The newest edition of “Road to the Show” is paved with gender diversity, and for some fans of the video game franchise “MLB: The Show,” it is a foul ball.
New wrinkles designed to tap potential customers are at the heart of every consumer experience, and so “MLB The Show 24” came out with “Road the Show: Women Pave Their Way.”
The marketing approach is obvious in a promotional trailer in which a young woman who has dreams of playing baseball lives them out through the game, then stuffs the game in a backpack with a bat poking out from it.
“For the first time ever, you can create and play as a female ballplayer, with a unique Road to the Show story that evolves with the player over the course of your career,” The Show posted on its website.
Would you play this game?
“This path will include all existing features of Road to the Show with the addition of a unique-to-women storyline following a lifelong friendship as it develops in professional baseball,” the site said.
The experiment in niche marketing struck out, several Twitter posters declared.
Imagine Barbara Bonds hitting 80 home runs in a single season 😂 this is so pathetic
— Lofti Pixels (@loftipixels) March 5, 2024
Why does Sony have a thing for releasing loser after loser product?
— 🇺🇲🇮🇱Jewish New Yorker (@JBmode27) March 5, 2024
They’ll do everything but fix the 100’s of glaring issues with the game
— Aaron Thetires (Alpha Male) (@HooLeeFucc) March 5, 2024
Why does #MLBTheShow24 have to be invaded with a WOKE gimmick. If anything, they could have developed a softball sim game. Looks like #SweetBabyInc got their nasty hands on sports too. Even though I have #XboxGamePass, I won’t be downloading 24. https://t.co/ajAXFFcmGC
— TeknoBlast (@TeknoBlast) March 7, 2024
Outkick’s Ian Miller offered a less-than-enthusiastic commentary about the venture.
“Obviously, this is a very common career path for women, especially considering that the average fastball velocity around the league has now reached 94mph,” he wrote.
“It’s unclear whether or not the game will depict female pitchers as being capable of throwing upwards of 100mph or say, hitting 470 foot home runs like Aaron Judge.”
Miller called the game “a confusing addition to a video game that’s come [into] criticism based on its graphical performance being stuck on the previous generation of consoles.”
“Was there a massive demand for spending valuable hours building this new feature into the game at the expense of other, more realistic, changes?” he wrote, adding one last dig.
“MLB better hope that the developers didn’t lean too far into the realism by incorporating the league’s new see-through pants for its female characters.”
