NHL 94: 2022 Edition by Adam Catalyst
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2022 06 12 - Version 6.0



Hello there friendly strangers,

After seven months of work, here is the final major version of my NHL '94 ROM. I set out to try to make the most refined and realistic modern version of NHL '94 that I could muster, and I'm thrilled to be able to share this with you. Here are the top reasons you might want to give it a try...

Rosters, Ratings & Lines
Up-to-date custom rosters, ratings, and lines, built on smozoma's 16-point player rating system (the original game was limited to a 7-point system), all based on extensive 2021-2022 regular season player data.

Gameplay Revisioned
The gameplay has been adjusted for a more realistic modern hockey feel, with harder to score goals, easier to hit crossbars and posts, more realistic speed burst, fewer penalty calls, custom energy depletion and recovery rates balanced for more realistic line rolling and shift length, and player ratings that have been carefully calibrated for more realistic gameplay on the ice. Furthermore, two bonus patches have been included, so you can easily modify the more realistic ROM with a Rookie mode for easier to score goals, or an Arcade mode for those who want faster gameplay and less realism.

Graphical Refinements
The most obvious change is the move to composite sticks, but there are hundreds of graphical refinements beyond this, including title screens, logos, banners, player photos, scoreboard, audience, face-offs, player sprites, scorekeepers, Zamboni driver, and more. The goal was to bring the most graphically refined version of NHL 94 ever made, while remaining faithful to the spirit of the original art direction.

And so much more
Of course there is the weight bug fix, but also a custom weight scale, less variance in Hot/Cold rating randomization, immediate goalie control by pressing the (Y) button with a six-button controller (clockwise), a custom 3-Stars of the Game rating formula, a Vegas / Washington / Winnipeg Menu & Player Cards crash fix *, and more.â€¨
Every single change is documented below. I would love it if you would give it a try, and leave me any feedback!

cheers,

-Adam



p.s. If you are interested in anything NHL 94 related, check out nhl94.com for more great ROM hacks, leagues, tutorials, and just about everything you could think of.



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About Me

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I've been discreetly creating an eclectic array of professional-quality media content for the Internet for decades. Whenever possible, I make sure that everything I produce is available for free, no strings attached. If you ever see anything with the tag "-AC" or my handle "Adam Catalyst" being bought, sold, or traded, please let me know at adam.catalyst@proton.me. Also feel free to just say hi anytime! And if you ever want to leave me a tip to help with my living expenses, I'd greatly appreciate it. https://www.buymeacoffee.com/adamcatalyst



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Features & Modifications

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Title Screens
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- Graphics: EA logo refined.
- Graphics: High Score Production screen restored to be closer to the original.
- Graphics: Splash image replaced with EA NHL 22 Austin Matthews photo.
- Graphics: Masthead re-drawn to match EA NHL 2022 lettering.
- Title screen Logos removed.
- Credits re-coloured & edited.


Main Menu
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- Settings: Default teams set for the 2022 Stanley Cup finals.
- Settings: Playoff brackets updated to 2022 seeding.
- Settings: Line Changes default set to on "On," because that's how I roll.
- Graphics: Team Logos updated, with official colours relatively mapped to the Sega Genesis/Mega Drive colour space.
- Graphics: Team Banner colours adjusted to be uniformly consistent with the logos.
- Graphics: Player Photos all updated with the NHL's 2022 images, cropped & colour graded.
- Hack: Bug that would causes crashes upon cycling through the Player Photos for Vegas, Washington, and Winnipeg has been eliminated. Please note, this comes at the cost of preventing saved stats from showing under player names.
- Typesetting: Player names centred vertically.
- Main Menu: Re-wording of a couple menu options for greater clarity.


Pre-Game
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- Graphics: Play-off Banner colours modified & dithered to look much closer to the authentic colours used in the menu screens.
- Graphics: The Pre-Game Announcer's picture frame has been altered to be more consistent with the design of similar elements throughout the game.
- Arena Names: All up-to-date as of January 2022.
- Pre-Game: Match-up position names have been simplified for better accuracy to "Forward," "Defence," & "Goaltender."


