Out of the Park Baseball 12 Windows, Mac, Linux game

Swing, batta, batta! Sa-wing, batta! The baseball season is underway, and now you can launch your digital version of the annual pennant chase in Out of the Park Baseball 12, the most comprehensive version yet of our best-selling, critically-acclaimed baseball simulation game. And at just $39.99, it's cheaper than a ticket at a typical big league ballpark. (Unless you want to sit in the cheap seats.)

We've already told you about many of its great new features, but we had a few surprises up our sleeves in the final few days before release:

Player development screen

This is a new screen that lets you see your current player development budget (an optional view), your top prospects, and your organization's positional depth chart. There are multiple ways to configure this, such as only showing all prospects or basing the rankings on current ability or potential.

Improved injury system

We have improved the injury system to make it more realistic (i.e. delayed injury diagnosis) and added retro-active disabled list assignments and rehab assignments to the minor leagues.

League newspaper

Grab a cup of coffee and relax with the new league newspaper screen. See what's happening around your league in one handy place. You'll even discover a few interesting things along the way, including leader boards, historical information, and team power rankings.

League finances projections

Forget about having to simulate multiple test seasons to figure out if the financial settings for your fictional league were going to work. We've included a new Financial Settings tab on the league setup screen that will let you quickly see average team revenue and payroll, other expenses, and overall profit and loss. Now custom finances are a snap.

Automatic calculation of league total stat output modifiers

This was another example of tedious trial-and-error to get the desired result. Now if you want your league's stats to match reality with a margin of plus or minus 2%, all you have to do is enter your desired league totals, hit a button, and watch as OOTP 12 quick-sims the season while automatically adjusting the league total modifiers. This feature is automatically applied in historical leagues, which means our historical sims are more accurate than ever!

And that's in addition to all the other awesome new features in OOTP 12:

2011 Major League Rosters:

Here's a treat: the best roster set we've ever included, from the big leagues' top stars to the guys making their debuts in rookie leagues. Our roster sets only exist thanks to the hard work of our rosters editing team, so we'd like to take a moment and tip our caps to them. Thanks, guys.

All players are individually rated with updated statistics and realistic contract data. Last year's top draft picks are included too. Could Bryce Harper and Stephen Strasburg, with the veteran leadership of newly-acquired All-Star Jayson Werth, help propel the Washington to the top of the National League East in coming seasons?

Revamped Financial System

Philadelphia shook the baseball world this winter when they signed top-flight free agent pitcher Cliff Lee, despite expectations that he would opt for the highest bidder. Now you can do the same with OOTP's recoded player contract negotiations, which are more realistic and fun. Don't forget to stay on top of the latest free agent signings and other news in the new off-season center, and keep your finger on the pulse of your team's finances with an improved view.

Contract possibilities are now more realistic, including vesting options, buyouts, minor league split contracts, signing bonuses and more performance bonus options.

We have even added reserve-clause era rules for early historical leagues.

Recoded International Scouting

We have completely recoded the international scouting in OOTP 12. Instead of just setting a budget, you can now send your scouts to the countries you select! But spend your money wisely: high-profile baseball countries are much more expensive to scout than obscure ones. Will you discover the next living legend?

Online Leagues

We're proud to support Official OOTP Online Leagues with a full-featured interface inside OOTP 12. With just one click, you can join a team, and creating a league is just as easy. Commissioners can make their leagues public and advertise open teams, with the ability to accept or deny requests from would-be GMs.

Online leagues offer several key advantages:

• League files are patches rather than full-size files, saving plenty of up- and download time.
• Reports can be saved in MySQL databases, increasing their upload speed.
• Forget about FTP: team data exports and imports work through the database. That results in improved compatibility and security for the league web site server.
• An export tracker.
• The promise of more great features to come, including online drafts and trades.

Greater Immersion and Realism

Historical leagues benefit from improved AI and real life transactions and as-played lineups as optional features. Thanks to OOTP's sophisticated game engine, you'll be able to enjoy the most realistic historical simulation results possible.

In addition, storylines have been expanded and news presentations have also been revamped, making you feel like you're part of the hectic 24-hour "better stay on top of this" news cycle that dominates today's sports reporting.

In-Game and Core Engine Changes

Like a manager constantly seeking ways to get the most out of his lineup, we're always tinkering under OOTP's hood. Here's what you can look forward to this year:

• Recoded parts of the in-game AI, making it the most challenging ever in an OOTP game.
• Improved Play-by-Play commentary
• Improved in-game sound, adding better quality sound files and more variation.
• Improved player evaluation AI, resulting in more realistic AI roster moves.
• Recoded parts of the trading AI.
• Recoded parts of the main scouting engine.
• Improved injury and recovery system.
• Added complete history for all coaches.
• Added the ability to save a game in progress and resume it later.
• Added optional confirmation questions after substitutions in-game, preventing mistakes.
• Added the ability to lock a player to a certain minor league level when the AI is in control of your minor league system.
• Added a new player development screen, including an organizational depth chart presentation.
• Added the option to have established international free agents enter the market during the offseason.
• Added WAR (Wins Above Replacement) as a statistic.
• Added a playoff roster for more realistic team transactions.
• Greatly enhanced the world database structure, resulting in more realistic fictional league and player creation.
• Added a simulation module, allowing you to match up two teams from the same league for a set number of games and see the simulation results. This is great for research purposes or just for toying around. For example, how would the 1927 Yankees fare against the 2004 Red Sox?