NHL 07

I've spent some of my precious, precious spring break time playing EA's NHL 07 on my 360. So far, I've developed gamepad thumb. The nasty little bumps on the 360's analog sticks, so comforting when using it for a little, have managed to blister my thumb. Ow.

It's been quite a while since the last time I played an installment of NHL, so I was shocked when I won my first game. Mind you, I was playing on the easiest difficulty. Then I lost three in a row. Oops.

EA's status as a behemoth is often derided, but people who deride it are also derided. I would think, though, that our largest game publisher could afford to include a real manual. One that, for example, helped me figure out what to do at faceoffs. I searched EA's increasingly juvenile and unpoliced forums to find out. All I discovered was that button mashing was for losers...of course a coarse word was used in place of losers. Nicely done EA.

I wimped out and turned off offsides penalties, that's improved my gameplay nicely! It's not a bad implementation, but, arguably, EA continues to not be innovative. Still, that shouldn't surprise anyone. The last time it was innovative was in the 1980s. Ahhhh..Starflight, MULE, Seven Cities of Gold, Earl Weaver Baseball, Lords of Conquest, Adventure Construction Set, etc. Heck, I'll even throw in Keef the Thief and Hard Nova.