Arena
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- Graphics: Audience colours throughout have been slightly adjusted to have more uniform tonal contrast.
- Sprites: Audience members throughout have had a myriad of minor errors fixed.
- Graphics: Ice Colour lightened slightly. The darker colour was giving me eye strain.


Arena - Sideboards view
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- Graphics: Scoreboard Banner colours modified & dithered to look closer to matching the Menu Banner colours.
- Graphics: Sideboard Scoreboard has re-drawn NHL logo.
- Graphics: Side-boards Score-Keepers revised.
- Sprites: Zamboni driver revised to better match the perspective of the side-boards.


Arena - Ice view
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- Graphics: Centre ice logos updated, adapted from NHL Rewind designs to match the perspective of the ice.
- Graphics: Goalie crease outline modification. (Author unknown)
- Graphics: The Creases now have texturing like in the original NHL 94. No self-respecting goalie doesn't chew up their crease with their skates.
- Graphics: Minor lighting details in the original ROM, but incorrectly coloured so as to be invisible, have been restored to be visible.
- Graphics: Bench coaches refined.
- Sprites: Bench players "chirping" animations refined to be less cartoonish.
- Graphics: Score-keepers revised.
- Graphics: Horizontal seam in the glass has been erased.
- Graphics: Bench area modifications. (slapshot67)
- Graphics: Bench backup goalie hack. (slapshot67)
- Graphics: Net re-design. (slapshot67)
- Graphics: Goal light modification. (slapshot67)
- Graphics: Face-off circles modification. (Author unknown)
- Graphics: Trapezoid line modification. (Author unknown)


In-Play
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- Sprites: Uniforms have been coloured to have consistent official colour use, and a greater sense of depth with as realistic as possible colour shifts for shadows and highlights. Tests were done with demo play to try and give the most accurate impression of how team's look in motion, and not necessarily what is the most accurate in still. Lighter shadows under the players complete the look.
- Sprites: Face-off animations revised.
- Sprites: Players given grey composite sticks.
- Graphics: On-Ice Player Numbers changed to white for better legibility against the ice.
- Graphics: On-Ice Player Star for Player 1 colour was change to have less contrast against the ice, and to be less distractingly conspicuous compared to other visual elements.
- Graphics: On-Ice Player Star for Player 2 was left the same colour, but because of the adjustments to the ice and player one star, the player two star now appears more distinctly.
- Sprites: Goaltenders masks tweaked to reveal their faces.
- Sprites: Puck and its shadow revised.
- Sprites: Player Helmet colour patch. (Clockwise)
- Sprites: Player Stick tape patch. (Clockwise)
- Sprites: Improved Checking animations patch. (Clockwise)
- Sprites: Player Eye colour patch. (Clockwise)
- Sprites: Player Boots & Gloves colour patch. (Clockwise)


Rosters
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- Rosters & Lines: Updated based on aggregate 2022 regular season player usage data.
- Rosters: Shortened all last names to a maximum of 10 characters, to avoid cosmetic glitches in the game. This affected ~20 players in the game.


Ratings
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- Team Ratings: Team attribute & overall ratings updated as per end of 2022 season data.
- Player Ratings: Underlying system has been changed from the default 1-6 scale to a 0-15 scale for more accurate differentiation of players. (smozoma)
- Player Ratings: Custom player ratings based on a mix of real-world data and gameplay oriented parameters. The goal was to make gameplay more contemporary, and individual player performance more realistic.
- Player Ratings: Custom overall rating formula.
- Player Ratings: Much more parity between the best and the worst of the league, with all players having a minimum 52 rating, ranging to a maximum 94 for McDavid, before Hot/Cold variance.
- Player Ratings: Weight scale modification patch. (smozoma)
- Player Ratings: Edit lines bug fix patch. (smozoma)


Gameplay
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- Controls: Goalie control can now be accessed immediately by pressing the (Y) button with a six-button controller. (clockwise)
- Player Ratings: Attribute rating distributions have been careful set and thoroughly tested to produce a faster more contemporary feel to puck movement & gameplay, with better goaltending throughout.
- Gameplay: Body Checking and Aggressiveness have been balanced to reduce the penalty rate from the original, and approximate the real body checking and penalty rates of each team in the 2022 season.
- Gameplay: Hot & Cold range of variance has been reduced by ~25%, from a displayed maximum variance of -9/+8 to -7/+6.
- Gameplay: The "goal" area of the net has been reduced slightly, making it slightly more difficult to score, and slightly more likely that you will hit the post.
- Gameplay: Player Speed Burst set to 25% of the original, for a more realistic feel and higher difficulty. No more winning every loose puck race.
- Gameplay: Custom Stamina Depletion & Recovery rates.
- Gameplay: Weight / Checking bug fix patch. (smozoma)
- Gameplay: Second-Assist bug fix patch. (smozoma)
- Gameplay: Overtime set to 5 minutes.
- Stars of the Game: New custom formula.


