This week people who had the misfortune of pre-ordering NHL Deluxe 27 were able to play their copies a week earlier than people who waited for the public release. The reviews began to pour in via X the everything app and boy oh boy were they not nice!
This isn’t necessarily shocking to hockey fans, because the biggest NHL 27 Connected Franchise problems are obvious immediately.. no CPU-controlled teams, no entry draft, no player development or aging, and the mode still lacks several of the deeper franchise features people waited years to get back. The game has been steadily declining for years now and there appears to be less hope than ever. Over a decade ago the same gaming company, EA, created NHL 14 and it was absolutely beloved. In the 13 years since the game has been falling off a cliff. Game physics had become more clunky, glitch goals were running rampant, and the AI has made no progress. Even if the developer fails to enhance gameplay on a yearly basis, which is common among all sports games, you could assume they would at least add new and exciting modes. In reality, EA has only removed modes over the past decade.
NHL 27 Connected Franchise Problems Start With No CPU Teams
Fans actually had a glimmer of hope a few months ago when EA announced they were finally bringing back a fan favorite mode, GM connected. In NHL 14 GM connected allowed you to play with friends and the computer to run a legit franchise mode. The mode that came years ago was universally beloved as it really felt like you were running your favorite team in real life. Somehow with that framework from a decade ago, EA found a way to screw up the new version. In NHL 27 the GM connected mode is basically pointless. The mode only works if you are in a league with 32 people because if you aren’t there are no computer ran teams. Not only that, but there is also no age decline, no stat tracker, and no real trades/draft. So basically, you are booting up to play online versus with your friends. Hell, you cannot even do a fantasy draft to create random rosters. Just a complete gongshow.
Not many people, if any, have 32 people as even tangential friends who will buy NHL 27 let alone take a connected franchise mode seriously. It just baffles my mind that they were unable to create a workable version of this mode. I can live with the all the bad gameplay, but I cannot live with releasing an unfinished product. It was a slap in the face of the fans who have stuck by this franchise despite it never delivering. It’s just crazy to me that they have an offline franchise mode that works perfectly fine. I’m not a game developer but I cannot imagine it’s that hard to take that offline mode and simply make it accessible to several people. EA even has this feature in other games they develop! I get its different development teams but c’mon man just steal the code!
I know I said I am okay with bad gameplay, and for the most part I am, but how could the graphics get worse? We have games that now make you honestly believe you are in New York City swinging around as Spider-Man but we cannot make hockey players look even semi realistic. I don’t need the players faces to look ultra realistic, but don’t make the animation make absolutely everything feel robotic, especially since it’s comparable to games that came out almost 20 years ago.
The unfortunate part is the fact that EA really doesn’t need to make a good product. Fans currently want to boycott the game, and rightfully so, but doing so would only lead to no outlet to play a hockey game. EA is the only developer making hockey games and they’ll just shut down shop if the interest completely declines. Hell, they might be purposefully dropping bad games so they can close the division. Hockey is the smallest market of the big four sports, and I understand that, but the sport should make one of the best video game experiences. EA has dropped the ball, and the fans cannot really do anything but take to X the everything app and complain. Truly sad.
EA’s downfall began whenever they dropped ultimate team. Ultimate team in every game is just a ponzi scheme to acquire tons of money via micro-transactions. It’s a great idea from a money-making standpoint, but it’s abundantly obvious that it’s the only thing the company cares about. As long as they can sucker people into buy VC or packs, they do not need to make absolutely anything better about the games. This isn’t exclusive to the NHL franchise as all EA branded games have largely shifted to this model.
It’s hard for me to see the light at the end of the tunnel. It’s more likely they stop producing the games than it is they improve the games. Maybe one day someone with a passion for hockey, and gaming, will get their hands on the franchise and end this madness. If not, it might be GG’s for all the hockey gamers out there.
What do you think about the new NHL game?
