Baseball Games: Home Versions of the National Pastime, 1860S-1960s (Schiffer Book for Collectors)

Rating:
Summary: Great Coffee Table book
Review: This is simply a picture book of a bunch of baseball games with some organization and text fill. The games are organized by century (18th & 19th), and by type (player-endorsed, non-endorsed, card, action and coin-operated). There's a bit of baseball history, but what you'll want this for is the attention to historical detail in the games themselves. There are hundreds of games photographed in a reasonable (if not exceptional) amount of detail; most of the text is just a description of what's in the pictures. Many versions of popular games are compared, with information on how to tell the versions apart, which will be invaluable if you're a collector. For some reason there's four pages on Cadaco, but neither APBA nor Strat-O-Matic get a look in, nor do more contemporary games from 3M or Sports Illustrated or Avalon Hill. Don't expect a forty-dollar art book with prose that'll entertain you into the night. The printing quality, photo quality, and text-quality are only so so. I'm still waiting for the book that compares how the different games are designed strategically and how they play. This one's aimed more at collectors.

Rating:
Summary: Great Coffee Table book
Review: This is simply a picture book of a bunch of baseball games with some organization and text fill. The games are organized by century (18th & 19th), and by type (player-endorsed, non-endorsed, card, action and coin-operated). There's a bit of baseball history, but what you'll want this for is the attention to historical detail in the games themselves. There are hundreds of games photographed in a reasonable (if not exceptional) amount of detail; most of the text is just a description of what's in the pictures. Many versions of popular games are compared, with information on how to tell the versions apart, which will be invaluable if you're a collector. For some reason there's four pages on Cadaco, but neither APBA nor Strat-O-Matic get a look in, nor do more contemporary games from 3M or Sports Illustrated or Avalon Hill. Don't expect a forty-dollar art book with prose that'll entertain you into the night. The printing quality, photo quality, and text-quality are only so so. I'm still waiting for the book that compares how the different games are designed strategically and how they play. This one's aimed more at collectors.