Let's Talk About Polish!
Guys... there's gotta be an effort to polish things and then move onto something big and then polish that. One thing I recommended I think in NHL 13 was working (and I remember speaking to a dev about this where I was showing him videos of it) on a system that was similar to fifa's at the time and that was a collision/battle engine where guys would go almost shoulder to shoulder to compete for a puck or a collision engine with the boards. Basically a system to rub a guy out (God I hate that term lol) along the wall. You see it all of the time in an NHL game where a guy is trying to get by a defender along the boards and then gets steered into the wall to have his other defender sneak in behind him to pick the loose puck up. I thought that by now they'd have something like that implemented because fifa already has a shoulder to shoulder engine where attributes such as strength/height/weight/aggression level all were calculated to come out with a realistic looking jostle for the ball. The boards aren't even live with a collision engine in this game yet and it's 2020.
The skating got polished enough (for now, there's still lots of refinements they can do)... The goalies need a lot of polishing. They still need more animations especially on the blocker side, MUCH better movement and control, better post work, a button that allows you to sprawl out to prevent wrap arounds whether it be a spread eagle with the toe to the post or an actual reliable paddle down save of some sort, maybe an ability to "ready for a shot" where it cancels out any movement but your goalie's agility is raised by like an attribute of 5 or 10 points if you anticipate a shot correctly (which what a lot of goalies in real life do, usually "quieting your feet" or basically getting into a ready position to react is a sign of a goalie being on his game). Say if you hold X, your goalie stops completely, you get a buff to your ability to make the save but if you're out of position and not square to the puck then it's a -5 or a -10 to your glove high/low blocker high/low so it can't be abused. That should hopefully eliminate the "sometimes goalies just get sniped" conversation because it puts skill into making a save against a high quality scoring chance if you set yourself up right for it, and likewise in real life if you anticipate a shot, hold down the X button and the shooter sells the shot and sends away a pass it also would realistically look as if you froze the goaltender. Just one of many thoughts to brainstorm off of. Maybe if you're in butterfly you get a +35% attribute bonus to shots in the lower half of the net (basically low blocker/low glove/five hole attribute), but a -15% to high blocker/glove attribute. Meanwhile staying on your feet you get a 20% bonus to high glove/blocker but a -10% attribute to five hole/low blocker/glove. It adds skill to the position, helps on shots in tight if you can anticipate a low shot because they're in too tight, but if they're far enough away to elevate the shot and you're down early you get beat up high.
Defense needs polishing obviously. This is where a proper collision engine would be huge. Being able to squeeze a guy along the boards would be huge and would make the game more realistic in terms of interference calls and whatnot. The poke check should not cause as many penalties as they do now. Depending on your stick checking attribute, it should aim the stick for realistic looking stick tie ups. Right now stick lifts all have like the same 2 or 3 animations (if there even is more than one) and half the times it's useless. In real life your stick lift targets parts of the stick that you need to have a lot of weight on to prevent, so stick lifts near the bottom of the stick are performed, blades are slashed to prevent accepting passes (HOW IS THIS NOT IN THE GAME?!), actual net front battles where the whole stick is basically hooked above the offenseman's shoulders! Why is there one animation here?! Why is there still no effective tie up for a guy going for a tip in front? Why do I have to risk getting a tripping penalty using the poke check button to prevent a one-timer? Why can't I just press X and stab at the player's stick and depending on how good my positioning is in relative to pressing the X button, how effective the stick lift actually is?! Guys get stick lifted all of the time from behind. This game usually calls it a hook or a high stick. Just make it a really weak stick lift where his stick goes up and right back down again. There should be a button to actually hook a guy and depending on how long you use it, the higher your chance of getting a penalty. Say if you tap the hook button, you slow the player down 3% of his speed but you have a 15% chance of getting called, a light press slows the guy down 10% but you have a 30% chance of getting called for hooking, a heavy press is a 66% chance of getting called but slows the player down by 25%, and holding down the button results in an automatic penalty but you can potentially save a goal. You should be able to move around (at a low speed) and have more aim when you press L1 to block a pass and it shouldn't be a penalty hardly ever.
Forwards still need some polishing on the shooting mechanics. Still too many snipes in my opinion and the one-timer accuracy is still too high. Goalies should be weaker to help with weaker shooting attributes (honestly the shooting is largely quite good in EASHL unless you're a sniper then it's too accurate, but the attributes for 80-85 shot is pretty realistic) and shots should only get elevated to the top corner of the net with things like dekes that are in control, or when the forward has control and it's going a mile a minute. The puck should feel looser. Poke checks, stick lifts, pokes that hit the stick should all be having some type of loose puck event that's more prominent than it is now. With that said, passing should be more effective. Hard passes through skates at close distances SHOULD go through defenders most of the time, passes should go through stick and skates if the defender is close, passes behind the skates or when a player isn't looking should ALWAYS get passed the defender. Passing should definitely be more effective, but defense also needs other tools like proper physics with poke checks, the ability to use realistic stick lifts/stick checks to eliminate passes, the decreased accuracy/power of the shots. Passing should be one of the most effective things this game has to offer offensively. However with that being said maybe the defenders should have a button that increases their chances of intercepting/deflecting a puck if they hold it down and have enough time to react. Speaking of which, hard passes should be DEFLECTED more! They shouldn't be outright stolen, and hard passes should be hard to accept for your teammates. Rocket passes aren't just coralled from 20 feet away and they're even less one-timered. There should be skill with the passing for how heavy it is, and also remove the damn auto sauce nonsense!
