NHL '11

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Luse
Posts: 171
Joined: Tue Nov 27, 2007 3:59 pm
Location: Klamath Falls, Oregon

NHL '11

Post by Luse » Wed Jun 16, 2010 11:33 pm

Okay, knowing there are some hockey fans around in these parts of the woods I figured I would open a thread about EA's newest NHL title that's coming out Sept 7th with a whole slew of new features. It's already pre-ordered for me. :)



Stolen from Epik@ Thebreakaway.net Hands on pt1. ( http://www.thebreakaway.net/forums/show ... stcount=14 )


"Hands On Part 1 - Broken Sticks, Faceoffs, Real-time Physics, and the all new dekes:


Broken Sticks

When I heard that there were going to be broken sticks; my face just lit up, but then I thought to myself "Oh boy here's another gimmick", but once they demo'd it to us in the initial presentation, littman actually told us to just watch, he didn't really say anything at all, he wanted us to experience it first hand.

So this is what I got from it, some of this may be new to you:
Quote:
- Broken sticks can happen from a wrist shot, slapshot, slash and hits.

- The stick can be broken in 3 area's (Blade, Shaft and up high on the stick)

- When you break your stick you can actually kick the puck around, by just skating to it (the direction you are skating will depict the direction the puck goes) Also, you can use your hand in the D-Zone to knock the puck out or pass.

- The stick is now live (as an entity in the physics engine) players will kick it around, it will get in the way of the play with the puck etc

- Teammates can hand off sticks in the D-Zone

- If you lose your stick you can grab it off the bench. A funny little animation but it works!

- If you pass your stick to a person who has lost it, the stick will actually be the same, it's all in real-time (they haven't decided whether the right handedness or left handedness would change, if the player was the opposite.) but the stick is exactly the same.

- The stick debris stays on the ice til the next whistle.

- It's possible to have your stick go loose off a check. The player has to get up and pick it up (this is a canned animation)



My comments:

All in all, I thought they did this very well. You can tell they took their time on it, and not just implemented this feature without actually thinking about it first. It works well, it's frustrating at times, because it can break even on a breakaway. (That actually happened to me and i was livid) But I can imagine that would actually and has actually happened in the NHL.

I give this feature a Thumbs Up.


All new Faceoff System

Finally, what we've been asking for, a whole new face off system. I noticed most of you who watched the trailer said it looks weird. But that was just the angle, it looks really authentic in game and the battles for the puck are pretty awesome.

Here are some points that I got from this feature:
- New Face Off Camera (Over top the circle, you can only see the REF and the two players taking the faceoff) However, with this once the puck is dropped it zooms right out so the wingers can rush in.

- The puck is completely free, there's no canned or sticky animations. It may even get stuck in between a players legs and a winger would have to pick it up.

- To take a faceoff the controls are mapped to the right stick. You can elect to take a regular faceoff like in the previous games by just tapping the direction back, or you can use the right stick and curve around to the right, to turn your body and shield the puck for a winger etc.

- You can deke off the faceoff (Trust me it doesn't work all the time. If the opposing player chooses to shield and tie you up, you're not going nowhere. It all depends on timing and the player you're using)

- Shooting off the faceoff. This is wicked for the offensive zone, I actually got a nice rebound off a shot like this. Again if you get tied up, the puck isn't going anywhere.

- You can choose to have a right grip or a left grip on the stick. You actually need to decide on this so you can tie up and shield your opponent in the correct way. This also depicts the direction you want to win the faceoff too.

My comments:

This feature is what we are looking for, however, there is room for improvement. The wingers picking up the puck looks a bit weird, because collision detection is still sorta out of the game. But it's definitely an excellent foundation, they went beyond my expectations for the faceoffs.

I give this feature a Thumbs Up.


Real-Time Physics Engine:

Ah yes! The most important of them all; the real time physics. Keep in mind this is a whole new implementation, this is their first year with this in, so it's hard to expect a lot out of it. They said it will take a couple of installments to get it perfect, but NHL 11 was definitely a great start as it compliments the other features like broken sticks.

Here's some info on what I got from this feature:
- The physics engine is designed by Igor (I believe his name was Igor not sure). He has a PHD in physics and the dude is very smart. Everyone who try to talk to him just gave up because he would bust out words that didn't even compute in our brains.

- The bench and the boards are all live (as you have seen in the trailer). This is so awesome. They won't go completely over the bench, that may be another feature in another game but they really can bounce their heads off the edge, or their legs.

- They have added animations for the smaller grazes and smaller hits and board play. By animations I mean the actual movement of the player; it's not canned anymore due to the physics engine. Everything is free.

- In some cases the hitter can go down as well. I didn't really see this often, but it may have been due to the build we were playing on.

- It's not a hit fest anymore. You can't just be standing still and corkscrew a dude. It's much harder to hit

- Physics engine on the puck and sticks are completely free now. You won't see anymore stickiness or magnetic play even on passing.

My comments:

This one is a little iffy for me. The engine is now implemented but the hit's still seem a little unrealistic. Some were a real pleasure to see, because it looked legit. But most hits were still kind of awkward to see because they resembled some of the big corksrew, spinning in the air type hits that we wanted to get away from. I am confident that this physics engine will be much better in the coming years because the foundation they have now is excellent and as long as they have Igor working on this; it's going to be great.

I give this feature a Thumbs Sideways.

All new dekes

This one is my favourite. They finally did what I wanted personally. The all new deke's are much less gimmicky, true to real life and more subtle. If you remember the past years, the dekes were insanely cool but very gimmicky. Like the windmill (which is still in the game)

Here's some points on this:
- Less gimmicky, more subtle toe drags

- Puck off the skate dekes, kick the puck up to your stick

- The dekes are more for evasion then for glamour. Looks much more realistic.

- Puck off the skate dekes can be used in shootout, and work well. Makes your shootout's prettier ;p

- Every moment can be different, because of the physics. Deke's can cause the puck to bounce off player's and go in other directions due to the puck being free

- Jump over player's who just dive all the time. (This I found gimmicky but it eliminates the gayness of diver's)

- Not all player's can deke like ovechkin, it's properly based off stats. They will just lose the puck and cause turnovers.

His comments:

I love this, the deke's are much better. Better evasion techniques so you don't get hit often. It eliminates alot of things, less gimmicks, less of a hitfest and more authentic play.

I give this feature Two Thumbs Up.

Sounds like a lot has been improved, and with 3 months until its release things should only get better.

Oh, and Toews is the suspected cover this year. Hawks making it two years in a row!
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