Dusty Diamond’s All-Star Softball (NES)
Developed by: Broderbund

Don’t quote me on this, but I think the Nintendo Entertainment System probably had more baseball games produced for it than any other video game system. Each one took a slightly different approach, and each one had its own share of weird quirks. But the baseball game that had, by far, the most weird quirks, was definitely Dusty Diamond’s All-star Baseball.

Looking at the game’s box artwork, one may be lead to believe that this is just a straightforward, fairly realistic style baseball game with little in the way of bells or whistles. This couldn’t be farther from the truth my friends.

First of all, Dusty Diamond’s All-star Baseball was not a realistic baseball game intended to simulate the major leagues. Rather, it is intended to recreate the experience of having a neighbourhood pick up game.

You get to choose from 5 different fields, including a school, a park, and a cliff. Each field has its own unique rules. For instance, at the school, if you break a window, you are automatically out. At the cliff, if the ball goes rolls under the fence it is considered a ground rule double.

The next step is what really makes this game so much fun though. You get to choose your team from a roster of 60 kids. Now, this is where the game gets really weird. Many of the kids living in this neighbourhood are simply not normal. Let me introduce you to some of the more bizarre players:

	Diablo One of the heavy hitters in the game. Yes, he bares more than a passing resemblance to Lucifer aka The Prince of Darkness. He also clubs the ball with a large spiked bat.
	Zelda I assume she is supposed to be a witch of some sort, and she uses what appears to be a broom when she’s at the plate.
	Sid Punks not dead! Before Sid Vicious was a heroin addict, he was chubby and a pretty average neighbourhood ball player.
	Fuji Bo Jackson played baseball and football.. Fuji is a sumo wrestler that plays baseball in the off season. This guy will run over anyone on the base paths who is dumb enough to get in his way.
	Artie As if the other kids weren’t weird enough, this kid wears a hard hat and swings a pick axe. WTF?
	Johnny Well, Johnny just looks like he’s a caveman or something…

There were many other weird characters, such as a guy named Froggy, who hops when he runs the bases, and a guy named Babe who looks a lot like Babe Ruth.

Anyways, once you have your line-up selected, you get to choose your team name. The available team names are totally wacked. There is a team name for each letter of the alphabet, and they sound like something a 5 year old kid made up. Your choices range from The Dorks to .. The Ukers?? And I guess the couldn’t think of anything for the letter E, so it’s just the E-team.

All in all, the graphics in Dusty Diamond were pretty cheesy. Especially when it shows the overhead view of the entire field. A lot of the players faces look messed up too.

The actual gameplay is fairly standard. It’s all easy to control, but there is a lot of added fun that comes from the different skills that each player has. Some of the kids can levitate off the ground when they are fielding. Some of the batters are really really fast and can often score an in the park homerun before you even touch the ball in the outfield. Some players are really good pitchers, and do crazy whirlwind wind ups before delivering the pitches.

This is one of those games that easily became a cult classic. Apparently there are some people out there who were absolutely obsessed with this game. I have found a few other web shrines that attest to this. But the reason why this game was so compelling was because of the different characters and their unique traits. People who played this game spent endless amounts of time examining the strengths and weaknesses of each player as they attempted to find their “dream team”, and then to assign the perfect fielding positions and batting order to the team. On top of this there are lots of cute little details, such as the crying faces the players have when they get thrown out while running the bases.

Dusty Diamond’s All-Star Softball has real lasting power. You don’t find too many games of this calibre anymore. It has stood the test of time, and even today can provide hours and hours of amusement. If you never had the pleasure of playing it, well.. then you just don’t know what you’re missing. — Sean