After playing the new BAP now for 20+ hours I can give some of my thoughts:
My first impression was that I loved every piece of it. I really struggled to score and went didn't score a point in the pre-season. I loved it. Now after a couple of seasons I hate it and think they kinda ruined the game mode.
So many bugs and glitches that it's not even funny anymore. I hate that they have taken away the possibility to make your own story and be a bottom-line grinder. If you would fulfil every challenge you're given, you would have 150 point rookie season.
I didn't get to see any pp time on my rookie year and scored 68 points playing 10 minutes a night. I won the Calder trophy but we didn't make the playoffs which was a bummer. Still the management thought I had a superstar season because I got a 6M contract and was named a captain of Oilers over McDavid. I almost quit on that career after that. 75 overall power forward that had seen zero playoff games, zero minutes on special teams and scored 20 points less than McDavid and still was made captain? You've gotta be kidding me.
I also hate that it's impossible to be demoted to AHL. I should have been sent down after having no points in pre season but somehow I still made the team. I guess EA didn't program the AHL as the part of the scripted story mode.
I would have preferred the old Be a Pro over this nonsense any day. The only thing that is still pretty fun is the gameplay itself. I'm not sure if it's much of an improvement but at least it feels fresh.
Glitched challenges, interviews and commentary happens too often to even give an example. Everyone who plays it would have seen those. What I do think they need to fix with an update
- I don't think it's realistic that in EVERY GAME, on a team of SUPERSTARS, the coach would go to the rookie and tell him to score unless he expects a 82 goal season. They need to tone down the frequency of in-game challenges
- After year 1 the player conversations are waaay to frequent. I'm 4 games in of year three and I've already seen 5 player conversations. So tone down those as well.
- Fix all the glitches and bugs on challenges. Even though I didn't mind the XP, I don't think my 0+0 -3 performance was better than another rookie's 1+1 on a game that I was supposed to outscore him.
- DON'T MAKE ME A CAPTAIN AFTER ONE YEAR. MAKE ME EARN IT. And if there's already a captain like McDavid, DON'T MAKE ME A CAPTAIN.
- In-game between the shifts simulation needs to be better. I played first 30 games of my rookie seasons, playing all three periods with 20min period length. At 30 games, I led the team with 25 points while playing on the 3rd line and no special teams. So my play didn't affect the other lines at all. Still, Draisaitl had only 14 points and McDavid had like 20. Only after simulating whole games they would get points. Basically I had to simulate games so that McDavid would get ahead of me in points.
It feels like a half-assed implementation and to me is actually a downgrade from previous versions. It really feels like a COVID-19 edition of an NHL game.
