Before you buy NHL22, think about this:

[Edmonton East]

lol skill

this game hasn't rewarded skill, to ANY balanced and reasonable degree, since at least NHL14 and I would argue NHL09.

Preach my man, preach!

EA realized that by keeping sport games as "random" as possible (without blatantly making it so), they could keep more users engaged over a longer period. Business decision. But it absolutely ruined the NHL and FIFA series.

And for those that haven't realized it yet, they make the CPU involvement higher/more important to drive randomness.

 

[ThePsychicSaw]

Preach my man, preach!

EA realized that by keeping sport games as "random" as possible (without blatantly making it so), they could keep more users engaged over a longer period. Business decision. But it absolutely ruined the NHL and FIFA series.

And for those that haven't realized it yet, they make the CPU involvement higher/more important to drive randomness.

facebook threw in my feed some $20k championship last minute goal, and the gameplay...my lord the gameplay ...

these are gamer "Pros" being showcased and they didnt do 1 attempt at a play that should be rewarded. every pass and shot defied logic/physics and shouldnt have been rewarded. Was absurd how poor it looked

 

[Matt UK]

EA Play finished and still nothing new on NHL 22 lol

Whatever your thoughts on the game, this definitely isn't a good sign.

 

[Cornwallace]

Who in this thread is saying the game is good? Did you mix it up with another thread? Because I don't see anyone saying it. I do see people stating that the reasons that the OP posted are not the reasons they aren't happy with the game, but that's not the same as someone saying it's good. Your contract example was even mentioned earlier as a reason why someone didn't like it. I think you just wanted to post your "superiority" over the casuals and didn't bother to read anything in the thread.

Yes, I want to post my "superiority" while making literally zero reference to my actual skill level at the game...

Plenty of people were defending the series and even saying it was good earlier in the thread. Maybe you should go back and actually read it instead of telling me to lol

Sorry if I hurt your feelings just by saying casual franchise mode player

 

[Cornwallace]

Preach my man, preach!

EA realized that by keeping sport games as "random" as possible (without blatantly making it so), they could keep more users engaged over a longer period. Business decision. But it absolutely ruined the NHL and FIFA series.

And for those that haven't realized it yet, they make the CPU involvement higher/more important to drive randomness.

EA filed a patent back in 2016 for dynamic matchmaking that was designed to increase player engagement and keep people playing for as long as possible

Everything about the series is designed to try and maximize the overall amount of play time in the hopes you stumbled in HUT

 

[Bondurant]

My biggest complaint was how poorly the EA servers were operating first months after 21 rolled out. Constant connection failures (including during games). On the EA support forum that had someone trying to claim it was everyone's connection and/or device causing the problem. Just admit fault when justified, EA. Tell me you're working on improvements. Do anything other than pawn your ineptitude onto us.

 

[123offtheglass]

EA NHL games clearly need some competition… no chance I’m supporting whatever crap they come up with

 

[J bo Jeans]

The game is so brutal. I've lost games to guys where in every single aspect of the game I'm miles better than him. But he'll just jam a few lucky cross creases and end up winning somehow.

Cross-creases have completely plagued NHL for years

 

[J bo Jeans]

There are still people bitching about "ice tilt". It doesn't exist. Stop with this. Accept your inadequacies. You're not as good as you think you are. The best players are the best players because they're good at the game, not because they have some special advantage or "ice tilt" in their favor. Stop it. It's childish. It's akin to believing the in the tooth fairy because you found a dollar under your pillow as a kid.

You cant tell me when I'm outshooting someone by 20 shots with double the TOI and he jams in a cross crease on his 3rd shot of the game that there isn't some sort of game design mechanic allowing that player to stay in the game.

 

[DuckyGirard]

This thread is hilarious watching people that competitively play the game online being told by casual franchise mode players that the game is actually good lol

Franchise mode isn't even good either which makes this thread all the more humourous. The AI teams are brain-dead and just handout contracts like there's 30 Jim Benning's running every other team. A couple seasons in and you start seeing elite to superstar players sitting out entire seasons because their teams couldn't fit them in under the cap... AI players on the ice are just as brain-dead and unenjoyable to play against.

