STRAT-O-MATIC CD-ROM DEMO DISK This file offers a brief description of the game. It is taken from our annual mailing and as such does not try to describe the entire game but just the latest innovations. We highly recommend you take the demo for a complete test drive to find out all of the features. The online help file also has a number of interesting articles that describe the game and company in detail. We recommend that you start by reading the "Strat-O-Matic Story" which can be found in the help file. NOTE: THE FOLLOWING ARE THE ANNOUNCEMENTS OF THE CD-ROM GAME (VERSION 2.0 AND VERSION 1.0). WE HAVE INCLUDED THE VERSION 1.0 ANNOUNCEMENT BECAUSE IT INCLUDES ADDITONAL DESCRIPTIONS OF THE GAME THAT YOU MIGHT FIND USEFUL. THE CURRENT VERSION OF THE GAME IS VERSION 2.0. ******STRAT-O-MATIC CD-ROM GAME VERSION 2.0 FOR IBM & MAC ANNOUNCEMENT***** THE GAME DESIGNED BY YOU! Introducing "Strat-O-Matic CD-ROM Baseball Version 2.0", the game designed by you! You see, we've been listening to your requests and we've heard a number of great suggestions. Some people have requested lower prices. Consider it done. Others want to take full advantage of their powerful new computer. Got it handled. Others wanted more options for tailoring the look and feel of the game. Not to worry. Some people wanted more play-by-play, while others wanted less! (Isn't America a wonderful place?) No problem to both requests. Others asked for more stats and reports. Have it covered. Still others asked for more control over the computer manager. You got it. In fact so many of this year's improvements have come from you, our loyal customers, that we're referring to this release as the "Game Designed By You"! Every year we at Strat-O-Matic deliver a new computer baseball game to you. And, as our long-time customers can attest, we continue to improve our game relentlessly (wait till you see this year's list below!). We plan to do this with your help for many years to come. So, after you've played with Version 2.0 for a while, please take the time to drop us a note with more of your fine suggestions. And the next time your neighbor stops over in the middle of a game, be sure to take the opportunity to tell him "Hey, I helped design that game"! REQUIREMENTS The Windows version requires a CD-ROM drive and Windows 3.1 or Windows '95. Macintosh version features a true Mac interface and requires a CD-ROM drive and System 7.5 or higher. Both versions require systems equipped with at least 8 Megabytes of RAM and 20 megs of free hard-drive space. CD-ROM VERSION 2.0 FEATURE LIST Price reduction. The price of the game has dropped to just $49.95 (a $16 reduction). In addition, in order to thank the customers who purchased Version 1.0, we will provide a free upgrade to Version 2.0 with the purchase of a 1996 roster disk (just $25 plus handling charge)! 32-bit Power. Version 2.0 will take full advantage of the 32-bit power of Windows '95 and Power Mac! (Note: both a 16-bit and 32-bit version of the game will be included on the CD-ROM). The Windows '95 version will offer a much nicer "chiseled steel" look. On both platforms 32-bit power translates into a big improvement in speed! Re-sizable Field. The number one requested change was to be able to re-size the playing field. Now you can easily accomplish this by grabbing the corner and sizing. So with Version 2, the playing field will fit your screen no matter what resolution you choose to play in. Auto Swap. Imagine you're sitting at your desk watching autoplay scores scroll by when suddenly the phone rings. On the other end is the GM of an opposing team and he has a trade offer for you. Imagine no more - this is literally what happens with the Version 2 Auto Swap option! Now you'll be able to watch trades between computer-managed teams scroll alongside the autoplay scores. And when the computer dreams up a proposal for you, the digitized sound of a phone ringing plays and you are presented with his offer. In addition, the manual Swap-O-Matic has also been improved so that you can request the computer to suggest possible trades to you. Player and team notebooks. A great new enhancement that graphically displays each player or team. The player notebook contains ratings, actual stats and replay stats, all shown graphically. The team notebook lets you view each team's stadium, ballpark effects and other pertinent information. And all notebooks have a blank page so that you can record your own personal notes about each player and team! Wait till you see this one! Player game logs. Ever wanted to see details on each player's season listed in one handy location? Well here it is, the player game logs. Now for every batter in your league you can see a game by game summary of at-bats, runs, hits, rbi's, walks, strikeouts, homeruns and stolen bases. For pitchers you can see a game by game summary of innings pitched, hits, runs, earned runs, walks, strikeouts, home runs, wins, losses and saves. Record book. Who had the most hits in a game, when was it and against which team did it occur? Questions like this used to be left unanswered but not anymore. Our record book report will answer 20 such questions at the click of a mouse. Play