NHL 27 MEGA WISH LIST (be nice)

Love a lot of this, especially the trade logic, AI utilization, and overall franchise depth. That stuff is long overdue.

The biggest missing piece, like you touched on, is full customization and immersion.

If we’re not getting GM Connected, Franchise needs to be a true sandbox. Even if we did get it, these should still exist:

• Full player editing during franchise
• Attributes and playstyles that can evolve or be adjusted over time. Players change in real life
• Ratings shouldn’t feel locked

Customization is way behind too:

• More hairstyles and the ability to edit hair and head size even on scanned players. They are already using generic hair on scan players, so we should have access to that. If we can change facial hair, we should be able to change hairstyles
• Real equipment options like stick color variants like Bauer Pulse, Twitch, Tracer. These exist in real life and should be in the game
• Helmet size, shin pad profiles, bigger or smaller, tapered fits
• Tape jobs, jersey style, shoulder pad size adjustments. Let us actually make players look real

Being able to fully customize generic players assigned to real players without face scans would be a huge improvement. Every year I end up recreating hundreds of players from scratch because the default faces and hairstyles look nothing like them. It takes hours for something that should be simple.

A better system already exists in Madden. When a real player has a licensed photo but is assigned a generic in game face, you can edit that face and swap it out. Once you do, the game simply replaces the real player photo with the generic version you selected.

This keeps everything within licensing rules while still giving users full control over how players actually look.

For players without image rights, they can still start with the blank silhouette. But as soon as we edit the generic face that was assigned to them, the silhouette should automatically switch to that generic face. That way, even without a licensed photo, every player still looks like an actual person once edited, without breaking any rules.

Immersion would take it over the top:

• Playable warmups and bench interviews during warmups
• Locker room walkouts and more cutscenes
• In game presentation that feels alive
• Practice mode with real drills and development both in and out of franchise mode

Right now Franchise is deep on paper but doesn’t feel alive. The details would pull in even non hockey fans or people who stopped buying the game. Add this layer and it completely changes the mode.