NHL® 23 Game Modes Deep Dive

From greater customization in your franchise mode leagues to cross platform matchmaking, NHL® 23 has made immense improvements across its game modes. So read on to learn more about the improvements to game modes this year and watch the full video deep dive on game modes here.

The most significant update to franchise mode in NHL 23 is the addition of Custom Leagues that allow you to control almost every aspect of your league.

Custom Leagues truly makes you the commissioner of your league by allowing you to choose the number of teams in the league from 6 to 48, divisions from 2 to 8 and number of conferences. So whether you want to recreate a historic league or a fictitious one of your own creation, Custom Leagues gives you this level of control.

In addition to the number of teams, divisions, and conferences, players can now change the minimum and maximum salary cap. From rookie salary control to complete playoff customization, Custom Leagues gives you more control over your league than ever before.

Dynamic Schedules

And now, with dynamic schedules, you can set the number of division games, inter division games, and conference games from 20 to 48. You can also set your league to play from 6 to 84 games, as well as a round robin schedule so you’ll have control over your league’s schedule from start to finish.

Playoffs Customization

You can even change the format of the postseason with playoff customization. You can format playoffs across your league, division, and conference by determining how many teams qualify up to 32 and even control league reseeding structures.

In playoff qualifications, players can change 4 tie breakers from regulation wins, regulation and overtime wins, total wins, goal differentials, and most goals for, to impact how your league creates tie breakers for the final few play off spots.

And now, you can even include a wildcard round in your league for a play-in spot at the playoffs.

Once you’re into the playoffs, you can control the breakdown of away and home games in each playoff series. You’ll be able to change the number of games played in each round from 1, 3, 5, or 7 and a 2-game aggregate series as well as the home and away formats. So if you want to have a 7 game series with three games away followed by the next four at home, Custom Leagues makes that a possibility. You can now also rename the conferences or divisions in your league structure.

Roster Sharing and Custom Leagues

Since NHL 22 and the introduction of roster sharing, expanding this feature further into franchise mode was always a goal. So now, you can create your custom rosters, download your roster sharing file and set it as an active roster in franchise mode allowing you to sub any team you want into franchise mode to recreate a historic league or a completely fictitious one.

Cross-Platform Matchmaking

Cross-Platform matchmaking arrives in-game in November, cutting down your wait times for matchmaking by reducing the split between Xbox and PlayStation players. Now, instead of four, there are two matchmaking pools since players on the same console generation can now play against one another across all World of Chel modes for the first time in franchise history.

As we strive to provide greater connectivity between our players, you can now spend less time finding a match and more time on the ice playing with your friends.

Of course, if you want to opt-out of the Cross-Platform matchmaking experience, there is an option to disable it from the settings menu, however it will default to ON when the patch launches.

And as a result of the expanded matchmaking pools, we’ve added another server in the central part of North America to better allocate resources to where our players are based and are going to be playing their games which will result in reduced latency for players in that area.

Open Bags Faster Than Ever

We’ve heard the community when they ask for the ability to open hockey bags faster in World of Chel. That’s why NHL 23 will feature the ability to open bags even faster by moving from one bag to another quicker than ever.

You can now open multiple of the same bag-type one after the other while skipping the animation, making for a smoother and quicker WOC experience.

Strategies

The new and existing strategies available in NHL 23 are now in WOC. You can set your offensive and defensive tendencies as well as formations to ensure you play each game the way you want.

Visual Customization

World of Chel will also feature new customizations in the form of on-ice projections, national anthems, and hat trick personalization. New vanity will continue to appear in NHL 23 to expand the customization of your World of Chel experience.

Changes made to Attributes and Loadout Slots

Based on your feedback last year we’ve tuned the preset attributes on multiple classes to ensure balance. This includes increasing the starting attributes and giving you a higher starting overall to work with. Height and weight will also play a larger role and dynamically shift based on adjustments.

We’ve also added additional loadout slots giving you more flexibility and choice from game to game.

Save Lines and Strategies

Coming into Online Versus to play but getting held up with setting up your team and strategies is not ideal for your in-game experience, so to get you to the next game quicker than ever, NHL 23 will feature the ability to save your lines and strategies for online versus so you don’t have to adjust your game before getting on the ice.

This, along with all-new strategies throughout NHL 23 creates a smooth and seamless experience so you can spend more time on the ice and less time in menus.

As always, we are taking community feedback into account with each update to the EA SPORTS™ NHL franchise, so stay tuned for more information about NHL 23.

Pre-order* NHL 23 X-Factor Edition now to get on the ice with access three days early.

*Conditions & restrictions apply. See http://www.ea.com/games/nhl/nhl-23/game-and-offer-disclaimers for details.