EA_Aljo really didn't think I'd be back this fast with yet another one. I genuinely want to hear your opinion on what you see here. Because I don't think I could find you a CLEARER example of where players see penalty bias in action. Mostly because, I believe play should've stopped when the player in blue(Admirals? I think? Idk, its one of the HUT Cup Chase teams.) got possession along the wall because of the crosschecking that lead to me accidentally dumping it into the corner. It feels exceptionally egregious as a player seeing this "missed call" considering there is a referee in the corner feet from it happening.
I won't even argue that "the boarding call was undeserved", as it was simply a result of me feeling the need to vent some frustration due to consistent "no-calls" over several games. The amount of calls on the player vs the AI feels like it only punishes the player and seems to "let more go" when it would be the AI that are penalized. I get that in a lot of cases, small things are glanced over, and I'd be lying if I didnt say I had gotten away with a couple accidental slashes in front of the net and I'm okay with AI getting away with some things here and there when it doesn't alter the momentum or disrupt the play. But it really isn't taking me much effort to find crosschecks that cause a loss of possession that regularly go unpenalized. Tripping incidents have also gone up and instead of "missing penalty shot" occurences, I just get tripped earlier or as I am passing them🤷♂️ so I guess "accuracy improved in one aspect"(? But I dont even feel thats accurate to say? Like, the trips get called, which is an improvement, but its far more frequent and happens earlier than before, so I cant say it's "missing pentaly shot" calls because I get to a step or 2 before I would be "clearly ahead" of the defender and thats where the trip happens.)
Gameplay can feel bad enough at times when AI players "suddenly get momentary inhuman abilities"(described as: effortless acceleration to cover 6-15ft gaps, or shoves that have drastically more force or range than you can ever exert on them even through full speed charging them) to cover defensive gaps, but how are players not supposed to feel frustrated by this? I can't even argue that "superstar difficulty is difficult" it just feels like the gameplay sliders are biased towards a toddler that would flip out on you if it didnt have advantages. I wouldnt describe it as "hard" or "challenging" but it teeters on "not fun" or "burnout inducing"