How to improve the online hockey game

[CellFish]

Copied and pasted from my newsgroup post:

'I have to assume that it's difficult to make a hockey game for EA
because they truly believe, year after year, that they're thought of
everything.

However, 2k has come up with ideas that I believe are ingenious and it
would be a surprise to me if EA didn't respond to them in some fashion.
Crease control (the ability to have total control of the goalie for a
save) is a brilliant idea that has, for me at least, become a way of
countering online cheaters. On the other hand, losing the puck when you
use turbo to increase the speed of your skater is a great idea on EA's
side.

There's a lot of room for improvement I have to admit.

There's one thing that I liked a lot a few years back though. I don't
remember whether it was NHL 2002 or 2003 but on the PC, during online
play, you started off with a generic team and the more you won, better
players became available to you. Basically everyone had a custom team
that reflected their skill. This brought up an interesting idea to me.

Considering Baseball Stars, IMO, on the original NES was the most 'fun'
baseball game ever made, and considering it did not have any real
baseball license, I'm surprised nobody thought of imitating it. Imagine
a hockey game that doesn't have the real NHL teams or any of the real
NHL players but allows you to fully customize a team by logo, by team
name, by player name, by arena name and by overall look. You would
start off with a certain budget and you would have to hire the players
available to you budget-wise. With every win, like in Baseball Stars,
you received a certain amount of money that went into improving your
team's roster. You can, for instance, hire better players or simply add
seats to your arena, advertise, or renovate your arena.

I'm not saying that EA or 2k should overlook the quality of the
gameplay by any means, but I don't think it is necessary for them to
put so much emphasis on the licenses. Midway lost the NFL license to EA
and it responded by making a football game that will certainly become a
classic with 'Blitz: The League' while 2k just gave up its acclaimed 2k
series. The more emphasis they put on licenses, the less though they
put into adding entertaining options to the game because they end up
going for realism alone and not fun factor. '

[chdude3]

Here's how to improve the online play - ALLOW MORE THAN TWO FRIGGING 360S TO CONNECT TO EACH OTHER!

We've got a group of 6 people across Canada that regularly hook up to play on Live. We'd love to play a hockey game, but there's nothing around that lets us all play at once. We got shafted with 2k6 since it said 8 player on the box - and we'll be boycotting 2k7 because of this.

[tpp]

chdude3, seconded. This is, by far, on top of my wish list for any sports game, but especially for hockey.

[SDonahue]

Top of my list.....take out exploits...no more cheap goals and crease control is **** because anyone who uses it does nothing but diving saves and it RUINS the game.

[gohabs93]

what I found stupid is that the server kept on restarting and you had to go back to bigginer eventhough you're not! So you had to play 10 games to go back to pro. I hate the default difficulty online (Pro), it is easy to score. The feedback system really sucks, if you are good, you automaticaly get a cheap feedback.Why are people who quit games allowed to give feedback?! Like I am beating one guy 4-0 he wants to quit, I refuse, he gives me bad feedback. Hockey goalies are the hardest thing to program in any sport or game. There are alot of physics and AI involved, I wonder when will we have a game where goalies are smart and there are no exploits.

[CellFish]

I absolutely hated the feedback system as well. I'm glad you mentioned it because I almost forgot about it when I pre-ordered NHL 2K7 in addition to NHL 07 last night. If you win a game, there's a 75% chance that you'll get bad feedback. Most of the time, in an online game, I would PURPOSELY hold back when playing the game so that whoever I'm playing against wouldn't think I'm being cheap. I easily could have scored 15 goals in two periods but I decided to be gentle. The person I'm playing against stays in the game and regardless of how nice I am to him on the mic, I get bad feedback for being 'cheap' even if the game ends with a score of something like 5-2. There are simply so many babies online that it's not worth playing.

[SDonahue]

Depends on how you score. If you use the slot shrug goal I'll give you negative feedback in a heartbeat. Same as the cut in from the corner, right through the crease and score. Those are bad goals and people who use them deserve negative feedback.....amongst other things.

[CellFish]

Well my trademark was to come in from the side, face the goalie from the glove side, skate a half circle and shoot into the top corner with a backhand. Coincidentally, it worked in 2k5 and 2k6. Some might consider that an exploit goal, but I simply consider it a trademark.

