It was one of those nights when I just couldn't unwind. I was starting to feel something almost like sleepiness, but not quite. At just after 2 a.m. I decided I had one more game of MLB The Show 25 in me. Another 25 or 30 minutes, I thought, less if I could get a lead and have my opponent quit as often happens. I had no idea what I was in for.
I got off to one of my best starts ever. On the mound, Negro League Legend Andy Cooper was setting them down with a powerful screwball. At the plate, everything looked like a beach ball. I have been struggling to generate the proper home run power with the Manny Ramirez I unlocked in Season 1. After a Ramirez homer, I was up 4-0 after three innings. I was in the zone, y'all. My opponent began pausing a lot, usually a telltale sign they're about to quit.
My opponent paused so much that he quickly ran down his pause timer, and I attempted to take my win. Then I learned of a pretty big glitch my opponent has known about and exploited for some time. After the pause timer runs out, the game notifies you that the opposing player is out of time. You then have the option to accept a game-mandated forfeit, or at least that's what's supposed to happen.
To accept the forfeit, you have to push the X button on PlayStation. Actually, you have to hold it until a circle fills up as if you're doing a quick time event. But, it turns out, your opponent can keep pushing pause over and over before you ever get the opportunity to accept the forfeit. We sat here for several minutes in this sad, ridiculous standoff.
"I've got all night," my cheating opponent messaged me. "Just quit."
I was starting to get tired, but a couple of things were in play. First, I wasn't about to let this guy cheat his way to this win. Second, I write for App Trigger, and this was the first I had learned of this game- breaking glitch. The other guy didn't know it, but I had to play this out to see exactly what kind of story I had on my hands.
After he realized I wasn't ready to concede, we kept playing a bizarre, stall-filled baseball game. Going to the pause menu every few seconds was every bit as annoying as you would expect. I use pinpoint pitching, one of MLB 25's most challenging mechanics. You use the analog stick to draw on an onscreen representation of the pitcher's throwing motion. Being even the slightest bit off can turn a perfect pitch into a 500-foot home run.
My opponent was able to get a couple of runs, and I was starting to feel like I was physically standing on a pitcher's mound, wearing out my arm and my sanity. My 20-minute "last game of the night was dragging toward the two-hour mark. I would need a bathroom break soon. This was becoming the least enjoyable game I'd ever played, including contests against people with open Nazi references in their gamertags.
You know what, I told myself? I've got more than enough to write a story. If this guy really wants to stay up all night cheating people at virtual baseball, I'm going to let him enjoy himself. Then he sent me a party invite. Against my better judgment, I accepted it. I figured I'd sarcastically congratulate him and then call it a night.
Upon hearing my voice, he immediately went to hateful racial stereotypes.
It had never occurred to me my opponent might be both a cheater and a racist, but there it was. I made up my mind right there that I wasn't quitting this game, no matter how much he cheated. We had just celebrated Jackie Robinson Day, and I had a Negro League legend on the mound almost pitching a no-hitter. I could hear the ancestors telling me to keep striking this piece of trash out.
He continued for a couple of minutes trying to convince me to quit a game that again, I was winning by two runs. I tried to reason with an obvious lunatic. I told him I had notes and video footage, complete with his PSN ID, cheating and bragging about it. He told me lots of people had threatened to turn him in, but no one had ever actually done it. I just chuckled to myself, left the party, and headed back to the pitcher's mound.
This dude was aggressively not good at this game. I have never gotten higher than a 700 rating at MLB, far from elite. But as time dragged on, it was clear that my opponent had no real plan beyond constantly pausing and berating me through PSN messages. I added three more runs and entered the ninth inning with a commanding 7-2 lead. The desperate messages kept coming.
Finally, my opponent realized he was cooked. The bigoted, glitching emperor of 2 a.m. PlayStation baseball was buck naked and we both knew it. Every time I threw a strike, he responded with a chat message.
3:31 am - "Might as well quit, you're not winning."
Still 3:31 a.m. - "You already know what I'm going to do."
3:34 a.m. - "Lol I'm going to bed."
Through more than three decades of playing games online, I have never enjoyed a concession or a victory quite so much. Too many people sacrificed too much so we could play baseball. Out of respect for them, the least I could do was stay up too late and push a few buttons.