You can track the downfall of the series with when David Littman stopped producing the games and Sean Ramjagsingh was put incharge. The first ever NHL he produced was 15...

Hockey's just a game, this game is a gamified version of the real deal. You guys take this way too seriously. I have no idea why you think they have any interest in selling to a small subset of the population who are all obsessed with competitive fake hockey. Most of their sales comes from 12 year olds.

 

[Cornwallace]

Hockey's just a game, this game is a gamified version of the real deal. You guys take this way too seriously. I have no idea why you think they have any interest in selling to a small subset of the population who are all obsessed with competitive fake hockey. Most of their sales comes from 12 year olds.

Did I say EA should cater the game entirely to competitive players? Not at all. I was saying the overall product is in a bad place, but go ahead and misconstrue what I said.

It's 2021, people are going to play pretty much any game competitively. Others clearly seem to disagree with your opinion of people taking it "too seriously" because actual NHL teams are sponsoring competitive tournaments with prize pools in the 10s of thousands...

You might have a point if the biggest/only gamemode EA cares about wasn't HUT. World of chel packs have HUT packs inside them just to try and get people playing it. It's the only gamemode that you can't unpin from the main menu of the game...

They make more money off a competitive gamemode like HUT than the actual sales of the game now so you couldn't be more wrong with that take.

 

[Saitama]

Did I say EA should cater the game entirely to competitive players? Not at all. I was saying the overall product is in a bad place, but go ahead and misconstrue what I said.

It's 2021, people are going to play pretty much any game competitively. Others clearly seem to disagree with your opinion of people taking it "too seriously" because actual NHL teams are sponsoring competitive tournaments with prize pools in the 10s of thousands...

You might have a point if the biggest/only gamemode EA cares about wasn't HUT. World of chel packs have HUT packs inside them just to try and get people playing it. It's the only gamemode that you can't unpin from the main menu of the game...

They make more money off a competitive gamemode like HUT than the actual sales of the game now so you couldn't be more wrong with that take.

Yeah, I don't see this changing much either. HUT is going to end up infecting every mode in some way, or I should say it already does, in that modes that don't have anything to do with HUT are getting superficial updates because they'd rather concentrate on HUT. But honestly, with how small the sales are for their NHL series compared to other sports, HUT might be the only thing keeping the franchise going at all.

 

[Favster]

Kinda agree with everything you said but I have to buy it for LG

 

[Pip]

@John Price

 

[KevFu]

The issue is the terrible philosophy that makes everything mediocre at best.

1. The annual release. You can't make improvements when you're locked into an annual release date because anything that would take longer than X months to build is not an option to make the next game, and with so many things to do in X months, it's not like they're splitting their staff up into "Next Game Team" and "Long Term Team." Long Term Team is probably like 5% of their staff at best.

These games need to dump the annual release aspect and just update rosters if the game isn't "new enough" to put out a new release for. This one runs counter-intuitive to the capitalist approach, but could work by winning back fans. $20 to unlock the next "program" instead of buy a new game for $70 and you may reduce the people who buy a new game every few years and get additional money from them.


2. Based on the size of the NHL fan base compared to their other titles.... NHL is where they should be doing their innovations/experimenting for features that could be universal across their sports titles. Take all the EA feedback for Madden and NBA and NHL and use NHL to address all of the top 100 issues you can fix and see how it goes. You can watch the sales of NHL and if you get a big spike, you're on to something.

 

[Cornwallace]

The issue is the terrible philosophy that makes everything mediocre at best.

1. The annual release. You can't make improvements when you're locked into an annual release date because anything that would take longer than X months to build is not an option to make the next game, and with so many things to do in X months, it's not like they're splitting their staff up into "Next Game Team" and "Long Term Team." Long Term Team is probably like 5% of their staff at best.

These games need to dump the annual release aspect and just update rosters if the game isn't "new enough" to put out a new release for. This one runs counter-intuitive to the capitalist approach, but could work by winning back fans. $20 to unlock the next "program" instead of buy a new game for $70 and you may reduce the people who buy a new game every few years and get additional money from them.