GUYS I HAVE SOME INTERESTING IDEAS.
LET'S BRAINSTORM!
The skating got polished enough (for now, there's still lots of refinements they can do)... The goalies need a lot of polishing. They still need more animations especially on the blocker side, MUCH better movement and control, better post work, a button that allows you to sprawl out to prevent wrap arounds whether it be a spread eagle with the toe to the post or an actual reliable paddle down save of some sort, maybe an ability to "ready for a shot" where it cancels out any movement but your goalie's agility is raised by like an attribute of 5 or 10 points if you anticipate a shot correctly (which what a lot of goalies in real life do, usually "quieting your feet" or basically getting into a ready position to react is a sign of a goalie being on his game). Say if you hold X, your goalie stops completely, you get a buff to your ability to make the save but if you're out of position and not square to the puck then it's a -5 or a -10 to your glove high/low blocker high/low so it can't be abused. That should hopefully eliminate the "sometimes goalies just get sniped" conversation because it puts skill into making a save against a high quality scoring chance if you set yourself up right for it, and likewise in real life if you anticipate a shot, hold down the X button and the shooter sells the shot and sends away a pass it also would realistically look as if you froze the goaltender. Just one of many thoughts to brainstorm off of. Maybe if you're in butterfly you get a +35% attribute bonus to shots in the lower half of the net (basically low blocker/low glove/five hole attribute), but a -15% to high blocker/glove attribute. Meanwhile staying on your feet you get a 20% bonus to high glove/blocker but a -10% attribute to five hole/low blocker/glove. It adds skill to the position, helps on shots in tight if you can anticipate a low shot because they're in too tight, but if they're far enough away to elevate the shot and you're down early you get beat up high.
Defense needs polishing obviously. This is where a proper collision engine would be huge. Being able to squeeze a guy along the boards would be huge and would make the game more realistic in terms of interference calls and whatnot. The poke check should not cause as many penalties as they do now. Depending on your stick checking attribute, it should aim the stick for realistic looking stick tie ups. Right now stick lifts all have like the same 2 or 3 animations (if there even is more than one) and half the times it's useless. In real life your stick lift targets parts of the stick that you need to have a lot of weight on to prevent, so stick lifts near the bottom of the stick are performed, blades are slashed to prevent accepting passes (HOW IS THIS NOT IN THE GAME?!), actual net front battles where the whole stick is basically hooked above the offenseman's shoulders! Why is there one animation here?! Why is there still no effective tie up for a guy going for a tip in front? Why do I have to risk getting a tripping penalty using the poke check button to prevent a one-timer? Why can't I just press X and stab at the player's stick and depending on how good my positioning is in relative to pressing the X button, how effective the stick lift actually is?! Guys get stick lifted all of the time from behind. This game usually calls it a hook or a high stick. Just make it a really weak stick lift where his stick goes up and right back down again. There should be a button to actually hook a guy and depending on how long you use it, the higher your chance of getting a penalty. Say if you tap the hook button, you slow the player down 3% of his speed but you have a 15% chance of getting called, a light press slows the guy down 10% but you have a 30% chance of getting called for hooking, a heavy press is a 66% chance of getting called but slows the player down by 25%, and holding down the button results in an automatic penalty but you can potentially save a goal. You should be able to move around (at a low speed) and have more aim when you press L1 to block a pass and it shouldn't be a penalty hardly ever.
Forwards still need some polishing on the shooting mechanics. Still too many snipes in my opinion and the one-timer accuracy is still too high. Goalies should be weaker to help with weaker shooting attributes (honestly the shooting is largely quite good in EASHL unless you're a sniper then it's too accurate, but the attributes for 80-85 shot is pretty realistic) and shots should only get elevated to the top corner of the net with things like dekes that are in control, or when the forward has control and it's going a mile a minute. The puck should feel looser. Poke checks, stick lifts, pokes that hit the stick should all be having some type of loose puck event that's more prominent than it is now. With that said, passing should be more effective. Hard passes through skates at close distances SHOULD go through defenders most of the time, passes should go through stick and skates if the defender is close, passes behind the skates or when a player isn't looking should ALWAYS get passed the defender. Passing should definitely be more effective, but defense also needs other tools like proper physics with poke checks, the ability to use realistic stick lifts/stick checks to eliminate passes, the decreased accuracy/power of the shots. Passing should be one of the most effective things this game has to offer offensively. However with that being said maybe the defenders should have a button that increases their chances of intercepting/deflecting a puck if they hold it down and have enough time to react. Speaking of which, hard passes should be DEFLECTED more! They shouldn't be outright stolen, and hard passes should be hard to accept for your teammates. Rocket passes aren't just coralled from 20 feet away and they're even less one-timered. There should be skill with the passing for how heavy it is, and also remove the damn auto sauce nonsense!
GUYS I HAVE SOME INTERESTING IDEAS.
LET'S BRAINSTORM!
2
Howdy, Stranger!
Replies
One could dream haha
As for the rubbing out on the boards, the game could do that already, somewhat. But for some reason, in online play, board friction is set to 0.
It's all about the dangle snipes and instant gratification this game dishes out.