NHL26 All NEW FACE SCANS NEEDED

Bruh Jake debrusk doesn’t even have a face scan yet… 

Bruins063​ 

He does it's just one or the new ai generated ones so it  doesn't look exactly like him and they gave him generic hair but at least that's better then a straight up generic face from their list of terrible generics. The actually added a ton of Ai generated face scans for veterans in NHL25 with their new  programming tool there is no reason they can't add a ton of these younger players now who are starting to breakout or broke out last season. A full real scan I know that will always be reserved  on star power and marketability and timing and draft pedigree and stats etc. but with the new tool even if it looks like **bleep** and kind of claymationy

at least it's not some random face and was generated from a picture or the player. 

I agree with you, this is something that’s really needed.

Agreed! It's kind of essential that players look like themselves when the graphics are where they are (and have been for a while...).

xPetro-_-​ thanks for the reply and thanks for agreeing! I'm really hoping they build on what they did last year with the goal of having every teams entire roster scanned real or ai generated. They have the tech for it now so there really isn't any excuse. 

Tobbish​ 

Thanks for the reply! I totally agree, it kills the realism when you have generic faces that have have been the same for years and  ever look like the actual player. The fact we cannot even edit them ourselves makes it worse, since the only option is to create a new player and replace them. As someone who mainly plays Franchise, that is a huge deal to me. But even for HUT players, how do you roll out a new card and get fans excited when the player looks nothing like himself in game? That is exactly what happened with Celebrini, Will Smith, and Michkov last year. They looked nothing like themselves all season because they were never added in a roster update.

KlariskraysNHL​ 

Do you think NHL will build on last year’s trend of rolling out more AI generated faces? Nothing tops the detail of a true real scan, but I was happy to see how many they added last year. Even the AI generated ones were way better than the random generic faces we have had for years.

Also, do you know why EA will not let us edit the generic faces they give players without scans? You can do this in Madden but not in NHL. If a player does not have a scan, they should at least let us change their likeness ourselves and assign a different generic and deferent hair etc. . Right now it forces us to create an entirely new player and then remove the duplicate by burying them on an alumni roster just so Franchise mode is not full of double players.

They added more faces because they were able to scan the players in person and then do touch ups probably.  I'm not 100% certain why we don't get freedom but I'm going with licensing and how they can't add player faces without scanning them.

KlariskraysNHL​

EA_Aljo​ 

From what I have seen in game and read, they now use a tool that makes an AI generated face from a player photo, then they assign an EA generic hairstyle. A lot of these AI faces look similar and sometimes have big heads or a claymation look, but they are still way better than the old generic faces that looked nothing like the players.

The community manager mentioned the full scan rig is hard to travel with, so the real bottleneck is getting players to Vancouver or to big scan events. That explains last season’s rollout. My concern now is this season: will they actually keep building on it, or let it stall?

I made the list above so the devs can see who is missing and should be added. None of those players are blocked by college rights. They are licensed NHL players with photos and stats and appear on every preseason depth chart. Last year I understood a few late college signings only making it in at the end of the season. But this year there’s no excuse — with the AI tool, they should be able to process each player’s photo, generate the face, assign a close hairstyle, and have them in the game at launch.

darkryd3r​

I saw your post about face scans from NHL25 from last year and with that new ai generated tool even if they weren't perfect and the head sizes  a little big and claymation like it was WAY better then the amount of generics that had flooded the game for years and I too was pumped. It was far overdue for realism  and I too hope they build upon it from last year. I made a list based off all players worthy of a real scan and/or ai generated scan for this upcoming launch of NHL26. Take a look trying to get the developers to take notice so they can add them in.
Cheers