Okay let's do a bit more detailed post of what I actually hope EA would do.
Let's start with actual gameplay issues:
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Better connections especially for EASHL, I'm tired of at least one player being kicked off before the start of the game about 70% of the time when playing with full rosters of 6 vs 6, this has been happening for way too long, fix it. Enough is Enough.
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Bug fixes, like the pause glitch, same thing we have had similar glitches like this for years. This is just unacceptable for studio as big as EA. Pathetic really.
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Balance the game better:
-The infamous short-side wrister is way too OP, how often you see that goal in real life? Not often, sure when that shot is taken from that spot and it hits the target, it's a goal 90% of the time but how many times it's actually taken? How many times does it actually hit the target? Not many, needs nerf.
-Defending, skill zone D has to be taken away, it's fine for Be a Pro and EASHL but when you play 1 vs 1 the defending player should always be forced to play as the active forechecker or as the goalie, don't do this for a couple of seconds and it should lead to a major AI mistake in the defensive end, Defending just cannot be, stay in the middle passively.
-One timers need to be buffed. Goalies make desperation saves way too often, infact in competetive online, goalies should never make an desperation save, hiscoring change shots that don't miss the net should be a goal 100% of the time (unless it's being controlled by a human who reads the play and makes the correct moves).
-Add embellishment penalty, simply if you on purpose skate backwards to bait people to poke at your feet there is a change that you get the penalty. One of the cancers in EA games are people who do this, this isn't realistic, yes there is a time and place for this but the embellishment penalty needs to be added, maybe it could have a timer, if you have been skating backwards for some time then the fault is the pokers but if you randomly spam it and somebody trips you, you should be penaltized not the guy that did the tripping.
-Ban people, when you find someone cheating either a perma ban or a "devaluation ban" should be given. For example if someone cheats on hut but isn't too severe like hacking, take away all their coins and turn all of their cards into untreadeables, they can still play but everything they gained with cheating cannot be transferred to their main users. Also if they still do it, perma ban the whole IP address, Console and all the users within it.
-Unrealistic pass interceptions. It's ridiculously hard to get a pass through sometimes when even the plugs in the ice have 6th. sense in reacting, reading and reaching for the passes, the same pass your own teammates have a hard time getting possession of your opposing team's players would grab it almost everytime no matter if they didn't even see the puck, no matter if it's even coming from a very awkward angle for them to reach for it and no matter even if it came with a ridiculous laser blast speed.
No, just a simple one handed poke to one side and woíla, perfect takeaway.
Do the same with no defenders the two players and your own teammate might not even react to the puck at all even if it just slowly passes him by.
Really EA?
Take note that these are only for competetive online game modes like HUT & Eashl, which leads to me to my next point:
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3 different gamestyles; Arcade, Realistic Simulation & Competetive which of EA is kinda trying to do but only Arcade works really.
Arcade: High flying offensive hockey with big hits and a lot of desperation saves, a lot of RNG in this gamemode should be only used in Offline gamemodes if the player likes that and in: Ones & 3 on 3 arcade.
Meh, it's okay this is maybe the only part of these games where EA haven't actually screwed up.
Realistic Simulation, there is some random change, sometimes goalies make desperation saves and sometimes they let in blunders, same with skaters sometimes they have momentum and sometimes don't. In this gamemode it's very important to have all the different scoring changes have realistic probabilities in whetever it's a goal or a miss or a save etc. This game mode isn't used in online at all expect for friendly matches, it's best used for offline seasons. EA has never made realistic hockey games really.
And last but not least, the competetive gamemode. A lot of games have this but for some reason not any sports games that I'm aware of. Basically, no desperation saves, no easy goals, as little random change as possible, every action has always the same exact reaction. No momentum no ice tilt no nothing just the players holding the controller and the overalls of each players matter... In HUT, in Online versus for example I would even go further, Overalls wouldn't mean anything only the player classes, their size and their handedness would. Snipers would have high shooting skill, playmakers passing etc. No place for random change, this is how an E-sports NHL tournaments should be played, sure it might be boring but this is the only way true skill would triumph 100% the time.
Sadly it will never happen since EA doesn't want that, they want the skill-gap gone so that anyone can become "elite" at the game with very little practice.
There are a lot of other issues with these games as well such as adding more teams, jerseys etc. but I only focused on pure gameplay with this post, there is no use adding other stuff as long as the base game is horseshit.
