This story starts way back when I was in high school. Ok, so it probably starts earlier than that, but what are you going to do about it? I was in high school, it could've been 8th grade, but we'll stick with high school. I was a freshman in high school and a friend of mine had turned me on to this new card game called MLB ShowDown. It was pretty cool, you collected the cards, put together a team, and played semi-realistic games by rolling a 20-sided die. We had fun with it. Upon seeing this game, my dad mentioned that when he was a kid he played Strat-o-Matic Baseball, which apparently was similar, but much more realistic. Of course, I did what any sophomore in high school would do, shrugged and said "ok". Little did I know, that might have been one of the smartest shoulder shrugs known to all of mankind! My dad quickly got on ebay, found a surprising amount of results, and ordered Strat-o-Matic Baseball for us to play.
Later that week we received the game. It came with 5 teams from 1983: The Cubs, Tigers, Red Sox, Orioles, and Padres. We split the teams up, he made a schedule and scoresheats and spreadsheets on the computer for stats. We were all set to go. I was skeptical. The first game went by and was speedily followed by the second and third and fourth. I DIDN'T WANT TO STOP! It was a blast! I loved every aspect of it and sure enough the stats turned out to be pretty true to real life. It took us several years to finish the season, but it was well worth it. I had started college when we decided to buy the 2001 complete team set, which included the 2001 World Champion Arizona Diamondbacks team. Unfortunately, with me living in the dorms and my dad not, we didn't get to play much. Then we stumbled upon Baseball Mogul 2008, a computer game much like Strat except quite a bit more advanced. Alas, it seemed as if our Strat days were over.
Fast forward to June 14th, 2009. This is the real story, all that other stuff was just background information. It's a Sunday and I've come home for two reasons:
1. Watch the Race
2. Do laundry
Dad had mentioned before I came over that Mom had got me something really cool the day before. Naturally, it was the first thing I asked about when I got home. Mom comes out with a red box that looks very similar to the Strat-o-Matic Baseball box...It is the Strat-o-Matic Baseball box!
WRONG!
It's Strat-o-Matic Basketball! Wow! She bought it at a thrift store for 3 bucks. Amazing! I, I guess I should say "We". We opened the box. Brand new and it came with two teams. '74-'75 Boston Celtics and '75-'76 Seattle Supersonics. We tried playing a game. Fun, time consuming, but fun. I realize that the game will become very boring, very fast if we don't get more teams soon. So I go to ebay, find the complete team set from the '89-'90 season and buy it.
I'm getting giddy. I can't wait for the new set to come and start playing. In the meantime I create a schedule for all 27 teams to play 12 games. I also realize that the rules will be a bit different since the 3-point line didn't exist in the early '70's. In that case, I go online and find the new rules and print them out.
Friday, June 19th, 2009. I come home to my parents house because I'm house-sitting for the weekend. There's a box sitting on the table, it's my new teams. Then I remember, I left the rules at my apartment. CRAP! Oh well, I can go online and get them again....or not. I search for 30 minutes trying unsuccessfully to find them. I'm starting to get frustrated and I'm about ready to drive to my apartment just to get them, then I find them. Phew! Dodged a bullet. I start reading the rules, I keep getting distracted from the dogs and it is prolonging my Strat experience. This is when I come across something about Action Cards. Action Cards? What the heck are Action Cards? It shows an example, and guess what? I don't have them. Turns out, they are a very important part to the new game. I decide to look to see if I can download them online anywhere. Nope. $%&^@!
So it comes down to where I have to buy the new game. I made a bid on ebay. The auction ends in 4 days. This is an epic disappointment. So much for my weekend plans. Guess I'll just have to play Baseball Mogul instead.
Later that week we received the game. It came with 5 teams from 1983: The Cubs, Tigers, Red Sox, Orioles, and Padres. We split the teams up, he made a schedule and scoresheats and spreadsheets on the computer for stats. We were all set to go. I was skeptical. The first game went by and was speedily followed by the second and third and fourth. I DIDN'T WANT TO STOP! It was a blast! I loved every aspect of it and sure enough the stats turned out to be pretty true to real life. It took us several years to finish the season, but it was well worth it. I had started college when we decided to buy the 2001 complete team set, which included the 2001 World Champion Arizona Diamondbacks team. Unfortunately, with me living in the dorms and my dad not, we didn't get to play much. Then we stumbled upon Baseball Mogul 2008, a computer game much like Strat except quite a bit more advanced. Alas, it seemed as if our Strat days were over.
Fast forward to June 14th, 2009. This is the real story, all that other stuff was just background information. It's a Sunday and I've come home for two reasons:
1. Watch the Race
2. Do laundry
Dad had mentioned before I came over that Mom had got me something really cool the day before. Naturally, it was the first thing I asked about when I got home. Mom comes out with a red box that looks very similar to the Strat-o-Matic Baseball box...It is the Strat-o-Matic Baseball box!
WRONG!
It's Strat-o-Matic Basketball! Wow! She bought it at a thrift store for 3 bucks. Amazing! I, I guess I should say "We". We opened the box. Brand new and it came with two teams. '74-'75 Boston Celtics and '75-'76 Seattle Supersonics. We tried playing a game. Fun, time consuming, but fun. I realize that the game will become very boring, very fast if we don't get more teams soon. So I go to ebay, find the complete team set from the '89-'90 season and buy it.
I'm getting giddy. I can't wait for the new set to come and start playing. In the meantime I create a schedule for all 27 teams to play 12 games. I also realize that the rules will be a bit different since the 3-point line didn't exist in the early '70's. In that case, I go online and find the new rules and print them out.
Friday, June 19th, 2009. I come home to my parents house because I'm house-sitting for the weekend. There's a box sitting on the table, it's my new teams. Then I remember, I left the rules at my apartment. CRAP! Oh well, I can go online and get them again....or not. I search for 30 minutes trying unsuccessfully to find them. I'm starting to get frustrated and I'm about ready to drive to my apartment just to get them, then I find them. Phew! Dodged a bullet. I start reading the rules, I keep getting distracted from the dogs and it is prolonging my Strat experience. This is when I come across something about Action Cards. Action Cards? What the heck are Action Cards? It shows an example, and guess what? I don't have them. Turns out, they are a very important part to the new game. I decide to look to see if I can download them online anywhere. Nope. $%&^@!
So it comes down to where I have to buy the new game. I made a bid on ebay. The auction ends in 4 days. This is an epic disappointment. So much for my weekend plans. Guess I'll just have to play Baseball Mogul instead.
well, i can't imagine many things worse than getting all set to strat it up and then not being able to find dice. which would be about the same as finding out you need an action card and you don't have one. enough to make a fella downright depressed.
ReplyDeleteone thing i might point out. while not very familiar with strat basketball, i've been a strat baseball fan for, well, a number of years. and the draw isn't the game itself. the game is tailor made for those among us who love statistics. we rush through the games just so we can compile the stats. that may be a sad state, but to those rare few of us that are truly stat fans,ahhh, what excitement.