Because Backyard Baseball ‘97 is a baseball game, there isn’t a story here at all. It’s a baseball sports game that features kids playing baseball in backyards. What this game lacks in story, more than makes up for in the way that it plays and its nostalgia. This game is a remaster of the original Backyard Baseball that was originally released in 1997 as the name suggests.
Backyard Baseball ‘97 is a baseball game that was made for the home computer back in the late ‘90s. Because of this, the game uses a cursor for menu navigation and really all elements of the game. This is done because the game was meant to be entirely played with a mouse so that you didn’t have to rely on keyboard keys. This helped to make the game easy to pick up for most people and you didn’t have to work on memorizing any keys or anything. You just started the game and used the mouse the entire time.
So how does using a cursor to play the game and navigate menus, meant to emulate a mouse work on the Switch? Well it works surprisingly well. The cursor movement is fluid and set at just the right speed, though it does take a couple minutes to get used to.
Fields, teams, playing a season or exhibition game, and team management is all done with the cursor. What is nice about this is that because the game is controlled entirely with the cursor, you have enough time to pick how you’re going to bat or pitch, press the button to simulate a click and then the game executes the pitch or the batter to hit the ball. It’s almost turn based, but it’s not. It sounds kinda funny to say that about a baseball game, but you really would have to watch it be played or play it yourself to truly understand what I mean.
I will try and explain what I mean. So let’s say you’re up to bat first. You select a batting option, lets say a power hit. Once you select the power option for batting, the game AI will then pitch the ball. There will then be a small circular shadow where the ball is expected to come across the plate and you’re expected to hit the ball. So you move your cursor into the circular shadow and attempt to hit the ball. It sounds rather simple and it kind of is, but at the same time it’s challenging.
But that’s pretty much how the game is played, same goes for pitching. So as simplistic as this game seems, Backyard Baseball ‘97 has a lot to offer in terms of how it’s played.
Backyard Baseball ‘97 has the look and feel of a ‘90s cartoon kids would watch on a Saturday afternoon. All of the characters have a cartoonish look to them and are well animated. Some will do things like blow bubble gum or play with a yo-yo while waiting for a pitch. This gives each character a unique personality that comes across very well in the animation and art style of the game.
Though the game uses very bright and vivid colors, it does have a grainy look to it. It almost gives the look that the game was colored with crayons, which really drives home the feel of the game being for kids and even made by kids. This artistic choice was a nice touch back in the day and looks really good here on the Switch, even in 2025.
Backyard Baseball ‘97 is a remaster and not a remake of the original Backyard Baseball game that was released on home computers back in 1997. So this game doesn’t have the best graphics and really isn’t all that taxing on modern platforms. The game plays very well with load times not being too long and the game plays as well as it can for a game that was made back in the late ‘90s.
Backyard Baseball ‘97 captures every bit of the ‘90s PC game era. The sound the ball makes when it is traveling through the air, the sound of the bat as it hits the ball, all of it has a slight hint of static to it but not too much. The commentators in the game poke fun at the sport and each character as they are pitching or coming up to bat. Other than poking fun, they do a great job at giving a play by play call out to the action on the field.
I wanted to kind of elaborate on the static sound of the game. What I mean by that is that back in the ‘90s we had sound cards and speakers that didn’t sound the best. Sometimes they would have a static fuzz like sound to them that was a result of the technology and not a representation of the games we played. Backyard Baseball ‘97 does a great job of capturing that quality, yes I called it quality. It’s an attention to detail of sorts. I mean they probably could have remastered the audio and made it sound clean, but instead they went the route of sticking to the original sound quality of the game at the time. I really appreciate this because it makes the game feel familiar and you can still capture the magic of playing this game and it takes you back to a much simpler time in gaming.
Over the years we have seen games from Humongous Entertainment like Freddie Fish and Pajama Sam make their way to the Switch courtesy of UFO Interactive. With so many of their games on the Switch and now having a remaster of Backyard Baseball, I have hopes that the rest of the Backyard Sports games will make their way to the Switch. With the Switch 2 offering mouse functionality, it would be great to see all of the Backyard Sports games make their way to the Switch ecosystem. Talk about taking it back to the ‘90s!
If you enjoy PC games from back in the day and you have fond memories of playing Backyard Baseball, you owe it to yourself to pick up and play Backyard Baseball 97!
Disclaimer: A review key was provided
In addition to writing articles, Ryan Byers also creates content for his YouTube channel called "Obscure Games and Consoles", collects video games, and dabbles in video game development.