Publisher Playground Productions and developer Mega Cat Studios have announced Backyard Baseball ’97, a remastered version of the 1997-released Backyard Baseball. It will launch for PC via Steam on October 10.
“This was my favorite game growing up,” said Playground Productions CEO and founder Lindsay Barnett in a press release. “While we’re already hard at work on the future of Backyard Sports, we first want to honor the past by restoring the games that started it all for me and so many others—beginning with Backyard Baseball 1997.”
Playground Productions chief product officer Chris Waters adde,d “This is just the beginning for Backyard and Mega Cat. We’re so proud of the engineers who worked long hours and overcame many obstacles to bring Backyard Baseball ’97 back to the gaming community.”
Here is an overview of the game, via its Steam page:
Play Like It’s 1997
Relive the game that started it all! The original Backyard Baseball ’97, now enhanced to run on Steam. Whether you’re picking your dream team, hitting home runs, or just here for the witty banter, step back into the backyard and experience the game that made baseball fun for everyone!
Play pick-up games, practice batting, keep track of stats, compete in single games or a whole season – you can even set the rules! Backyard Baseball ‘97 features all of the realism and statistics of adult baseball games but with simple, intuitive controls that anyone can master.
Batter Up, Playground Style
The rules for Backyard Baseball are a hybrid of Major and Little League rules:
- No leading off
- No Injuries
- Bunting is allowed
- Tagging up is allowed
- You can also practice batting
To get into the swing of things, choose a batter and face Mr. Clanky for some batting practice. This is where you’ll learn just when to click to make your chosen batter hit that ball!
One Nation Under Pablo
For many fans, this is the game that debuted one of the most iconic video game characters of the 90s or any era—the legend himself, Pablo Sanchez. Build a roster from a cast of 30 hilarious child athletes who made Backyard Baseball a cult classic.
Game Modes
- Random Pick-Up – A quick way to jump right in! The computer chooses a random team for you and itself, and the game starts immediately.
- Single Game – You take turns with the computer, choosing players from a random pool of characters.
- Season – You create a team and manage the team through a 14 game series. The opposing teams are computer generated. At the end of the season the best two teams advance to the BBL playoffs (best of three). The playoffs winner advances to the championship series which consists of the Super Entire Nation Tournament (best of three) and then the Ultra Grand Championship of the Universe Series (best of five)!
Global Leaderboard
Compete globally! Steam’s Leaderboard system lets you compete with friends and players around the world. Track your home runs, strike-outs, grand slams, season wins and more in real-time. See how you stack up and strive to reach the top!
At our core, we are fans first–not just of video games but of the Backyard Sports franchise. Fans have asked for accessible and legal ways to play their original Backyard titles for years, and we are excited to deliver.
Without having access to the source code, there are hard limitations on the experience we can create. As an example, we can’t support gamepads, nor the Steam deck, in these original titles. We can’t use the original 32bit code to support modern macOS, as even with an incredibly clever wrapper, macOS can’t execute the binaries.
We can make the game run buttery smooth, stack it with Steam achievements to test your mettle and give you a chance to batter up to compete in the Steam Global Leaderboards for Home Runs. Baseball 1997 runs well, looks better than ever, and creates a new installation for digital preservation within the Backyard Sports catalog that allows the next generation of fans to fall in love with the title that started it all.
Development
With the original source code lost in the years since the 1997 release, Playground Productions has teamed up with Mega Cat Studios to remaster the original titles and bring them to modern devices. Forming a team of avid gamers and Backyard Sports enthusiasts, Mega Cat accomplished a near-impossible feat by hacking the original CD-ROM and developing new game builds to be compatible with current generation PCs. It was a meticulous process that took a considerable amount of time and effort to revitalize the game. Given the intricacies involved in this remaster, Backyard Baseball ’97 is only compatible with PC devices at this time, but both Mega Cat and Playground Productions are working diligently to ensure Backyard Sports becomes available on multiple platforms moving forward.
Watch the announcement trailer below. View a set of screenshots at the gallery.