NHL 23 Technical Test - Let us know what you think!

Need to play more than 3 games obviously, but first impression is that slowdown for poke checks (not just skill stick, but single tap as well) plus the Balance boost for all player classes, which renders hitting ineffective in many situations, is a massive W for attackers and a massive L for defenders. Might need some rebalancing?

Good stuff:

-increase to base speed attribute for many builds

-manual saucer pass assist is a nice touch

-basically everything feels more responsive, fast and agile, just the way icehockey is these days

-shot and pass speed increase across the board, I like it

-human goalies can actually stop onetimers and breakaways. BUT let's see again when everybody has Close Quarters unlocked 🤡

Bad stuff:

-while the pokecheck nerf is a step in the right direction, it is like a deathblow now to even slightly touch it as the puck carrier got a speed increase at the same time

-hits should just a tiny bit more often result in a stumbling animation for the puck carrier or at least separate the puck

-many of the X-factors are completely useless (third eye, tape to tape, send it, magnetic) due to the gameplay changes

-AI goalies are carbage 1on1 but they save nearly every wide open onetimer or cross-crease. A little balancing needed there

Good points :

Better passing,AI defensive smarter, AI goalie smarter, skill stick and poke slow down player, sign when line change and well positionned

Bad points :

2-0 cross-creased only score 1 on 20 and probably should works 95% of the time in the real life.  Random point shot easily score but good D2D not going in.  The last movement feature not seems to work a lot, still bounce off the puck.  Still have interception when puck is behind a player or the player not looking in hte puck direction.   Too easy to make a breakaway pass or a drop pass. 

The game is too slow of a pace 

Yeah sure, let's by all means increase the speed, especially on offence.🤮

Slowing the player down to a crawl while poking might sound great for HUT or something, but it damn near kills defence. Who in their right mind wants to play defence after this? I guess you can adapt to it eventually, but there's literally nothing to counter-balance this either by giving some other tools to defence, or nerfing offence in some way. I guess scoring is all that matters, eh?

Plus it seems players have increased balance, so they can shrug off hits and nudges more easily, and even if they do get bumped or fall, they have this new desperation move... great, just what game needs. That and the lacrosse goal, good to see the devs have their priorities right.🙄

 

 

I had "only" one evening of experience so far which where around 6-7 games. Most of them came to 6vs6 play and two 3vs3 games.

- Goalies seem to be pretty hot trash. While AI goalies can only save cross creases and high percentage shots, you can score on pretty much other shot. Human goalies also struggle to save some "easy" shots and received a lot of goals during scrambles or better to say when they can't make the initial stop.

- hitting/bumping is completely unnecessary or useless. I know that those endless bumps favoured the defense but in the test it felt for me that you can't even bump anymore, it didn't trigger any animation in most of the cases and when it occasionally happened it didn't had any effect. Furthermore you either were able to hit the opponent right in the face or not even at all. If you weren't spot on on the hit, like completely centred, I flew right by the opponent without any impact. Felt also the way that I basically was animated around the opponent. This was for PMD and with a "heavier" TWD. Heard that from someone with a 95kg DD as well.

- skating as an offensive player is fun and I like that if you have a decent speed advantage with the puck you can keep it and don't get penalised just for skating straight forward with the puck. So you keep your advantage, that makes sense to me.

Skating as a defender especially in backchecking situations is extremely awful. F.e. the basic situation where you cover the middle of the ice and the forward wants to skate near the boards to get the entry over the side, you can't defend that beside camping basically already near your own zone or hustling straight backwards towards the net and hope for the best. Normally you skate a little bit across to the boards but you loose so much speed while doing it. This needs to be fixed, otherwise RIP defenders

- stick lifting feels ok/good, quite the same to NHL 22, idk if they changed anything there but IMO there is no immediate need.

- still unsure how to judge the poke checking. I like that that you can't spam it anymore, which was just brutal. Personally I had the feeling that it was up and down all evening, like sometimes it was pretty accurate with the timing and the effect it caused, and sometimes I poked three times perfectly but it didn't had any effect on the opponent. He still kept the puck (unstoppable force on gold). That non effect occured with other builds on the opponent side as well though.

- still unsure how to judge the speed penalty for holding the defensive skill stick. I get why they changed it and it was abused a lot of times, f.e. blocking, but yesterday it felt like you can't use it at all. You basically stop while doing it. So it's effectively you can poke one time or never. My guess is they can't prevent the blocks so they made the penalty for using the defensive skill that high, which should make it pretty much non existent. If you have to penalise that, then probably not that much IMO.

- occasionally a flickering effect occurring on the center ice line.

- no server selection --> big L

- we didn't play a private game, but I guess it is highly unlikely that you can connect the SG stats to the ingame stats for the team leaderboards which pops up after goals. While this is cool for normal EASHL games, I guess it could be annoying for private games as they don't count towards the statistic so it will probably pop up multiple times with the same stats in private games which is useless. Like the goal celebrations for a certain amount in the last game.

- are those new OT celebration cinematics randomized, I thought MAYBE you can set them also up in the club settings which was obviously not the case. Never played an OT game though so far.

- passing felt quite smooth so far. I like that you had better aim and strength to some "drop" passes.

Trying to  put it briefly;:

I have been mostly pleased on gameplay in NHL 22 and I´d like to see it be similar mostly in NHL 23. Of course you can adjust some little things but mostly I like it. 

More than gameplay I want to see game fully operating since the day one until NHL 24. Last year the first 1,5 months were horrible with all the bugs. I don´t want that anymore. More than fixing gameplay too much I want to see the game working without problems (or as little as possible) from the beginning until the end of the cycle. The best gameplay has no use if the game is broken like it was last year from it´s release to  December.

