of time and it’s a lot of fun even for English-only players. There’s no mode like it in western baseball games: Imagine an infinite franchise mode with player recruitment similar to the old NCAA Football games, plus some light baseball management and fun strategies for increasing the abilities of your players.
I’m sure it’s been talked about on this site before, but the Koushien national high school baseball tournament is huge in Japan, similar to March Madness in the U.S. eBaseball Powerful Pro Yakyuu and eBaseball Pro Yakyuu Spirits both have dedicated high school modes despite being “pro baseball” games.
A note about Out of the Park Baseball 24 on Steam Deck
I noticed that Out of the Park Baseball 24 is listed as “Unsupported” for Steam Deck. Well, I own OOTP 24, and I own a Steam Deck, and the game runs great on Steam Deck. It is a mouse-driven game, so you will have to use the trackpad for mousing around the menus. But that’s really not so bad. I can think of no other issues and I’ve gone through multiple seasons now so, yeah, I don’t know. I’m mystified. If you’re looking for a baseball management game on Steam Deck, this is the one.
An A’s Accomplishment
Speaking of, in my latest game I managed to win the first wild card as the 2024 Oakland Athletics. Rookie Zach Gelof came a hit away from a batting title, Shintaro Fujinami pitched like an ace, and deadline acquisitions Jose Abreu and Luis Robert provided just enough punch to the lineup.
It’s a lot of fun, but also makes me wonder if the game is a bit too easy somehow. In Football Manager I will get my head kicked in sometimes, but in Out of the Park I can take just about anybody and make them a strong contender within two seasons.
The new features around “hard mode” trades seem to be backfiring for some reason. Previously, you could use the “Make this work now!” button to see a list of players who would make the trade palatable for the CPU, if any single additional player would tip the scales. Now it’s basically the same system, except you have to send an offer and then wait a day to get the list of “make this work now” players sent to you. It feels like even when the computer gives a “No Way!” response, they’re pretty open and reasonable, giving a list of reasonable value players to help make a trade work.
It’s always hard to tell since scouting has a fog of war to it, and maybe five years later the players you trade away will come back to bite you. But it sure seems like in the new OOTP, the best strategy is to keep doing positive-value trades. Find a player you like from another team, send some kind of basic skeleton of an offer for them, and then wait for the “one more player” list from your fellow GM. Half the time they’ll ask for some 1.5 star nobody prospect that you can send over. Just keep trading and reap the profits.
More real-life names confirmed for Super Mega Baseball 4
It remains announcements season for Super Mega Baseball 4, and we’re getting to know a little more about the game’s MLB alumni, or legends. The above video, while it doesn’t name a ton of new names (Ron Gant, Willie Mays, Brad Ziegler, and a few others), does show off the main menu and give a clearer picture of your options for playing with and without the legends.
Baseball Card Collector… by Konami?
I stumbled across this piece of computer software called Baseball Card Collector the other day. Okay, sure, there are plenty of these, but what’s that logo down in the bottom left corner? Konami?! The company that makes half the games I cover on this site?
I will have to buy a copy of this and then work hard on some DOSBox magic to see what it’s like. I suspect it won’t be too exciting, and it’s clearly not a “game” at all, but I have to have it.