In-Game Overlays
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- Graphics: Referee pop-over refined.
- Graphics: Linesman pop-over revised.
- Graphics: In-Game Timer logo has been re-drawn to match the old EA Star logo in the style of the original graphic, but wider and smoother like The Sauce's excellent version, and shorter to fit the allocated space better.
- Penalty: "Cross Check" renamed to "Cross-check" as per the official NHL rulebook nomenclature.
- Penalty: "Face-Off" renamed to "Face-off" as per the official NHL rulebook.
- Penalty: "Fight Instigator" renamed to "Instigator" as per the official NHL rulebook.
- Graphics: Line Change Energy bars have been drawn to use an inverse quasi-logarithmic scale, more representative of ideal shift length and degrading player performance.
- Graphics: The green for the line-change energy bars has been altered to be little bit more... energetic.
- Graphics: Custom Stars of the Game icon.
- Stars of the Game: Typesetting & layout refined.


In-Game Menus
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- Graphics: NHL & NHLPA Logos re-drawn for greater authenticity.
- Graphics: "Hockey Night" Banner slightly re-coloured to be more visual appealing to me personally.
- Hack: Bugs that would causes crashes upon cycling through Player Cards for Washington (and possible also Vegas & Winnipeg) has been eliminated.
- Typesetting: The "Change Goalie" option for "no goalie" is now in ALL-CAPS for greater visibility.


Extras
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- Gameplay: An optional Arcade Mode patch has been included, for those who prefer faster action.
- Gameplay: An optional Rookie Mode patch has been included, for those who are still learning how to outsmart the CPU.
- Artwork: Matching box art was made. I did one very faithful to the layout of the original Genesis release, and one with the front slightly re-arranged in order to have an image frame better suited to the official EA photo for this year. You can view and download them from here:
https://forum.nhl94.com/index.php?/topic/21621-nhl-94-2022-edition-by-adam-catalyst/&do=findComment&comment=188909



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Known Issues

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* Vegas / Washington / Winnipeg Player Cards may crash if User Records are turned on, and there are stored goaltending statistics for these teams. A potential fix was being investigated, but is not at a workable state. For this reason, User Records are recommended to be left off.

* User Records may incorrectly store user data if playing with Vegas / Washington / Winnipeg.



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Future Wish-List

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I've run out of time to work on this project, but if I did find more time, here is what I would like to focus on next...

- Gameplay: Reduce the rebound rate of the puck to be way less bouncy.
- Gameplay: Enable energy Recovery for players sitting in the penalty box.
- Line-Changes: Enable line changes to be initiated without possession of the puck, preferably with a dedicated button.
- Gameplay: Improve logic for how icings and offsides are calculated to use puck position instead of player position.
- Gameplay: Prevent the goaltenders from skating into the trapezoid areas.
- Sprites: Redraw Sideboards Referee to better match the art style of everything else (requires "de-compressing" shared tiles.)
- Gameplay: Program the CPU to pull the goalie when trailing by 1 - 2 goals (currently only pulls with a two goal deficit).
- Gameplay: Reduce the energy depletion rate for Speed Bursts.
- Gameplay: Increase the amount of CPU Body-Checking without increasing the amount of penalties called.
- Sprites: Improve the comparatively low visual quality of the on-ice officials throughout (requires "de-compressing" shared tiles.)
- Penalties: Rename "Cross-check" to the proper "Cross-checking."
- Penalties: Re-name "Roughing" period that causes an injury to "Illegal Hit."
- Player Cards: Eliminate the crash that occurs on player cards for Washington when user records are turned on, and the goaltender has saved stats.
- User Records: Restore system to be as fully functional as possible.
- Player Sprites: Restore some player sprite shading details that have been lost from the original.

