The NHL 2K series has always been extremely solid and this year’s game is no exception. It is packed with features and modes and minigames and it plays better than ever thanks to a couple of new gameplay additions. The presentation suffers a bit with the loss of the ESPN license, but overall NHL 2K6 is an excellent hockey game that NHL fans will love.
Gameplay
At its core, NHL 2K6 is much more of a hockey simulation than EA’s NHL 06. This means that it is a little slower, the defense is better, the goalies are better, and games generally tend to play out more like real life hockey games. Of course, if that isn’t your ideal game of hockey you can adjust a number of sliders to change the game speed, ice friction, penalty frequency, and a bunch of other stuff to make the game play however you want. Basically, whether you like sim, arcade, or in between, NHL 2K6 has something for any and every hockey fan. The fundamentals of hockey – passing, shooting, skating, checking, puck control – all of them are as solid as ever in NHL 2K6 and everything controls like a dream.
NHL 2K6 sets itself apart with a few key additions to the gameplay that really make it stand out. The first, and coolest, change is that you can use an icon passing system. Just press in the right stick and button icons will appear over your players heads so you just press the right button to pass to a particular player. This allows you to accurately make a number of passes in succession in order to confuse the defense as much as possible and give yourself the best chance of scoring. Scoring a goal after a carefully planned out attack like this is extremely satisfying. The only problem is that you have to click the stick in to bring up icon passing after every shot which sours an otherwise perfect addition. Another big change is that you can call plays on the fly with the d-pad. These plays are fun to use and when everything works the way it should it is yet another very satisfying way to play hockey. Other new features include an enforcer system where designated players can intimidate the other team, and an option to control your goalie directly (fun, but pretty useless considering you can’t really see well enough to use it right).
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