It’s time to check out the next NHL title. I’m fairly early on in the hockey marathon, but already I can feel myself improving a little bit. At least I feel like I’ve got the angles down for making the shots. I’m still not scoring goals are reliably as I would like, but I’m getting shots and that at least means that I at least have the opportunity to make the goal. Still no big wins for me here, but what can ya do right? The game still feels nice and smooth. While there isn’t much of a difference compared to 08 it also doesn’t introduce any negatives so it is still a quality title.

This time the game did start off with a little tutorial which was fun to play through. You get to practice your shots and movement options a little before going into a real game. Since there is a lot of pressure and the computers are always running at you during the real deal I definitely thought this was a nice change of pace. I definitely do need the training here so there’s that to consider as well. Ultimately I don’t feel like I improved much after this training session, but it was better than nothing.

When the game started I quickly went to my go to strategy which is to rush the opposing side and just keep swinging at the goal. Shoot off enough pucks and you should get a point eventually right? Well, it took multiple games and endless shots, but I eventually did get the point and it was a good feeling. I ended up losing 2-1 as the only time I scored was naturally when the other team decided to pick things up as well.

I found that swinging the control stick up seemed to work better than going for the power shot which is down then up. It’s nice to see your guy getting ready for a power move of course, but it just didn’t seem like it did any real good which defeats the entire purpose. The other way of hitting was a lot faster and since I’m banking on the goalie making a mistake either way the faster option just made more sense. I’m sure there are better ways to decide which shot to take of course, but that’s just my personal experience based on the 3 games I played.

I started by facing the team on easy mode and then ramping up til the final game I fought them on the highest difficulty. I’m happy to report that I didn’t get blown out in any of the matches. My defense is always able to hold strong even if the offense isn’t doing a whole lot. I also worked on not getting as many penalties as last time. I didn’t trip anyone up and I only did the body slams occasionally. I focused on getting the rebounds and I feel like it worked out pretty well for me.

I did manage to trigger a fist fight this time around which I missed out on in NHL 08. It was definitely satisfying to take the other guy down and it’d be cool if they officially made it some kind of minigame you could play. I’d also be down for all the other sports adding that in as well. Ultimately it’s not as if it would ever replace the main mode, but I could definitely see it doing well in side events. Now you can finally have 2 players literally duke it out for the title of being the greatest player of all time.

It comes as no surprise that the graphics are pretty sharp here. EA never phones that part in and you can always expect things to look pretty life like. You’ll feel like you’re in a real hockey game by the end of this adventure. As mentioned earlier the gameplay is also smooth so on a technical level the game holds up really well. There is naturally a lot of replay value here too since you can play as any team you want and go for the full season to see how your skills improve. I expect you’ll see a lot of improvement by the time you make it to the end because that’s just how these things tend to work. The more you go through the motions and repetition the better you will be able to see which tactics work and which do not.

Overall, NHL 09 is definitely a game that is worth adding to the collection. Especially since you can get it for as cheap as a dollar or two. It’s hard to beat that kind of value but a good counterpoint is that you can get a later year like NHL 12 for basically the same price. After the sport game has been out for around 2 years it drops to bottom price so you may as well ante up and get a newer version. I think you’ll be fine either way, but it’s definitely worth noting. I like getting them all as a collector, but otherwise I would probably just skip to one of the most recent years instead of getting them all.

Overall 6/10