by play. Already the best play by play in the industry, we have upped the ante on realistic play by play. It is now more realistic than ever sensing a host of new situations and describing them appropriately. Also new this year is our "newsworthy event" category which will mention real-life newsworthy events as you are replaying your schedule. So don't be surprised if the announcer in Chicago mentions that Michael just scored 50 points! Over 15,000 lines of play by play are included. And for just $5 more you can enjoy thousands of more lines of team specific play by play. More control over computer manager. Now you can set the following options for pitchers: Avoid using before 6th inning, 7th inning, 8th inning or 9th inning. Max of 1 to 2 Innings in relief. Max of 2 to 3 innings in relief. Max of 7 Innings for a start. Issue less intentional walks with this pitcher on the mound (great for gopher-ball pitchers). Position players also have new settings: Don't pinch-hit for vs. lefties. Don't pinch-hit for vs. righties. Avoid using as a pinch-hitter during a blow-out (saves his at-bats). Remove for a defensive sub with a lead (will always search the bench for a better defensive player and bring him in if one is found). That last one is great if you play Edgar Martinez at short stop in your draft league! Draft league lineup mode. When using this mode lineups 1 and 2 will continue to be used against lefties and righties respectively. In addition lineups 3 and 4 will be used against "reverse" lefties and righties. Player comparison mode. Sometimes the BAL rating just isn't enough when you're trying to decide which substitution to make. So now the lineup screen has a "Compare" button. Just click it and you can graphically compare any two batters vs. any opposing pitcher. You can even anticipate your opponents move and display the current batter vs. the current pitcher side-by-side with your potential pinch-hitter and his potential relief pitcher! Tactile Dice Option. Designed for those that play with the computer game in "dice and card" mode. This is a simple mechanism to allow you more control over dice rolls. You can keep the dice "shaking" longer by holding the mouse button down, and then "roll" them when you want to by releasing the mouse button. This simulates the tactile effect of holding dice in your hand and putting that "little extra" on the roll when you need that big hit. In addition you truly are effecting the outcome of the play (without effecting statistical accuracy) because thousands of new random numbers are generated every second while you "shake" the dice. In all other computer simulations each play result is determined by the next random number "due" in the algorithm, which is roughly the equivalent of playing a board game with a random number booklet instead of with dice. Even more stuff. Things like an optional toolbar for the manager screen. An optional rule to allow for additional baserunning decisions. Other niceties include automatically assigning rest during autoplay, bold printing for headings, plugging schedules with game results when importing game files (same schedule must be used by both computers), using mixed case player names throughout, ability to toggle maximum rules individually, and saving the DH switch for each league separately. 4 Stars also included. Computer Gaming World recently reviewed our CD-ROM Version 1.0 game and gave it a 4-star rating. (In fact, the only thing they didn't seem to like was the Regulator, our attempt at introducing an arcade-like feature into the game.) Of course Version 2.0 includes everything that was in Version 1.0. That includes tremendous play-by-play improvements, drag-and drop functionality throughout and "Extended Stat Mode" which reports full statistics for Home/Road, Day/Night, for each Month and for each Team vs. Every Other team in the league. Note: Much to the dismay of the CGW reviewer the Regulator feature is still included! **********Strat-O-Matic CD-ROM Baseball Version 1.0 Announcement********** Get ready to play ball with the hottest thing to come down the pike since a Mark Wohlers fastball! Strat-O-Matic CD-ROM Baseball Version 1.0 (for Windows and Mac users) offers a brand new gaming experience to the Strat-O-Matic world. There are too many features to list in this short mailing, but we'll give you some of the highlights, just to whet your appetite... There's a long fly ball...Way back... Over 10,000 lines of play by play! That's right, we didn't misplace the comma, ten thousand. And not just quantity, but quality. How about play by play that keeps you up to date on the out of town scores? Or play by play that's smart enough to know when an all-time record has just been eclipsed? Play by play so interesting that every once in a while it will share a baseball anecdote with you, or ask you to answer one of thousands of trivia questions. This play-by-play is so good you've got to see it to believe it! In addition, we offer an optional team specific play by play disk (only $5) that will add greatly to your enjoyment. This optional disk adds the names of managers, coaches, owners, mascots, etc. and also has highly specific details about each