NHL 14 Review

Nostalgia on ice. 

I'll be honest here: I mostly watch hockey for the violence. That doesn’t mean I don’t appreciate the intricacies of the plays, and the skill it takes to skate and handle the biscuit, but it's not hockey until someone’s slammed against the glass so hard it causes me to spill my beer all over my lap. So it pleases me to say that NHL 14 is the hardest hitting, most enjoyably violent hockey game I've played, even though players still lack adequate brainpower.

Last year's NHL 13 introduced new skating mechanics and physics, and this year EA Canada builds on that concept by adding a new dynamic to the physics engine: Collision Physics. It’s easier than ever to pull off a bone-crunching collision, and the results are more realistic. Now things like speed, weight, and position matter, so you can't just spam the hip-check button and expect to take a winger down. Instead, just skating into a player fast enough triggers collisions, so chasing down a puck can easily turn into a slam against the boards. It not only makes the hits more varied, but creates a more seamless way to work the body on the ice and make some big hits. I found myself becoming a more physical player because of it.
Speaking of bigger hits, the other most notable on-ice edition to the game is the Enforcer Engine. Based off EA's Fight Night boxing game, Enforcer completely changes how fighting works.
Instead of the first-person mode that has been the staple since NHL 10, you're now in a third-person mode, right there on the ice. All your teammates and opponents remain, and the ref circles you waiting to blow the whistle. The mechanics change to a simple punch, dodge, and grapple set of moves, controlled with the sticks, and it feels way more natural and engaging to yank the gloves off and charge an opponent. And to add to it, fighting is no longer a request you have to accept. This isn’t a duel at high noon – if you take a shot on the goalie after the whistle (because you're a dick like that), you can bet the biggest guy on the other team is going to come over and deck you as hard as he can. But with great hits come great concussions, and my biggest complaint with the series – teammate AI – remains in full effect. It's certainly better in NHL 14 than in previous years, at least, because teammates now know to retrieve pucks behind the net, and opponents will go offsides and ice the puck. But then you'll notice teammates missing routine passes, and somehow the score is tied even though you've taken three times as many shots on goal. Now to be fair, most of the issues only occur when playing on the easier difficulties, but that's still a problem.
Off the ice, NHL 14 brings new modes and some familiar ones. Be a Pro has undergone a makeover. Renamed Live the Life, it's now more fleshed out with between-game content like press conferences, endorsements, and social events. It's mostly just menu based, so don't go expecting an NBA 2K-style experience, but it helps to make the mode feel more like you're actually stepping into the role of an NHL player. I'm a fan of these sports RPG modes, so I appreciate that there are extra mechanics that measure things like my teammate likeability and fan popularity. And unlike NBA 2K, the extra stuff in Live the Life is very quick and streamlined, letting you get back on the ice before it wears out its welcome.

One of the great things about NHL 14 is that nearly all its best features carry over to online play. For players that want the Live the Life experience, there's the EA Sports Hockey League, which lets you take a created pro online. EASHL is an amalgamation of the online GM mode and Live the Life. You play as your guy, online against up to 12 other players. It feels like Online Team Play, but with a league built around it, and it makes EASHL the most ambitious online created-player system I've seen. But I really wish my offline Live the Life player transferred over to the EASHL – it’s frustrating that I worked so hard to raise his attributes, only to have to start over when I want to go online.
NHL 14's other big online mode, GM Connected, also largely relies on everyone playing to be invested. Managing a team and playing multiple seasons of hockey with potentially dozens of friends is awesome. The mode itself, however, is kind of lackluster. The hub is boring and slow to maneuver, and it's not immediately apparent who's winning – you have to dig for it. By contrast, EASHL is more vibrant, and shows your league progress front and center.

And finally, although it's mostly just a nostalgic extra, my favorite addition to this year's game is NHL 94 Anniversary Mode, which transforms the modern game into a high-definition version of its 16-bit ancestor, complete with simplified controls and rules. (Remember when hockey games didn't have icing and offsides?) The camera view, the light blue ice, the stars around the selected player... it's all awesome. What doesn't change is the AI, so don't expect to score easy goals just by looping behind the net every time. It's an awesome way to get back into hockey games if you've been gone a while, and it's the best way to show NHL to friends, assuming they were born in the '80s. See, Madden NFL 25? This is how you celebrate an anniversary.