8 days

Smodic has just hit the 1000 goal mark tonight at around 12:15 am. Congrats to him and his family on making this night an unreal night.

There's talk of broken sticks, real-time physics, new Junior Leagues, and etc but EA didn't mention the biggest news of all. An actual 4v4 clock!

Check out IGN's NHL 11 Page

First off I encourage anyone interested in the actual game to read the Xbox guys section. Us PS3 guys are jokes in that regard but I guarantee we'll put together some jobber posts throughout the year. Hopefully they'll be entertaining to more than just us and will include more than just inside jokes.

Nowhere has a firm date been released on when to expect the demo. A quick search around message-board-land reveals that the general consensus (I had to look up that word) is to expect the demo to be released somewhere around 3 weeks prior to release date. September 7th is the release date maybe expect to see the demo around August 17th. Last year the demo was released on August 20th (XBOX) and August 27th (PS3) for the September 15 release date. Let's hope the Dave Littman's agenda (inside joke) includes getting the PS3 the demo either first or at the same time this year.

Bottom line is that no one knows for sure so I hope you enjoyed wasting your life reading that crap.

Some videos...

If you made it to this site I doubt you want to be left out in the cold waiting for this game and Gamestop is the place to pre-order it.

• Reserve NHL 11 and receive a GameStop exclusive in-game 20th Anniversary Bauer Boost Pack containing in-game Bauer stick, gloves and skates. Available online and in-store while supplies last.
• Online Customers: A code and instructions on how to redeem your exclusive in-game boost pack will be emailed when the game releases.
• Store / In-Store Pickup Customers: A code and instructions on how to redeem your exclusive in-game boost pack will be printed on your receipt at time of purchase.

Gotta love the jobber comments from the Gamestop site...

i think for nhl 11 there should be upgradeing for the team stats like mlb the show where you can upgrade the scot the trainer therapey transport i think they should have my fizagal hitting in it

i really was stunned when nhl 10 came out. it was an overall great game for the ps3. it had so much improvements from nhl 09 but here's some suggestions for nhl 11. a choice between networks that are broadcasting: nbc, versus, and even regional networks such as fsn pittsburgh and wgn (chicago). differing commentators verying on the network: eddy olchek and mike emerick or paul stiggerwald and bob errey. and lastly, they need reginal boards logos. such as in pittsburgh: american eagle and giant eagle. and lots of other stuff maybe they can go to all of the arenas and copy them down. and less of the hockey equiptment sponsers. oh, and one more thing maybe they could show sponsers during replays, powerplays, or other stuff. and i almost forgot. maybe they could have intermission reports with stats replays and other scores such as madden 10.

We'll find ways to complain but hopefully they're new to 11. Come on 4v4 clock! Some confirmed stuff we have high hopes for.

• Real Time Physics (scripted hits are gone but hopefully it's not arcade style)...in other news Bunka will be out for life after this NHL 10 collision...
• Sticks breaking (hopefully it doesn't suck but it should add some intrigue)
• Practice Mode (We can all take our suck to the ice where it doesn't count)
• New Faceoffs (not just the same win it back to the D every time)

Hopefully exploits are minimized and fixed throughout the year. There's ton of good videos on youtube from E3 but here's a few to get you started.

Ok so if you are reading this and are not a part of our team at the moment you might be wondering how you could partake in the upcoming season of online hockey. Here is some information that we are putting out there so you know what it is going to be like the coming season.

There are a few things that are set in stone already.

• There will be two teams, a main "Big Club" team and a minor team. It will be set up just like the real clubs, you can be called up or sent down depending on your performance.

• There will be no owner-for-life. We saw how that was bad last year and we will not make the same mistake twice.

• To get on the main team you will have to try-out this can be done now if you have a copy of NHL10. Also you will need to have a good standing with the current team members.  Lastly you must have good stats in NHL10 or be able to show what you are capable of on the ice. There is also a limit to how many we will have on the main team.

• To get on the minor club just place a comment with your name and PSN onto this post we will be putting a list together, then once the game comes out you will be added to the limit of the time. If needed we will have a third team put into play.

• Team play is also a big plus, we are not looking for a one man team guy that will just try to glitch goals the whole game. If you are seen glitching you will be warned once then cut.

• There will be no players named Chris Menn on ether team.

 

Team Pensblog bounced back from a poor October in which we only won a silver medal to finish 15th in November to win our 2nd gold medal of the season. It's our second best finish in a month so far with September being our best with a 9th place finish. So far in December we're looking at possibly our best month yet as we're currently tied for 6th with only a few glitching teams ahead of us(2 man teams).

It looks like this team is the only one to watch as Team Baby Pensblog dropped off the face of the earth and our Xbox 360 counterparts are looking pedestrian with a sub .500 November. This game is so much better when you can actually compete which is why we're staying in casual for now.

In other news almost everyone who plays often has received their legend card. 5 out of 7 full-time players are now owners of the legend card and as of today 3 players have an A- rating overall.

That's it for now, I'll have something new in 2010.

We finally get a title update after going through a few tuner updates and there's a shitload of stuff that's being fixed in this update. From Inside EA:

Fixed the exploit to slap-shot a 5-hole goal from below the face-off circle.

