ITT, I answer Ben's questions about video game hockey

Ice Cream Jonsey · Post by **Ice Cream Jonsey** » Tue May 05, 2009 12:35 pm

BRING THE NOISE, MOTHERFUCKER.

pinback · Post by **pinback** » Tue May 05, 2009 3:00 pm

What have been the best video hockey games you have ever played and why.

pinback · Post by **pinback** » Tue May 05, 2009 3:01 pm

Also, do hockey video games have a tradition of not being able to keep you from just skating in circles to run out the clock.

pinback · Post by **pinback** » Tue May 05, 2009 3:45 pm

Also, what is the worst/are the worst hockey games, and what made them bad?

Ice Cream Jonsey · Post by **Ice Cream Jonsey** » Tue May 05, 2009 4:34 pm

pinback wrote:Also, do hockey video games have a tradition of not being able to keep you from just skating in circles to run out the clock.

I wouldn't call it a "tradition," as that implies apple pie.

But yes, it has not occurred to any video game programmer that you can "seal" a victory against the computer by doing that EXCEPT for the following games:

- Hat Trick (Arcade only)
- Bubble Hockey (Not as long as the other player can physically move the bubble off the ground and shake the puck loose)
- Eastside Hockey Manager (a sim with no arcade-style gameplay elements)

Ice Cream Jonsey · Post by **Ice Cream Jonsey** » Tue May 05, 2009 4:43 pm

pinback wrote:Also, what is the worst/are the worst hockey games, and what made them bad?

I am spending a lot of time on the best games question, but why only celebrate man's accomplishments? Why not berate them?

The worst hockey game of all-time is NHL '97 for "PC-CD," which was EA's cute fucking way of not mentioning Windows, IBM, and Intel.

The reason that NHL '97 is the worst hockey game of all-time is because, in NHL '96, we were able to control the goalie for the first time in an EA sports hockey game for the PC.

That made NHL 96 a fun game to play with, say, your brother. If you played 50 regular season games, and then went through three rounds of seven-game playoffs and then faced a human -- say, your brother -- who did the exact same thing and had a much better team than you did, you can be damn sure that the only thing that stopped you from raining blows down upon his fucking head was the fact that you were able to take control of the goalie at the last minute and make a save the computer wouldn't/couldn't.

This feature was removed from NHL '97. And added to 98. And I am pretty sure it's out of NHL 99.

Oh, the code to make the game -- NHL '97 -- not fucking work on Cyrix-processor PCs? Yeah, that was in there. But not goalie control. Goalie control was not optimized for Pentiums!

Other terrible hockey games include "NBA Jam"-derived games where people are setting themselves on fire, or have heads that are too large, and various other things. Here's the great thing about video game hockey: you need not fuck with it. Nobody ever threw up their hands and said, "I don't get it!!" Hitting someone in the fucking face and watching their body twitch on the ice as blood leaks from their cranium: awesome. All that, but in a cartoon game? Retarded.

Third on the list is every hockey game in the world made after like 1998. Though apparently you have one I need to play, so we'll see.

pinback · Post by **pinback** » Tue May 05, 2009 4:45 pm

When I read your "good" list, I will compare the things you enjoyed about those games to the game I am currently enjoying the fuck out of, NHL 08!

Then I will decide whether NHL 08 is actually any good, or I just don't know what I'm missing.

pinback · Post by **pinback** » Wed May 06, 2009 2:36 pm

Why can't Wayne Gretzky be properly represented in a video game.

Ice Cream Jonsey · Post by **Ice Cream Jonsey** » Wed May 06, 2009 2:58 pm

Gretzky did not have superhuman speed or strength, though he was so far beyond anyone who has ever played his sport, it's ridiculous to try to find his peers. (There is an Australian who played cricket better than other cricketrs, but it's fucking cricket.)

What Gretzky was able to do is anticipate where the puck was going to be, where everyone on the ice was going to be, and what the rink would look like in the next four or five seconds, and plan accordingly. He was also good behind the net, which is impossible to depict in a hockey game because of the orientation of the camera. Meanwhile, who ends up being the best, or most useful, player in video game hockey? Either a really fast guy, or someone who cannot be checked onto his ass.

So there's two issues here:

GRETZKY AS A COMPUTER-CONTROLLED TEAMMATE

This is retarded to model because there would need to be separate methods, functions and AI for this one guy that doesn't exist for the other players. He won't be valuable because he got down the ice faster than anyone else (he's not fast) and let's say you're gonna play in a mode where your character doesn't change: if Gretzky is perfectly programmed and you get the puck right where you need it, you still have to not be a retard and hit "shoot" at the right moment. But nobody plays that way, everyone plays with the game giving you control of the guy with the puck.

