EA Sports may have made fans wait for NHL 21, but they’re doing what they can to get fans excited about the title thanks to a retro mode announced on Friday.
NHL 21, which has seen production delays push the game’s release date to October 13 after “major adjustments” to its development schedule, announced a mode that gives fans modern rosters with a beloved version of perhaps the series’ best games: NHL 94.
Y’all ready for a throwback? Introducing NHL 94 Rewind
It’s today’s teams and rosters with controls and graphics from ’94
Pre-order #NHL21 and you can play NHL 94 Rewind on 10/30
https://t.co/kY3mwW8px6 pic.twitter.com/x4JLl70tdO
— EA SPORTS NHL (@EASPORTSNHL) October 2, 2020
The video didn’t reveal too much in 15 seconds, though it certainly did the job of providing a jolt of nostalgia. The classic NHL 94 title track played while a pixelated hockey player — clearly Washington Capitals superstar Alex Ovechkin — gave a gap-toothed smile.
EA announced Friday that if you preorder NHL 21, gamers will get NHL 94 Rewind, an updated version of the genre-defining classic. Few details about the game itself were given, other than the fact that EA promised NHL 94 Rewind to anyone who preordered, so it’s unclear if it’ll come out in any form or fashion beyond this. There’s certainly an appetite for retro hockey, though, as some dedicated fans actually worked to keep an updated version of an NHL 94 rom that could be played with a classic console emulator on a computer.
How NHL 94 Rewind plays with a modern gaming controller isn’t clear, but it’s a neat perk to preordering the latest version of the company’s hockey sim, especially if you’ve played a lot of EA hockey games over the years.