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NHL 09 Review
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Manufacturer: Electronic Arts
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ESRB Rating: Everyone 10+
Platform(s): Xbox 360
Release Date: September 9, 2008
Average Rating: 4 out of 5 Stars
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Retail Price: $59.99
Online Sale Price: $56.99
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User Submitted NHL 09 Reviews
Date: 2009-01-05
Don't buy into all the hype
This game is fun at 1st, however I have to agree with parts of the review from Gwilym. I have been playing hockey sims for some years now and although this one has some nice features and graphics, gameplay is what it is really about and this game is just not up to all the hype, it is neither arcade or a simulator in an arcade game you would have simpler to use controls and less realism, in a sim you would get NHL type games, in this game the AI is horrid, your goalie is nearly useless as are your team mates most of the time, want to prove this, play on any setting and let the AI run the game your AI teamates and goalie will allow at least 4 to 6 goals easily each period, that is not a sim or like the NHL at all granted you are supposed to play, however this is the AI of your teammates so do not expect to much there at all. Online play might be fun if you are into playing a team game, but each time I have tried online you will find alot of 2 on 1 matches so unless you have a buddy to play online with it is not fun at all. Lastly, this is a game and should be challenging yet accessable to new comers or non gameaholics, this really is neither... I cannot find 1 person to play this and this is the only title they do not like friends, family will play every other game I have, but this one they all say the controls stink and they loose interest. If you are an avid hockey game fan or have friends also interested and have the time (ie: live off your parents or in their basement) this might be a game for you, but if you only have a couple hours a week to play... I would recommend a different game. To sum it up this is fun for a short period of time, it is not for casual gamers and really turned me off from the genre. It is sad because the game could have used customizable controls and better difficulty settings to get past most of it's issue's, brining more people to the genre but if more are made like this on... hockey titles will go the way of many racing games dwindleing to a small dedicated audience, unfortunetely since I cannot get anyone around me interested in this, I could care less if that happens... If I was one of the 5 star raters here and elsewhere well good luck playing against the very few and getting worse and worse products in the genre because of the larger communities lack of interest. Lastly I want to say how horrible the documentation is, there are settings that you will have to go to forums to find out what they do and entire parts of the game undocumented, it is some of the worst documentation I have yet to see in a game, there are some tutorials which are nice but the lack of documentation is a joke.
Date: 2008-12-22
Fun game
First off, let me say, that like many other reviewers, I feel this is one of the best hockey games (although I'm still a sucker for NHL 94 and 95). Also, I am yet to experience any of the glitches (knock on wood) that I've heard other people have had.
While the be a pro mode is really fun and an ingenious idea, I'm a fan of the old-fashioned mode of controling the whole team.
My only question is to Amazon... WHY IS THIS GAME [...]?!? I'm sure it's just a glitch, but it won't sell for [...]bucks. It's good, but not that good.
Anyway, in conclusion, this game is definitely worth the investment ([...], not [...]) if you're into hockey/sports games...
Date: 2008-12-14
Very unrealistic because of the goalies
This is a fun game in many ways, but with some very frustrating drawback. EA Sports has been producing this game for 17 years now and they have received the same criticism for all those years - still they seem unable to do anything about it.
Here goes:
1. As in every other NHL-game in this series, the AI is very bad. Even if you play at the most advanced level, you will very soon dominate the game completely.
2. The goaltenders are just as pathetic as ever. To compensate for not being able to create a decent AI that could make the game challenging, EA Sports insteade made the CPU goaltender almost impossible to score against while your own goalie will drop in almost every puck.
The consequence of these two drawbacks are simple. You'll dominate each and every game completely, but you'll still loose. Be prepared for you shooting 70 shots and scoring 1 goal while the CPU will shoot 3 shots and score 2 goals. The result is that the games in NHL09 don't resemble real hockey games.
All in all, this is a fun game if you play agains friend (and these days it's the only thing I use it to do) but totally useless if you want to play against the computer as EA Sports hasn't been able to develop an AI that would produce realistic games despite 17 years of experience. It would be time for them to stop putting out almost the same game year after year and start focusing on getting the game to work instead.
Date: 2008-12-13
Great game when I can get it to play
This game freezes during game play or sometimes I can't even play because the disk will come up as unreadable. For the past 3 years I have had this problem with EA Sports NHL games. Every other game I have works perfectly.
Date: 2008-12-01
Great game when it works
This is an awesome game. Only problem is that on some 360's it consistently freezes up, often at the very end of a game. You have to reset your 360 and lose all progress you had made up to that point. This is the only game out of 15 that I own that ever freezes. EA's quality control is horrible.
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