EA have just missed the goal with this one but it is salvageable!
I don’t normally gripe about icehockey games that are out on the market because I love the sport so much and I think that EA Sports do a good job, most of the time. I’ve been buying the EA sports hockey games for the last ten years and they have gone from strength to strength.
The latest instalment is NHL08 which was religiously released recently like it’s predecessors. As like all the previous titles this is no different when it comes to graphics and immersion. With each title they get a bit closer to the gritty realism of the sport. This post however will not be highlighting the few faults in gameplay, I’m actually quite happy with the game itself, my main gripe is the interface which has fallen short on nearly every title since I first bought the game in 1998.
The interface is aesthetically pleasing, layout is ok although EA have always made a small menu like 800X600 res, it’s cramped and players lists and attributes have to be found with the use of scroll bars. Just make an interface that fills the screen, you have alot more space to play with then. However, I have gotten used to this method since they first introduced it around 2000/01 titles. So it looks nice but…
After a brand new install of the game, and an attempt at running a patch (which didn’t work) my game menu soon started to crash. Crash in such ways like, buttons disappearing, Team logos and players faces disappearing, buttons refusing to work after certain menu selections. During the game itself upon pressing escape to bring up the ingame menu as normal, about 1 in 4 times, this ingame menu would not appear and the game would freeze forcing a Ctrl-Alt-Del to task manager.
As I said, I’m actually quite happy with the game play, the graphics, physics and playability. In certain circles the game realism needs adjusting, but there are parties hard at work making editors that can change the game for the better. But why make a buggy interface? EA, you nearly had it. The first official patch, made no attempt to fix these bugs, it was a non essential patch, in my opinion, to unlock some extra textures in the game. Wtf? I have had frustrating times with other of EA’s NHL titles with buggy interfaces, in the 2005 release I would get Internet Explorer scripting errors during game play! Oh Please…
Your game menus in NHL98 and 99 were perfect. It does not have to be flash and spectacular, I know what the game is about I don’t need fancy sliding menus and pulsating buttons to interest me!
I fault you in the lack of continuity for just missing the target with the interface, but commend you on game play, graphics and dedication. Please give us a patch to resolve these annoying errors.