2. Based on the size of the NHL fan base compared to their other titles.... NHL is where they should be doing their innovations/experimenting for features that could be universal across their sports titles. Take all the EA feedback for Madden and NBA and NHL and use NHL to address all of the top 100 issues you can fix and see how it goes. You can watch the sales of NHL and if you get a big spike, you're on to something.

While you bring up some good other points, this is one I don't necessarily agree with entirely.

I don't think a lot of people realize how many ways there are to get the game for less than full price.

If you get a month of EA play (Costs $5 and you used to be able to/I think you can still refund it after) then you can play a 10 hour trial of the game before deciding if you want to buy it. On top of that EA play will give you a 10% discount off the cost of the game, which at full retail price is more than the cost of the month of EA play.

Then the game usually goes on sale for half price within 3 months around the holiday season so you can grab it for a further discount if you're patient. If you're even more patient you can play the game as much as you want with just an EA play sub in april/may when it gets added to the vault. I believe 21 also got added to xbox gamepass eventually too.

I'm not trying to shill for EA but there's all sorts of ways to play the new game at less than retail price.

Hell if you really want to stick it to EA you could only play on 10 hour trials and just make a new account whenever it runs out. Just refund the month of EA play every time and you get to play the game for free.

 

[Vxnation]

Not sure what the issue is. Outside of losers who manipulate the connections the games played pretty awesome this year. I don't play hut and anyone who does should ask themselves why in the world a company who can profit of you buying packs wouldn't have code in there to help bad ppl win and frustrate good people to buy more packs . That game mode is complete and utter trash across all EA platforms .

That being said vs mode is really fun . I found it could do it all. Skill or grit . Try nyi with a full forchek and std to aggressive offensive stgys on staggered defence . Almost a god mode team if you know how to use the RB dump past the defence and just hammer them or pick it up for a quick. Two on one . The game is addictive . Sure people abuse the same garbage goals hanging around those hash marks year after year but this year at least it's fun . Just change your attitude around. They made a really fun game this time .

 

[OKR]

You cant tell me when I'm outshooting someone by 20 shots with double the TOI and he jams in a cross crease on his 3rd shot of the game that there isn't some sort of game design mechanic allowing that player to stay in the game.

It’s a fact that no such thing exists as ”ice-tilt” no matter how you feel about the game, there is no built in feature to make other players have better results than the other

 

[CBJx614]

I think the problem can be traced back to two major issues.

1) the AI, it's completely garbage and is ENTIRELY too rigid when it comes to playing whatever system you are using.

Which leads me to the next point.

2) the system/formations (controlling everything on the D-pad) the AI plays these systems way to rigid and they really need to simplify the options. I've played hockey my whole life and it's a nightmare trying to figure out what system I need to change to mid game. There's WAY to many options to change on the fly and it gets way to confusing way to quick. Make it simple.

Aggressive, conservative, defend lead, etc.

The major changes should only be available to be made in between periods. Coaches might want you to play tighter or more aggressive mid period, but they aren't going to switch entire systems on a whim.

 

[Lyons71]

It is so close to being a good game, but the cross crease makes it awful.
I have clips of me feeding the puck through 4 defenders in front of the net to score back door . its not fun, that should be an interception 99 times out of 100.

Is this in online play? I only play be a pro, and it's difficult to get your teammates to even setup on the far side of the goal. Most just skate to the corners, or right next to an opposing defender, making them useless. My defenseman let millions of cross crease passes through, on the other hand.