If you were able to help me implement any of these changes, please let me know!

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Credits

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This project was built decades of work by the NHL94.com community, and never would have been possible without them. I'm sure there are more contributors than I could ever possibly know, let alone acknowledge, but I will do my best...



Contributors

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This ROM contains contributions from the following individuals...

Brodeur30
- Rink & Net collision geometry logic.

chaos
- Hot/Cold variation logic.

Clockwise
- Goalie Control with a six-button controller.
- Player sprites helmet colour patch.
- Player sprites hockey stick tape patch.
- Player sprites improved checking animations patch.
- Player sprites eye colour patch.
- Player sprites boots & gloves colour patch.

Dervin10
- Roster extractor & importer tool development.

kingraph
- Scoreboard graphic hack.
- Stars of the Game graphic hack.

slapshot67
- 30 to 32 team ROM re-structuring.
- Scorekeepers graphic hack and original design.
- Bench area graphic modifications.
- Bench coaches hack and original design.
- Bench backup goalie hack and original design.
- Net graphic re-design.
- Crease graphic revision.
- Goal light graphics revision.

smozoma
- 0 - 15 Player Rating scale patch.
- Credits editing logic.
- Edit Line Ratings bug fix patch.
- Player Overall rating formula logic.
- Player weight scale modification patch.
- Second-Assist bug fix patch.
- Stars of the Game formula logic.
- Weight / Checking bug fix patch.
- EARE tool development.

Tony H.
- Stopping & Crossover Rate logic.

wboy
- 28 to 30 team ROM re-structuring.
- Player photo logic.
- Player energy depletion & recovery rates logic.
- Speed burst rate logic.
- NOSE tool development.

Author unknown
- Face-off circles graphic modification.
- Trapezoid line graphic modification.
- Goalie crease graphic modification.



Special Thanks to...

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kingraph - tips & resources.
Sauce - resources for rosters, ratings, and lines.
smozoma - utterly invaluable tips, resources, tools, & support.
...and everyone at nhl94.com who tested Betas or provided feedback.



Extra Special Thanks to...

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Ena - for nothing less than everything.





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Version Change-Log

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2022 06 12 - Version 6.0

"The [Gameplay's] the thing." This final major version is overwhelmingly focused on rebuilding the gameplay to a more realistic & contemporary feel & balance. This version also introduces two patches, a Rookie Mode to make scoring goals easier, and an Arcade Mode for faster action. And you can finally control the goalie immediately with a 6-button controller. Of course there are other improvements, but the biggest changes are invisible to the eye...

Main Menu
- Settings: Default teams set for the 2022 Stanley Cup finals.
- Graphics: Over one third (>64) of all Player Photos were re-scaled and re-cropped for better visual balance.
- Graphics: A couple of player photos were replaced.

Arena
- Sprites: Zamboni driver wave hand colours adjusted.
- Graphics: Arena glass in corners have seams removed.
- Graphics: Coaches (implied) arms shortened.

In-Play
- Graphics: EDM & OTT Home uniforms and on-ice logos revised.
- Graphics: CHI & MIN Away uniforms revised.
- Sprites: Bench players animation uniforms, shading, & shadows improved.
- Sprites: Face-off pop-over graphics further refined, cosmetic glitches from original removed.

Rosters & Lines, & Ratings
- Rosters & Lines: Minor changes to some teams.
- Ratings: Major changes to everyone. All ratings completely re-done (a third time) to conform to provide a new gameplay balance & feel.

Gameplay & Ratings:
- Speed: Attributes for skating, shooting, passing have been balanced to have a much more realistic ratio between the relative speed of these motions in real-life.
- Skaters: All players, especially the low-end players are now more responsive in their skating & shooting.
- Penalties: Aggression & Checking distributions have been conformed to (slightly) reduce penalties.
- Defencemen: On average, defencemen are now rated a little higher for contemporary gameplay balance.
- Goaltenders: All attributes re-rated with a new attribute distribution, in order to provide better goaltending throughout.

