No matter how you play computer hockey – solo, e-league or Netplay – your games should come to life that much more with the soon-to-be-released Strat-O-Matic Hockey 2013 for Windows.
 

            Necessary for playing the 2012-13 NHL season with its historic and breath-taking Chicago-Boston Stanley Cup finals and the simultaneously released 1953-54 and 1982-83 seasons, Strat-O-Matic Hockey 2013 also adds a solid list of improvements for game play and post-game reports.
 

            Strat-O-Matic is especially pleased to meet gamer demand for a Game Highlights Report with unprecedented detail that captures all the game-changing action.
 

            The report displays every goal, but also every near-goal – great saves (from the goalie cards), shooter misses on split Goal chances and failed breakaways. It displays every penalty, but also every successful intimidation. And it’s all organized by period and time elapsed, allowing the viewer a chronological review of the action.
 

            Viewable during the game or afterwards, the Game Highlights Report satisfies many needs. Re-live your greatest games or analyze how games were won and lost. The game was played without you on a league member’s computer, or on your own via auto-play? You won’t miss a single highlight or fail to understand when the turning points occurred. Want to do post-game write-ups? The Game Highlights Report supplies a perfect memory. 
 

            There’s even a shootout summary for games that end that way.
 

            For more detail, the box scores and play-by-play account files for manually played games are now automatically saved into the league’s Print file subfolder, placing everything in one folder.
 

            The improved League Leaders Report also captures more of the action. The dozen new categories (nine for skaters, three for goalies) include Intimidations, Takeaways, Ice Time per Game, Face-offs Won, Face-off Win Pct, Penetrations, Outside Shots, Inside Shots, and Breakaways, as well as Goalie Penalty Minutes, Tough Saves (from Goalie Rating readings), and Tough Save Pct.
 

            The Team Statistics Report is more insightful than ever with each team’s record (wins, losses, ties, overtime losses, goals for and goals against) against every opponent.
 

            You don’t have to wait till the game is over to appreciate playing with Strat-O-Matic Hockey 2013.
 

            Windows gamers who lost, er, cut their Strat-O-Matic Hockey teeth with the board game will be thankful for the new Alternate Penetration System. Previously, the Windows game limited users to the original board-game penetration system that had wingers penetrating most often against wingers and defensemen penetrating against defensemen. For years, board gamers reversed that for a more realistic representation of wingers trying to penetrate against defensemen, and vice versa. Now users can do that with the Windows game, too.
 

            Other in-game options will limit injuries to the current game and display the skater and goalie notebooks on the game screens. The injury option will satisfy replayers already controlling game usage and draft leagues that don’t want injuries carrying over to future games.
 

            Netplayers will enjoy using the Chat Support on the Improved Game Screen.
 

            Veteran gamers also will welcome fixes to bugs involving goalie injuries, faceoff locations and more.
 

            For information on Social Media Updates, other Version 13 improvements and bug fixes, see the Help file below:

 

1) Game Highlights Report – A new Game Highlights report has been added to the game. It can be viewed during the game or afterwards. To view it after the game you must choose to automatically save it along with the boxscore on the Autoplay tab of the League Options screen.
 

This report displays every goal, penalty, intimidation, breakaway, penalty shot, great save (saves made off of Goalie cards), and scoring chance (split readings from skater’s cards that did not result in a goal). The report also displays the shootout summary in the case of a shootout. The report is organized by periods and time elapsed so that you can easily follow the flow of the game. Viewing the report can help give you insight into why the game was won or lost. For example, it’s exciting to see that your goalie made a great save with just seconds left to preserve the victory! And you can also get a feel for the physical part of the game since your successful intimidations are shown.
 

2) Alternate Penetration System – The original board game penetration system often results in wingers penetrating against wingers and defensemen penetrating against defensemen. For years board game players have reversed it, so that wingers penetrate against defensemen and defensemen penetrate against wingers, which is more true-to-life. You now have the option to do this with the Alternate Penetration System.
 

3) League Leaders Report – The League Leaders Report has been improved with the addition of 9 new skater categories and 3 new goalie categories. The new skater categories are Intimidations, Takeaways, Ice Time per Game, Face-offs Won, Face-off Win Pct, Penetrations, Outside Shots, Inside Shots, and Breakaways. The new goalie categories are Goalie Penalty Minutes, Tough Saves (from Goalie Rating readings), and Tough Save Pct.
 

4) Team Records Vs. Opponents – The Team Statistics report now displays the team’s record vs. all opponents. