Thoughts after Build 17

[yzerwing]

Game Look:

1) Submit button in trade screen and offer screen is still randomly not working, even when player is happy with the offer.

2) Keyboard shortcuts are definitely needed as they are way to many clicks to get to and from everything.

3) Team Stats missing include (at least, could be more) goals against and goals against per game, as well as shots against, and shots against per game.

4) In player profiles it should list when and where they were drafted.

5) Would be nice to have a list of Free Agents who left your team on July 1st.

AI:

1) Trade value is well off and is a game breaking frustration at this point.

-examples; AI Trade with AI saw, To NYR: James Neal
To Pitt: Martin Biron and a 6th rounder

-adding draft picks to a balanced deal turns to them not likely taking it, which makes no sense

-human teams player rights have absolutely no value to AI, even if said player is someone the likes of a NHL 1st rounder from 2012.

-draft picks have no value

-good players net nothing, example; the best I could get for Lubomir Visnovsky was a 5th round pick (didn’t matter whether they had cap space or not)

OTHER:

1) Goalies seem to be getting losses when their team gets and overtime win.

2) Goalie stats are still off, with losses and shutouts.

3) When I control both tactics and lineups it still plays the goalie I listed as backup. (particularly annoying issue to me)

4) No way to set player numbers.

5) No way to select shootout members.

6) You can assign protected list European players under contract in Europe to your own team and play them.

7) Same with non contracted members of your AHL team.

8) Contract demands are still too much per year and way too many years, and it seems to be worse with marginal players, who should feel lucky to be on your team, let alone diving after 6 and 7 year deals.

9) NHL still scheduling games on December 24 and 25 (NHL never does this)

10) Still can’t edit league settings such as: GPG, etc.

11) Fake players in Free Agent list (nothing more need be said about this)

12) Waivers still not functioning.

13) Still not seeing effects of the player ratings being different. Way too low of ratings for most players.

14) AI teams players always have way more stars then human team players.

15) NHL Awards are not named properly not sure if they can put real names or not, but the teams are named right, so I don’t see why not.

16) Lots of Awards missing.

17) ESC button not working when simming to next game.

I am sure there are more issues, but these are ones that I found and noted.

Conclusion:

Some of these issues might seem nitpicky or being harsh, but I want this game to be great, so I am pointing them out. It seems to me a fair number of these should be implemented by this point, and it does bring hopes down some. I know it is a first version in beta, which is still 4 months away from release, so I am taking that into account, just a little disappointed at this point. Maybe that isn’t fair, so sorry if it comes across wrong.

[jbsnadb]

Same here on pretty much everything.

Started two games with Build 17. My first, I took control of an ECHL team hoping to work my way up (started with Below Avg. rep). Played game by game until December, then simmed to end of season. Game crashed June 26th, 2013.

Game two, I left myself unemployed (Avg. rep) and tried to sim long term. Made it as far as October of 2013 before it crashed yet again.

Speaking as someone who beta tested EHM 2007, and played OOTP for more than 10 years, this game is quite broken in its current state and has quite a long way to go between now and September.

Oh, and add RFA to the list of things that do not work at all in the NHL.

[yzerwing]

Originally Posted by jbsnadb

add RFA to the list of things that do not work at all in the NHL.

Yeah, there is one I forgot to mention.

[Skills]

You can add the NHL Entry Draft issues too. You can't draft russians, and for some reason the finnish top prospects this year (Barkov and Ristolainen) aren't eligble in the first season when they should be.

[yzerwing]

Teams also sign and then within a week or so release the player, randomly. Still no option to pick left handed shooters, just right or no right, which leaves shoot field with no info.

[jbsnadb]

Originally Posted by yzerwing

Teams also sign and then within a week or so release the player, randomly. Still no option to pick left handed shooters, just right or no right, which leaves shoot field with no info.

I thought the sign and release bug was fixed. Guess not.

I, for one, am getting very frustrated that some of the things I would like to test in this game - namely how things work when your contract is up with your current team - I have been unable to because every single game I begin crashes.

Every. Single. One.

[DaleAndre]

yzerwing, great post i agree with all the things you have said. i have to say after being an eastside hockey player for years as old as that game is now and all the features it had, it seems to me and maybe wrongly that this beta would already be at that game level considering the engine and all the parts of that game could be easily duplicated in 2013 as a starting point for the beta. maybe i am missing something. i too after spending my money to shell out now in hopes of a great game in september am a little concerned. i hope whoever developed ehm is involved with developing this as i expect this game to be well past a 2005 game already in the dev stages.

[jbsnadb]

I share your concerns, Dale. I started playing OOTP as Season Ticket Baseball, but was away from the game for Version 12. I was on my way to purchasing OOTP14, when I came across the FHM discussions and chose to make that purchase instead.

I am beginning to regret that, because I am not enjoying playing this very broken game right now.

I have tested betas before, and generally know what to expect, but to have MAJOR issues for weeks at a time (not being able to click the "Submit Offer" button is a biggie) and having the game crash EVERY SINGLE TIME when you haven't even touched a thing is KILLING ME. And the worst part is, the crashes are (according to the Devs) being generated long before they manifest themselves, so once a savegame crashes, BOOM, you're done and need to start again.

[Rob316]

Since the new patch has been out (0.9.17) I've encountered numerous crashes I have no clue which it is pertaining to. I trust the team will find the source but as said already, the game is very far away from what hopefully will be ready by September.

[jbsnadb]

I'm beginning to think that there is a crash-inducing bug when simming to the Free Agent filing Date. That is the only things remotely constant in any of my crash scenarios besides the May 22nd date in three of them.