Mutant League Hockey

 As much as I like sports games, I'm really not a fan of most of them before the 5th generation. However, I do have my share of exceptions.

Of course, Tecmo Super Bowl is awesome. I don't really consider them true sports games, but I guess Punchout and Super Punchout are boxing titles. Exceptions like that are why I don't really like to make generalizations. But then again, those generalizations have to come from somewhere. It's a weird dichotomy. And fortunately, we don't have to explore it any further, because this week I want to talk about another, almost universal exception to this generalization, arcade style sports games. Maybe it's because they make absolutely no attempt to mimic actual sports at all, but I've always loved old school arcade sports games. NBA Jam is the first one that jumps to mind for a lot of people. I'm not a huge basketball fan...but I absolutely love NBA Jam. What other game allows you to have Hillary Clinton do a 360 flip dunk over Hakeem Olajuwon? NFL Blitz is another popular title, it's beloved by lots of gamers, whether or not they are sports fans. I've played tons of arcade sports titles over the years, but one of the more popular titles I missed were the Mutant League games on the Sega Genesis. Growing up I had tons of access to Sega's 16-bit console, but I never actually owned on myself. As such, my knowledge of the Genesis library growing up was divided into two categories: The big-name titles (Sonic, Vectorman, Streets of Rage, Etc.) and whatever obscure games my friends or family members happened to own. I missed a lot of the middle of the console's lineup, and that certainly would count Mutant League Football and Hockey. Both titles deliver exactly what they promise, souped up versions of their respective sports featuring crazy mutants with wild powers, fields full of booby traps and players exploding into bloody messes. You might have expected this to come out of some small, indie studio, but both ML games were developed and published by Electronic Arts. Yeah, like, EA. Before they were shoving microtransactions down your throat and removing any feature possible from Madden, EA was once using their sports game prowess for good, adapting their engines from the Madden and NHL franchises into unique and creative titles. There was definitely some attempt at making the ML franchise a thing, as a cartoon based on the games soon followed them. I remember the show, but it wasn't something I went out of my way to watch, though I always thought the games were spawned from it rather than the other way around.

I decided to give Mutant League Hockey a shot first because I just feel like hockey games from this era translate better than football games. Again, I hate the "aged poorly" argument but if there's one place I think it does apply, it's with sports games. Fortunately, it isn't the case here, as MLH is a well-made, fun sports title that's still worth checking out. It's a little bit rough around the edges, but that almost adds to the game's charm. Game modes are a little bit limited; you have a single game, playoff, and playoff with best of 3 series. It's not a lot but that was pretty standard for a sports game at the time. Franchise modes weren't really a thing yet, but it would have been nice to see a full season mode included. Where they did go above and beyond though was with the teams. There are 23, with 10 teams across two conferences and three all-star teams. That's quite a few, especially considering these are all made up squads in a fictional sport. Of course, there are plenty of plays on actual NHL club names, you have teams like the Montroyale Cadavers, the Deadthings and the St. Mucus Ooze. Each team has a huge roster of unique players, consisting of skeletons, trolls and robots. These players all have unique stats and similarly clever NHL-inspired names like Smelios, Yzergone, Jamnina Dagr and Britt and Buggy Skull. The bots are smaller and quicker, the skeletons are average, and the trolls are your heavies. The controls are simple, you skate around with the D-pad, punch with A and shoot or check with the C button. It all makes sense and it's relatively responsive, movement takes some time to get used to but that's true of most hockey games. You are supposed to be on ice after all.