stadium. Can you imagine a statistician on steroids?... "Extended-Stat" mode is ready to flex it's formidable muscles, so move over you pencil-neck geeks! With a single click of the mouse you can activate the most powerful database in the gaming world. Full statistics can be maintained for Home/Road, Day/Night, by each Month and for each Team Vs. Every Other Team in the league! Could it possibly be this easy?... League commissioners will just love our new "Game Results" files and the "Automated Import" function. Simply drag all of the game files into the "import" directory and fire away. Then sit back while CD-Rom Baseball does the rest. Show off your speed by dragging one... CD-Rom Baseball features drag and drop throughout. Want to trade a player? Simply drag him to his new team. Bring in a reliever? Just drag him from the bullpen to the pitching mound. Don't like where we put the scoreboard on the game screen? Drag it anyplace you choose, even off the game screen and onto the border (if your monitor supports greater than 640 x 480 resolution). If hitting a curve ball was this easy we'd all be in the major leagues! A picture is worth a thousand words... So we dispatched a professional photographer to every major league ballpark and told him not to return until he had all the stadiums done. After tasting 28 varieties of the local bratwurst he returned with all new stadium shots that will give our competitors heart burn. We include 28 black and white (256 shades of gray) free with the game and offer optional color day and night shots described below. If you're a Regular guy... The Regulator is now ready for your gaming pleasure. Extensive code and testing has been put into this feature which performs the seemingly impossible. That is, an "arcade" type feature (hitting only) that does not affect the statistical accuracy of the game. How do we do it? That's our secret, but we'll put you on notice right now - don't bother trying to cheat the Regulator, it's too smart for you. What do you mean I can't run this game on my Commodore-64?... Sorry, but there are some minimum system requirements. For IBM systems you'll need Windows (3.1 or '95), a CD-Rom drive and 8 Megs of Ram. Mac users will need system 7.5, a CD-Rom drive and 8 Megs of Ram (16 Megs if you wish to use the Regulator). Stop drooling all over your computer... It's not good for the electronics. So calm down, CD-Rom Baseball is just around the corner. We anticipate shipping at the end of July (this date might be adjusted if testing dictates it). The game costs $66 and includes the 1995 teams right on the CD-Rom. And it's totally compatible with Version 6.2 statistics, so if your replay is already underway you can switch over to the new game right away. Orders will be shipped on a first come, first served basis. The best things in life are optional... And we offer several options at exceptionally low prices. The optional play by play disk described above is only $5. We also offer a stadium disk that has day and night shots for all 28 stadiums in 256 brilliant colors, and the cost is just $28. Finally we offer an old-time ballpark disk which features 24 stadiums drawn in 256 colors (this is similar to our old 16-color versions but of much higher quality), for just $20. We highly recommend all of the above options as they bring our game to the "next level". (Note: Stadium pictures used with the Version 6.2 game are not compatible with the CD-Rom game as the size of the screen has changed). NEW ITEM: VERSION 6.3 AND 1996 SEASON AVAILABLE FOR DOS AND MAC The DOS Version 6.3 game is the same as last year's Version 6.2 except it has been updated to allow you to play with the 1996 and 1960 seasons. Minimum requirements for this game: IBM: 640K, Dos 5 or higher, smartdrive, 10 megs free disk space, 2 to 4 megs RAM, 580,000 bytes conventional free memory. MAC: System 7 or later, 10 megs free disk space, 2 megs RAM. This product is part of our older product line. IMPORTANT: While we plan to continue releasing season roster disks for this product line, we highly recommend that you purchase the CD-ROM game if your computer meets the minimum system requirements (see the CD-ROM Game Order Form for more details). All future development efforts will go towards improving the CD-ROM game. NEW ITEM: 1960 "RE-CREATED" PAST SEASON DISK Seventh game of the World Series. Bottom of the 9th. Now the pitcher rears back and tries to fire one past you, but you connect. The arch of the ball tells you all you need to know. You've won the World Series on a home run! Who amongst us hasn't dreamt of that moment? Yet only one has lived it, Bill Mazeroski on October 13, 1960. Even though you can't live the moment, you can re-live it with Strat-O-Matic's latest masterpiece, the 1960 season. This exciting set features sluggers Aaron, Banks, Mantle and Maris. Speedsters Wills and Aparicio. Fireballer's Drysdale and Bunning. And many more greats such as Mays, Mathews, Clemente, Killebrew, Spahn, Ford and Wynn. Concerning the pennant races, New York rolled past Baltimore and Chicago by winning their final 15 games. While in the NL Pittsburgh beat back Milwaukee and St. Louis en route to winning 95 games. This