Virtual Sports Network Reviews NHL 14

[Swarley]

Reviews

First off, I’d like to say I’m not an HHL series regular. This is the first iteration I’ve played since NHL 11.

In playing a sports game series that I haven’t played in a few years, I wanted to jump into a game as soon as possible. I fired up a quick game as the Boston Bruins playing against the Colorado Avalanche.

The first thing I noticed was the pre-game presentation. It’s top notch. I think they’ve really done a great job in capturing the feel of a hockey arena, especially during the pre-game introductions and warm ups. The crowd and atmosphere is one area that I’ve never really been impressed with in most sports games. You never really feel like it’s a professional sporting event. However, I felt that this game actually did it right. The crowd cheered every time I delivered a good hit and every time I scored (which, I’ll admit, wasn’t often haha).

For people that don’t dabble into the hockey games, it might seem like it’d be tough to get the player control down right since it’s on ice. I’ll say I felt in control of my player at all times. Whenever there was a mistake made or something, right away I knew it was my own fault and not just some horrible controls and gameplay, which is nice that you don’t have to worry about that every second of the game.

I thought it was pretty cool when I got into my first fight. I came across and just destroyed an Avalanche player who didn’t see me coming. He immediately got up and threw the gloves off. Of course, I put him on his rear once again. However, as the game went on, the AI kept picking fights. In the first game alone I was involved in three fights, which I thought was a little much and it took a little away from the fun and surprise of that first fight.

Returning to the topic of this game and how well it brings gamers into the game; I felt that Gary Thorne does a great job with the announcing in this game. His announcing is very fluid and it feels like he’s actually there announcing your game. I’ve always been a fan of his, and seeing him do so well with this game is nice. There are definitely other games out there where the announcing sounds phoned in and it just takes away from the overall experience, but you wont find that here.

I will say, I suck at this game. I haven’t won too many of the games that I’ve played. I don’t feel like the game is cheating me, though. Every time I lose, I know what I’ve done wrong and why I lost. My shooting needs a lot of work, but I really enjoy how in-depth the shooting can be. My only real gripe is that I feel your AI teammates don’t do the best job getting into position while on offense, especially on breaks. There were many times when I’d been streaking down one side of the ice and wanting to pass to someone in a better position to score, but they wouldn’t be there and I’d end up just turning the puck over.

The modes in this game are very enjoyable. How can anyone not love NHL 94 Mode? This mode will take any game and transform it into an absolutely awesome 16-bit game of gloriousness. Everything about it just brings out the nostalgia of playing these games as a kid. I haven’t been able to dig into the big modes like Be A Pro or GM Connected Careers, but I’m looking forward to.

Overall I’ve really enjoyed my time with NHL 14 so far. It does a great job of bringing the game of hockey to your living room (or wherever you game). NHL 14 does a fantastic job of immersing gamers. The gameplay and controls feel fairly tight and there’s rarely an instance where you feel cheated by the game. Many sports games over the years just phone in their iterations, but the NHL series feels and plays like a top-notch sports game.

Score: 8.5​

 

[Playmakers]

Don't take this wrong way but that opening comment you made kind of reminds me of EA a few years ago trying to get a Hockey guy to bring back life into NBA Live.....Seriously my 1st thoughts were why is a Hockey guy who's never worked on a basketball game being put in charge of NBA Lives rebuilding project......very similar to your comments about not playing the game for a few years but you were assigned to write the NHL review I'm guessing LOL! I do appreciate your honesty in the write up stating your not a very good player....I love the fact that Gary Thorne is still broadcasting in this series he's one the few guys in any sports games by EA that they didn't make sound like a robot in the booth when calling the games. I've always loved Gary Thorne to me he's like the Kevin Harlan of the NBA....his voice just sounds right for Hockey games. I stopped playing this series years ago I think it was around NHL 08 or 09 because the game simply lacked Penalties and the CPU AI would refuse to deliver any checks during the game..... At that time I could give a rats aZZZZZZ about fights in the game anymore but when a hockey game doesn't have penalties by both teams (CPU) then you know something is whackkkkk and that is how I felt about NHL. Which forced me to stop playing the series. I'm not even a big Hockey guy in terms of strategy but I fell in love with this series around NHL 95 I was like 15 years old and me and some buddies from high school used to play this game non-stop even though we didn't know what the hell we were doing....we used to play the game just for the fights at that time and our scores would be like 20-15 with 100 fuching penalty minutes racked up back then.....Now as I got older years later in the Marine Corp I had to learn how to actually play NHL because a lot of guys in the barracks where from places like Detroit and New York and they loved their Red Wings and Rangers would beat the shit out of me in tournaments we would have every weekend for money. Well to make a long story short I went the next decade loving NHL on the PS2 and then when the game moved on to the XBOX 360 and PS3 it kind of turned into crap the same crap year after year by EA. I was even a die hard Hockey SIMULATION player but even then I could tell EA wasn't producing a Hockey game anymore that was SIMULATION STYLE Hockey.....In fact I thought 2K's NHL series had passed them up at one point and basically haven't played a NHL game in like 4-5 years now. But your review intrigues me to rent this game and possibly purchase it if they (EA) have turned the corner and produced a SIMULATION TYPE of game again.