NHL 11 Roster Update #2 Available Now, Post Your Impressions Here

Hey guys, Gurn Sumal here and I just wanted to let everybody know that the NHL 11 update is now live and is ready for download. I would also like to thank you guys for being very patient as this was a massive update that had me and the other guys (Andy Agostini and Anthony Parra) working around the clock to get this out as fast as we can.

One of the reasons we took so long with the update is as you all know we now have 10 leagues in our game (CHL being three of them) so each league has different guidelines to which players we can and cannot use. So unlike you (our consumers), we cannot create any player we want and just put him in the game, we must get clearance from each individual league before we can proceed in creating him.

So with the NHLPA, all we have to wait for is when a player has stepped on the ice for his first shift in the NHL, we can then create him. If it’s a goalie we can create him when he is on a score sheet as a backup. For the AHL we have to wait for each player (even if he’s in the game already) to sign his PHPA form. This form is what makes any player playing in the AHL a member of the Pro Hockey Players Association which in turn lets us use his name and likeness in the game. This is why you’ll see players that are in the game currently on a CHL team (prior to this update) that are no longer in the game until they return in a future update as soon as they have signed their PHPA agreement. In terms of the CHL, there are over 400 players we added as the league has massive turnover. This affected every roster and because of this we had to get these players in the game otherwise we would have players who are no longer part of the CHL in our game to fill out rosters.

Now that we got the licensing stuff out of the way we can talk about the good stuff. We’re planning on roughly the same schedule for updates as we had last year so injuries (week to week injuries or greater) will be taken into account as well as updated lines if needed from the last game that team played. So be prepared as some teams will have a different look each and every update just due to injuries this year.

As we are moving forward this year with more roster updates we will be evaluating players at different intervals during the season to determine if anybody need to be tweaked up or down in their attributes. This will be for players who are having a breakout year or a major drop in their talent. This is only to simulate what is going on this year and next year the player will be reevaluated so their numbers might go up or down depending on their career path and overall skills.

The first update has about 600 new players on from around the world. Here are a few of the more well known:

Derek Stepan NYR
Nick Leddy CHI
Zac Dalpe CAR
Oliver Ekman-Larsson PHO
Brayden Schenn LAK
Mark Olver COL
Magnus Paajarvi EDM
Jordan Eberle EDM
Taylor Hall EDM
Tommy Wingels SJS
Marcus Johansson WAS
Jonas Holos COL
Jarred Tinordi London Knights
Jack Campbell Windsor Spitfires
Louis Leblanc Montreal Juniors

On top of all that we have updated the goalie equipment for the NHL goalies about 65 or so goalies.

So I hope you like the first roster update. We are currently working on the PHPA agreements for the players that are new to the AHL this year so we can put those prospects into the game as well.

Hope you guys enjoy playing with these rosters.

-Gurn

Source - NHL 11 In the Crease Blog