Hey Howdy Hey Tappers!
We’re talkin’ softball…
From Maine to San Diego.
Talkin’ softball…
Mattingly and Canseco.
Ken Griffey’s grotesquely swollen jaw.
Steve Sax and his run-in with the law.
We’re talkin’ Homer… Ozzie and the Straw.
Baseball! Is there anything more glorious than the game of baseball? (Don’t answer that if you’re going to say no…)
The Marge at the Bat update combines two fun baseball episodes of The Simpsons…”Homer at the Bat” and “Money Bart”. I feel like it’s no coincidence that those are two episodes we’ve been talking about around here lately. (For those who’ve missed it, Safi’s been talking a lot about Baseball on his Monday Morning Math Posts)
But, leave it to EA though to mess up an update about Baseball, with zero new content. Kind of like MLB is messing up the game itself these days with all these stupid new “rules”…but I digress. (hey look, I can be Cranky too 😂)
Anywho, the one thing Marge at the Bat has, that EA didn’t mess up, is a fun questline. The questline is pretty amusing for those that follow baseball, so let’s get to it…
Marge at the Bat Pt. 1
Auto starts
Burns: Smithers! Get your pasty-white dress shirt in my office right this minute!
Smithers: I’m already here, sir. Gazing at you silently like I do all night while you sleep.
Burns: Well, stop being creepy and get me Aristotle Amadopolis! We have a feud that needs settling.
Aristotle Amadopolis: I too have been here the whole time, with the aid of several bugs I’ve planted in your office.
Make Burns Get Into a Net Worth Measuring Contest- 4hrs, (requires Aristotle) Earns $350, 90xp
Make Smithers Scrub the Office for Bugs- 4hrs, Earns $175, 45xp
Burns: Curse you, Amadopolis, you swarthy Greek salad! We’ll settle this dispute once again with a baseball game. Only this time my team will win!
Aristotle Amadopolis: But your team won the last time.
Burns: It did? Jeez, my memory isn’t what it used to be. I should do more crossword puzzles.
Aristotle Amadopolis: A rematch would be my pleasure. I’ll see you on the blood diamond.
Burns: Curse you, you swarthy Greek salad! Oh God, now I’m repeating myself?
Note: Part 1 of the questline is where folks who don’t have Aristotle are getting stuck. This is a bug on EA’s part, you can try contacting them or wait until they patch it (which will hopefully be soon).
Marge at the Bat Pt. 2
Smithers starts
Smithers: So, sir, would you like me to call up the ringers again?
Burns: Ringers? No, that didn’t work last time.
Smithers: Actually, it did. You won, remember? No, of course you don’t.
Burns: I’ve seen a lot of baseball movies. What we need is a band of misfits: a nerd, a fat guy, an angry guy, and a coach who doesn’t care if we win.
Smithers: How many baseball movies have you seen exactly?
Burns: Just one so far: the Bad News Bears. I hope Part Two is as good as Part One.
Make Smithers Print Out Sign-Up Sheets- 4hrs, Earns $175, 45xp
Make Burns Watch the Bad News Bears in Breaking Training- 4hrs, Earns $175, 45xp
Burns: Dreck! Utter dreck! We’ll never win with a team of misfits.
Smithers: So you want to go with the ringers then?
Burns: No, that’s just what you say before you add a cool guy and a girl to your roster, causing the team to gel. Don’t you know anything about baseball?
Marge at the Bat Pt. 3
Homer starts
Homer: Burns is forming a baseball team again? Baseball was lame then, and it’s lamer now!
Carl: It’s like the old man’s run out of ideas. Or some old men somewhere have.
Lenny: We should totally not sign up for this.
Homer: Look, Mindy signed up in the slot for “Girl”.
Lenny: There’s a girl on the team. Sign me up!
Make Lenny Sign Up as the “Nerd”- 4hrs, Earns $175, 45xp
Make Barney Sign Up as the “Fatty”- 4hrs, Earns $260, 70xp
Make CBG Sign Up as the “Angry Guy”- 4hrs, Earns $175, 45xp
Make Disco Stu Sign Up as the “Cool Guy”- 4hrs, Earns $260, 70xp
Homer: These selections are really iffy. Disco Stu is the “cool guy”?
Disco Stu: Disco Stu is hurt by your line of questioning.
Homer: And Comic Book Guy is the “angry guy”? He seems harmless.
CBG: Just wait until someone makes a canonical mistake on the message boards. I’ll be on them like a hawk.
Marge at the Bat Pt. 4
Marge starts
Marge: You’re playing sports with Mindy from work?! Over my dead body!
Homer: Well, it’s me playing sports… so it’s probably going to result in MY dead body.
Marge: Mr. Burns! I demand you take Mindy off the team.
Burns: But we need a woman. You can’t have a team of misfits without at least one woman. And no more than one woman.
Marge: Well the only woman Homer is going to be breaking a sweat around is yours truly!
Make Marge Sign Up for the Team- 4hrs, Earns $175, 45xp
Make Burns Fire Mindy Without Cause- 4hrs, Earns $175, 45xp
Marge: Thank you, Mr. Burns. I probably should have mentioned earlier that I know nothing about playing baseball.
