Nice write up, but I have a different opinion on the skating.
The skating was a nice new feature, but the controller scheme and implementation was poor IMO. My biggest beef is that they have the skating all wrong. The issue being that the left stick controls the direction and speed. What it really should have been was left stick to control the direction and the left trigger to control the speed.
Look at the wide turns that a person takes in the game or that you need to glide before a tight turn and then skating through it, that is not what you would do in the real world. You would glide during the turn, since you use the edges of your skates to cut into the ice to improve the turn. If you are not at top speed, then you usually do cross overs to power through the turn and no need to glide before I do that. But when I am already at top speed or any speed for that matter...if I need to turn tight I glide so I can use my skate blades to dig in to turn. So they have the gliding wrong.
Take a look also at the acceleration. In the game, the player takes like four, five, sometimes more strides and then he gets a burst of speed. This is not how it should be. The player should increase with speed with each step and by the time he gets to the fourth or fifth step, he should be at his top speed. The explosiveness is all wrong.
Even the pivots are all messed up and much of the time players are turning the wrong way or just have issues. You can't even take a step from a stationary stance and glide, you must take a couple of steps first. Just go into practice mode and stand still, then just quickly nudge the joystick in any direction. The player just jogs on the spot? We need this ability to take one step and a little glide, to make small adjustments (especially in front of the net).
Had the controller been better implemented this is how you would do it:
Pull in trigger to skate hard, back off on the trigger to skate slower (just like the gas pedal in auto games). The players attributes would then dictate how quickly he would get to that speed. To turn move the joystick. Take your hand off the trigger to glide and you could then dig in more while still using the left stick. The more you move the joystick in the opposite direction in an arc, the more the player digs in. Pull straight back/up and its a stop. Going slower and want to power through a turn, just pull in on the trigger and the player will start skating and do a cross over animation. Maybe make the left bumper the backskate button. All the skating controls on the same side. This would have given us full control of the skating.
The skating in this game is not like real world skating at all. I really hope they revamp the control scheme for NHL14.
My grade for skating is a C-, with a nod to a good idea and poor implementation.
Edit: Devmcdonnell, the post just above mine, gets it! I agree with his view on this game.
The skating was a nice new feature, but the controller scheme and implementation was poor IMO. My biggest beef is that they have the skating all wrong. The issue being that the left stick controls the direction and speed. What it really should have been was left stick to control the direction and the left trigger to control the speed.
Look at the wide turns that a person takes in the game or that you need to glide before a tight turn and then skating through it, that is not what you would do in the real world. You would glide during the turn, since you use the edges of your skates to cut into the ice to improve the turn. If you are not at top speed, then you usually do cross overs to power through the turn and no need to glide before I do that. But when I am already at top speed or any speed for that matter...if I need to turn tight I glide so I can use my skate blades to dig in to turn. So they have the gliding wrong.
Take a look also at the acceleration. In the game, the player takes like four, five, sometimes more strides and then he gets a burst of speed. This is not how it should be. The player should increase with speed with each step and by the time he gets to the fourth or fifth step, he should be at his top speed. The explosiveness is all wrong.
Even the pivots are all messed up and much of the time players are turning the wrong way or just have issues. You can't even take a step from a stationary stance and glide, you must take a couple of steps first. Just go into practice mode and stand still, then just quickly nudge the joystick in any direction. The player just jogs on the spot? We need this ability to take one step and a little glide, to make small adjustments (especially in front of the net).
Had the controller been better implemented this is how you would do it:
Pull in trigger to skate hard, back off on the trigger to skate slower (just like the gas pedal in auto games). The players attributes would then dictate how quickly he would get to that speed. To turn move the joystick. Take your hand off the trigger to glide and you could then dig in more while still using the left stick. The more you move the joystick in the opposite direction in an arc, the more the player digs in. Pull straight back/up and its a stop. Going slower and want to power through a turn, just pull in on the trigger and the player will start skating and do a cross over animation. Maybe make the left bumper the backskate button. All the skating controls on the same side. This would have given us full control of the skating.
The skating in this game is not like real world skating at all. I really hope they revamp the control scheme for NHL14.
My grade for skating is a C-, with a nod to a good idea and poor implementation.
Edit: Devmcdonnell, the post just above mine, gets it! I agree with his view on this game.
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