Some years it to hearken to its glory more of an arcade flair, the kind of game you can enjoy with a few buds and a few beers. The next year it attempts to challenge 2K's hardcore sim sports brand. But even then, the offerings tended to feel "sim lite." If you look at the history of this series, it's hard to imagine that it could ever deliver a true knockout. That's why this year's iteration comes as a total shock. It's not just marketing talk, it's not just hype; EA has finally delivered an NHL title worthy of a standing ovation. Wow.
For NHL 08, EA Canada decided to drop its legacy of fastbreak hockey and create a game that so closely mimics an NHL game, you may swear you're watching the real deal. To achieve this, EA created a brand new skating engine and built a dynamic AI system. Either of these alone would have been seen as a nice improvement over NHL 07, but together they create a feeling of being on the ice in an NHL game.
