MLB: The Show
MLB: The Show is a Major League Baseball video game series produced by SIE San Diego Studio, a development team that is part of SIE Worldwide Studios. The series has received critical and commercial acclaim, and since 2014 has been the sole baseball simulation video game on the market.
The series debuted in 1997 with MLB '98 for the PlayStation. There has been a new release in the series every year since 1997, though the series did not adopt "The Show" subtitle until 2006, after ten entries.
The first eight entries in the series—through MLB 2005—were released on the PlayStation, with MLB 2005 among the final releases for the PlayStation. The series was released on PlayStation 2 from 2003's MLB 2004 through 2011's ' and was available on the PlayStation 3 from ' through MLB The Show 16. The series is currently released exclusively on PlayStation 4 consoles, with the mobile versions of the game being shelved after the release of . Every entry in the series from MLB 2006 had been released for either the PlayStation Portable or PlayStation Vita.
After over two decades of exclusivity with PlayStation consoles and five years as the sole baseball simulation on the console market, on December 9, 2019, it was announced that MLB: The Show will cease to be an exclusive PlayStation franchise, and will be released on the Xbox One and Nintendo Switch platforms in the future, though the edition of the game in development at the time—MLB The Show 20—would be a PlayStation 4 exclusive.
Gameplay
Gameplay simulates a typical game of baseball, with the player controlling an entire team or a select player. The player may take control of one of 30 Major League Baseball teams in any game mode and use that team in gameplay. The Series has variable game modes in which a player takes control of a team for a single game, one season, or a franchise.Games
Commentators
Reception and sales
Year | Game | Sales |
1997 | MLB '98 | |
1998 | MLB '99 | |
1999 | MLB 2000 | |
2000 | MLB 2001 | |
2001 | MLB 2002 | |
2002 | MLB 2003 | |
2003 | MLB 2004 | 660,000 |
2004 | MLB 2005 | 900,000 |
2005 | MLB 2006 | 400,000 |
2006 | ' | 940,000, 350,00 |
2007 | ' | 930,000, 280,000, 280,000 |
2008 | ' | 420,000, 700,000, 330,000 |
2009 | ' | 330,000, 720,000, 270,000 |
2010 | ' | 410,000, 730,000, 210,000 |
2011 | ' | 130,000, 590,000, 180,000 |
2012 | ' | 930,000, 200,000 |
2013 | ' | 840,000, 150,000 |
2014 | ' | 430,000, 730,000, 120,000 |
2015 | ' | 400,000, 1.01 million, 40,000 |
2016 | MLB The Show 16 | 380,000, 960,000 |
2017 | MLB The Show 17 | 1.16 million |
2018 | MLB The Show 18 | 1.06 million |
2019 | MLB The Show 19 | |
2020 | MLB The Show 20 |