 

[crazy8888]

1. Your skill is negated by your proximity to a server. It's a proven fact that players near servers have an advantage. EA has refused to acknowledge or do anything about this. This means that if you work hard and are great at this, you're still equal to an average player who lives next to a server (QC for example). Do you want to deal with that again?
2. EAs stance on puckragging (relayed to us on the official EA forum by CMs) is that they "don't see it as a problem". In thqt forum, our best opportunity to interact with them, they've refused to give transparency and/or commit to a concrete plan to combat it. It'll be there next year. Do you want to deal with that?
3. It's a proven fact that base gold teams magically catch up to higher rated cards. I'm telling any player who doubts me to go give a base gold team a try. Then remember that the point of the game is to earn better players..... who are useless against base golds. Do you want to experience that again?
4. Remember the GWC? The guy who won the whole thing, Eki, said the following after winning:
“It’s a bit of a shame that you can play this simple of an offense”
“I don’t love how you score goals right now”
“I have tried to play a pretty fast-paced, counterattack hockey with a lot of creativity, but it wasn’t getting me the tournament results.”
“During this 1.5 years, I have never felt truly in control of the game.”
“I scored most of my goals in the tournament the same way: be as fast as possible and wait for the cross crease.”
Even the guy who won the GWC takes shots at this game and confirms it's just a cross-crease race. Do you want that again?
Think about that before buying NHL22.

I did not know that about the servers. Makes a lot of sense now though. I saw one player in the top 5 having a record of 200+ wins and 1 loss. I reckon he lives right under the EA servers?

But while you may be making some valid points, the fact that EA has monopolized the nhl video games industry leaves us with no choice but to buy it anyway.

 

[Jazzguitar]

It’s a fact that no such thing exists as ”ice-tilt” no matter how you feel about the game, there is no built in feature to make other players have better results than the other

Why does my team play faster and score easier the more I score? Why is it if I have three or so bad games in a row I suddenly have a game where my whole team is playing on steroids. (not lag) Why does EA have a patent for what would seem to be something that could be ice tilt: EA faces yet another class-action lawsuit connected to loot boxes

They claim to not use that but there is clearly something there and has been for a long time now. I've always called it momentum, maybe it's two different things but they at the very least have some sort of momentum mechanic built into the game.

 

[OKR]

Why does my team play faster and score easier the more I score? Why is it if I have three or so bad games in a row I suddenly have a game where my whole team is playing on steroids. (not lag) Why does EA have a patent for what would seem to be something that could be ice tilt: EA faces yet another class-action lawsuit connected to loot boxes

They claim to not use that but there is clearly something there and has been for a long time now. I've always called it momentum, maybe it's two different things but they at the very least have some sort of momentum mechanic built into the game.

Because you’re not as consistant as you think...

For years and years that i’ve spent playing this game, people have moaned about ”ice-tilt” but for whatever reason all players with high win % don’t recall ever facing issues with it, maybe they just happen to get the best luck with ice tilt? For whatever reason that ice tilt has also never been confirmed, dispute being said as excuse for losing since NHL 04.

The ”ice-tilt” patent is in FIFA too, it just adjusts the A.I difficulty based on how you play, it doesn’t affect players that are user controlled. NOBODY is claiming to have anysort of tilt in FIFA.

 

[Crosscrease14]

Why does my team play faster and score easier the more I score? Why is it if I have three or so bad games in a row I suddenly have a game where my whole team is playing on steroids. (not lag) Why does EA have a patent for what would seem to be something that could be ice tilt: EA faces yet another class-action lawsuit connected to loot boxes

They claim to not use that but there is clearly something there and has been for a long time now. I've always called it momentum, maybe it's two different things but they at the very least have some sort of momentum mechanic built into the game.

I've played the series since NHL 11 and can definitely confirm this is true. It's why I never sweat it when I go down 2 early. If your stats are decent (shots, zone time, passing, etc) and you can finish your chances the game will give you opportunities. The biggest thing is practicing aim/dekes to capitalize on the golden opportunities.

Anectodal but curious if others feel the same way about it. I'm not upset about soft scripting of games but I do think it's in there. If the skill level is lopsided or one player is a much better finisher you can get lopsided games. Connection also plays a major role online in my experience.

 

[traffic cone]

Lot of shitty players (mostly boomers) here complaining again, it seems. Like they are every year.

At least inside the competetive and (semi-)professional scene (here in Northern Europe) the game is liked by many.

Maybe actually spend time on learning the game and its mechanics (master the skill stick for example) before shitting on the game just because you lose to someone online.

And no, there is no ice tilt. It’s just psychological. And a way for people to find excuses when they lose, mostly.