MLB The Show 21
MLB The Show 21 is a PlayStation 5 sports game developed by Sony Interactive Entertainment. It centers on sport controls, shifts between attack and defense, and score or tournament goals, with controls and information arranged around the DualSense twin sticks, triggers, directional pad, and face buttons, with touchpad, motion input, adaptive triggers, and detailed haptics where the game uses them.
- AI score · out of 10
- 8.2 / 10
About this game
MLB The Show 21 is a PlayStation 5 sports game centered on sport controls, shifts between attack and defense, and score or tournament goals. Matches, challenges, and tournament goals give sessions clear boundaries, with progress divided into stages, tasks, matches, or growth milestones that make immediate goals understandable. Its value depends on whether these rules continue to create judgment and room for mastery rather than on length, sales, or series recognition. Short campaigns are judged by repeat-challenge value, while longer ones are judged by variety, pacing, and recovery after failure. Players, venues, animation, and score feedback establish the match atmosphere, while SSD streaming, 4K and HDR output, 3D audio, performance or quality modes, and high-density interfaces need to preserve feedback and information clarity together. The genre-specific limitation is that opponent ai, control precision, multiplayer accessories, and period-specific rosters can affect consistency. Platform conditions also include install size, SSD space, patch version, DualSense battery life, visual mode and frame rate, online dependencies, PS VR2 requirements, and cross-generation version differences affect the current release. This description covers only this platform release and does not import features or conveniences from remasters, emulators, or other console editions.
Collected in series
MLB: The Show turns baseball’s pitch-by-pitch decisions into a mix of batting, pitching, fielding and longer-term team building. Across the series, you can develop a player’s career, manage a franchise or assemble a roster through player cards.
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AI review
AI reviews are subjective assessments, not player ratings. See each review for its evidence and limitations.Published date:
Strong pitching and fielding support rich management and stadium building, despite uneven menus and visual detail.
MLB The Show 21 earns its appeal on the field. Pinpoint turns pitches into timed stick gestures, with mistakes affecting location, while wall-ball fielding reactions strengthen the exchange between offense and defense. Pregame perk choices make preparation matter alongside practice. Career play lets you specialize rather than indefinitely alternate pitching and fielding; team management and stadium building offer longer-term goals beyond matches, from modifying templates to designing blank grounds. Broadcast replays, spatial umpire and coach voices, and bat-contact sensations sell the ballpark atmosphere. Facial details and changing stadium light add character, though models and turf are less consistently convincing. Three gameplay styles, tutorials and alternative pitching interfaces help learning, but navigating the abundance of options is not always intuitive.
Strengths
- Pitch gestures, fielding reactions and pregame perks reward both skill and preparation.
- Team management, selectable career roles and stadium creation provide distinct ongoing goals.
- Broadcast editing, spatial sound and bat-contact sensations reinforce the ballpark atmosphere.
Weaknesses
- The original PS5 experience reports unintuitive menu organization despite its many settings.
- Models and turf are less consistently convincing than the overall broadcast atmosphere.
Who it is for: Baseball players who want to master pitching and fielding, manage a club or play in a personally designed stadium, including newcomers willing to learn through tutorials and gameplay styles.
Play notes: This concerns the original PS5 Standard base game, supporting offline and 1–4 local players; the checked US version uses English voice and text. Switch to an older pitching interface if Pinpoint does not suit you. Online matches require PS Plus; today's matchmaking, connected rewards and community stadium downloads are not guaranteed, and early career-progression criticism does not establish current-patch behavior.
View scoring basis
| Dimension | Review state | Score | Weight |
|---|---|---|---|
| Dimension Team management, a career with selectable roles and stadium building provide an excellent content mix, with distinct rewards for long-term planning, match practice and creation. Two-way play varies repeated duties without preventing specialization, while templates and blank designs support different levels of creative investment. | Reviewed | 8.1 / 10 | Not provided |
| Dimension Pitch gestures, location control and fielding reactions form an excellent on-field core with tangible rewards for practice. Pregame perk configurations make the opposing lineup matter, connecting execution skill with role choices rather than merely completing successive games. | Reviewed | 8.6 / 10 | Not provided |
| Dimension Broadcast editing, spatial sound and bat-contact sensations create a convincing ballpark atmosphere, supported by facial details, clothing folds and time-of-day lighting. Contrasting assessments of models and turf show less consistent visual conviction than the overall broadcast presentation, making expression good rather than uniformly exceptional. | Reviewed | 7.9 / 10 | Not provided |
| Dimension Gameplay styles, tutorials and interchangeable pitching interfaces offer good room for adaptation, with a defined entry to stadium creation. The original review's criticism of unintuitive menu organization identifies navigation friction: learning approaches are adjustable, but the many options are not all immediately understandable. | Reviewed | 7.8 / 10 | Not provided |
Review sources
Not provided
Core information
- Developer
- Sony Interactive
- Publisher
- Sony Interactive
- Release date
- Apr 20, 2021
- Platforms
- PlayStation 5
- Content kind
- Game
- Release state
- Released
- Region
- Worldwide
- Official website
- Not provided
- Offline minimum players
- Not provided
- Offline maximum players
- Not provided
- Online minimum players
- Not provided
- Online maximum players
- Not provided
- Categories
- Sports · Primary genre
- Tags
- Pick-up and PlayFast-pacedMain Story Under 10 HoursReplayableSolo-friendlyShort SessionsPlayer versus Player3D GraphicsLow Entry BarrierSports-based Play
- Supported game languages
- Not provided
- Requires base game
- Not provided
- Standalone
- Not provided
- Age ratings
- Not provided
- Play modes
- MultiplayerSingle player
- Perspectives
- Third person
Release editions
- PlayStation 5WorldwideApr 20, 2021
Game gallery
Sources
Not provided