"BEING" GRETZKY

You're Wayne Gretzky! You're playing a guy with 70 speed, 40 strength, 20 defense 99 passing... fuckin' great! Big deal! You, the player, are still handling the decision making. Maybe you play enough of the game where you start to learn the computer's tendencies, right? So you know this particular video game inside and out? Well, one, Gretzky the human still did it better, and with REAL PEOPLE who are trying to knock him the fuck out, and two, you no longer need a special player if you've memorized the game. You can take any random dude and make him the Gretzky of your video game season.

Of course, you're viewing the game from a bird-eye camera, which real humans can't, although Gretzky's eyes are kind of fucked up and too far apart, which I have seen as an attempt to explain why his peripheral vision was superior to the average human's, but I am not sure if I buy it.

There's one other factor at play here with Gretzky in a video game, which is so into the consciousness of America, it made it into a movie:

BARAKA

Not the MK character, but:

Barakah (Arabic: Ø¨Ø±ÙƒØ© : also Barakaâ€Ž) is an Arabic term meaning blessing, particularly, spiritual gifts or protection transmitted from God. Baraka is used in contemporary French as a synonym of "luck". A person who has "baraka" is said to be able to emerge unscathed from dangerous situations. This use of the term derives from the time of French colonization in Algeria (1830-1962). When asked why he did not fear being killed by his enemies, Charles de Gaulle is said to have replied, "I have baraka."

In real life, you didn't try to knock Gretzky out of the game. First off, you couldn't, he was too agile, secondly, Jesus fuck, show some respect, it's Wayne fucking Gretzky. Not only would you get murdered by Marty McSorely (doesn't translate in a video game, which is pain-free on the part of the human players) you were simply a piece of shit if you "tried to make Gretzky's head bleed." I don't think I need to go into any sort of drawn-out diatribe regarding gamers and their general understanding of the concept of respect. And as for programmers and designers: the average video game programmer cannot, I repeat, cannot successfully dump variables to a state file, saving the particular game in progress anywhere. Let's not get crazy here, asking one of them to model the fucking concept of baraka.

It's much easier to simply make a guy with 99 in everything, from speed to stick-handling, to endurance to everything else. And if I recall correctly, that's what they did. Doesn't describe Gretz even remotely, but it made him the best player on the ice, so MISSION ACCOMPLISHED on the part of EA and others.

Ice Cream Jonsey · Post by **Ice Cream Jonsey** » Wed May 06, 2009 5:19 pm

I went crazy because of how poor a job Gary Bettman has done. Here's a log.

Ice Cream Jonsey: Nashville, Columbus, Atlanta and Minnesota. Minnesota should have never lost their team in the first place, but JESUS FUCK.
Ice Cream Jonsey: I am expanding hockey. I will be moving four teams into Rochester, Cheyenne, Raleigh and Mexico City.
Pinback: And Fresno.
Ice Cream Jonsey: Yes
Ice Cream Jonsey: Fresno, that Texas Border Town Where The Young Women Keep Disappearing, Alberquerque and Atlanta again.
Ice Cream Jonsey: Two teams in Atlanta. Think of the rivalries!
Ice Cream Jonsey: San Luis Obispo, Olean, Birmingham and Death Valley.
Pinback: The Chatsworth Matresses, Conway, SC, The Hawaiian island with the lepers on it, Space
Ice Cream Jonsey: Hahah

Ice Cream Jonsey: Triton, Ceres, Deimos and Charon.
Ice Cream Jonsey: Easter Island; Gary, Indiana, Roanoke and Vulcan.

Ice Cream Jonsey: And if he did get some in Canada:
Ice Cream Jonsey: Yellowknife, Juneau, The Yukon and the North Pole
Ice Cream Jonsey: Then he would immediately expand to the South Pole
Ice Cream Jonsey: And put those two teams in the same decision
Ice Cream Jonsey: And remove extra-divisional games, letting those two play each other 4 more times, bringing it to like 27
Ice Cream Jonsey: Wait, I've got one that is even better, ready? Ready? ATLANTA, COLUMBUS AND NASHVILLE

Pinback: The Nagasaki A-Bombs and the Hiroshima H-Bombs
Pinback: Every team except 1 gets into the playoffs.
Ice Cream Jonsey: Yeah. There's no play-in game, Bettman has simply expanded to 51 teams.
Ice Cream Jonsey: 151 teams.
Pinback: A particular player can play for up to 3 teams simultaneously.
Ice Cream Jonsey: Canadian National Service includes mandatory third-line shifts on the El Paso Burn

pinback · Post by **pinback** » Thu May 07, 2009 6:31 am

How do you define the magic of video hockey.

