The hockey sim genre of video games has not seen much innovation in quite some time. Many hockey fans have become content with playing EA’s annual entry in the NHL franchise or have completely stopped playing hockey games altogether. If you’re a hockey fan and have been looking for a game that actually attempts to add modernization to the genre, throw on some pads and a fresh pair of skates because Tape to Tape is precisely what you’ve been looking for.
The best roguelike games are able to take a genre and redefine its expectations. With Tape to Tape, developer Excellent Rectangle has delivered an authentic hockey game that blends the best parts of the sport, turning them into cartoonish fun while implementing the most addicting parts of roguelikes.
Tape to Tape embraces all of hockey’s best cliches: big slapshots, knocking skaters on their backs with big hits, and scoring via ridiculous bounces and deflections. In the game’s story mode, players take control of a team and acquire players with differentiating abilities and stats throughout each randomized frozen odyssey. At the start of each run, you’ll select your core group of skaters, who you’ll be upgrading throughout the run.
The most hilarious opposing team you’ll face is certainly the squad of dirty referees who cheat the entire match (ramping up the difficulty by quite a bit), even waving off goals you’ve rightfully scored.
Some of the most fun abilities you can acquire throughout a playthrough include flinging your stick at opponents to straight-up freezing an opposing skater in an ice block in real-time.
The game initially launched back in May 2023 and is still considered in Early Access, as the developers have slowly been releasing new updates that add more gameplay elements.
Tape to Tape is on sale for 20% off at $15.99 / £12.63 on Steam. This sale is only running until May 20, 10 am PST / 1 pm EST / 5 pm BST, so make sure you hop on it before it’s too late, or you’ll be paying full price.
If hockey isn’t your passion, check out our list of the best roguelike games in the genre that you won’t want to miss out on.
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