NHL Powerplay 96

It's been months since we brought you advance pics on this masterpiece created just down the street from our offices. Since then we've gone nuts on the preview betas in the office. We've played and played until the Saturn controllers turned our thumbs into a bloody pulp. As I have said before, in our preview, this is the finest incarnation of hockey ever to hit a game system. The more hours I spend on the ice the more I become unwavering on that point. I love this game, I can't stop playing it. It is everything an armchair hockey fanatic could hope for.

Everything, mind you, is a relative term. The more the Saturn stayed on, the more I wanted out of NHL Powerplay 96. Then somewhere during my 83rd hour of play it dawned on me that the features and additions I wanted out of this digital ballet were items that would never come to mind were I playing a less polished game. It occurred to me that an excellent benchmark for a truly superior game is the fact that the more finely detailed and sophisticated the complaints one has for a game, the better it has to be at the outset.

For example, a mediocre or average game might bring about oft considered wishes such as less polygon dropout, or that there were a better storyline written into the gameplay. A superior game has you wishing for elements that push the envelope of current game development. NHL Powerplay 96, for example, had me wishing that I could see the individual hockey player's names on the back of their uniforms when I zoomed in during the frame-by-frame replay of a spectacular check.

NHL Powerplay 96 now serves as the example by which other finely detailed sports sims should be constructed. At the heart of NHL Powerplay 96's excellence is its computer AI. This is something that producer Kevin Wilkenson, from the outset, wanted to be strong and a focal strength of the game. They achieved it in spades. Never before have I had to be constantly creative and just plain smart to beat the computer, without feeling I was cheated by the difficulty level of the game. This was often the problem that I had with the enjoyable Face Off for the PSX.

Let me define that. If I played at the Veteran level in Face Off I could often outplay the computer and still lose, simply because the one variable changed was that the goalie became much harder to beat. With NHL Powerplay 96 there is no difficulty level, just more difficult teams and players to pit yourself against. That is because the individual skills of each player are never going to change. Patrick Roy is never going to be any harder or easier to beat and Chris Chelios is always going to be tough to deke unless you become more creative than he and just generally rise above the skillset of the individuals and teams that you face. That's the way it should be.

The team at Radical has taken great pains to make sure that what you are playing on the screen accurately reflects the NHL, its players and the institution of hockey itself. They did it because almost all of them are true fans of the game. In fact, most of them religiously play a scrimmage in the morning before they arrive at work. As a result they have transferred what they enjoy on the ice to the code that flows through the Saturn's processors. Sometimes that results in some subtle biases towards certain players or teams. Vancouver plays a little better, defensively, than their rating, and certain hometown favorites like Burnaby's Joe Sakic plays beyond the legitimately fabulous skillset that makes him the superstar that he has been all these years. But beyond all of that, Radical's love for hockey has made NHL Powerplay 96 the fan's hockey game to play.

For those that don't follow the game of hockey as fastidiously as some they will find NHL Powerplay 96 to be a great education of the game and its players. As you play you'll find out who's strong at faceoffs, who's easy or hard to knock off the puck and who, given the opportunity, will ripple the mesh without fail. You'll also find out who had injury problems in the last season. I found this to be yet another great example of the detail put into this game but I also found it to be a little frustrating at times. Mario Lemieux and his bad back will invariably miss the odd period of play should he be cross checked from behind and Jeremy Roenick can rather easily be lost for two to three games, a reflection on his injury plagued 1995-96 season. I did wish that the already plentiful options screen allowed for injuries to be turned off.

Enough about the fine minutiae of the value added detail that NHL Powerplay 96 offers. The gameplay is, of course, the pivotal aspect of any sports sim. Here, once again, NHL Powerplay 96 offers up the best of its kind. NHL Powerplay 96 moves as if you were watching a live telecast from one of the 26 arenas in North America. The pace is fast but not accelerated as is the case with Sony's Face Off or EA's 16-bit NHL 96. It moves with enough speed to keep you on your toes but it also allows time to strategize, set up shots and generally get creative with the play. The control is superb with separate buttons, offensively, for the wrist shot, slap shot, back pass and the enormously helpful flip pass. Defensively there are separate buttons to check, hook and trip. The two latter actions may land you in the penalty box but more often than not, if you're savvy in your timing, they will simply put your opponent off balance or offside without the ref being any the wiser.

The animation of the players is a real treat. Using Motion Capture technology, the players skate about with grace and fury. Players reel, one hand in the air, when knocked off balance. Splitting the D becomes a thing of beauty on more than one level, and the checks have real weight and power to them.

Graphically, NHL Powerplay 96 shows itself off in its replay mode. Here the game becomes fully 3D (as opposed to its static but perfectly chosen, top-down view of the ice) making the replay fun for not only the action that causes the air horns to blast, but for the devastating checks that are dished out with wild abandon. Frame by frame, bodies hang in mid air before toppling over the boards into the opposing teams bench. Pucks spin suspended before a goalie's last helpless pose before entering into the net and at times you could swear that you are hearing Canadian hockey dinosaur Howie Meeker's nasally whine telling the camera operator to "stop it right there!", before making unintelligible marks on the screen with his light pen.

There may be no trading or player creation options in NHL Powerplay 96 but it more than makes up for it with the addition of the "Coach Team" option and the ability to play international teams in a World Cup. The opportunity to set your strategies for forechecking and defensive coverage at any point in the game is something that fans of B-ball sims have been able to enjoy for the past couple of years. It has added so much to my enjoyment of the game because it allowed me to not only outplay my opponent but to out-think them as well.

Then there is the World Cup play which is a real treat. Essentially, Radical created 3 allstar "dream teams" for you to play beyond the requisite East and West Conference teams from the NHL. Canada, USA and Russia are powerfully scary teams that make for great action when pitted against each other. Russia, of course, is fast and pretty, what with linemates such as Fedorov, Bure and Mogilny. On the USA side the play is hard hitting and huge and the Canadians... well what can you say about the depth of talent on a team when the 4th line is centered by Joe Sakic and winged by Fleury and Yzerman. Yikes! If you can get a team tap and 7 other friends to play with there is nothing better than the talent rich play of World Cup hockey.

I can't say enough about this game. Solidly constructed with a great mix of flash and substance, NHL Powerplay 96 has proven that the domain of world class sports titles no longer rests with EA. Not that EA hasn't got some great stuff up their sleeves but they certainly haven't got a monopolistic hold on the market any more. This is the hockey title to buy for the Saturn, if not the sports title for the year. It has tons of depth and fun packed into its code. I'm so glad this one came out because as a Saturn player I was beginning to tire of World Series Baseball for my sports fix. Virgin and Radical have a huge hit on their hands and I certainly expect them to eat the market up with this one. Now we'll have to wait and see if they expand on the brilliance of this game and make next year's sequel jam packed with all the little extras I wanted from this one. I should be careful for what I wish for though because if they do I may have to stop watching the real game because it won't feel real enough any more.

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