Also On: PS4, PS3, Xbox 360
Publisher: Electronic Arts
Developer: EA Canada
Medium: Disc/Digital
Players: Multi
Online: Yes
ESRB: E10+
Iโm kind of a terrible Canadian. I donโt think Iโve ever rolled up the rim to win at Tim Hortonโs, and Iโm positive Iโve never had a double-double there. I donโt buy my milk in bags. I have no opinion on the merits on Canadian vs American beer. And, above all else, I donโt care about hockey: I donโt watch Hockey Night in Canada, I think Don Cherry is a national disgrace, and I honestly have no idea how Canada fared at the last Winter Olympics.
Youโd think, then, that I would hate NHL 16 โ or, at the very least, you might expect me to be indifferent to it. And yet, that couldnโt be further from the truth.
See, throughout my time with NHL 16, I kept having to fight the urge to stop playing and just watch it all unfold in front of me. Watch as my teammates moved the puck around the ice with clockwork precision. Watch as opposing defenders feebly waved their sticks at an impressive display of skating. Watch as my teammates lit up the red light time and time again, running up the score against hapless opponents. When this game clicks โ and make no mistake, it clicks pretty often โ itโs a thing of beauty to behold.
Itโs only slightly less impressive when youโre actually playing it โ though, to be fair, this may be because my created player wasnโt as talented as some of her teammates. NHL 16 slows down the tempo ever-so-slightly when your player is on the ice, perhaps because thereโs no way you could possibly move as impressively as your CPU-controlled teammates. Nonetheless, even at that slower speed, things still move at a crisp pace, making it really easy to get sucked in to the fast-paced beauty of it all.
(Side note: I find it bizarre that, as in previous iterations of the franchise, thereโs the option to make created players female, but the announcers never seem to acknowledge that fact. Itโs like EA Sports decided theyโd make the game inclusive, but somehow do that in the least inclusive way possible.)
What really impresses me, though, is that the gameโs speed doesnโt substantially slow down in online multiplayer. Maybe years of abysmal online play in MLB: The Show have left me jaded, but Iโm just not used to playing a sports game online thatโs free of weird glitches and slowdowns. NHL 16 has no issues that I could see, which kind of blows my mind.
And speaking of comparisons to The Show, NHL 16 also impressed me with its approach to the whole Ultimate Team concept. Iโm used to the ridiculous difficulty and lousy packs of player cards that The Show throws at you, which meant I was totally unprepared for how fair and easy-to-use the NHL 16 equivalent is. It makes me want to give it the highest compliment possible: it just works, and itโs intuitive, which are two qualities that a lot of games, sports and otherwise, can sometimes forget to include.
Now, is NHL 16 going to make me think twice about my feelings towards the real thing? Probably not. But it does make me want to keep playing โ online or offline, it makes no difference to me โ which means that, just maybe, I donโt have to turn in my Canadian passport just yet.