Burns: You can’t play? Then excellent, you’ll be the coach!
Homer: What?!
Burns: Those who can’t do, teach. Or coach. All that matters is that they’re in a position of power over those who know what they’re doing.
Krusty: Like non-writing Executive Producers?
Burns: Exactly.
Marge at the Bat Pt. 5
Marge starts
Marge: All right, team! Who wants to catch some fly balls? And as a unrelated question, can anyone here hit fly balls?
Softball Burns: What’s going on here?! You call this a practice?
Marge:I did in the email I sent out to everyone.
Softball Burns: They’ll have plenty of time to learn to catch and hit in the game. Practice is about fleshing out the characters. The nerd should be missing plays because he’s watching other people play baseball on his laptop. And the angry guy should just be getting really mad and yelling at everyone.
CBG: That’s the stupidest thing I’ve ever heard!
Softball Burns: That’s more like it.
Make Team Members Practice in Weird Ways- x3, 4hrs, Earns $175, 45xp Freemium and $260, 70xp Premium (Can Send Homer, Barney, Lenny, Carl, CBG, Disco Stu, Jasper, Moe, and Zutroy)
Softball Burns: Excellent. I like how the cool guy spiked the Gatorade when no one was looking.
Marge: He did what now?
Disco Stu: Disco Stu has an issue with alcoholism too.
Softball Burns: Now I want everyone to go home and get into giant arguments with their loved ones. Then tomorrow I want the best player on the team to quit, but change his mind at the last minute because of something his dad says. Great practice, coach!
Marge: But I didn’t even get to bring out my orange slices.
Marge at the Bat Pt. 6
Marge starts
Marge: Our team is ready. I found out our nerd only got an 1100 on his SATs. Can you help me, Lisa?
Lisa: I don’t think I should. I turned into a real monster that week I coached Bart’s team.
Marge: But you won the championships.
Lisa: Actually, we lost. You should do more crosswords, Mom.
Marge: Please, I need your help. The game is tomorrow and I haven’t even started slicing oranges yet.
Lisa: Well, I guess I could crunch some stats with Sabermetrics.
Marge: Great, and after you eat you can help me with the team.
Make Lisa Crunch the Numbers- 4hrs, Earns $175, 45xp
Make Marge Prepare Orange Slices- 4hrs, Earns $175, 45xp
Marge at the Bat Pt. 7
Burns starts
Softball Burns: All right, team! I’ve got a good feeling about today. This game is going to be as good as Bad News Bears Go To Japan!
Lisa: Actually, Mr. Burns, I ran the numbers and our chance of winning today is zero. Which, coincidentally, is the Rotten Tomatoes score for Bad News Bears Go To Japan.
Softball Burns: Young lady, I’ve had it up to here with your pessimism. And your hip 1990s “big data”. The Bad News Bears won, didn’t they?
Lisa: Actually, they famously lost.
Softball Burns: Curse my memory!
Marge: Does anyone know what positions they’re supposed to play?
Make Marge Manage the Bullpen- 4hrs, Earns $175, 45xp
Make Burns do Crosswords- 4hrs, Earns $175, 45xp
Make Team members Fall Apart- x3, 4hrs, Earns $175, 45xp Freemium and $260, 70xp Premium (Can Send Homer, Barney, Lenny, Carl, CBG, Disco Stu, Jasper, Moe, and Zutroy)
Marge: My God, this is a disaster!
Lisa: I know. We’re down by twenty runs, and there’s only one inning left.
Marge: I was talking about these orange slices. I meant to make the first slice core-to-core, but I must have done it around the middle.
Marge at the Bat Pt. 8
Homer starts
Homer: Okay Homer, this is your moment to shine. All you have to do to win the game is take a ball to the head like last time. *oof*
Marge: Homer! Are you okay?
Homer: Did we win?
Marge: No, we’re not at bat yet. You let the ball hit you in the head while you were fielding. I think you have a concussion.
Homer: I’m going to sleep for a little now.
Make Homer Sleep During his Concussion- 4hrs, Earns $175, 45xp
Make Team Members Lose Game- x3, 4hrs, Earns $175, 45xp Freemium and $260, 70xp Premium (Can Send Homer, Barney, Lenny, Carl, CBG, Disco Stu, Jasper, Moe, and Zutroy)
Smithers: I’m sorry, Mr. Burns. Your team just lost.
Softball Burns: In that case, I’ll stop doing this crossword. Ah yes, my brain’s already starting to forget things. And 3-2-1… We won!
Marge: *sigh* Well, that game was humiliating.
Lisa : Yeah. But on the upside, we lost by the exact number of runs that I predicted.
Bart: And I can confirm that, because I bet that we’d lose by that much and won a bunch of money!
Marge: Is Homer still sleeping?
Bart: It looks like it. But at least he’s not snoring anymore.
And there you have it my friends, the full dialogue version of Marge at the Bat. The only thing new to hit with this update, so we mine as well enjoy it right?
Thoughts on the questline? How about the content with this update? Wish they would have done more? What would you have added? (besides the baseball players) Sound off below, you know we love hearing from you!