NHL 2K9 for Wii Reviews by Gamers

I don't want to hear about the Wii not being able to get good presentation for its games: the hockey games in NHL 2K9 are presented very much like a normal hockey telecast. The commentators are on the spot and there's great reporting from the benches (okay, it tends to repeat, but that's true for many sports games.)
But there's one big problem with the graphics: the crowd is made up of people cut out from cardboard, and they are blurry. Talk about ugly.
The game modes are what you'd expect: Single game, Season play, Team play, play on a frozen over pond, and practice. The lack of on line play is a real turn off. If Madden can get on line play, this game should, too.
The controls take some time (okay a lot of time) to get used to, most notably the defense and face off parts. Even then, passes don't always sail the way I wanted them to go to, causing turnovers. The AI on defense for my team is suspect at best; they tend to let the offensive AI player go right past them too many times. If it wasn't for my goalie, several more goals would've been scored against me.
Scoring goals is hard to do in this game because you can't set up your offense in any way; you're left at the mercy of the AI to get the players not controlling the puck into the right places to get that perfect pass/passes and shot off.
Oddly, the AI doesn't have that problem when it goes on offense against me; it makes crisp passes and great one timers that would've gotten more goals - except my goalie's great.
NHL 2K9 is a great looking game and it's fun to play, but the unbalanced game play makes this a rent, not buy.

Are you guys serious? The controls are the BEST thing about this game! I commend 2Ksports for putting motion controls in this game without having them feel 'tacked on' or like an afterthought. Finally...hockey comes to the Wii!

The face-offs are done well, the 'point & press' passing controls are EXCELLENT and allow you to make fine one-timers and other cool set-up plays. Yes there are many controls to learn, but only if you're lazy or new to the Wii should it be too much for you. If you're a hockey fan, you'll LOVE the control you have over your players. And except for the dive-blocking being on the minus button, it all seems pretty natural. Even the fighting is well-done, making you 'punch' as well as keep your balance.

The presentation is excellent, and the commentary is pretty good too. The sound could be better and so could the graphics, but the game is very fun to play which is what really matters. You can also create a player, run a franchise, and negotiate player salaries and contracts if it suits you.

There's a new 'motion save' goalie control scheme as well, which is okay...but at least gives you the feeling you saved the puck yourself without having to 'cross your fingers' and hope the computer makes the save for you.

The only thing that kills it for me is THE GAME HAS WAY TOO MANY GLITCHES!!! Too many times the game got 'stuck,' making me have to reset. Annoying as H-E-double hockey sticks, but I picked up the game for $17 so I guess I can live with it. It IS the only hockey game in town so far for the Wii.

Great presentation, good commentary, excellent gameplay, and revolutionary controls...the graphics and sound could use some work, but if all you were worried about were graphics and sound you'd get a PS3. This is hockey like you've never played it before...and it's a good first effort. If you HAVE to have a hockey game, it's the only one so far. I'd try to get it for under $30 though. Not hard if you shop here on Gamefly.

hey fun

This is hands down the worst game I have ever played. I was huge fan of hockey games, until now. The game play is complicated. There are far to many things to do. If I wanted to seven things to do at once, I would play real hockey. It started out bad and just got worse. I would not wish this game upon my worst enemy. I really hope someone comes out with hockey that does not make me screen obscenities at my TV.

A hockey game for the WII. Once I got a WII console, I couldn't wait! I live for hockey games. EA has cornered the market in my eyes...sure other companies have made good hockey games, but EA has set the standard. I saw the commercials for NHL 2K10, and thought it looked awesome...read the reviews and thought..."no way...they've got it wrong". They did, it was worse than they had said. I've never in my life seen a game with such inconsistent play control.
Often when I scored, the other team would automatically score too. It was crazy, how the controller would seem to shut off. I would be unable to affect anything. My players would literally turn away from the play, while I struggled to gain control of one of them. The game seems to have a severe preoccupation with tripping penalties. I like physical play, so I check like a madman. I would check a guy real well, only to have the game penalize me for tripping. The replay would even show I'd done nothing wrong. It was bizarre. It could have been a great game, it's just poorly done.

so as you could tell the title really says it all. I do think the game play is solid. graphecs are aful for the wee evvry person looks the frekin same. still really game play and very fun so that really makes up for it. also any person can run at the goal and shoot the puck in. Yes i really actualy think the goalie could score if he wasent so weighed down. thats all for now

Great Game !
Alot of different game menus and settings to choose from.
I think I will Keep this one .

Well, I would like to say that this game kept me playing and coming back for more but it did not.

I went to this game because I was playing an old sega genesis game called NHL 95 and was thinking, let me see how the sports games are holding up on the Wii.

I chose this to see and while the graphics were there, and the fighting was a bit amusing, the game overall was hard to control.

Chalking that up to me just getting older and more and more buttons to press on game controllers today this one was a bit harder than expected.

Overall, if you like hockey you may rate this higher than I did but, I am not a hockey fan so that also disapointed me a bit.

I found it very confusing on how to play this game right out of the envelope. I had the instructions up on the lap top where I could see them but got very frustrated fast. I tried it again last night and understood it a little bit better but still struggled with it. My husband tried it and said to send it back as there were too many controls to work. I couldn't get guys to move where I wanted them to nor I could I get off playing as the Red Wings vs Penguins which just added to my frustration. I wanted to change teams but couldn't. My husband and I are die hard NHL fans but we found this game more frustrating than fun. I'm thankful that I rented it first vs buying it!

I hate how the hockey rinks look. I've played EA sports games all of my life and I'm sticking with them. Graphics are not really bad but still are bad. The controls are hard to get used to. 2K Sports just needs to give up on hockey games. I would NOT recommend this game to ANYONE!

I was so looking forward to this game. Looking forward to slap shots and free play of basic hockey. What I got was nothing but frustration and difficult game play. I gave this game about 6 hrs. plus of play, and over a week of playing day after day to give it the best shot I got at getting use to the difficult buttons and controls which were way too many. Something you think would be so simple was a difficult task to master much of anything in this game. Too many buttons on both controlers to work with at the same time. Offense and defensivly. After many practice modes and over 20 games I had enough. Winning face offs are next to immpossible. The graphics were nice, set up nice, making of your own team and city was a nice feature, but game play way too difficult 4 me to master much of anything. And game play is the most important feature of any game. Too bad Nintendo doesn't come up with thier own version with Mii Characters and a simple ice hockey game. This first version of NHL2K9 was a bust for me. Will hope for much easier game play on NHL2K10. Keeping my fingers crossed for a good Wii hockey game next year. This game might be worth about $5 if you had enough time in your life to possibly learn all the many manuvers and controls. After playing this game, I felt like it would take me a lifetime.

I didnt really expect much out of this when I rented it, so I wasnt really disappointed too much. The controls were fairly easy, and actually kinda fun. Bad thing however; graphics are terrible, no online play, or roster updates. Future Wii hockey games can definitely build off of this one, but wait for them and pass on NHL 2K9.