WAITING FOR USER... this needs to be fixed.

[ipushmycar]

If there's one thing wrong with this game... it's this. This NEEDS to be fixed. Half the time in OTP is spent waiting for user... this is annoying and truly unacceptable. Seriously, disable the pause button, disable replays, WHATEVER you have to do to get rid of the waiting for user.

Ideally...
-Cut out all replays except goals and penalties.
-Majority pressing "A" should skip replays, scrums, and cutscenes.
-Cut down the waiting time in between periods.
-When someone presses start, it should not pause the game. Time outs are not necessary.
-If a player goes idle, or pauses, the CPU should temporarily control him (similar to Left 4 Dead).

This is my only major gripe. It truly is ruining the game, and that's not just my opinion. EVERYONE online complains EVERY game about "waiting for user". EA- this is 2009. Multiplayer gaming should not be so sketchy.

[tgalv]

Re: WAITING FOR USER... this needs to be fixed.

i'm in total agreement. there's too much downtime. and what annoys me even more this year is the stupid after the whistle stuff. just a total waste of time and it wasn't even that fun the first week when it was new. maybe i'm in the minority because i play on a fairly mature club team and it seems like most of the guys still enjoy flying around the ice after the whistle checking people and taking shots. zzzz. let's just get on with the actual game.

[jyoung]

Re: WAITING FOR USER... this needs to be fixed.

Agreed on both posts.

[Myloman]

Re: WAITING FOR USER... this needs to be fixed.

"Waiting for user" wastes about 5 minutes per game which doesn't sound like a lot, but like money it adds up.

[ChiTownKid]

Re: WAITING FOR USER... this needs to be fixed.

100% agreed

[Section_25]

Re: WAITING FOR USER... this needs to be fixed.

I agree also, sometimes I sit there waiting and start thinking WTF are they doing ?!? Looking at a replay? Looking at the stats?!? Changing their lines ?!? Maybe I don't want to know what there doing but it IS aggravating, especially when they keep stopping play over and over in the same game. An occasional break in he action to make a goalie change or something I can understand, but usually this doesn't seem to be the case. They make you wait for unknown reasons...Grrrr

[warriorwm6]

Re: WAITING FOR USER... this needs to be fixed.

Most of the strategies including forecheck are also mapped to the controller as is pulling the goalie...so I don't see why they would want to pause for that.

The only time I see it as necessary is if those without an HDTV have to change their camera angle to see the whole arena

[Redskins Pride]

Re: WAITING FOR USER... this needs to be fixed.

yeah but it shouldn't take that long.

i think dickheads are just trying to get the other team to quit.

[ButchCassidy]

Re: WAITING FOR USER... this needs to be fixed.

I agree with all stated above, especially the completely unnecessary pushing & shoving after the whistle..and if I hear 'These teams really don't like each other' one more time I'm gonna clock someone! I thought (for ps3) you can push L2 to eliminate that?

And also the 3 stars and highlights after the game, ugh. A simple 'X' click should let you escape that.

[BigDisk]

Re: WAITING FOR USER... this needs to be fixed.

I agree with everything the OP wrote.

One thing that could help alleviate the pain of "waiting for user" during the break-in-play and post-period replays would be if we wouldn't be shown "WAITING FOR USER" over an uninteresting background (the ice or some static, camera angle of the arena/crowd)

Whenever I press A, the game will stop showing me the replays and instead show me the ice or some stupid part of the arena with the WAITING FOR USER message. Instead, what it should do is flag my user as READY and keep on showing the replays until a majority of users are READY.

I know for a fact that some user think "Hey, if I press to skip the replay, all I'll be shown is the ice or something uninteresting while I wait for everyone to skip. Why get screwed, I'd prefer playing now but I'll just watch the frickin replays cause looking at WAITING FOR USER sux".

And that's what makes it 100% sure that at least 1 person will watch the frickin replays even if they all want to just go on with the game.

(for the record, I always press A).


Another idea would be to have the professional league be played on "fast mode" (without replays or break-in-play animations except for goals and penalties), and with a 15 or 20 seconds timeout between periods instead of the previous 30 seconds. Want to play the PRO league? Go to the toilet BEFORE the game not during the intermission.

Leave the Casual league as it is right now for the slowpokes that like watching replays of their last save.

[BigDisk]

Re: WAITING FOR USER... this needs to be fixed.

Oh, also...

Another idea would be to write on the screen who is READY (aka "waiting for user") so that we can see who's the dumba** watching the replay and yell at him on voice chat :-)

[bukktown]

Re: WAITING FOR USER... this needs to be fixed.

I've only played 1 club game because I don't have the patience for it. What's even worse is when the goalie freezes the puck on every save.

[Fiddy]

Re: WAITING FOR USER... this needs to be fixed.

agree with the OP..

come on Red_Shirt.. get this done!! lol

[Ktulu]

Re: WAITING FOR USER... this needs to be fixed.

I agree with everything the OP wrote.

One thing that could help alleviate the pain of "waiting for user" during the break-in-play and post-period replays would be if we wouldn't be shown "WAITING FOR USER" over an uninteresting background (the ice or some static, camera angle of the arena/crowd)

Whenever I press A, the game will stop showing me the replays and instead show me the ice or some stupid part of the arena with the WAITING FOR USER message. Instead, what it should do is flag my user as READY and keep on showing the replays until a majority of users are READY.

I know for a fact that some user think "Hey, if I press to skip the replay, all I'll be shown is the ice or something uninteresting while I wait for everyone to skip. Why get screwed, I'd prefer playing now but I'll just watch the frickin replays cause looking at WAITING FOR USER sux".

And that's what makes it 100% sure that at least 1 person will watch the frickin replays even if they all want to just go on with the game.

(for the record, I always press A).

In addition to this they should add the little countdown timer (that you see in the pause menu) underneath the "waiting for user". That way you don't have to wonder if the game is locked up... ie you can see that something is still happening.

They also need to cut the number of pauses allowed down to one per user, or alternatively, if a user pauses the game their player should be replaced with a generic AI player.

The "scrum" time between whistles should also be cut in half and all cut scenes that aren't replays should be eliminated (I don't need to see a cut scene showing a player's height and weight or the fact that they have 0 goals and 0 assists).

While I'm at it they need to heavily increase the penalty for users quitting in OTP and also track DNF% for team play. If a user quits they should get all F grades for that game and if their DNF% is over a certain threshold their overall grade (and thus their players cards) should be penalized.