However, people who freely give negative feedback like you are morons because you expect people to get into the game and play like crap just so that you don't give them negative feedback. Last I understood, playing a game online was supposed to be competitive. If you can't stand competition, then get out of the online game and play exclusively offline. There are tons of players that used exploits in 2k6 and as easy as it is to whine about it (I do it too), the best solution is to use whatever resources are available to you to stop the onslaught. Crease control was my solution and I scared off many a cheater by controlling the goalie and ridiculing them in their attempt at a cheap shot.

Here's a summary of what will get you negative feedback in NHL 2k6:

- A one-timer
- A deke
- A back-handed top corner shot
- A slap shot from the middle of the ice
- Stuffing a puck in
- Staying near the goalie and waiting for the player to make a mistake and pass it to the player at which point a goal is scored when the goalie is stunned by his stupidity

In other words, pretty much everything.

[KITCHENERBOY]

All there is to exploit is someones lousy defence.

[tpp]

Here's a summary of what will get you negative feedback in NHL 2k6:

- A one-timer
- A deke
- A back-handed top corner shot
- A slap shot from the middle of the ice
- Stuffing a puck in
- Staying near the goalie and waiting for the player to make a mistake and pass it to the player at which point a goal is scored when the goalie is stunned by his stupidity

In other words, pretty much everything.

That's funny, cause I haven't received negative feedback after using any of those. I suspect there's something else that you're doing that's not jiving with your opponents.

[CellFish]

That's probably because you ended up losing the game. The crybabies don't complain when you lose the game.

[tpp]

I win more than I lose. I'm about .600 lifetime on NHL 2K6 with a 90% feedback rating. If everyone that ever lost to me gave me negative feedback I'd be way less than 80%.

I suspect the reason why my feedback rating is much better than yours is that I usually play against people ranked at the same level (or slightly higher than me). The games are usually pretty even and I rarely get a blowout win.

[CellFish]

Actually my rating was always over 80% ... the reason it bugged me is because I feel my rating should have been 100%.

[gohabs93]

Depends on how you score. If you use the slot shrug goal I'll give you negative feedback in a heartbeat. Same as the cut in from the corner, right through the crease and score. Those are bad goals and people who use them deserve negative feedback.....amongst other things.


The shrug goal is that the one where you cut in front of the net and score? IF it is, then it is very easy to stop if you play well on defense. Anyways in the nhl, if you let a player cut like that infront of the net , he wil score in most of the time. The only glitch goal that ****es me off is the top corner one, to stop it you have to poke the puck, if the guy deeks you and you are screwed.

[wrAthchild]

..in the nhl, if you let a player cut like that infront of the net , he wil score in most of the time.

Very true. In other words: clear front of the net! All there is to it :)

[SDonahue]

The shrug goal is that the one where you cut in front of the net and score? IF it is, then it is very easy to stop if you play well on defense. Anyways in the nhl, if you let a player cut like that infront of the net , he wil score in most of the time. The only glitch goal that ****es me off is the top corner one, to stop it you have to poke the puck, if the guy deeks you and you are screwed.


The top corner goal is the shrug goal. The one where you shoot in the slot after a small deke and the goalie just "shrugs" to try and save it. It's easy to stop sometimes if you get a poke check in but if you miss that shot will go in EVERY SINGLE TIME.

[SDonahue]

All there is to exploit is someones lousy defence.


So you use the shrug goal?

[gohabs93]

Id like to play a game against SDonahue , but I have sold the 360 verion for the same reasons he stated.
1-exploits (wrap around goals, shrug goals, top corner goals) LOL a game with 3 expoloits!
2-goalies suck
3-Crease control

All of that make the game one of the worst online experience ever.

[SDonahue]

The game gets so much better when you get into league games. League games allow people to take the exploits out of the game. Autoshot and a clear understanding of what is cheap and what not to use makes the game alot of fun. It's the dickholes out there that do the same stuff all the time that ruin it for everyone.

[gohabs93]

The problem is, how can you refrain yourself from shooting top corner. Thats the way most players shoot when they have a chance (like kovalev). The goalies suck ...point finale.