Gameplay
- Players: Energy Depletion rate slightly decreased, for better gameplay balance.
- Players: Stopping & Crossover rate quickened, for more realistically responsive skating.
- Controls: Goalie control can now be accessed immediately by pressing the (Y) button with a six-button controller.

Miscellaneous
- Penalties: "Kneeing" penalty for injuring a player restored to its original name, "Roughing."
- Graphics: Referee pop-over refined.

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2022 05 22 - Version 5.4

Gameplay
- Players: Energy depletion rate reduced, for better gameplay balance.

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2022 05 21 - Version 5.3
Meet me in St. Louis...

In-Play
- Sprites: St. Louis home uniforms colours adjusted.

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2022 05 20 - Version 5.2
Once more with feeling...

Gameplay
- Players: Speed Burst reduced by 25%, for a more realistic feel, and higher difficulty. No more winning every loose puck race.
- Players: Stamina Depletion & Recovery rates both raised.

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2022 05 18 - Version 5.1
Things you don't notice until its too late...

In-Play
- Sprites: Face-off animations improved, incorrectly overlapping shadows fixed.

Menu
- Graphics: Play-Off tree Banner colours have been made more authentic.

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2022 05 17 - Version 5.0
The one with the composite sticks...

Mostly many minor graphical tweaks, with a goal of refining the presentation throughout...

Title Screens
- Graphics: EA logo refined.
- Graphics: High Score Production screen restored to be closer to the original.

Main Menu
- Settings: Default teams changed to the East & West conference winners.
- Settings: Playoff brackets updated to 2022 seeding.
- Graphics: All team logos (except for ARI) refined, some banner colours updated for consistency.
- Graphics: Player Photos all individually refined.

Pre-Game
- Graphics: Ron Barr image restored to be closer to original.

Arena
- Graphics: Scoreboard (& Playoff Tree) Banner colours updated and dithered to get closer to perceptually matching the Menu Banner colours.
- Graphics: Side-boards Score-Keepers revised.
- Sprites: Zamboni driver revised to better match the perspective of the side-boards.
- Graphics: Centre ice logos updated, adapted from NHL Rewind designs to match the perspective of the ice.
- Graphics: Bench coaches refined.
- Sprites: Bench players "chirping" animations refined to be less cartoonish.
- Graphics: Score-keepers revised.

In-Play
- Sprites: Players given grey composite sticks for harder shots.
- Sprites: Face-off animations revised.
- Sprites: Puck and its shadow revised.
- Sprites: Goaltenders masks tweaked to reveal their faces.
- Sprites: BOS, CHI, CBJ, NYR, PIT, & SEA uniform colouring revised.

In-Game Overlays
- Graphics: Referee pop-over refined.
- Graphics: Linesman pop-over revised.

Rosters, Lines, & Ratings
- Team Ratings: Team attribute & overall ratings updated as per end of 2022 season data.
- Player Ratings: Every player rating has been updated with a more refined rating system.
- Rosters & Lines: Updated based on end of 2022 season data.
Every roster, line, and player has been updated with a more refined rating system.
- Gameplay: Body Checking and Aggressiveness balanced to approximate the original physicality and penalty rate.

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2022 03 29 - Version 4.1

Quick fixes...

- Rosters: Fixed the spelling of Ivan Prosvetov's name, and a minor lineup order fix in Arizona.
- Player Ratings: Minor adjustments to the ratings of Dmitri Jaskin & Drew O'Connor.

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2022 03 28 - Version 4.0
Builders, Re-Builders, and Gamblers...

Title Screens
- Graphics: Masthead refined.
- Credit sequence updated.

Menus
- Graphics: Player Photos all updated with the NHL's 2022 images, cropped & colour graded.

Arena
- Sprites: Audience member errors in the original game fixed.
- Graphics: Arena Bench/Skate blade colour mistake fixed.

Rosters & Lines, & Ratings
- Rosters & Lines: All rosters and lines have been re-done from scratch based on regular season player usage to date.
- Rosters: Shortened all last names to a maximum of 10 characters, to avoid cosmetic glitches in the game. This affected ~20 players in the game.

Player Ratings
- Player Ratings: Underlying system has been changed from the default 1-6 scale to a 0-15 scale for more accurate differentiation of players.
- Player Ratings: Every single player has been re-rated with a more refined rating system.
- Player Ratings: Even more parity between the best and the worst players in the league, with all players having a minimum 52 rating, ranging to a 94 rating for McDavid, before Hot/Cold variance.

