NHL 17 Impressions

[ChubbyD]

You may not have noticed as a casual hockey fan, but there is a rule that on faceoffs, the home team gets the last line change. So they can wait for the visitor team to put a line out, and then put their own to match-up. It used to be in the game, but was removed around 2012 or 2013.

Was this in the game? Did you play as home team and have a chance to see what line the Hurricanes put out and then pick your own?

I'm guessing not, but a guy can hope.

[BenVenom]

Ea access is live. It's 109 eastern. I posted here because this thread seems the most active. I searched nhl 17 and the trial was up.

[BenVenom]

The download is 19.7 gb

[onlybygrace]

Downloading...:-) :-) :-)

[BenVenom]

Some quick impressions. Just so you know where I'm coming from. I have bought every nhl game since the first on sega genesis(40 years old).
Ok, so I played 1 period only because I wanna let the game fully download. Me sharks at Pitt. 10 min period, full sim(that's an actual option).
I didn't adjust sliders or penalties from that option. Score zero zero, 11 shots to 9. I took one penalty and Pitt took 3(one was then putting the puck over the glass in their own zone.
First impression is that this is the least north/south game ea has put out. The puck was loose and bouncing a lot. I honestly saw the player have more puck reception problem than I did the last few years with that slider maxed. I also saw Pitt flat out miss more passes than I have ever seen. I also felt they dumped when pressured more than in the past.
Also a lot more shots wide of the net. More deflections in front of the goalie. He board play frequency seemed higher but not where it needs to be yet. I saw a few tie ups in front of the net, would like to see more. My game just finished downloading. I'm gunna jump back in. Will be playing for a few hours hopefully.
One last thing. The presentation is basically the same.

[BenVenom]

I played on all star on full sim

[duffman]

I was just about to post basically the same impressions you had BenVenom (same history with the game too heading back to NHLPA 93). All-star, full sim, 10 minute periods, the best thing I can say is that the flow of the game felt like a real game. There were stretches where neither me or the CPU could get through the neutral zone and the game would slow down, shifts where one side got pinned in their own end and just had to ice it, and some wide open stretches as well. Saw missed passes from CPU and the incidental contact is awesome on full sim since it makes it much, much harder to pull off big dekes in tight areas (finally!). Online will probably be a different story since it doesn't use full sim, but from the period and a half I got in during my lunch break it's the best offline vs CPU gameplay i've seen in a while. Turned off pass assist as well for a short time and it was even better. I've been missing a real manual passing option since nhl 14 on last gen, it just hasn't felt right to me on any of the current gen games.

The funny thing is that when I read one of the slider descriptions in-game, the one about how much incidental contact it takes to separate the puck, instantly I understood why the things that frustrated me so much on previous years were happening. Sticks through pucks, skates through pucks, and magically the other guy just holds onto it. So far, that seems to be gone on the full-sim setting.

I'm sure there will be the usual pile of stuff that annoys me after I play the heck outta the game, and we'll see what happens when I get together with my usual EASHL club guys and we watch the BS unfold there, but for now I'm waay more excited about this game than I was yesterday, even after having played a bunch of the EASHL portion of the beta.

[onlybygrace]

Didn't play full SIM bc I didn't want to play 10 minute periods. That said, I was pretty happy with what I experienced. The controls are very right and the CPU AI was much smarter both for and against me. That was great to see!!! Liked the new goalie animations and the tie ups seemed proportionate to what was happening on the ice. This game, with the sliders available has a lot of promise.

I can already tell.