Another look at APBA GO (with screenshots)

Hi Fans, 

I’ve taken another look at APBA Baseball’s new online game called APBA GO. Why?  The APBA Games Company have announced that the 2018 World Series teams are now available for free for a limited time.  

“Now Available! The 2018 World Series Teams – You can now play the 2018 World Series teams (Boston Red Sox and the LA Dodgers) for free! 

Remember the 2017 World Series teams will no longer be free after November 30th. “

from https://baseball.apbago.com 

Logging into APBA GO, I noticed that I still had last year’s World Series teams, the 2017 Houston Astros and the 2017 Los Angeles Dodgers in my repository.  Of course, I wanted to see the new cards of the two new teams so I chose the 2018 Dodgers and Red Sox.  So what the heck?  Let’s play a game!  

Once you click “Play Ball”, you get a couple of options.  You can play solitaire either by managing for both teams or taking on an AI manager.  You can compete against another APBA fan too or issue an open challenge.  Finally, there is an option for Tournaments for multiple opponents and a more complicated structure.  I opted to manage the Red Sox against the default AI manager who had the Dodgers.

APBA GO is NOT APBA Baseball for Windows (BBW) nor does it pretend to be.  If anything, it is a dice version of the Basic Game formatted for the computer.  BBW is loosely based on the APBA Baseball Master Game which allows for decisions which affect baserunning, steals, defense and other facets of the game and APBA GO does not provide for that. 

APBA GO will display the batter’s card (if you want) and will display a graphical display of each dice roll (again, if you want).  The simple result (such as, “Single to left”) is provided along with the dice roll overlayed on top of the depiction of the field with those players currently involved in play.  

Interactive play seemed relatively intuitive.  It was nice to have the familiar APBA card staring me in the face as I rolled (or “pitched”).   Overall, the gameplay was pretty quick.  Interestingly, the game paused when there was a decision to be made (like a pinch-hitter to be decided on).  

The graphic look and feel is a little more modern than BBW’s which always struck me as stuck in the 1990s.  That said, most APBA fans are more concerned about substance rather than style.  

To put things in perspective, here is the pricing model for APBA GO:

APBA is selling GTOP sets, World Series sets.  Prices of past seasons are generally $20 and individual teams are $3.00 each.  

One caveat:  Not too surprisingly, you must be online, for the game to work.  This actually affected me.  I was playing the game at my favorite coffeeshop where I spend most of my “APBA Blog time”.  The cafe’s wi-fi cut out just as I brought in J.D. Martinez as a pinch-hitter.  That froze the game (see left).  The wi-fi came back online in 5 minutes and I needed to announce J.D. as the pinch hitter again and all was well.  

Overall, I enjoyed the game.  If I was playing against someone else, I might it even more. I generally like tabletop APBA, in person APBA better.  It’s why I play.  Before I forget, I have to mention there is a chat feature which is integrated in the dice result window (“Yo, that 44-6 on Martinez is dope!”).  

Like I said, this is not APBA Baseball for Windows.  Those who do play BBW (in leagues or solo) will miss the complexities of the game.  A good analogy is asking a seasoned Master Game player to play the Basic Game. That said, if you’re looking for a quick way to play the dice game remotely and online, it’s a solid choice.  Like with any product in today’s world, it will depend on the adoption by APBA fans.  If fans flock to it, APBA GO will succeed.  

So give it a try.  You must register at APBA GO but there is no cost to play with the 2018 LA Dodgers and the Boston Red Sox.  

Here are some screenshots from Boston’s 7-1 win over LA.