• Although our goalies are much improved in NHL 10, there was an exploit when shooting from below the face-off circle that resulted in a goal more often than not. The goalies are now tuned to better handle shots from this area.

Increased speed of passes with Manual passing on.

• This year we added Hardcore Passing (manual passing) that gave you total control of your pass speed and direction. Overall, the new passing was well received but the consensus was that you should be able to pass the puck harder and that the bottom-end speed was too slow.  We've increased the bottom-end speed so the passes are crisper and also increased the top-end slightly as well.

Reduced the ability to boardplay players who are far away from you.

• It was a little unrealistic being able to 'suck' a player into boardplay as he was skating away from you so we've made it much harder to pin a player that is skating away. The further he is from you, the less likely you'll be able to boardplay him.

Tuning of trade logic.

• Too many superstars were being offered up for trades so we've dialed this back along with reducing how often players are repeatedly offered up for trade.

Added the ability for a user to apply boost slots to authentic helmets.

• We've added the ability to apply boost slots to an authentic helmet so users can get the benefit of the boosts without having to wear a helmet with a design on it.

Here are some of the other main fixes that will be in the Title Update:

• Fixed the bug that would make a player sometimes exit pass blocking (L1/LT) when they got close to their goalie.
• Fixed the bug that would prevent offline Be a Pro player from getting ice-time in some situations.
• Fixed a crash that could happen on delayed penalty shots.
• Improved logic for how fighting affects teamplay scores in Be a Pro.
• Prevent L1/LT from allowing players to bypass stumble animations.
• Improvements to goalies to reduce 5-hole goals in some contexts.
• Tuned thresholds for injuries from hard shots.
• Added the ability to escape a prefight circle by pressing L2/LB.
• Fixed the bug that made it possible to "shoot" a puck slowly out of the one-handed animation such that nobody could pick it up.
• Improved goalie aggressiveness when poking the puck on cross-crease passes.
• Improved the ability of defencemen are able to do puck pickups behind them to help defend cross-crease passes.
• Reduced the ability to stuff the puck through the goalie by running into him without shooting (most common on wraparounds and reaching puck pickups).
• Reduced accidental interference in front of net.
• Fixed the offline Be a Pro line-change bug where the player is stuck at the bench.
• Prevent slap passes from being deflected at large angles.
• Fixed the bug where the goalie does not react to a shot if he's banging his stick on the ice to signal the end of a penalty.
• Fixed the bug that makes flip dumps to the middle of the offensive zone go over the glass frequently.
• Fixed the bug that makes CPU center win draws to the the same side all of the time.
• Fixed the bug in the stat tracking of passing.
• Prevent accidental saucer passes after receiving the puck while trying to poke check (because both actions are on R1/RT).
• Tuning to reduce occurrence of tripping penalties when the player being tripped is stationary or moving slowly.
• Tuning to game logic to make it a little easier to stay up on the NHL team during 4-game trial in BAP.
• Many other changes to improve our ability to refine the gameplay tuning with via tuner sets.

I like a few of these such as the prevent accidental saucer passes fix since I always do that in a game because I didn't think that I would get the puck directly off a pass and the tripping fix since that's the one I get called for the most. The one I don't like but other people will like is the 5 hole fix since I score most of my goals 5 hole. I have to try that slap 5 hole one since I never try it from that close since it's an all-out brawl in front of the net in most games.

They say the patch is in testing and they hope to get it out by November 5th, so we'll most likely still play in the same style for the rest of the month.

In team news:

Team A beat Team B twice with 3-1 wins in the past few days

Team A is ranked 23rd at the time of this post, Team B is 36th

Smorjug was called up due to inactivity of a bunch players but he'll stay up for now even when the inactive players come back since he playing good hockey.

Jaos was sent to Team B for being a crappy player and will never get called up to A again since he's being a douche over it. Drunk or not, you sucked(under .500 when you played) and everyone was in agreement over your inability to play defense. So suck it up and play on Team B and cool off on the insults.

Since the Baby Pens squad is full, it's been decided that a Team C would be created other wise known as Team Nailersblog based off the Penguins minor league club the Wheeling Nailers. I won't be running this squad as I'm not going to create a third account just to set this up but it will be ran by one of the GMs on Team Baby Pensblog.

All the info you'll need will be found here: http://www.easportsworld.com/en_US/clubs/761A0001/13613/overview

To join in game just search for Team Nailersblog under club search and then send a request to join.

Naturally some people will be booted from Team B in order to clear up some space so don't be offended you'll still be able to play just not with the same people. Team Nailersblog shouldn't be too different from Baby Pensblog since it'll have part of the Baby Pens roster along with other people who haven't signed up yet.

In other news, Jaos has been sent down to Team Baby Pensblog in order to work on his defense. He is welcomed to come back once he learns how to play better defense otherwise a spot is open for an active pure defenseman. Not a tweener or a guy who says he can also play defense I mean a guy who plays defense most if not all the time and doesn't allow breakaways, getting beat like a rented mule everyother play, and can stay in position. Recommendations from Baby Pensblog members are welcomed since it's not easy to tell who's a good defenseman on stats alone.

That's it for now