Gameplay
- Gameplay & Player Ratings: Reduced checking effectiveness & CPU hitting.
- Gameplay & Player Ratings: Improved CPU goaltending, slightly harder and more accurate shooting.
- Gameplay: Custom Stamina depletion and recovery rates.

Miscellaneous
- Penalty: "Injuring" (previously renamed to "Elbowing") renamed to "Kneeing."
- In-Game Menu: Change Goalie typesetting revised.
- Stars of the Game: New custom formula.
- Numerous other trade deadline updates.

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2022 01 04 - Version 3.0
To Washington with love...

Menus & Player Cards
- Hack: Bugs that would causes crashes upon cycling through the Menu Player Photos or Player Cards for Washington, Vegas & Winnipeg has been eliminated. Please note, this comes at the cost of those two screens showing slightly less data.
- Main Menu: Player names centred vertically.
- Main Menu: Re-wording of a couple menu options for greater clarity.

Pre-Game
- Arena Names: LA & Winnipeg have been updated.
- Pre-Game: Match-up position names have been simplified for better accuracy to "Forward," "Defence," & "Goaltender."

Gameplay
- Gameplay: Hot & Cold range of variance has been reduced by ~25%, from a displayed maximum variance of -9/+8 to -7/+6.
- Gameplay: The "goal" area of the net has been reduced slightly, making it slightly more difficult to score, and slightly more likely that you will hit the post.

Miscellaneous
- Rosters: Minor updates.
- End of Period: Cosmetic glitch fixed.
- Stars of the Game: Typesetting & layout refined.

...and to Nashville and New Jersey with apologies
- Player Ratings: a glitch in my rating system had left virtually every NSH & NJD player with an incorrect rating. My apologies. It's been fixed, and lessons have been learned.â€¨
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2021 12 28 - Version 2.1
Rookies on Fire...

- Player Ratings: Raised the ratings for eight of the top scoring rookies in the league.â€¨â€¨------------------------------------------------

2021 12 28 - Version 2.0
Gameplay Refinements...

- Gameplay & Player Ratings: Scoring was too easy. You've got to work harder for it now, as shot accuracy has been reduced for the majority of players.
- Player Ratings: Many of the weaker players in the league have had their ratings updated with more differentiation in their play style (too many were rated identically).

- Player Ratings: Less extreme difference between the best and worst players in the league, with all players having a minimum 43 rating, ranging to a 95 rating for McDavid, before Hot/Cold variance.

- Team Ratings: Minor update.

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2021 12 25 - Version 1.0
Initial Public Release...â€¨
I just discovered this site (nhl94.com) about eight weeks ago, and have been enjoying playing The Sauce's 2022 ROM (among others). I wanted to modify his ROM to have an Austin Matthew's title screen and tweaked Toronto Maple Leafs lineup for my brother-in-law, with a hope of giving it to him as a Christmas present. But then one thing led to another... I've worked as a designer and design educator for years, and so I couldn't resist trying and use some of that experience in refining some visual elements. Here is a complete list of all the changes made to date...â€¨
Title Screens
- Graphics: Splash image replaced with EA NHL 22 Austin Matthews photo.
- Graphics: Masthead re-drawn to match EA NHL 2022 lettering.
- Title screen Logos removed.
- Title screen Credits re-coloured & edited.

Main Menu
- Hack: The game would crash on the menu screen if it tried to display the Washington player cards. This has been patched so that the error is cosmetic only.
- Graphics: Team Logos updated, with official colours relatively mapped to the Sega Genesis/Mega Drive colour space.
- Graphics: Team Banner colours adjusted to be uniformly consistent with the logos.
- Graphics: Player Photos for the Toronto Maple Leafs updated to use their current official NHL images.
- Settings: Line Changes default set to on "On," because that's how I roll.

Pre-Game
- Arena Names: Based on The Sauce's 2022 v2 ROM.
- Graphics: The Pre-Game Announcer's picture frame has been altered to be more consistent with the design of similar elements throughout the game.