Ice Cream Jonsey · Post by **Ice Cream Jonsey** » Thu May 07, 2009 10:14 pm

The magic of video game hockey, for me, is that it was something that I pirated with my good friends Da King, IM HUGE and Farsase during the early 90s, and then played with my good friends Those Guys and my brother.

The PC couldn't do a lot of things well in the 80s. We could describe caves and offer a SURPRISING selection of hockey games, which I will go into detail about if I ever finish that post on the good ones.

Ice Cream Jonsey · Post by **Ice Cream Jonsey** » Thu May 07, 2009 10:15 pm

And re-reading that, it occurs to me that 80% of the reason I like something is due to nostalgia, with the 20% being tits. CHRIST.

Ice Cream Jonsey · Post by **Ice Cream Jonsey** » Sun May 10, 2009 10:19 pm

Okay, listen up. Let's talk about EA Sports.

EA Sports is the worst video game company in the world. Any questions? Yes, go ahead, ahhhh shit, not these tw---

Q: Hey there, A - been a long time, hasn't it?
A: Certainly! ICJ has barely posted any of his own worthless pap, much less populated the BBS with any characters he stole from Benjamin "Pinback" Parrish!

Q: Well, let's start things off easy... why is EA Sports the worst company in the world?
A: Well, they make horrible, broken... horribly broken games!

Q: That's a big 10-4 on that, A, but don't lots of other companies?
A:: Sure! But if Epic Megagames makes a shitty first person shooter, well, they haven't bought up the rights to make games with shotguns! Anyone else is free to try!

Q: Whereas EA Sports...?
A: Electronic Arts has run everyone else out of business with inferior products, grabbed exclusivity deals whenever they could, and also taken to stopping production on the PC after making themselves the only game in town.

Q: Isn't that bad? For the PC?
A: Haha, nice try, A! EA Sports making less games for the PC is actually a GOOD FUCKI---

Okay, okay, easy with the nerd rage, you two.

Anyway, I stopped buying their shit years ago. Pinback wanted me to try NHL 09 which he was enjoying, so before BSG Nite on Saturday, we played a quick game of NHL '09 for the Microsoft Xbox 360 and 360-Compatible Computers.

Lemme break it down with some good and bad:

- We selected five-minute periods. I look at the display and there's 9 minutes left at one point. What the fuck?? Well, rather than just use a real-life second, and set the timer to 5:00, they use 20:00 and speed up time. I like that, actually, since now you can have Agamemnon Titov scoring at 18:26 short-handed, or whatever.

- The announcers were great.

Here's the bad!

- I still didn't get any sense that my actions were gonna result in a goal being scored. This is what I hated about the last EA Sports hockey game I played with any regularity: it just felt like you shoot, shoot, shoot, shoot fifty times... and then the game goes, "oh" and lets the 51st one in. Let me tell you a thing about how America works, EA Sports, Vancouver Studio Assholes: we don't want the 51st anything getting fucking in.

- They removed speed burst. Actually, they removed it from NHL 07, and left it out.

That's right. It's not something you can toggle, it's not something you can decide to have or not, it's not an "option": it's fucking GONE.

Which is the most hilariously poor decision I've seen EA Sports make, in their entire existence. But it's so perfectly them! They must really think they're making a hardcore hockey simulator or something. It's adorable.

There is saying, I can't remember if it's for Daredevil or Kingpin, but one of them is a "man who loves his enemies" and I feel the same way about EA here. They've done uncalculatable damage to a field that everyone working there would profess to love, and there really is no limit to what miserable decision they could make next that would surprise me. That whole company (well, its management) is the worst thing about this hobby. It makes me feel like an idiot for spending any time playing video games.

Good work, EA! Even with all this, is was one of your best releases in years.

pinback · Post by **pinback** » Tue May 12, 2009 12:59 am

I am going to fuck you up, right here in this thread. Or maybe a new one.

I am going to fuck you up.

Let me just put away my track shoes, and I'll be right back to fucking fuck you up.

Ice Cream Jonsey · Post by **Ice Cream Jonsey** » Tue May 12, 2009 10:07 pm

I won't make a single decent post until that list of good video game hockey games is finished.