Overview
If you love baseball or quick play sports games there’s only one Android Game out there for you. Homerun Battle 2 is the newest version of Com2uS’s hit game Homerun Battle 3D. Part deux has big shoes to fill as the original game was a blast to play. Can Com2uS hit it out of the park with Homerun Battle 2 or will it fall short and land on the warning track? Read on to find out…
GAMEPLAY
If you’re not familiar with the game, Homerun Battle 2 gives you a bat and puts you to work smashing home runs, and you get to do it online! Swinging the bat is made simple as you just need to tilt your phone a bit and tap your screen. When you tilt the phone you’ll your “sweet spot” move around, and you’ll want to match that grayed out area to the ball when you swing. I actually don’t think the zone is all that important as I’ve knocked 20 out in a game by just timing my swings without ever tilting my phone. It may take a little getting used to at first, but once you get the hang of it you won’t want to put it down. My Kenny Powers inspired player is on the left…
MODES
Most people will spend their time in multiplayer mode, but Single player is pretty fun and it’s got 3 different modes of play. You can take on Arcade mode, burning mode or training; Arcade & training are exactly what they sound like, but burning mode is something brand new. Burning mode lets you smash homers to fill up a heat gauge, and the more you hit the hotter it’ll get until you eventually “catch on fire”. The outs are unlimited and your scored based on your hits, but there is a timer and if it runs out you’re done.
Multiplayer gives you Duel, Survival, and Mission modes. Duel is what most people are used to as it lets you go up against an opponent to see who can fill up their homer gauge first. Survival mode pits you against an online foe and gives you a set goal to reach, and Mission throws 4 players into the mix. In Mission mode you’ll compete against up to 4 players; there is a “mission” in each game and whoever completes its first gets gold balls according to their playtime and performance. The missions were quite a bit of fun, but not as good as the classic Duel mode. Most of the missions in Multiplayer and Single player will actually cost you gold balls which sucks to put it mildly.
FEATURES & EXTRAS
Homerun Battle 2 let’s you setup 3 characters; 2 male and 1 female, but the female said it would set me back around 990 stars. That in itself is funny as you can’t earn stars in the game at all, so it’ll basically cost you 9 bucks if you want to play as a chick. As for the equipment there are around 12 different sets of equipment which means you’ll roughly get 200+ items to mix and match. Some can be purchased as a full package while others can only be gotten through achievements or events. Homerun Battle 2 also throws 6 stadiums into the mix two of which you’ll see below. The stadiums and gear are all just as cool as you’d expect, but most of the awesome gear is pretty much unaffordable unless you want to drop quite a few bucks. The game also has a nice ranking system that covers Duel, Survival, Arcade, and Burning modes. This allows you to check and see who the best is in your country and the rest the world.
VERDICT
Overall, I enjoyed playing Homerun Battle 2 and there were a lot of new things I liked. Burning mode was cool as were the new stadiums they’ve added into the game. There’s also nothing like crushing someone’s soul with a last second homer to get the win. That being said, as much as I enjoy the game there are quite a few things I don’t care for. The stars are pointless, gold balls are more scarce than usual, it will cost you gold balls just to play a game, and there are a ton of ads.
There are also the connection issues; I didn’t have any at all the first few days with the game, but over the past week it’s gotten horrible. I always get in and get to play, but it generally takes multiple tries to login. Don’t get me wrong, I still enjoy playing the game, but it has some issues that should be addressed. Due to all the issues, I’m giving the game a 5 for now as it seems like I’m not the only one having some major issues; if they fix thing connection/login issues I’ll fix the rating. If you want to give it a go, you can pick up Com2uS’s Homerun Battle 2 for free on Google Play.