Game review: Hockey Nations 2010 - iPhone / iPod Touch

I see it as a uniquely fast-paced, intense and aggressive sport.

It’s also traditionally translated well into computer games, primarily Electronic Arts’ long-running NHL series which I’ve played many versions of on various platforms over the years.

Sadly ice hockey has been missing from the roster of sport sims available to play on iPhone and iPod Touch, despite the other three big stateside sports of baseball, basketball and American football all being present.

That’s all changed now, with the release of Hockey Nations 2010 from Distinctive Developments, the first proper 6-on-6 hockey sim to appear on Apple’s mobile devices.

The game isn’t perfect but does represent a good starting point which can hopefully be built upon in the future.

As you can gather from its title, this game features no NHL teams from the US and Canada, or any domestic teams from elsewhere. Instead it contains 14 national teams, such as Sweden, Russia, Norway and Belarus. Britain are in there, although we’re unsurprisingly the weakest team of the bunch.

With these countries you can play exhibition matches and tournaments, or hone your skills in practice sessions or shoot-outs.

Hockey Nations’ strongest feature is how it looks.

After playing some of its other titles such as Pool Ninja and Heli Rescue, I’ve come to expect high production values from Distinctive games, and it’s no different in HM10 which has polished menus, team selection pages and pre-match screens.

On the ice the game looks very credible.

With 3D graphics and an ice rink that’s nicely textured and well lit it’s clear a lot of effort has gone into making a game which looks authentic.

Animation is well done, with players moving around the rink in a smooth and believable style.

The one negative about how the game looks is that because everything is so small it’s hard to make out much detail, such as when two opponents come together tussling for the puck.

The players are at least well proportioned to the scale of the rink and size of the screen.

A decent job has been made of squeezing a full-scale hockey sim onto the mobile games machines.

Matches flow well and provide the usual end-to-end action of ice hockey, but it’s clear concessions have had to be made.

The game lacks some of the tempo and ferocity of the real-life sport. The usual aggression has been almost entirely left out. Ice hockey usually plays out on a knife edge, with hostilities threatening to erupt at a moment’s notice – but that tension hasn’t been captured in the game.

Fights between players are nom-existent, but aside from that the game generally doesn’t pack enough of a punch for an ice hockey sim.

The game feels a little too tame. This isn’t helped by unimpressive audio. Skating and puck sounds are good but the crowd effects are quite muted and there are no player noises or in-game commentary, leading to the atmosphere feeling flat.

Ice hockey is obviously not just about force, it’s also about skill. Unfortunately the controls and gameplay in this pocket-sized conversion don’t allow for very much skilful or subtle play.

For both attack and defence in HM10, a virtual D-pad on the left-hand side handles player movement while three virtual buttons on the right-hand side perform different actions.

In attack the three buttons are pass, shoot and sprint.

The main issue I’ve had when attacking is that it’s difficult to make any progress down the rink using passes, so I generally try and force my way through the opposition by dribbling.

It’s hard to find a team-mate when passing, chiefly because of being crowded out by the computer team and the opposition having an annoying ability for intercepting.

Goal-scoring positions are too infrequent, and when they have arrived I’ve often had the puck snatched away before I’ve had chance to shoot.

In defence the action buttons are body check, poke check and sprint.

Here the biggest problem is the computer decides the ‘most appropriate’ player for you to control. All you can do is use the two challenge buttons and hope for the best.

It’s very frustrating not having direct control over players when you’re trying to stop the opposition scoring.

The lack of a button to switch players is a big omission. Even being able to tap a player on the screen who you want to control would be better.

I’ve found elements of the game to be frustrating at times, and sticking with HM10 has required more patience than I’ve needed to find with other sports games on my iPod.

Sport sim developers have generally struggled to replicate physical controls in virtual form on the iPhone and iPod’s touch screen, and HM10 doesn’t buck that trend.

Tapping a button on the screen to smack the puck towards goal just doesn’t feel as natural as pressing a button or moving a stick. There isn’t much a mobile game can do about this, but even so I think HM10 could do a better job with a rethink on some of the control choices. Maybe some swipe gestures for performing certain actions such as passing or shooting would give the game a more organic feel and put a bit more oomph into it.

Despite the issues, HM10 is still playable and still serves up a respectable game of ice hockey in miniature form.

While undoubtedly HM10 needs some work if it’s going to skate to gold and not be consigned to the sin bin, its developers still deserve credit for bringing the closest thing so far to a lifelike ice hockey game to the iPhone and iPod Touch.

The game is a welcome arrival which definitely has potential to develop in future updates and instalments.

Verdict: 6 out of 10 – Lacking some of the bone-crunching excitement usually found in ice hockey, this is still a decent first stab at bringing the sport to the iPhone and iPod Touch.

Watch a preview video of Hockey Nations 2010: