Quick NHL 09 Review

This has nothing to do with the Avalance (per say), but it's my blog, so tough. This is my take on the game after expereincing it for the last two days on the Xbox 360.

The Good: Be a pro mode is spectacular, both online and offline. There's nothing cooler than seeing your name on the back of an NHL jersey, especially if you've worked your way there from the minors.

Playing a regular game is alot harder(but also more rewarding) than last years also EA hockey game. You cannot just blindly try to crash the net with the puck, blowing by every defenseman on the way. If this is your strategy, you will lose the puck, and you will lose the game. The defense is very solid in this game, so we, the users, are required to dump and chase, or try to be patient and wait for a play to develop. It's very realistic.

The Bad: The goal horns sound crappy. Really, they do. Don't call it nit picking either; when realism is the goal, every detail is taken into account. They should have just left them how they were last year (they sucked last year, but they really suck this year).

The crowd could have also been done better (apparently no women go to hockey games).

The Ugly: If you like playing both goalie and skater, you're going to be irritated. You can edit both your BAP (be a pro) skater and goalie, but the changed effect both characters. Allow me to explain: I'm a right handed shooter, but I catch with my left hand while playing goalie. So when I make my skater shoot right, it also makes my goalie catch/shoot right handed. Very poor attention to detail here.

Overall: If you're a fan of both hockey and good things, buy this game. It's easily, in my opinion, the best hockey game ever made. Expect it to win sports game of the year for the 2nd conscutive year.

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Roy's number to be retired by Habs

Patrick Roy's number 33 will be raised to the rafters in Montreal on Nov. 22. Alot of people find this move questionable because of the terms he left on, but I think it's justified.

Roy collected two Stanley Cups and two Connsymthe trophies in his 10 year tenure with the Habs, and I think it would be foolish not to raise the number of (possibly) the best goalie of all time.

Plus his two cup wins may have unknowingly set Montreal up for the most perfect season imaginable (come on people, getting a 25th cup in the franchise's 100th season is about as perfect as it gets), so he may as well be part of the excitement next year at the Bell Center.