NHL 22 Gameplay Video and Changes That Have Been Made Since the Closed Technical Test Revealed

Originally scheduled to arrive today, the NHL 22 team has announced they will show 27 minutes of NHL 22 gameplay video footage tomorrow at 11:00 AM ET. Be a Pro and Franchise Mode details are still scheduled to arrive on October 4 with NHL 22 Hockey Ultimate Team details set to arrive on October 6.

UPDATE: (9-29) We have embedded the video below.

The team also answered NHL 22 community questions and provided additional details in a deep dive hour long Q&A audio session and revealed plenty of gameplay changes that have been made since the NHL 22 closed technical test.

Passing/Pickups/Receptions

• Improvements to short range passes which were causing unintended pass quality penalties in those situations
• Fixed an issue where pucks would sometimes cleanly go through the blade rather than bobbling when not fully handled
• Fixed a few situations where the awareness attributes weren’t being factored into reaction time
• Change to use puck control rating to determine how quickly a player can react after bobbling a pickup/reception
• Fixed a case where players wouldn’t drop the puck when the puck/stick would be held up with the net leading to warps
• Blade angle animation improvements to various pickups and receptions

AI

• Improvements to AI defenders to have them facing up ice more and getting their stick toward their opponent when in good position goal side
• Fix for AI defensemen that would frequently move out of position off center ice faceoffs
• Fixes for AI where they wouldn’t attempt to tie up/stick to the winger on offensive zone faceoffs

Physics

• Fixed cases where the puck would bounce unrealistically or at high speed off the goalie or players
• Tuning and stick physics improvements around the boards
• Fixes for the puck going through stick blades on one-timers
• Improvements to goalie interference logic to avoid unwanted weak interference calls
• Fixed a case where the puck could pass through the top of the goalies pad
• Stick strength and tension tuning
• Reverse hit animation responsiveness improvements
• Stick lift targeting and reaction improvements
• Fixed a few cases where sticks would get tangled with players off faceoffs

Goalies

• Fix to stop goalies from looking around screens during faceoffs and play far outside their zone
• Fixed an issue where human goalies reaction time would be too high when having to move a limb a larger distance, allowing them to sit deep in their net and have success
• Improved flinch saves while the AI goalie is leaning against the post in butterfly
• Various goal scoring balance improvements
• AI Goalie poke check frequency tuning
• Improved user goalie Spread V and butterfly mechanical consistency
• Improved AI contortionist saves trigger logic
• Fixed an issue where goalies would drop an already covered puck if they were poke checked

Shooting

• Fixed issues where attempted slap passes would lead to unrealistic deflection postures/outcomes
• Fix for when shots were getting queued before a hit
• Rebalanced one timer shot outcomes based on quality of pass and reaction time
• Fixed an issue where players would still attempt to deflect blocked shots
• Blade angle improvements to various deflections

Skating

• Improved postures and stick interaction when trying to turn near the boards
• Fixed skating transitions that were not blending correctly
• Improved skating behavior and transitions in and out of board play

General

• Vibration tuning and fixes for cases where vibrations wouldn’t turn off
• Fixed an issue where players were able to perform actions to extend the goal post goal sequence
• Various improvements to preserving proper momentum when a player would trip
• Fix for shot blocks that were being picked inappropriately instead of diving poke checks
• Improved flinch logic for kneeling/pass blocks
• Various X-factor ability tuning and logic improvements
• Fixed pro-am penalty logic where regular trips from non-diving players were being called
• Various crash and desync fixes

The Standard Edition of NHL 22 releases on October 15 for Xbox One, PlayStation 4, Xbox Series X|S and PlayStation 5. The X-Factor Edition launches 3 days earlier and includes bonus in-game content. The NHL 22 trial arrives for EA Play and Xbox Game Pass on October 7.