| NHL | |
|---|---|
 | |
| Genre | Sports (ice hockey) |
| Developer |
|
| Publisher | EA Sports |
| Platforms | Mega Drive/Genesis,Super NES,Sega CD,MS-DOS,Game Boy,Saturn,Windows,PlayStation,Nintendo 64,Game Boy Color,PlayStation 2,Xbox,GameCube,Game Gear,Game Boy Advance,PlayStation Portable,Xbox 360,PlayStation 3,Wii,PlayStation 4,Xbox One,PlayStation 5,Xbox Series X/S |
| First release | NHL Hockey August 1991 |
| Latest release | NHL 26 September 12, 2025 |
NHL (colloquially referred to asChel[1]) is a series of professionalice hockey simulationvideo games developed byEA Vancouver and published yearly byElectronic Arts under theEA Sports brand. The game is developed under license from theNational Hockey League (NHL), which enables the use of the league's team names, arenas and colors in the game, and theNational Hockey League Players' Association (NHLPA), which enables the use of the league's player names and likenesses.
| DOS | DOS /MS-DOS | GB | Game Boy | GBA | Game Boy Advance,iQue GBA |
| GBC | Game Boy Color | GCN | GameCube | GEN | Sega Genesis / Mega Drive |
| GG | Game Gear | N64 | Nintendo 64,iQue Player | PS1 | PlayStation 1 |
| PS2 | PlayStation 2 | PS3 | PlayStation 3 | PS4 | PlayStation 4 |
| PS5 | PlayStation 5 | PSP | PlayStation Portable | SAT | Sega Saturn |
| SCD | Sega CD / Mega CD | SNES | Super Nintendo / Super Famicom / Super Comboy | Wii | Wii,WiiWare,Wii Virtual Console |
| WIN | Microsoft Windows, all versionsWindows 95 and up | XB | Xbox,Xbox Live Arcade | XB360 | Xbox 360,Xbox 360 Live Arcade |
| XBO | Xbox One | XBX/S | Xbox Series X/S |
InNHL Hockey from 1991, the game modes were season and playoff, and due to the license, the game was calledEA Hockey inEurope and featured 22 national teams instead.NHLPA Hockey '93 was without theNHL license, so instead of NHL team names and logos, there were onlycities. Game modes added inNHL 95 were exhibition, training, shootout and the possibility to edit and trade individual players in teams. On PC,NHL 96 was in3D with2D player textures, fights are back (most recently in the first two games).NHL 97 was the first full 3D installment, the national teams ofCanada,USA andRussia have been added, the other two teams contain a compilation of the best European players. InNHL 98, 18 national teams were already included. In NHL 99, the career mode was added and in NHL 2000, the tournament mode.
Denmark;^FIN in
Finland;^RUS in
Russia;^SWE in
Sweden;^SUI in
Switzerland;^CZE in
Czech Republic;^US in
United StatesIn addition to the NHL itself, the different installments of the game include development leagues like theAmerican Hockey League andECHL, major junior leagues like the member leagues of theCanadian Hockey League, European national leagues from Russia, Sweden, Finland, Germany, Austria, Switzerland and Czech Republic, and the EuropeanChampions Hockey League.
