NHL 09 Preview

[Flyermania]

Quote: Originally Posted by Eddie1967

Not that I don't believe you but is that in the article?

From Littman's blog entry:

Quote:

NHL 09 Producer Blog Hi there, David Littman here, producer of NHL 09. This is my favorite time of year. The weather is nice. The Stanley Cup finals were awesome to watch. And we finally get to talk about our game. More than any other year, I can honestly say that many of the features in NHL 09 come directly from your (the NHL community) feedback. The two most asked for features were better defensive controls and superstar mode. I don't need to go into those here, since you will be reading about them elsewhere. As you have heard, Dion Phaneuf is our cover athlete. He is a perfect choice for NHL 09, not just because he loves playing the NHL series, but because he is one of the best young defensemen in the NHL. Taking control of Dion and stepping up on an opponent in the neutral zone is a beautiful thing. Some things you might not read about over the next couple of weeks are: - Yes, we are fixing bugs that have been called out in all of the forums, like the dynasty bug where released players ended up back on your roster and: - The ability to turn off CPU trading in Dynasty - PS3 locked at 60 FPS - The bug called fighting - Oh yeah...less hip checking - The dump and chase style will be a genuine way to win a game. (The new flip dump will sometimes bounce over the defensemen's stick and get him in all sorts of trouble. Then you can use the lift stick or the new checking system to get the puck back using one of the new forecheck strategies). - Lower skilled players will have a tougher time deking and scoring than in previous years. - Did you watch Sydney Crosby protect the puck with one hand on the stick when powering his way to the goal? You can do that too. - Separate line changes for forwards and d-men (finally) - We are adding features that will help newcomers to the series. Features like an interactive tutorial and a simplified control scheme. The reason for this is simple. We want to grow the sport of hockey. Hockey has great momentum right now, and we should all be working together to bring new fans to the sport. Hockey is truly a global sport and this game sells very well overseas as well as in NA, so we added new teams from top leagues around the world. - We will have lots of retro jerseys in the game (Seals, North Stars, etc) and we are doing something even more special with one of the NHL franchises.

[bigwill33]

Quote: Originally Posted by Eddie1967

Not that I don't believe you but is that in the article?

Yeah I mentioned being able to change the D lines separate from the O in the article.

[bigwill33]

Quote: Originally Posted by Joborule

Good write up man.

Thanks jobo!

[RealmK]

Quote: Originally Posted by Eddie1967

Not that I don't believe you but is that in the article?

Seperate line changes, along with fully controlable stick lifting, and defensive sweepchecking more along the lines of how it is in NHL2k. A new fighting engine, more types of penalties including pucks over the glass and checking from behind etc. Thats not even mentioning the 75 or so new goalie animations including desperation types of saves, no more lock on hitting, its now all physics and momentum based. One handed dekes that only star players can pull off with any regularity. a dedicated dump with forechecking options for how many guys you want to send in behind the puck. And to top that all off added presentation like breakdowns of what you did right or wrong during replays. I think you owe it to yourself to at least give the game a chance this year, you may be suprised.

[meh]

If all of these add-ons are implemented without taking away the quality shown in 08 - then wow, this could easily be the big game of the year!

Really looking forward to this one..... problem is, I want it now

[Splitter77]

if they make somebody like donald brashear (or the other scrubs) a 35 or so for an overall rating- then I'll get really excited about the game. What this game needs is variation between the stars and scrubs.

[wildhockey19]

Not to sound like a homer, but with a newly revamped fighting system I hope that it follows that the "true" fighters are much better at it then any other player. By that I mean if Boogaard were to square off with Ian Laperriere (to bad he's a puss and has public said that he has no intention to ever do so) the fight shouldn't last 30 secs. Just hoping that the fighting system is much like the deking system where the true skilled players at is excel much more noticably than the others. Peace!

[meh]

Quote: Originally Posted by Splitter77

if they make somebody like donald brashear (or the other scrubs) a 35 or so for an overall rating- then I'll get really excited about the game. What this game needs is variation between the stars and scrubs.

that is an interesting point and i think that covers most sports games - are the top players that far enough apart from the average everyday players in how the game rates them?

is 89 OVR to 70 OVR a big enough gap to warrant a star over a basic player (just for illustrative purposes)

maybe a radical overhaul of the ratings sytem is a way off yet, but that would most probably add another dimension when factored into the AI/Gameplay development