Nostalgia Game Review: Ken Griffey Jr's Winning Run

I love baseball. It's one of my favorite, if not, the favorite sport of mine (it literally says it on my website's front page). That's why when I'm not playing the more well-known franchises in Mario, Pokemon, and Mega Man, I usually go with a baseball game to play.

Ken Griffey Jr's Winning Run for the SNES was one of those games I grew up with. Sometimes, I'd stay up for an hour playing the MLB League mode before I had school the next day. The memories of the screen shaking as the batter struck out and the ump yelled, "YEROUT!" brought me back to a simpler time.

Looking back on the game had made me realize a few things. One, it's really hard to strike out batters. If you're lucky, you can get a batter to foul off a pitch or two. From my experience, it was hard to get a batter to swing and miss on a pitch (luckily, later Ken Griffey Jr. games were a bit more forgiving). Another thing I noticed with the game was that it was even harder to hit home runs. Even with Ken Griffey Jr. himself and other big boppers, it was a pain in the ass to try and crank one out. I even struggled in the Home Run Derby.

Ken Griffey Jr's Winning Run actually isn't too bad to play. There are other fun perks like hearing the ump yell, "PLAY THE GAME, KID" if you leave the game be for a while and using a code to play as either the Tampa Bay Devil Rays or the Arizona Diamondbacks. But this game could've been so much more, which is why I felt a bit let down. If you want a good baseball game from the Ken Griffey Jr. series to try, either give the first one a whirl or play Ken Griffey Jr's Slugfest (one of my favorite games).