Player Cards, Records, etc.
- Graphics: NHL & NHLPA Logos re-drawn for greater authenticity.
- Graphics: "Hockey Night" Masthead slightly re-coloured to be more visual appealing to me personally.

Arena
- Graphics: Audience colours throughout have been slightly adjusted to have more uniform tonal contrast.
- Sprites: Audience members throughout have had a myriad of minor errors fixed.
- Graphics: Ice Colour lightened slightly. The darker colour was giving me eye strain.
- Graphics: Scorekeepers graphic hack. (slapshot67)

Arena - Sideboards view
- Graphics: Sideboard Scoreboard has re-drawn NHL logo.
- Graphics: Banner colours updated.

Arena - Ice view
- Graphics: Centre ice logos updated.
- Graphics: The Creases now have texturing like in the original NHL 94. No self-respecting goalie doesn't chew up their crease with their skates.
- Graphics: Minor lighting details in the original ROM, but incorrectly coloured so as to be invisible, have been restored to be visible.
- Graphics: Bench area modifications. (slapshot67)
- Graphics: Bench coaches hack. (slapshot67)
- Graphics: Bench backup goalie hack. (slapshot67)
- Graphics: Net re-design. (slapshot67)
- Graphics: Goal light modification. (slapshot67)
- Graphics: Face-off circles modification. (Author unknown)
- Graphics: Trapezoid line modification. (Author unknown)

In-Play
- Sprites: Uniforms have been coloured to have consistent official colour use, and a greater sense of depth with as realistic as possible colour shifts for shadows and highlights. Tests were done comparing demo play against video footage of each team, to try and give the most accurate impression of how team's look in motion, and not necessarily what is the most accurate in still. Lighter shadows under the players complete the look.
- Graphics: On-Ice Player Numbers changed to white for better legibility against the ice.
- Graphics: On-Ice Player Star for Player 1 colour was change to have less contrast against the ice, and to be less distractingly conspicuous compared to other visual elements.
- Graphics: On-Ice Player Star for Player 2 was left the same colour, but because of the adjustments to the ice and player one star, the player two star now appears more distinctly.
- Sprites: Player Helmet colour patch. (Clockwise)
- Sprites: Player Stick tape patch. (Clockwise)
- Sprites: Improved Checking animations patch. (Clockwise)
- Sprites: Player Eye colour patch. (Clockwise)
- Sprites: Player Boots & Gloves colour patch. (Clockwise)

In-Game Overlays
- Graphics: In-Game Timer logo has been re-drawn to match the old EA Star logo in the style of the original graphic, but wider and smoother like The Sauce's excellent version, and shorter to fit the allocated space better.
- Penalty: "Cross Check" renamed to "Cross-check" as per the official NHL rulebook nomenclature.
- Penalty: "Face-Off" renamed to "Face-off" as per the official NHL rulebook.
- Penalty: "Fight Instigator" renamed to "Instigator" as per the official NHL rulebook.
- Penalty: "Injuring" renamed to "Elbowing."
- Graphics: Line Change Energy bars have been drawn to use an inverse quasi-logarithmic scale, more representative of ideal shift length and degrading player performance.
- Graphics: The green for the line-change energy bars has been altered to be little bit more... energetic.
- Graphics: Stars of the Game icon re-drawn.

Rosters, Lines, & Ratings
- Rosters & Lines: Based on the Rosters & Lines from The Sauce's 2022 v2 ROM.
- Player Ratings: Custom player ratings based on the characteristics from EA's NHL 2022, modified using a mix of real-world data and gameplay oriented parameters. The goal was to make gameplay more contemporary, and individual player performance more realistic.
- Player Ratings: Custom overall rating formula.
- Team Ratings: Team attribute & overall ratings updated as per Christmas 2021 break data.
- Player Ratings: Weight scale modification patch. (smozoma)
- Player Ratings: Edit lines bug fix patch. (smozoma)

Gameplay
- Gameplay: Speed Burst reduced to what personally felt right while playing.
- Gameplay: Overtime set to 5 minutes.
- Gameplay: Weight / Checking bug fix patch. (smozoma)
- Gameplay: Second-Assist bug fix patch. (smozoma)

Extras
- Matching box art was made.



---



I hope you enjoy :)

-a


