I haven't played a NHL game for probably 5-6 years, so this game is pretty foreign to me.
At first, I thought it was pretty cool and much more realistic--which is true, but it was probably also a case of 'shiny new toy' syndrome. The more I play this, though, the more I see how much work EA has to do to get this series to start catching up to MLB The Show (which is the other series, I play).
The gameplay on this, while more realistic, still has some major issues. First, these are supposed to be NHL players, for chrissakes. Getting them to stop and start, turn and go a different direction, etc., shouldn't be like trying to do an about-face with the Titantic. I'm (obviously) not playing in the NHL, but I'm a decent hockey player in real life and I can do tighter turns and quicker stops than the players on here.
Second, the AI is good, but also stupid. About 6 times a game, I'm trying to carry the puck into the zone on the wing and right at the offensive blueline my own player cuts right in front of me and stops me from entering the zone or causes me to lose the puck. Also, the AI cannot read and react to loose pucks at all. I've had it happen a number of times in the slot where my AI is the closest to a quick rebound but will not start moving toward it. By the time I take control of that player, I've already lost the puck race to the other team.
Third, the poke check spamming is annoying as hell. They need to figure out a way to tone down the effectiveness of poke checks.
Fourth, and related to the poke check, the passing is too slow to react when going back for a loose puck. In real life you can tap the puck up the boards or to someone as soon as you reach it when it's loose. Not in this game, though, and it leads to lame poke checks when in reality the puck would have been long gone.
That's all I can think of right now, but I know there's more that bugs this shit out of me about this game.