In technical test so far there has not been problems at least when I have been playing. That´s the good part of it. Also the menus are progressing faster than before from the beginning to the start of the game. 

Edited September 2, 2022 by JakePlay77

as an of offensive skater there's some nice additions: the ability of PWF's to actually grind through bumps is nice. Not losing momentum just because you have the puck is nice. Not passing 20 feet away from the guy you wanted to is nice.

as a goalie: this is hot garbage. It is so bad this could legitimately kill 6's leagues because no one will play goalie. You have no control/tools/answers for any of the tuned up offence. snipes/high danger shots have been tuned up dramatically. Scrambles/garbage goals have been tuned up dramatically. Add in the Pass boosts (IE increased threat/ease of execution of CC One Timers/etc) as well and it's just a completely unrewarding experience. You'll stop more goals by just setting up on one side of the net and leaving your guy there then trying to play the game.

Haven't played it too much yet but here are my first thoughts:

- Human goalies' movement has slightly got improved, moving towards the shots and rebound control gave me more realistic feeling.

- Stick blocking is almost impossible, which is a good thing, this will lead in changes in dman builds or even play style.

- Shots have been boosted, which is in my opinion fine but also goalies should get some kind of boost, not sure yet where but perhaps hockey iq (or movement?) which could in my opinion be boosted for skaters as well to see more beautiful goals.

- Servers were trash, which is probably not gonna be a problem when the game gets published, but if it is then I wouldn't be surprised if half of the players quit.

Edited September 3, 2022 by MonkeyHeadAF

I played some 3vs3 drop-ins and club 6's, skater and goalie. Around 10 games. PS5.

- Not so much difference in controlling/skating. Free skating (loadout testing) was identical to NHL22.
- Pokecheck nerf is good, but maybe the slowdown effect was a bit much. Also the bumping effect was really weak and now when attacking player can react (pass/shoot) after tackle, there aren't many old defending tools left. Tackling was hard, hit needs to be direct to a player to result puck loose. Pacy attackers have advantage sprinting around defenders.   
- AI GK was really good at saving one-timers but really bad at breakaways. Otherwise pretty close to what it is in NHL22 (direct shots, rebounds, animations etc.). AI player was the same old, except pointing the stick to every free players direction . 
- Games felt smoother because of PS5. I'm glad the next ECL will be played with new-gen.
- Passing was easier and cutting passing lanes harder. Don't know if I like this (flashbacks from NHL21 horror). 
- Human goalie was pretty bad. This could be the beta-tuner, but basically every decent direct shot went in, despite the positioning or loadout. Moving with goalie was smoother but this could be just the PS5. 
- I had some fps drops especially in drop-in cut scenes. Also saw some new graphics which told highest scorer of the club etc, it was pretty cool.
- Nothing new in the menus? Hope there is at least something new?? 
- Same puck-reflection glitches occurred during the matches as in NHL22. Clearly they haven't touched the game-engine this year, except tuning the pokes, tackles, passing and shot speeds etc. 
- Overall, when the loadout-meta has been found again, I believe It will be pretty similar experience compared to NHL22. 

Ok so these are my thoughts about the TT after playing 42 games ( 3vs3 Drop ins, 6vs6 Drop ins , and 6's clubs) in net PS5.

 

- Goalie movement is slightly improved , and i really like the improving of the goalie passes. Now you can "shoot" or pass while you are out of your grease while moving. Goalie doesnt do anymore the Stopping animation when you have the puck before passing , and that is a a really big improvement.

- Also when going towards the puck, skating continues without the stopping animation

- Dont know if it's just my imagination , but after getting the boost agains the one timers  it felt like the whole game changed. It was much more easier to be in net against those one tees , and when i added there the wrister perk , it felt like playing NHL22 again. Most of the Snipes were stoppable with good positioning playing on top of the grease , and that felt like playing IRL. U have to do some work in the net to stop those puck's , not just stay deep in your net. I Like the idea that you have to adapt to every situation and try read those plays and try to make shooters chances small by covering the net as much as possible.

- When i played games with A.I defenders , i liked how they actually made a hit to a puck carrier. Don't ever change that , actually you could also improve the hit effect when it comes from a A.I. or Player. this will give defenders more changes to defend , now when the poke check is nered with slow effect

- I'm really disappointed as a goalie , that it felt like again EA has left goalies like they have been many years. Same old perks , Same old stats , Same old classes , same old story. Literally there is NO CHANGES AT ALL in classes , stats , or classes... Correct me if i'm wrong.

- Like i have said in twitter , biggest improvement was the " OPEN NEXT BAG" button. It's much more faster to collect those Ducking bags and im grateful of that.

- Goalies definitely need some boosts to saving pucks. In my opinion , it's much more fun to play games where isn't  scored totally like 16 goals or something like that. Yeah sure if you are garbage in net you should be allowing those goals , but with these tuners , it's gonna be a goal fest in every game.

- Still waiting the opportunity to make you a 6th skater class , when your team  is down by one , and over exited goalie wants to come and score that one goal to tie things up. But then u are given WRONG HANDED BRAINLESS NOOB BOT WHO HAS JUST LEARNED HOW TO TIE THE LACES!! .... Come on ea let us have that.

- Overall as a goalie there is lot to improve and add to this game when u look this in GOALIE perspective , but i think everyone can agree that when goalie or skater A.I is not balanced , this game will never work

- Jiihooo86

-Jiihooo861 ( Twitter )