It seems that the PlayStation exclusive series MLB The Show will be coming to Xbox in the future. Ardent baseball fans have long been allegiant to Sony because of The Show’s exclusivity on PlayStation. Last years MLB The Show 19 was well reviewed and regarded as the best in its class, but now, the world’s most renowned baseball series seems poised to be coming to a much larger audience.
A decade ago, there were several competing baseball games. EA Sports had the MVP Baseball games from 2003 to 2007. MLB 2K ran from 2005 to 2013. These franchises came from two of the worlds biggest video game publishers as well in Electronic Arts and Take-Two. By 2013, however, The Show had eclipsed its competitors in quality by so much that they essentially monopolized the market. In recent years, the third-party alternative to The Show has been R.B.I. Baseball; an admittedly frustrating and low quality series. The most serious of baseball fans have long enjoyed Out of the Park Baseball, although that game is entirely a simulator, so it isn’t really competing for the same demographic.
MLB Communications has announced that the MLB, the MLBPA and Sony have come to an agreement that will allow MLB The Show to release on new platforms, starting in 2021. The official Xbox Twitter was quick to respond, captioning the tweet and saying “No more away games.” This statement seems to confirm that The Show will be coming to Xbox, most likely in 2021. It’s important to note that next year’s iteration MLB The Show 20 has already been revealed with cover star Javier Baez and will be coming exclusively to PlayStation 4.
The implications of The Show’s move to other platforms could be massive. Although licensing is obviously a factor with MLB, if Sony is able to profit off distributing the game across platforms, then it might cause them to reconsider the exclusivity of other games. The PlayStation corporate team is a savvy group of veterans, and know that game exclusivity is a major reason why millions of gamers choose PlayStation, but that doesn’t mean they can’t shift their strategy to meet the market.
In recent years, Microsoft and Sony have been far more friendly with one another. Gone are the days of sub-textual digs at one another in press conferences. In a symbolic step-forward towards unity for the companies, Microsoft just added cross-play across consoles for its wholly owned Minecraft. The Show exclusivity is a little bit different though, as Sony has to negotiate the licensing with the MLB and MLBPA. It makes sense why the MLB would want the most popular baseball game to be more widely available, and now that the floodgates have been opened, it’s likely that versions of MLB The Show will be coming to Nintendo platforms and PC as well in the future.
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Source: Xbox/Twitter