But of course, this is much more than regular hockey. The ice is filled with hazards, from land mines to giant holes to the bodies of fallen players, that will trip or outright kill anyone that skates into them. The fans are keen to throw weapons onto the ice, which can be picked up and used to great effect. Seriously guys, the ECW show was last weekend. They will also throw bones that can be used to restore health. Each player has a health bar and when its drained, they're dead, like, for the rest of the game. You can actually win a game by forfeit if the opposition doesn't have enough players left, though this does cut both ways. You can adjust the damage settings at the beginning of each game, ranging from minimal to severe. Trust me, if you turn the damage all the way up more games will end in forfeits than not. Honestly, that's actually pretty cool and I think it really fits with the theme of the game. Believe it or not, there are penalties here, with certain actions seeing your players end up with a two-minute minor. I guess interference is still a problem even when bashing someone over the head with a mace is totally okay. You can turn the penalties off in the options menu if you don't want them. Or you can kill or bribe the ref, that works too. Each team has a variety of special abilities, which can be activated once per period, that can dramatically change the flow of the game. As mentioned, you can attack the ref or pay him to open the penalty box early. You can also have your whole team attack the goalie, take a super slapshot or make the puck explosive so it blows up the next opposing player that touches it. This all leads to some very chaotic gameplay, but that's kind of the point.

The moment-to-moment gameplay is fun, but what would hockey be without the fights? There are plenty of those here, with any manner of mutants more than willing to drop the gloves. Each scrap results in a mini game, where the two fighters face off on a 2D plane. You can move back and forth, throw light and heavy punches and defend. Drain your opponent's life bar and you will knock them out, leading to them receiving a penalty for losing. Some mutants are better fighters than others, so you want to make sure your forwards are behaving themselves while letting your beefier defenders mix it up. The fights are pretty fun, even if they are just kind of glorified games of rock, paper, scissors. For one, they fit the vibe of the game, both the "Mutant League" and "Hockey" parts. They matter for the actual gameplay because they lead to penalties and damage to your characters. I would also be remiss if I didn't talk about the graphics during these segments. They are outstanding, with big, detailed sprites showing off some of the best the Genesis has to offer. The graphics as a whole are solid and the sound is minimalist, but good. I especially love the talking sounds for the trash talk or coach advice you get during breaks in the actions.

I think the biggest issue I had, and this might sound ridiculous, was selecting the right character. I felt like I could never get to the player I wanted, when I wanted them and it led to some difficulty keeping possession of the puck. There were a lot of times where I ended up accidentally skating away from the puck because I couldn't switch to the right player. Even when I did have possession of the puck, it was sometimes hard to see as the puck itself is small and the player indicator is kind of muted. Again, I feel like I missed out on a lot of goals because I would lose a few seconds while unintentionally standing around. I also felt like the fights, while fun, were a little bit too frequent. This would have been a bigger problem if the fights were bad, but they do still break up the pace of the game a little bit more than I would like. Finally, my biggest issue came with the hit detection, which felt really spotty and inconsistent. The puck bounced and moved around fine, but it was very hard to successfully check the opposition. Punching was a little bit easier, but even that felt like it was kind of off, like I should have been connecting with opponents and I wasn't.

Those issues weren't enough to prevent me from having fun with Mutant League Hockey. I will say it was a little less consistent and much rougher around the edges than the NHL games of its era. But it made up for those in uniqueness and personality. It's a shame that the series died out after these two games, because I think a lot of the issues would have been ironed out in a sequel. It's doubly a shame that the IP is owned by EA, because you know they aren't going to take a risk on taking another shot at the series and even if they did, it would most assuredly lack the inspiration and creativity of the originals. A spiritual successor to Mutant League Football, titled Mutant Football League (all it takes is switching two words to avoid a cease and desist from EA apparently), was funded by a Kickstarter led by Michael Mendheim, the original game's designer. Unfortunately, that game received middling reviews, with criticism levied at the lack of content among other problems. They aren't giving up, as Mutant Football League 2 is slated for release just a few days after this writing, so maybe I will check that out. But still, it would be really, really nice to see a proper modern remake of the Mutant League games done by a AAA studio with a big budget. Unfortunately, I don't think it will ever happen. But at least we have the originals. Mutant League Hockey wasn't the best arcade sports title I've ever played, but it was a fun diversion with solid gameplay. Putting aside the thoughts of what could have been, I think it's definitely worth playing today, despite being a little rough around the edges.

7.75/10