Flyers Faithful Throwing NHL ’94 Tournament Fundraiser
Sure they might’ve removed fighting in NHL ’94, but it’s still celebrated as one of the greatest sports video games of all time. It supported four players at once and introduced first-timers to hockey video games. Nearly twenty years later, this gem of the 16-bit era lives on.
Flyers Faithful and Orange and Black Breakdown have teamed up together to do a fundraiser for the Ed Snider Youth Hockey Foundation. Later this month, at the interactive sports bar PLAY2 Parx Casino, 26 registrants will be playing each of the 26 teams on pixelated ice for bragging rights and for charity.
Attendees will get a free retro hockey-themed t-shirt from DavesGeekyHockey.com but the winner will be receiving a $100 prize and a trophy. For those at the intersection of being a geek and hockey fan, you’ll definitely want to see Dave’s Game of Thrones, Futurama and Doctor Who-themed jerseys for sale on his site.
Other stuff to know: this is a 21+ event, there will be a 50/50 raffle, they’ll be giving away three copies of NHL ’12 courtesy of EA and it’s also rumored that there’ll be some Versus/NBC swag as well.
NHL ’94 Tournament
PLAY2 Parx Casino
Sunday, April 22 @ 8-11pm*
To register/learn more, visit Flyers Faithful as they’ve got all the details.
*Time subject to change depending on the Flyers’ playoff schedule
We had an NHL ’94 question on The Reckoner a few weeks ago that posited that it was still the greatest sports video game ever conceived. That proposition was confirmed heartily by the vote totals.
NHL ’94 works in much the same way that Super Mario Brothers does — supremely satisfying physics. Just the act of maneuvering the players on the ice is fun, because the NHL ’9x engine did a tremendous job of modeling the inertia of a skating player in a satisfying way. The series would get more serious about being a simulation with the arrival of polygons, but I don’t think it has ever quite recaptured that primal sense of satisfaction.