outstanding Strat-O-Matic season includes all Super-Advanced features. Requires Version 6.3 or CD-ROM Version 2.0 to play. UPDATED THROUGH 1996: CAREER HISTORICAL DISKS - $35 FOR THE ENTIRE SET! Strat-O-Matic's "Career Historical Disks" contain every player who has ever appeared in a major league game! Approximately 15,000 players' life-time averages are represented in this complete collection. (NOTE: Ratings are for the most part based on statistics rather than on typical Strat-O-Matic research). Previously $99 for the set we have decided to alter our marketing strategy and price them so that anyone can afford them! Each year a new set will be sold that is current through the previous season. (Note: due to this new pricing policy we no longer sell individual decade disks or offer upgrade disks for this product). A hard-drive and Version 6.3 or CD-ROM Version 2.0 is required to use these disks. PREMIUM "RE-CREATED" PAST SEASON DISKS Here, in all their glory, are the Strat-O-Matic "Re-Created" past season disks. These disks represent the ultimate in computer baseball realism. In fact, they put all lesser efforts to shame! It takes over 1,500 man hours of research to bring you each one of these fantastic seasons, and we're sure you will appreciate the work that goes into them. We are the only company in the world that offers actual lefty/righty statistics for the seasons prior to the 1980's. That's because we're the only company dedicated enough to wade through every single box-score in a given season to extract this information. And we don't stop there - we do tons of reading to come up with our subjective ratings so that when you play with one of these disks you can be assured of their realism. Think about that for a moment. The only place where you can find out if Ted Williams was better vs. left-handed or right-handed pitching is on a Strat-O-Matic "Re-Created" disk. PLEASE SEE THE ABOVE DESCRIPTION OF OUR LATEST RE-CREATED PAST SEASON, 1960. You should know that there is no accurate way to determine some ratings through statistical formulas, the method used by all of our competitors. For instance, sometimes the player who leads his league in outfield assists might have one of the worst throwing arms on the planet! The reason he gets so many assists is that the other teams run on him every chance they get. All other games would rate this outfielder as having a "rifle" arm. Only on a Strat-O-Matic "Re-Created" past season disk would he be rated properly. The difference is clear - these disks are the next best thing to being there! WORLD SERIES WINNERS DISKS These two disks contain World Champions for the years 1967 through 1993. The first disk contains all World Series winners from the years 1967 through 1979. And the second disk contains all World Series winners from 1980 through 1993. Every one of the teams contained on these disks are champions which make these disks great for running tournaments. ALL STAR GAME DISKS These two disks contain the All Star games, ready to play, for the years 1967 through 1994. The first disk contains every All-Star game for the years 1967 through 1980. And the second disk contains every All-Star game for the years 1981 through 1994. The disks have lineups pre-programmed in, so all you have to do is fire up your machine and you'll be ready to relive some of your best baseball memories immediately! SCHEDULE DISK This disk contains the "as-scheduled" schedule for the following seasons: 1927, 1930, 1941, 1950, 1956, 1959, 1961, 1962 and 1968 through 1993. Please note that the other season disks we sell (such as 1934 and 1964) already include an "as-scheduled" schedule. This disk is a great time saver and it costs only $15. 28 STADIUMS IN 256 COLORS These 256-color renditions of our digitized stadium photos will add greatly to the graphical appeal of your game. The digitized photos included with the game are reduced from 256 to 16 colors and then retouched, while the 256-color version looks much more like a photograph. Current through the 1994 season. REQUIRES AN EXTENDED-VGA GRAPHICS CARD AND 4 MEGS ON YOUR HARD-DRIVE. VGA OLD-TIME BALLPARKS DISK A companion item to our popular past-season disks, the old-time ballpark disk contains 16-color VGA drawings of 24 classic ballparks. Playing a game in these ballparks will surely transport you back in time. Imagine seeing Babe Ruth stride to the plate in Old Yankee Stadium, or Jim Palmer twirling a gem in his old haunt, Baltimore's Memorial Stadium! If you enjoy baseball history at all then this is a "must have" disk. Only $20.00 for all 24 ballparks. 42 OLDTIMERS & 80 HALL OF FAMERS (BASIC ONLY) Our famous 42 oldtimer teams and Hall Of Fame sets A&B are all included on this one disk. The 42 teams represent some of the best teams of all time. The 80 Hall Of Famers are included twice each - with both their best season and career totals. These players come in "basic only" style without lefty/righty breakdowns and they are an exact duplicate of the cards that have long been a popular item. NOTE: CONTACTING TECHNICAL SUPPORT You can contact technical support between the hours of 8:30 a.m. and 12:30 p.m. Monday through Friday at (516) 759-5368.