Eikan Nyain (High School Baseball Free Game) Introduction, Impressions, and Strategy Notes

In Power Pro, there's a game mode called "Eikan Nine" where you manage a high school baseball team.
The free game "Eikan Nyain" that I'm introducing today is a work that imitates that.

You can experience the fun of managing a high school baseball team, and the games are tense and exciting, making it highly addictive.
This time, I'll be introducing the game's content and sharing my impressions after actually playing it.
With its more compact game design compared to "High School Baseball Simulation," I feel it's easy to get into right away.

Game flow

The story progresses in monthly increments, so the pace is quite fast.
However, months with qualifiers or tournaments may feel longer because there are multiple matches.

The flow of the game is the same as in a real high school baseball game, and is as follows:

April: New students join the club

We assess the abilities of the students who join the club and determine which position they should play and which skills they should focus on developing.
This is also the most exciting part.

From this screen, you can check each character's abilities and set the training content.

July: Summer tournament qualifiers

This is truly the main event.
The first opponent isn't particularly strong, so I'd like to give our young pitchers some experience.

The match will basically proceed automatically.
However, you will be in control of the game by giving instructions during the first and last innings, as well as during critical and opportune moments.
The screen looks like this.

August: Summer tournament main competition

If you win the qualifying rounds, the Koshien tournament awaits you.
With many formidable opponents, not only will your team's overall strength be tested, but luck will also play a significant role.

September-October: Autumn Qualifiers

3年生が抜けて、大きく戦力ダウンしてすぐの大会です。
This is a period to solidify a vision of how the remaining members will fight on.
If you're lacking players in a particular position, consider using positional conversions.

March: Spring tournament main competition

This is a competition to test the results of the rigorous training we've undergone throughout the winter.
In many cases, we may not be able to participate, but if we can conquer this, we have a chance to win the summer championship.
It's easier to win in the spring.

Your "reputation points" increase or decrease with each match you win. They increase significantly when you beat strong opponents and decrease when you lose to weaker opponents.
As you accumulate reputation points, your team will rank up from weak to mid-level to strong to prestigious, improving the effectiveness of your training and the quality of new recruits.

thoughts

As a game, I think it's well-structured and streamlined, with unnecessary elements removed.
The ability scores have also been kept as simple as possible.
I found the "intelligence" stat, which represents baseball intelligence, particularly interesting.
Even if other ability scores are low, you can have an advantage in various situations through your plate discipline, situational hitting, and ability to foul off pitches.

The game's difficulty level seems moderately high.
If you can get the hang of it, you can become a regular participant in the Koshien tournament, but winning the championship will be quite difficult.
If you want to win again, you'll have to practice a lot.
No matter how strong the members are, they'll all leave once they graduate, so I enjoy managing and maintaining the team's overall strength.

Many of the opposing high schools have names that are based on manga and anime, and the team members are also characters from those works, which makes it quite interesting.
The teams I often face near the finals—the JoJo's Bizarre Adventure Part 3 team, the JoJo's Bizarre Adventure Part 5 team, and the Dragon Ball team—are incredibly strong, and I never want to see them again.

The names of the new members joining the team are all based on real players from the 12 professional baseball teams, making them easy to remember.
The players' names and their ability ratings don't always match, which is interesting in itself.

One thing that caught my attention was that the ball speed and home run distances during the games were significantly higher than what one would expect, which was a bit concerning.
(For example, his fastball speed exceeds the mid-140s km/h, and he occasionally hits home runs that travel 200 meters.)

In any case, as a high school baseball simulation game, it's a highly addictive and enjoyable title.
If you're interested, I highly recommend you give it a try.

Strategy Notes

There are many hints written on the author's official website.
Based on that strategy guide, I'll be writing my own personal strategy notes here.

What should I start training?

I believe that the most important abilities for a fielder are speed and intelligence.
First, if you train everyone's running ability to A, your on-base percentage and scoring ability will dramatically increase.
The strategy of "getting on base → stealing second base → stealing third base → ground ball" to score a run is important.
After that, it would be good to improve your intelligence, hitting ability, and fielding.
If an outfielder has an S rating in defense, they can easily get ground ball outs, so I think this is a rare game where you can really see the effect of defensive ability.

If you're a pitcher, it's a good idea to train your control, fastball or breaking ball, and stamina.
First, raise your fastball or breaking ball to an A, and then raise your control to around a C.
After that, it's up to your preference whether you raise the pitch that isn't A, or further improve your control.
If you have enough pitchers, you probably don't need to worry too much about stamina.

Even if a player has low initial ability scores and seems hopeless, they can still make it if they have intelligence and speed. I also found positions like pinch hitter specialists and defensive substitutes interesting.
I think it's a fun game because you get to discover your own strategies and theories as you play.