Publisher Electronic Arts announced today the next game in the NHL franchise, NHL 15, which will be coming this fall for PlayStation 4, Xbox One, PlayStation 3, and Xbox 360 with features that include new commentary and physics. Also today fans will be able to vote on who will be on the cover of NHL 15.
In NHL 15, you experience more features on next-gen consoles that you won’t find in the older consoles. Features include a full real-world physics engine for those hard hitting collisions between all 12 players on the ice and also the puck itself, which EA claims that this will be the first for any sports game. Also other features that EA calls Vision AI, which means that the CPU-controlled players on the ice will be smarter. Plus Skill Stick improvements, which will allow skaters to have more control and also more realistic arenas with over 9,000 individual crowd models.
“NHL 15 delivers groundbreaking player likeness, emotion, and animation. From the strides a player takes to get up the ice to the emotion on their face after scoring a game winning goal, the players are as real as they’ve ever been.”
Since NHL 07 the franchise has had the commentary from Gary Thorne and Bill Clement, but now EA has teamed up with NBC Sports and it will now be passed onto NBC anchors Mike ‘Doc’ Emrick and Eddie Olczyk. TSN’s Ray Ferraro will also be down at the ice providing commentary. EA mentions that with the new-gen consoles you will be able to get “real-world” pregame notes from Emrick and Olczyk in the broadcast booth.
EA is partnering with the NHL and the NHL Players’ Association in order to let fans vote for the next NHL cover on the official NHL website, as well as on Twitter and Instagram with hashtags for the respective players. It starts today with the quarterfinals and will end on June 1st, and the winner will be announced during the 2014 NHL Awards on June 24th. The cover athletes that you are able to vote on are Patrice Bergeron, Logan Couture, Drew Doughty, Matt Duchene, Erik Karlsson, Phil Kessel, T.J. Oshie, and P.K. Subban.