You can play at 'Field of Dreams' in The Show

Who wouldn't want to play baseball in MLB's Field of Dreams ballpark?

Hitting home runs into giant cornstalks, fielding grounders on the pristine grass, memories of the 1989 film classic swirling in that warm Midwestern breeze.

Well, if you're not on the White Sox or Yankees, you probably can't play in the stadium MLB built next to the famous field from the film. BUT, if you own MLB The Show 21, you can play in it virtually. As any team. With any player.

Beginning today, the game has added the field as a free content update for all players on PlayStation 4 and PlayStation 5.

"Yeah, this is the first time I think we've dropped in a brand new stadium in the game [mid-year]," Jason Villa told me, excitedly, over a recent Zoom call.

The idea to get the famed field into The Show came to fruition when MLB first announced they'd hold a big league game there in early 2020. The process was carried out by Jason Villa, director of production, Shawn Robles, lead environment artist, and their respective teams. A basic framework was put in place last year, and then, after a pause during COVID, the groups ramped up production the last six weeks or so.

How did they build the virtual ballpark? Did they visit Dyersville, Iowa, taking photos of every inch of the new stadium? Did a voice in their backyards tell them how to get it started?

No (Well, at least that's not what they told me).

Amazingly, The Show team simply scoured the internet, gathering screenshots posted by MLB and other media outlets.

"It was kinda sparse, but a lot of it was having some of the guys on our team finding things on social media," Robles said. "Finding screenshots from MLB, little news blurbs. Those were some of the most up-to-date images we could get and they were a big help. I'm guessing we're fairly close, being that we've been doing this a long time."

They were also able to accurately lock down key dimensions -- wall heights, bullpen dimensions, and dugout details -- with this blueprint from MLB.

And don't worry, other elements of the movie made their way into the video game version.

"You can see the farmhouse," Robles said. "You know, we couldn't do the farmhouse exactly the way it is, but we did that style of house and that's out there. There's a smaller field that's out in the background that we did."

"Yeah, during presentations and replays, and if you go to your replay camera, even experientially during the game, you'll be able to see the house and that smaller field," Jason said.

There will also, of course, be cornfields visible beyond the outfield fences.

Along with being able to unlock the "Field of Dreams" ballpark, users will be able to unlock the game's uniforms -- which were announced last Thursday.

Robles, who's worked on The Show game series for more than 20 years, told me this may have been one of his more enjoyable projects.

"I gotta say, the style of the stadium, the way it started to turn out, there's the batter's eye that looks like an old barn, there's weathered wood throughout the stadium," he said. "That was really fun to do because that's not a typical style for a stadium. It's completely different. We went beyond a typical MLB stadium or even Minor League stadium. More of a fantasy style."

Both Robles and Villa are excited to see how users react to their creation and how closely it matches up to the actual field on Thursday. They also hope to do more special add-ins like this in the future.

"For us, hopefully it's a gateway to do more of these things throughout the year," Villa told me. "It's a way to celebrate whatever's going on in baseball. Whether it be the London game that they've done in the past or another territory -- it'd be fantastic."