NHL 25 Review: Stunning Visuals and Franchise Revamp Anchor Another Win

The puck has officially dropped on NHL 25, and this latest installment in the long-running hockey sim offers much more than just a roster update. Franchise Mode players are in for a treat, and as the first Xbox Series X|S and PS5 exclusive release, it delivers the breathtaking visuals you'd expect. Major presentation upgrades and refined core gameplay mechanics enhance the on-ice immersion, but one game mode remains virtually untouched for the third consecutive year. 

Gameplay, Presentation, and AI Upgrades

While gameplay has been solid in recent years, it was NHL 24 that introduced a major enhancement with the pressure system, where offensive presence fatigues the opposing goalie. That feature returns in NHL 25, now fine-tuned after a year of feedback. In NHL 24, it was enjoyable but often too easy to gain full pressure on a goalie. In NHL 25, it's still possible, but you'll need to be more strategic with your time in the offensive zone - and contend with one major improvement in NHL 25 - the AI.

For years, balancing AI has been crucial for keeping single-player modes enjoyable. The problem isn’t just with how your opponents are playing; flawed AI can make team sports frustrating if your teammates struggle to execute plays. NHL 25 works to remedy that with the new ICE-Q system, featuring an upgraded skating system, a complete AI overhaul, new reactive action animations, and new Skill-Based One-Timers. All of these changes and enhancements work together to make an already excellent gameplay experience even more fluid and engaging. 

Once you're on the ice, the visual upgrades in NHL 25 are immediately noticeable —especially if you use Instant Replay to zoom in. Since this is the first game exclusive to PS5 and Xbox Series X|S, the player models have seen a major upgrade. Faces are more detailed, sweat starts to show as a game progresses, clothing moves more naturally, and the new strand hair technology is truly stunning. Combine this with lighting and ice improvements from recent years, and NHL 25 is easily the most visually gorgeous installment this franchise has ever seen.

NHL 25 also introduces a new Infinite Camera System, capturing significantly more angles of key moments during a game to create more exciting replays. Coaches have also received an upgrade, in that they’ll now complain about referee calls, celebrate close wins, and chastise their own players for causing untimely penalties. The new Grudge Match system will track long-term rivalries across all modes, to allow for contextual cinematics and unique commentary. Lastly, there's a new Hypestage, used as essentially a 3D platform designed to highlight players before or during games and showcase storytelling moments in different game modes. 

Dedicated Franchise Players Rejoice 

After years of community requests, Franchise Mode has finally received the much needed attention it required. In NHL 25, players now have a newly revamped hub that offers more responsive and cleaner screens for everything you’ll handle off the ice in Franchise Mode. A new 'Quick Links' tab at the top provides easy access to relevant actions during a franchise run, whilst a ticker tape at the bottom of the main hub mirrors the real-time information you'd see while watching NHL games.

Contract negotiations received a significant upgrade. Beyond numbers, you'll now need to factor in no-movement, no-trade, and modified no-trade clauses to persuade players to sign. If you want to take the roleplaying aspect of it up a notch, there’s now a full conversation system. It means you’ll discuss each element of a contract directly with the player to see what they’re focused on, and which details you might be able to convince them to prioritize during a negotiation.

That same conversation system also extends to interactions with both players and coaches. For players, these discussions set short-term or long-term goals which can upgrade your abilities or get that player closer to an X-Factor. You can also persuade players to adjust their playstyle or position to something that better fits your current roster. This creates a whole new risk/reward factor throughout franchise mode, where players might become upset and reject your persuasion attempts, and setting unrealistic goals could ultimately irritate players, coaches, and ownership.

Additionally, NHL 25 features upgraded stat and awards tracking, the ability to move draft picks when making custom rosters, improved game logs, and easy access to league-wide box scores; which overall makes this arguably the best Franchise Mode experience in years

The only minor frustration is that NHL 25 still needs the ability to upload custom logos and a community hub for downloading custom created teams. While the in-game selection is decent, it’s a shame that the same grouping of logos and options haven't changed for quite some time. On top of that, if you use the creation zone to make a custom team they can only be added into Franchise Mode when you first create a new save. If you relocate a team during an ongoing save, you'll have to set all the uniform and logo details from scratch as created teams can't be imported for relocation.

Career Mode Neglected in Favor of Online Game Modes

Despite the many great things NHL 25 brings to the table, some issues persist. As sports games increasingly lean into microtransaction-heavy online modes to milk as much revenue out of players as possible, these modes also tend to be the primary focus every single year. Hockey Ultimate Team remains the same card-collecting grind of buying packs for progressively stronger cards throughout the year, and World of CHEL heavily prioritizes online play over the single player experience.

HUT does introduce a fantastic new Wildcard Mode, reminiscent of MLB The Show 24’s Battle Royale in Diamond Dynasty; where you actually draft a team for both online and offline game modes. You can fill a few Wildcard Slots with the cards you own, but the majority of the team is chosen within the mode and must be kept under a specific salary cap to be eligible. While this mode is fun, it probably won’t be enough to convince players who generally avoid HUT to change that in NHL 25.

World of CHEL introduces new live events which will drop throughout the year, but these are still almost entirely online. Pro-AM has a decent array of offline games and challenges allowing players to progress by defeating various NHL teams and legends. One positive sign that the NHL 25 developers are still trying to keep these modes from becoming too microtransaction-fueled is that they’ve allowed all WOC cosmetics purchased with NHL Points in NHL 24 to carry over into NHL 25, as well as some cosmetics purchased with WOC Coins. Unfortunately, just like HUT, none of this is really going to convince players that prefer offline play to bother with World of CHEL. But it's something.

Meanwhile, the most glaring flaw in NHL 25 is the Be A Pro career mode. Although the devs introduced a revamped version in NHL 21 and upgraded it in NHL 22 with X-Factors and expanded story elements, there has been little to no progress since then. In fact, almost nothing has been done. The mode feels identical to NHL 24, and NHL 23... and NHL 22. While gameplay improvements enhance on-ice performance in Be A Pro, the mode itself has become unforgivably stale. Of course, we understand that annual release cycles mean not every mode receives attention from the dev team every year, but Be A Pro has been egregiously neglected for far too long and will need serious improvements in NHL 26.