I must admit I was pretty excited when I heard that the CHL was being added to EA Sports upcoming NHL 11.  Then I was even more excited when I heard about the new physics engine, but when I heard about the EAUHL feature, I was blown away.  This feature is a card collector’s dream.

I remember back when I was young (seems like forever at this point) my brother and I collected basketball cards.  We built up quite a collection with some of the biggest names in basketball including Magic Johnson, Larry Bird, and Julius Irving.  Being kids we never put them in hard cases or binders.  We used these cards to set our line-ups and act out the roles as we played Nerf basketball.  We really got into the idea of creating the perfect lines and moving the cards around to represent each position.  We would lay them out on our bed and move the players around until we got the best lines.  It was great because the cards took on a whole new meaning to us.  They were no longer pieces of cardboard, but living-breathing players. 

Maybe that is why the new EAUHL feature is so appealing to me. Basically it works like this.  You are a GM of a team and you are given a card pack to start that contains CHL, NHL, and European players.  You as the GM need to put together the best lines based on chemistry, player attributes, ratings, etc.  You then play games and earn puck points based on how well you do in the game.  These puck points allow you to purchase new card packs, which adds new players to your teams.  Just like in the real world, it is not always easy to grab those elite players like Crosby or Ovechkin. 

Have a look at this video, which gives you a look at some of the key features in the upcoming release.

Hopefully we will see a website pop up that will extend this experience even further so you can look at how your team is doing in the league and possibly see some game highlights, game notes, and story lines.  Imagine having an NHL type website for the EAUHL.  Sounds amazing to me!

I have to applaud EA Sports for continuing to put out top shelf sports games.  I have been buying the NHL games every year since they were released and I love where they are taking the game this year.  I have been all over this demo and can’t wait to get my hands on the real game to see what the “Den Danglers” can do. 

If you are still not sure how this works, have a look at EA Sports Hockey Blog where they have all the details and a Q&A on the EAUHL.

Details: http://www.easports.com/blogs/inthecrease/post/slug/eauhl-the-biggest-online-dynasty-ever

Q& A: http://www.easports.com/blogs/inthecrease/post/slug/hockey-ultimate-team-you-asked-we-got-answers