UPDATE 2/27/12: I just found some new info about MLB.com At Bat ’12 that you should check out. It’s in this new blog post: Update to MLB.com At Bat ’12 info.
UPDATE 2/28/12: Macworld just put up a post about the app: MLB.com At Bat warms up for 2012 season.
UPDATE 2/29/12: The MLB.com At Bat ’12 app is finally out! Take a look!
I was just informed by a friend that MLB in their infinite wisdom has drastically changed the MLB.com At Bat app for 2012. After doing a little digging, I found an article that pretty much says it all.
This year, we’ve just confirmed that MLB At Bat 12 will be free with your subscription, which remains at $119.99 for existing subscribers. New subscriptions will be priced at $124.99. This enables you to receive 150 Spring Training games and all 2430 regular season games (some games are subject to blackout), with no added cost for either the iPhone or iPad apps.
Every article I found about this change made it sound wonderful! This would be true if you were writing to all the folks that paid the $125 subscription last season.
First off, you do not get 2,430 games! There is no way that anyone will be able to stream every game! There are games that start at similar times, the AppleTV and iOS devices can only play one stream at a time. Sure, your computer can do more than one, but how many people are going to sit in front of their “computer” and watch several games at a time. I guess, if that computer were hooked up to an HDTV, they might, but that’s about it.
Secondly, last season, people were able to pay $15 for the Game Day Audio streams. Being forced to pay almost 10x that for the ability to listen to Game Day Audio again is ludicrous!
I’m having a hard time understanding why all the reviews I have read so far about this news is positive! I would much rather pay $30 or even $50 for MLB.com At Bat ’12!
In this household. We paid the $15 for MLB.com At Bat ’11 and $15 for the Game Day Audio. We were fine with that. In fact, I paid $30 for the apps because I bought both the iPhone and iPad versions!
To be fair, it’s not all that clear if the Game Day Audio can be purchased separately and used with the app, or the only subscription that will work with the app is the full $125 one.
The $125 subscription really caters best to people who root for a team that doesn’t play in the city they live in. My wife who is a huge Indians fan living in St. Louis would benefit the most from a $125 subscription, but as a Cardinals fan, there is no big advantage.
Ah well, time to look for a new app to track baseball!
Dave M.
February 27th, 2012 at 6:21 pm
Word is the app is free. You can get an in app purchase of the audio stream for around what you paid last year, or the video version for $125. In the end, you will be spending much less.
February 27th, 2012 at 7:13 pm
Yes, the app is going to be free. But how much of the app will be usable if you don’t have the $125 subscription? That’s the big question on my mind at least. I haven’t found any info on what MLB is going to do to the app if you don’t subscribe.
Are you still going to be able to watch the up to the second live play by play coverage that the app used to do when you were just paying the $15 for the app?
I never used the audio or video streams in the MLB.com app. I just opened up my team’s game and watched play by play on that little baseball diamond that they show.
If that functionality is still there in the free app even without either subscription. I’m going to be a very happy camper!
February 28th, 2012 at 5:43 pm
Hey Dave ! I have the same worries. I used to use the app just for the audio feeds. However I saw on other websites that the mlb at bat 12 is FREE with the MLB.TV PREMIUM subscription. Which means there has to be another version ( paid) for non subscribers. They only difference should be : the app is free if you get the premium package. if not..its like before.. Or at least that’s how i see it ! I guess we’ll see tomorrow.. the 29th
cheers
February 28th, 2012 at 7:23 pm
It’s very possible that when you enter your MLB.TV Premium subscription, it unlocks all the other features of the app and not having to pay the extra $15 for those features. That would make sense.
I was writing from the point of view of someone who isn’t going to subscribe to the MLB.TV Premium subscription. I never do since my team would be blacked out for over 80 games. My wife is an Indians fan, but doesn’t really need to “watch” the games. Plus, you can watch a condensed version if you don’t mind waiting until after the game is over.
The app being released tomorrow will be free. From inside the app, you have a choice of either using the “Lite” version, paid version ($2.99/$14.99) for the Gameday and highlights package, or pay the $24.99 monthly subscription for the MLB.TV Premium package which probably includes the ($2.99/$14.99) package. I am guessing that the $125 full season MLB.TV package need to be purchased on MLB.com’s website. I could be wrong, but the PDF document didn’t really seem to have that option documented.
It could be that the document was an early draft and later drafts handle the $125 in-app purchase.
Overall, we’ll find out tomorrow (or possibly tonight 10pm CST).
February 28th, 2012 at 7:15 pm
You may be looking at this the wrong way. Instead of the cost being 10X more, it may be half as much. The app will be a free download, as you mention. If you can subscribe to GameDay audio for a similar amount this year, but the subscription is linked to a login/account instead of the app, you’ll only need to pay once for both iPhone and iPad.
We’ll see tomorrow I suppose, but I have a hard time believing MLB would sacrifice the primary feature of the most popular sports app.
February 28th, 2012 at 7:35 pm
Usually, in-app purchases are linked to the AppleID purchasing. So both my wife and I use the same AppleID to get apps in the App Store. When I use the in-app purchase to unlock the Gameday audio/highlights, etc… it will work on all the devices attached to that AppleID.
So, in theory, we only have to pay once for all three devices (my wife’s iPhone, my iPhone and iPad.).
February 28th, 2012 at 7:44 pm
Exactly. Big improvement over last year. No need to go find a new app as your articles states.
Also, MacWorld just released an article confirming this is how the app will work.
February 28th, 2012 at 8:03 pm
Yep, if you look at the linked post I made yesterday (added to this post as an UPDATE at the top of the article), I found a PDF that described how the in-app purchases would work and roughly how the app would handle the subscriptions. Not to toot my own horn or anything, but I beat the Macworld article by a day.
They were probably embargo’ed not to post the article until today so I suppose I had an advantage there. 
Still, the Macworld article is well written. Way more so than mine since I’m not a writer.
Thanks for the dialog! It’s nice to get some feedback now and then.
April 5th, 2012 at 1:53 pm
Does anyone know if ou purchase MLB atbat12 if you can also stream it on your computer or do you have to purchase adio separately through MLB.com? Thank you
April 5th, 2012 at 4:45 pm
Yes, in fact I have streamed a game from the iPad to a Windows computer very easily. It was the Audio stream. You need a freeware program on the Windows computer that will accept AirPlay streams.
For Windows, check out this page:
http://compixels.com/8974/enable-airplay-on-windows-pc-to-wirelessly-stream-audio-video-from-ios-devices
For Macs, check out this page:
http://www.macupdate.com/app/mac/36263/airplayer
I haven’t found a utility that will stream video to the computer, yet.