Baseball Highlights 2045 looks like a good system but being 2 players and a sports game I knew I wouldn’t get to play it much.
Luckily, there is a digital version.
American baseball was on its last legs as a spectator sport. Football had become the predominant national pastime — that is until the year 2032, the year baseball decided to revolutionize the game and regain the throne!
Baseball Highlights 2045 Game Play
This is just a very brief general gameplay overview.
Players have a deck of 15 cards representing their team of robots, cyborgs and human players. This deck is shuffled and 6 are drawn as that player’s lineup. Each of these cards represents an inning and as all of these cards are played, a game will last 6 innings.
So on your turn, you choose and play a card which affects both you, and your opponent so several things will happen.
First, if the card has an immediate action it is triggered. These have game effects like ‘Pick Off’ which removes one of your opponent’s base runners, represented by pawns.
After you play a card, your opponent then activates the ‘Hits’ shown card they played on their previous turn. These can be singles, doubles, triples, home runs or sometimes multiple hits, such as 3 singles.
For each hit, pawns are moved around a diamond just like baseball and any that make it ‘home’ score. The players have different speeds represented by different colour pawns and those that are faster move more around the bases.
So, this means that the card you play is both your Pitcher/Fielder and your at Bat card.
There are other baseball things like pinch hitters etc that I know little about in the real world but can all be used effectively in the game.
Free Agents
After an innings is over and a winner has been declared, players have a chance to buy free agents which are more powerful cards. For each card you buy, you send one of your other players to the minor leagues. (In other words, remove that card from the game)
The money you have comes from cards you played during the innings.
Then a new game with the new and improved deck of cards is played. The winner of a best of 7 series wins the game
Theme
Future Baseball!
I like the idea that they just gave up and allowed robots and cyborgs in the game. They have their positives and negatives, they’re not just superhuman. They’re generally slower at running but hit harder… You have to balance your squad.
Baseball Highlights 2045 Summary
First up, I like the game but I do have two issues that are not the game’s fault. The first is that I don’t get to play 2-player games too often, The second is the sports theme will put almost everyone I know off the game.
The closest game I have to this is Blood Bowl Team Manager, mostly because it’s a sports card game and I can’t think of anything else.
But there is a lot to like about Baseball Highlights 2045. Balancing offence vs defence where every card you play needs to account for both.
It’s cool to hit a home run but if your opponent played a triple and you can change that to a walk… You have to right? Too defensive and you don’t score enough, too offensive and you get out hit…
It’s a good fun game and while I would never get a physical version to the table, the digital version will live on my iPad for a long, long time.
Jesta ThaRogue