The Show has three cover athletes too
Sony are shoveling coal into the boilers on the MLB The Show 25 hype train. A few tiny details promising changes to Diamond Dynasty got announced back in November, but the tone was a bit vague and apologetic. This week, we got the cover athletes reveal:
Three young stars will stand together on the cover: Paul Skenes, Elly De La Cruz, and Gunnar Henderson. This is the first The Show game to have multiple athletes on the same cover (several had different cover athletes for different regions or special editions).
I’m no graphic designer, but this cover art feels rough to me, instinctually. I didn’t think it was the final product at first. The three different action shots from games overlaid on each other screamed “placeholder,” but that doesn’t seem to be the case.
Last year’s art also featured an action shot from a game, not something new from a photo studio. I didn’t love the little clip art icons floating everywhere, but at least overall the texture had a Dominican town vibe, which I think it was going for. It certainly helps them that Vlad Jr. was so good last year, really justifying his spot on the cover.
This year’s art is going for “road” as a theme, I think, as in the Road to the Show mode. There are chevrons everywhere that look like either traffic sign arrows or tire treads depending on how they’re used. I think the main issue is the three players look so disconnected. Prospi covers struggle with this because by the licensing agreement with NPB, they have to have 12 different players on the cover (if they have any) so the teams are equally represented. But that doesn’t stop them from putting some art into how the players get arranged. Here, it just looks like three Photoshop layers and some shadows added in-between.
The choice of cover athletes is fine at least. None of the three are especially nationally famous, but they’re undoubtedly three of the best young players in the league. Skenes I think could have justified holding the cover by himself, and I don’t think anyone would have been surprised to see Elly on there after Jazz and Vlad the last two years. Apologies to Gunnar, who’s a fantastic player but a bit too white bread to communicate “young and exciting.” In eight years he might be a great cover athlete in the Joe Mauer mold.
College teams in The Show?
The most interesting thing about the cover is a tiny detail next to Skenes’ shoulder: An LSU logo on the cover of an MLB game. It’s part of a design element showing which teams the three cover guys played for, but… They wouldn’t have an LSU logo on the cover unless LSU is licensed in-game, right?
The early description of the game on the PlayStation Store hints similarly: “Ignite your passion and build your path to greatness, from high school right to the Hall of Fame.”
My guess: This will be similar to NBA 2K games from 5-10 years ago: A limited selection of licensed college programs will be playable for a new college step of Road to the Show. And then I’d bet there will be unlockable jerseys and maybe some “legend” player cards in Diamond Dynasty for each of those colleges.
They could prove me wrong! College Football 25 rode the NIL rule change and a patient dev cycle to become the best-selling sports video game in U.S. history. So if you’re fighting with producers arguing to put more effort into college sports, you have a lot of ammo on your side now. But I’m guessing this will not be a major new college franchise mode a la American Eikan Nine, and it may not even have any real-name college athletes in it.
Release details
Quietly, this announcement also confirmed the game will be on PlayStation 5, Xbox Series X|S, and Switch only. No more PS4 or Xbox One. And apparently no PC. The game will also not be on Game Pass in 2025. No more making Sony players feel like idiots for paying full freight.
Oh, and they announced you can buy a shirt with the game logo and cover athletes on it. If the game is just another regular entry in the series, this would just be a dorky shirt. But if it’s a legendarily great or terrible game, I’d die to own this shirt. If a stupid lanyard with NBA Elite 11 on it can be sold for $250, a shirt for a bad baseball game could go even higher.
YouTube Viewing Guide
- When a baseball YouTuber with more than 100,000 subscribers plays MLB Power Pros, it’s an event. Jolly Olive gave the game a good two hours on stream. Props to him for capturing a live console to do it too.
- HardBall II in the Accolade Sports Collection (Switch) Gameplay – I was lucky enough to get a pre-release copy of Accolade Sports Collection, a collection of old sports games by Accolade for DOS and Genesis. I used HardBall II‘s team editor feature to make Nintendo and PlayStation character teams and had them square off.
- Choujin Ultra Baseball: Action Card Battle (3DS) Gameplay – Can’t say I was too aware that the series called Baseball Simulator 1.000 in North America had a Japan-only strategy baseball game with cards. I enjoyed this one, though some Japanese reading ability is a must.
- MLB The Show 10 (PSP) Gameplay – Sure, nowadays you get Switch versions of big sports games. But it’s still impressive to relive the magic of a fully-featured The Show game on a PlayStation Portable.