NHL 2003 Review

I’ve been a lifelong hockey fan and have played hockey video games since I was four. For the longest time, I repeatedly played NHL 95 on my DOS PC because it was my newest hockey game. I rented NHL 2002 when I bought my PS2, but it wasn’t until the following year when I received NHL 2003 for Christmas that I could fully replace NHL 95. This would start a yearly tradition of me buying the latest hockey games from EA (and sometimes 2K) on launch day, even if it isn’t always the best choice. I recently decided to go back to NHL 2003 to see if the game that sparked my obsession with hockey games still stands out after over 20 years.

Presentation

Graphics

I remember when I first saw NHL 2002, and I couldn’t believe how different the game looked from games on the PS1. I didn’t think graphics could get any better. NHL 2003 took an even bigger step forward, polishing what was there to make it look even more lifelike for the time. Prominent players look like their real-life counterparts, while lesser-known players receive generic faces and hair—an issue that still plagues sports games.

The arena seems bright, and everything feels like it has a sheen. It almost looks like a cartoon, but I’ve always appreciated the aesthetic of those 2001-2003 NHL games. The entire arena has so much detail between the banners in the rafters and the jumbotrons. This is the point where the games started to feel much more realistic. The one part that I can never get past is the crowd of cardboard cutouts in the stands. EA gets by this a bit by cutting to cutscenes of 3D-modeled fans during stoppages.

Animations/Cutscenes

There are many little details in NHL 2003 that we still don’t have today, or that originated in this game. Players move their heads, and their eyes follow the puck if it’s in the air. Coaches protest calls. Players are profiled in cutscenes before a faceoff. The goalies are profiled and have their real-life masks (Oh, how I miss that). It feels much more like a broadcast than a video game.

Audio

Arena Noise

The on-ice sounds in NHL 2003 may be better than those in NHL 25. Everything sounds crisp, and you feel like you’re actually at the rink. It’s one of the first things I noticed when I returned to this game. Much of what you hear was recorded at a hockey game, which may be part of it (I’m not sure how EA does their sound recordings these days). It can sometimes become too amped up, but I appreciate the thunderous shots and hits. There’s nothing like hearing a puck tick off the post or the boards bounce from a bruising hit. It’s also nice that some teams have their correct goal horns and crowd chants. The atmosphere feels like I’m watching from the stands.

Commentary

This was one of the most memorable eras of commentary in the NHL video games because there was some balance, for better or worse. Jim Hughson and Dan Taylor provide the commentary once again, with Jim providing the play-by-play and Dan providing the witty commentary. Some people aren’t fond of this, and, admittedly, it gets old when you hear the same jokes repeatedly. I enjoy it more because the color commentary gets dry in video games, at least this throws some humor in. They do manage to talk about milestones and stats as you go through seasons. It’s cool to hear them remember something from a previous game, which was mind-blowing at the time.

EA Trax

EA Trax has always been pretty polarizing. Whether you like many of these songs depends on your taste in music. I will say, however, that NHL 2003 has two of the most iconic songs to ever appear in NHL games: “Sweetness” by Jimmy Eat World and “No One Knows” by Queens of the Stone Age. Going in on a breakaway with one of the songs in the game kicking in as you score is one of the most incredible things they’ve ever put in a hockey game atmospherically. This is one of my top soundtracks in the series, with Trapt, GOB, Treble Charger, Default, and Papa Roach also providing songs. It probably helps that I played 2500 games when this came out; I heard them repeatedly.

Gameplay

Control

It’s always weird to go back to these games after playing the newer installments and realize how much better control you had over your player. It was a more arcade experience in 2003, but everything feels snappy. Passes are crisp and easy to make, shots go where you want them to with manual shot aim, and hits knock people down. There are no variables; everything works.

This year, a couple of new features were added. This includes improved shot blocking, which may be better than today’s shot blocking in NHL 25. They also added a new deking system with analog sticks, which was primitive at the time. This would set up the analog control scheme we received in NHL 07. It’s fun to see how long ago they came up with the idea that revolutionized the control in hockey video games and how well it worked even so early. You can fake out the goalie with the quick movement of the right analog or both right and left in unison.

EA decided to take the concept of the slowed-down breakaway camera from last year and add a Gambreaker. Once you get a full momentum meter at the bottom of the screen, you can trigger a Gamebreaker, and everything slows down around you, and the audio goes muffled. You can move a bit faster than everyone else during this time and take your time to make the perfect play. It’s a weird addition because it doesn’t feel all that helpful. The zoomed-in camera makes it hard to assess what to do. It works on the breakaway because it’s one-on-one. I don’t think I was the only one who thought this was weird because I don’t believe it returned next year.

This leads to a few of the main issues with NHL 2003. The camera is zoomed right in with the Action camera angle. This can be changed, but starting a game like that is jarring. The other issue is that the game is a little too fast. It almost feels like you’re on fast-forward. There are sliders to change all that, but the default settings are horrible. None of the rules are on by default, which is strange. The only thing you can’t adjust is the goaltending, which can be a problem as it’s not uncommon to score in double-digits if you’re even half-decent at the game. This even happens for the CPU on higher difficulty levels, with them routinely putting up four or more. That lack of realism always left a bad taste in my mouth in NHL 2003, mainly because goalie AI was touted as “improved”.

Game Modes

Franchise Mode

We’ve come a long way in terms of NHL game modes. At this time, we had all the usual modes, and Franchise Mode was what everybody dove into. It was a barebones Franchise Mode, and I question how I even had that much fun with it back in the day. Trading is a simple yes or no scenario. There are no draft picks or anything like that. You can view awards and compete for a Stanley Cup. That’s pretty much the extent of the mode.

Other Modes

One of the only other modes in the game is Playoff Mode, where you can bypass the season and go right to the playoffs. There’s also an International Mode if you want to play for your country. After that, it’s Play Now. That’s it. I’ll group NHL cards here since that’s a mode. This is a precursor to Hockey Ultimate Team, where you get points for everything you do in a game that go towards NHL card packs. You can collect every player card and get some special cheat cards for things like Big Head Mode or celebrations for your player. It’s a fun diversion, but nothing I care too much about.

Multiplayer

I used to play multiplayer on this game all the time with the PS2 multitap. We played a lot of two-on-two hockey, and we even had times where we would team up against the CPU. The game had online multiplayer on PC, but I had never experienced that. I’ve read that you could join clubs and enter tournaments, so it sounded ahead of its time.

Conclusion

NHL 2003 was such a big game for me. It was the first time I truly felt like I could live out what I saw in real life more authentically. It’s not the greatest hockey game ever made, but I still appreciate many aspects to this day. If you’re a hockey fan and haven’t tried some early-2000s hockey games, I encourage you to do so. It’s an entirely different world.