As is traditional with EA Sports, the NHL seriesboxes feature live action photos instead of drawings. As it lacked the NHLPA license, the early titles staged photos without real players.NHLPA Hockey 93, on the other hand, had the rights to use player images, but not of the teams. On this cover, the main action photo features theNew York Rangers'Randy Moller checking thePhiladelphia Flyers'Rod Brind'Amour while Rangers goaltenderMike Richter makes a save (in this photo there is the logo of theNew York Rangers located on the bottom right of the goaltender's pants). This photo is surrounded by eight small portraits of players (Steve Yzerman,Andy Moog,Pat LaFontaine,Brian Leetch,Ray Bourque,Patrick Roy,Jeremy Roenick, andRick Tocchet). This changed withNHL 94, which featured a goal situation forTomas Sandstrom (Los Angeles Kings) againstAndy Moog (Boston Bruins).NHL 95 featured an in-goal camera during a goal scored byAlexei Kovalev of theNew York Rangers during the1994 Stanley Cup Finals againstKirk McLean of the Vancouver Canucks.NHL 96 featuredNew Jersey'sScott Stevens andDetroit'sSteve Yzerman. More recently,Claude Giroux was featured on the cover ofNHL 13 andMartin Brodeur was on the cover ofNHL 14. On June 24, 2014, EA Sports announced at the 2014NHL Awards in Las Vegas thatPatrice Bergeron of theBoston Bruins would be the official cover athlete forNHL 15. In 2015, during the NHL awards, it was announced that the cover ofNHL 16 would featureJonathan Toews andPatrick Kane carrying theStanley Cup together. However, on August 12, 2015, EA announced that Kane would not be appearing on the cover or participating in any promotional activities for the game in light of a criminal investigation he was involved in. Instead, the cover featured Toews alone. At the 2016 NHL Awards, it was announced thatVladimir Tarasenko of theSt. Louis Blues was to appear on the cover ofNHL 17.[22] On June 21, 2017, during the 2017 NHL Awards, EA announced thatConnor McDavid of theEdmonton Oilers would be the cover athlete onNHL 18.[23] On August 22, 2024, EA announced thatQuinn Hughes of theVancouver Canucks would be the Canadian and international cover athlete, andJack Hughes of theNew Jersey Devils would be the US regional cover athlete onNHL 25. And on the deluxe edition cover ofNHL 25, all three Hughes brothers (includingLuke Hughes of theNew Jersey Devils) are the cover athletes together, which is for the first time in video game history that three siblings are on a video game cover art together.[24] On August 4, 2025, EA announced thatMatthew Tkachuk would be the cover athlete forNHL 26 where he is seen hoisting the Stanley Cup. This is the first time sinceNHL 16 where a defending Stanley Cup champion, as well as the Stanley Cup itself is on the cover.[25]
InNHLPA '93 andNHL '94, Emmy award-winning[26] sportscaster Ron Barr gives a pre-game scouting report prior to each game. In the Genesis version of NHL 95, KNBR radio sportscaster John Shrader replaced Ron Barr in that duty. Liveplay-by-play commentary was introduced in the PC version ofNHL 97.Jim Hughson, former play-by-play man forCBC'sHockey Night in Canada and also one of Canada's best-known hockey announcers, provided the play-by-play for much of the series. The last games in which he is one of the announcers are the PC and PS2 versions of NHL 09.Bill Clement was the sole commentator in theNintendo 64 version ofNHL 99.Gary Thorne provided the play-by-play commentary in allXbox 360 andPlayStation 3 versions fromNHL 07 throughNHL 14.NBC Sports commentatorMike Emrick andEddie Olczyk provided the play-by-play and color commentary on all platforms, with their first appearance together being inNHL 15 and last inNHL 19.James Cybulski is the current play-by-play commentator, starting withNHL 20.NHL 15 was also the first game to introduce an ice level analyst, withTSN analystRay Ferraro appearing in the Xbox One and PlayStation 4 versions of the game.Color commentary has been provided byDaryl Reaugh (NHL 98–99),Bill Clement (NHL 2000–2001, and NHL 07–14 for the Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3),Don Taylor (NHL 2002–2003),Craig Simpson (NHL 2004–09),Eddie Olczyk (NHL 15–19). Ferraro made the jump from ice-level analyst to full color commentator inNHL 20 (NHL 20–23). Ferraro was replaced byCheryl Pounder as color commentator inNHL 24 (NHL 24-present).
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One idea that has been widely discussed over many years within the fan community is a purported automatic built-in gameplay mechanism called ”ice tilt”, which modifies skaters' and/or goalies' and/or the referee's penalty-decision-making behavior irrationally to favor a worse player, a player on a losing streak or a player who is down by multiple goals. EA Sports has openly denied the existence of any such mechanism, instead saying that winning is a product of skill and the quality of the team's roster. However, EA once published a document about a feature called "Dynamic Difficulty Adjustment", which was interpreted by some as confirming the existence of ice tilt. EA has not denied this. In fact, they patented the software for it.[27]
NHL 99 was the first game in the series to feature fully licensed music fromDavid Bowie for the intro video. Since then, each game has had soundtracks of licensed music known as EA Sports Trax, with selections ofpunk,alternative, androck music. Electronic and hip hop music was later added to the mix in later games.NHL 15 andNHL 16 onPlayStation 4 andXbox One use an original orchestral score instead for the menus, while the soundtrack continues playing in the arenas.NHL 17 returned to the traditional EA Trax feature and also allowed the option to switch back to the original score fromNHL 15.
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