NHL 25 Early Access and EA Play Trial Available Today - Share Your Impressions

[Steve_OS]

NHL 25 is available today on PlayStation 5 and Xbox Series X|S for players who purchased...

Written By: Steve Noah

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[Cycloniac]

I posted this elsewhere, but will also post here after messing around in the menus.

Player ratings, specifically how player overalls are calculated, are now based on player type. If you're familiar with Madden's archetype system, it's similar. I don't see a place to see all of the player overalls by type like you can in Madden's player cards, but maybe someone else has found it.

This is interesting because it should allow more player differentiation i.e. no more boosting defensive awareness for pure offensive players like Ovi to get to a desired overall.

[riskbreaker76]

My first impression is that it's the same ol sticky laggy menu

[jake19ny]

I'll give a deeper impression after more time but quite simply put it's nothing but a full blown arcade game now that barely resembles the actual sport. For years EA NHL has ignored, even lamented the true hockey fan and sim gamer but NHL 24 was the first real step toward arcade only play and NHL 25 is the completion of that transition. It's not a surprise because Madden is the sane way now as it's impossible to get anything to resemble real football out of that game too.

[adayinthelife]

I managed to get one game in, so these are very quick limited impressions.

+ The game overall does look better than it ever has. Brighter all around, ice looks great and player models are proportionately better.

+ The skating feels better than last year and the new LT/L2 functionality is great.

Having said that...

- Everything is as janky as ever. For every nice new skating/edge work animation there are a dozen in between that make players look like crash test dummies having seizures.

- None of gameplay improvements to mobility end up mattering because the AI is as bad as ever, and they don't even make use of the features. CPU defense flying out of the zone for a breakout pass, non-existent coverage, etc, etc, etc

- Horrible goal camera is still there.

- Replays all seem about the same. ******* spot light on big hit replays the same as the above mentioned goal camera. Awful.

- Cybulski needs to be launched into the sun.

Overall, I could copy/paste impressions for basically every EA NHL game from the last decade+. I truly, truly feel like I've been playing the same ****ing game for 18 years now. They need to blow it up and *actually* start fresh. I know they've claimed to have done this numerous times, but I'm sorry, that is utter bull****. We are playing a game that has been tweaked annually since 2006. I cannot do it anymore.

NHL 2004, 06, 2k3, 2k5, 2k6, 2k7, 2k8 and 2k10 are all superior games to this. Of all of the major sports franchises, NHL is the one they is least representative of the actual sport it's emulating, and IMO it's not close.

[iaxy]

Well, credit where it’s due - it is smoother and more fluid.

However, the improvements are really really marginal and that is being generous.

The new vision control is a good idea overall, but doesn’t really add that much. I miss the protect the puck mechanic and the push puck forward mechanic. Currently there is no difference in animation between slow and fast skating and this detracts from the visual appeal.

The ice looks too white even with the brightness reduced and contrast increased.

Player models still look a bit rugged and untidy with sharp edges - especially when the camera is zoomed in. And those facial expressions on the bench are just… well… disturbing.

There is still some questionable AI especially in 2 on 1 type of situations.

It’s basically an NHL 24.1

[MizzouRah]

I played a game on superstar defaults, and I actually think they finally have it playing more like hockey than it ever has and the few things that bug me (hitting) can easily be fixed via sliders.

Love all the franchise additions as well.

It will definitely be in my rotation along with The Show, Madden and CFB.

[phillyfan23]

Justy played games between panthers/oilers. I think it is set in 4 or 5 min periods so hard to gauge stats. I installed my nhl 24 sliders and played. Here are my early impressions

Positives:

1) Pressure level meter can be turned off hallelujah!!
2) Dump ins have more force to them, nice add, and the dmen do not do those freaky NBA jump ball animations to snag the puck like last year aginst those dump ins. Nice
3) Cpu dmen manage the puck on blue line better due to new animations and straddle more like their real life counterparts.
4) Better checking animations all around but right now it's overpowered. I had to reduce my hit power from 10 to 5 and I still see a little too many hits.
5) CPU off ai is slightly better, they do move around more and look to get in position for shots during cycles.
6) Defensive AI is also slightly better, finding it harder to gain the zone and create offense in the offensive zone. But again, these ai improvements are not significant and the hockey IQ buzz is just that....buzz.


Negatives:

1) Played 4 games, 1 powerplay total for me, and 0 for the cpu on 4/4 penalty sliders and near max specific penalty sliders. my 24 sliders are tuned to play 92/93 rosters to achieve 5 powerplay average per team. With the same sliders, nearly non-existent. Raised penalty sliders and still no penalties. Maybe due to sample size, will keep playing and see how this is.

2)Powerplay set up by the cpu still unchanged, it is passable but still doesn't look like real life. I spammed the trip/high stick buttons to artifically get penalties to test this. The cpu do set up like last year, but it's still a little too quick paced and frantic. Revamped strategies all around that were mentioned.....no change for me.

3) The one timer feature is a gimmick and doesn't belong in the game. It artificially reduces goalie ratings when you execute a "perfect" one timer. Should have left it as is. An organic and perfect one timer still scored plenty of goals in nhl 24 without this feature. It remains to be seen if it is overpowered, but I dont like it.

4) Goalies seem stiffer, they dont flail as much but overall more robotic. tough to gauge this using short periods and 2 goalies only. but something I will look for later.

5) The gameplay is fine as I enjoyed nhl 24 immensely, but the improvements overall are just marginal at best. It feels like a patch on top of nhl 24 to be honest. For me personally the jump from 23 to 24 was much bigger, especially the cpu dmen offensive ai improvements which is perfect in nhl 24. I will play more using different teams when this finishes downloading.