Some things are sacred. Not Sistine Chapel sacred, but rather “mess with it and I’ll break your kneecaps” sacred. And I’m not talking about family or country or any other wimpy bullshit like that.
I’m talking hockey.
I’m not one to over-dramatize the importance of sport. If my team loses, I can pretty much get over it in a matter of minutes, precisely because I realize that in the large scheme of things, it simply doesn’t matter. My life didn’t change after watching the Rangers win the Cup in 1994, and it didn’t change after watching them lose to the Penguins in the second round this year. Life goes on.
But I am an American, after all, and if you fuck with my entertainment, I will drop bombs on you. This is why the folks at EA Canada have courted my ire with NHL 08.
Right off, I’ll happily admit that Canadians are the kings of Western Hemisphere hockey. It’s their game, no question, and the fact that they grudgingly tolerate our cheeseburger-scarfing intrusion into their world speaks quite well of them. The fact that they haven’t come pouring over the border with pitchforks in hand seeking revenge for what the American influence has done to the game says even more. Two words; Gary Bettman. Point made, we move on.
NHL 08 provides robust physical evidence that not every hockey-related product to come trundling southward from the GWN is worth the sweat stains on Sean Avery’s jockstrap. While an enormous improvement over the previous next-gen installment, NHL 08 falls short in the most elemental of video game criteria; it’s simply no fun.
Is it realistic? You bet. But if I want realism, I’ll pop in my DVDs of the ‘94 Finals. I’ll flip channels to Dish 540 and catch any one of the latest games, live. I’ll watch Boston vs. Montreal, or even better, Edmonton vs. Calgary, where the ice is fast, the fans are smart, and a hint of meaningful rivalry still exists in the over-regulated, sanitized, debrided mess that American marketing has made of this once-great game.
I’m gonna paraphrase Steve Martin, and proffer that a good video game may not be the truth, but it is what we wish were true. I don’t know about you, but I don’t play games to experience the drudgery of day-to-day life, and I think it’s safe to accept this notion as at least marginally universal, as noted by the lack of such titles as Auto Insurance Simulator 2.0 or World of Toilet Scrubbers Online. While accurate simulation is technologically admirable, it makes for shitty entertainment.
The inability to change offensive and defensive lines independently of each other in this series has bothered me for years, but that’s a minor quibble compared to the list of things that you’re no longer able to do in NHL 08, which includes playing a single season, applying a burst of speed, and saving customization options to your own liking.
Someone at EA Canada needs to explain to me why it was necessary to remove the speed burst. Any player at any level can always find an extra burst of speed when the game is on the line, but the removal of this feature from the series beginning with last year’s next-gen abomination (NHL 07) reeks of arbitrary arrogance. EA Canada doesn’t think the game should be played with a speed burst, so like the Great Gazoo fading out with a shark-jumping “vvvvbt,” it’s gone. Hey, thanks. How about letting the player decide?
Those aren’t pillows!!
EA must have shelled out an assload of cash to license the aardvark-buggering songs in NHL 08. Why else would the game not save your choice of turning the menu music off, like it saves all the other sound options? Again, forcing the player to manually adjust the volume every single time they play is a petty, arrogant motherfucker, similar to the decision to disallow a fantasy draft for Franchise mode.
NHL 2K8 doesn’t give a shit if you want to begin a franchise with a team of your own choice and composition, so why does NHL 08? If I turn injuries off in NHL 2K8, they stay off, by God, and I don’t have to readjust the volume of the crappy menu music every time I play, either. Good sense notwithstanding, if I want to play Malik and Rozsival for the entire game on defense, I can, while still changing the forward lines at will. If I want to lower the frequency of the goaltender covering the puck in order to keep the action moving, I can do that too.
Not in NHL 08. There’s an option for it, to be sure, but it does absolutely nothing to halt the baffling number of play stoppages that manage to grab whatever end-to-end flow you might cultivate in the game and throttle it to within an inch of its tedious-as-the-real-thing existence. From the puck going over the glass on every third shot to goalies that cover up on routine saves, the only thing more frustrating than playing NHL 08 is watching someone else play it.
Team management is a nightmare, as callups and demotions and dressing and scratching players are handled not only on two different screens, but in two completely different menus. In order to remove a player from the lineup, he must first be removed from any applicable lines and scratched. He may then be demoted to the minors or traded from a completely different menu, provided the precise number of players (23) is maintained on the roster. Don’t try trading for someone who’ll extend your roster to 24, otherwise the trade won’t go through, as the game isn’t smart enough to automatically assign the overage-causing player to the minors. It’s dozens of stupidly arbitrary details like this that spoil the NHL experience; there’s absolutely no reason why roster moves and lineup changes couldn’t be handled from the same screen. Realism, indeed.
A few things can be said in the game’s favor, though, as it’s not all Brussels sprouts and dog shit. The visuals are top-shelf, from textures to animations and lighting, video hockey has never looked better. The sounds are also vastly improved over every previous incarnation, as the exaggerated slap shot and body check effects are gone, replaced with those that aid in the suspension of disbelief instead of shattering it like a Leafs fan’s hope year after miserable year. Also, the broadcasting team of Gary Thorne and Bill Clement are my sentimental voices of the game. Nothing against Jim Hughson, or Bob and Harry, but Gary and Bill are it for me.
All in all, for fans of the game, this one is Steve Smith banking that outlet pass off Grant Fuhr in the second round of the ‘86 playoffs; unnecessary and avoidable dejection. For those who have no idea what I’m talking about, NHL 08 will probably appeal to you.
Everyone else steer clear.
Tags: EA Canada, Hockey, Oilers, Steve Smith
