NHL Hitz Preview

Wayne Gretzky's 3D hockey debuted on the Nintendo 64 around the time of the console's launch in 1996 and quickly established itself as the NHL equivalent to NFL Blitz and NBA Jam. While followers of EA's NHL series quickly turned up their noses, the game struck a chord with mainstream players because of its twitch-influenced gameplay, over-the-top checks, and flaming slapshots. Midway was guilty of milking the franchise for a couple of years before it was finally dropped from the arcade-born publisher's roster. After several years of inactivity, though, Midway is back in the hockey game, with NHL Hitz--an improvement over the Wayne Gretzky forumla in every possible way.

Midway may be leaving the arcade market, but the arcade influence will likely never leave its console games. In true arcade form, NHL Hitz's three-on-three gameplay takes place in a minimal amount of gameplay modes. Championship is the primary one-player experience. Here you choose a team and start chipping away at the mountain of NHL teams in hopes of winning the Stanley Cup. Stats are tracked throughout the season in a multitude of categories, but this is about as close to a simulation as NHL Hitz gets. Other than an exhibition mode for up to four players, the only other gameplay mode is called skills. The skills mode presents you with challenges, like pickpocketing another player in a given amount of time, checking another player to the ice, faking out a defender with a deke, and performing one-timers.

New to Midway's NHL games is a points system that lets you unlock a healthy number of features. As you win games in the exhibition mode, you are given points to unlock jerseys, new player heads, and 14 fantasy arenas including a circus rink, a graveyard, a moon ship, a pirate ship, and a shark tank. Points are also awarded for completing the skills challenges, answering trivia questions at the conclusion of each game, and for winning games in the championship mode. Another new addition is the create-a-team mode. You can choose from 11 different jerseys and any unlocked rink. You may then draft players from the NHL onto your team's roster and use the customized team in every mode, including head-to-head. Considering how exaggerated Midway's sports games are, it's a wonder fighting hasn't been a big part of its hockey series until now. The fighting system included in NHL Hitz is probably the best ever included in a hockey game. You can duck or lean back to avoid punches, throw jabs or knockout blows, and get back up once you've been dropped. Players getting on fire in arcade sports games is really nothing new, but all three players in a team can catch ablaze at once in NHL Hitz, practically ending the game.

The control has been vastly improved over Midway's previous hockey games. Besides the atypical one-timers and give-and-gos, you can now deke your opponents, protect the puck while skating, taunt the other team at will, or cause the crowd to boo. Controlling skating is very smooth, and pass targeting is already nearly perfect. Computer players will storm the net at the appropriate time to set themselves up for a backdoor tip-in, but there are still some issues with goalie AI for Black Box to address. Another problem with the game thus far is its lack of speed. You can adjust it in the options menu, but even at its highest setting it still falls well short of the fast-paced action found in the Wayne Gretzky games. Hopefully this is something scheduled for adjustment on the developer's to-do list.

The graphics engine being used for NHL Hitz pushes a lot of polys, but Black Box Games has done some interesting things with them that mask the engine's power. Players are suitably modeled, though they are less rounded and detailed when compared with the player models found in EA's NHL 2001. The extra polygons that were saved in the character models have been used to construct several rows of polygonal fans complete with independent animations. The crowd will literally get up and walk out of the arena during a blowout or react appropriately to actions on the ice. It's quite impressive, but in the latest version of the game we received, the crowd lacks the camera time required to make an immediate impact. The NHL arenas are all basically the same save for a different logo at center ice, but the fantasy rinks more than make up for it. It's surreal to watch NHL players make their way through the tunnel and step onto a sandy or wooden surface. There are some nice details included in the game such as helmets that get knocked off players' heads, real-time shadows, and electricity that strikes your players as they catch on fire. The frame rates remain solid throughout the game, and the animations for the players are just as wacky and as zany as ever.

From the sound of things, Midway went the extra mile to get top-notch talent for NHL Hitz's soundtrack. While we haven't been supplied with a list of artists, a Limp Bizkit track is already in the early burn we received, as well as several other grinding rock-rap groups. Midway has again acquired the services of the same announcer it uses in all of its sports games--so count on the same nasal commentary full of quips and put-downs you've come to expect from NFL Blitz and NBA Jam.

As the only arcade hockey game for the PlayStation 2, NHL Hitz will fill a genre gap nicely while providing the same thrills Midway's other sports franchises are known for. Those who enjoy the ebb and flow of the real NHL game will likely find Hitz to be too "out there," but casual fans will appreciate its simplicity and reliance upon player reflexes. NHL Hitz is scheduled for release at the end of this year, and based upon the latest version we received, Black Box should have no problems correcting the issues and completing it on time. We'll have more on NHL Hitz for the PlayStation 2 as it breaks.