PS3: NHL 10

I wasn't sure if I should buy NHL '10 for the PS3 as all I read stated that NHL '10 wasn't a drastic improvement over NHL '09. The inclusion of a "Be a GM" mode doesn't immediately appeal to me, and including 'board play' doesn't do too much for me as I tend to play goal in "Be a Pro" mode -- thankfully retained for NHL '10.

Anywhoo, I purchased NHL '10 mentally prepared to admit it was a waste of my money; not because it's a bad game, far from it, but NHL '09 is already a great game so why bother with a minor upgrade?

To my delight my fears were misplaced. The fact that NHL '10 fixes several minor annoyances with NHL '09 makes buying NHL '10 worthwhile in itself. I say minor annoyances, but really as a person who likes to play goal they more often than not were quite irritating and detracted from NHL '09.

The most notable fixes are with the announcers. One, announcers in NHL '10 no longer describe a defenseman's own goal as the result of an amazing shot by the opposing team or as the poor play of the goalie. In NHL '09 the incongruity between the announcers' words and my emotions resulted in even more aggravation. No longer in NHL '10. Second, in NHL '09 injuries in-game were virtually ignored. I might see a player on the ice during play, but all too frequently a very brief close-up of the injured player was too brief to identify before play resumed. It's not like I know the jersey number of every single player on every single team. Of course, that's when the game even bothered to show the injury clip. I'd have no idea which player was injured or whether he was out for the duration. Thankfully, in NHL '10 this is remedied. The injury clip is enough to identify the player, and afterward the announcers even say whether the player will be returning. Nice.

Descriptions of breakaways in NHL '09 were a tad too inclusive. The announcers would describe a rebound as a breakaway. Stationary, open players and one-timers were too often called breakaways, as well. To date, none of that has cropped up in NHL '10.

In NHL '09, I'd always been disappointed that the game didn't provide some pre-game information on the opposing team, beyond the current win-loss record. No more in NHL '10. NHL '10 summarizes information like starting line ups, goalies, and stat summaries like PP, GF and GA.

Goalie animations have been added to in NHL '10, and there's much more manual control available. Overall an improvement, and it will even be more of an improvement when my use of the new controls becomes more automatic.

"Be a Pro" mode has been updated. My Be a Pro goalie had the option to play a prospect game prior to draft day to help determine draft position. Neat. Unfortunately, this leads to a minor annoyance with NHL '10. My goalie played well enough in the prospect game to be 1st pick on draft day. Huzzah! Too bad in the player stats page for my goalie under "Draft position" it still says "N/A". Eh?

Random points:

• GM and coach updates could be more timely. I went from the prospect game, the draft, contract, then directly to my 1st NHL game. What happened to the AHL? It was only after I finished the 1st game that the GM thoughtfully informed me that they were having me play in the bigs first prior to deciding whether I neeeded seasoning in the AHL. The coach didn't talk to me until after my 1st NHL game, too.
  
• In NHL '09 I thought goalie post-game evaluation was too tough. The game appeared to penalize goalie "grades" for circumstances not under the goalie's control. Poor grades adversely affect his number of starts. NHL '10 looks to have remedied this. A goalie can play well but still lose the game, and NHL '10 recognizes this. I might get fewer XP, but at least my grade average stays up and won't negatively impact my number of starts.
• I was leary of loading the game multiple times until being drafted by the Vancouver Canucks. I still have no idea if Luongo's 12-year deal made it into NHL '10. Oh well, if Luongo's still with the Canucks after my 3-yr, $0.85M entry contract expires perhaps I'll consider other teams.
• I wish in Be a Pro mode the game allowed you to see what the players' current contracts are.
• NHL '10 does a nice job with playable injury graphics. Demitra played with a fractured jaw for a couple games and you could see the additional plastic guard he wore for added protection.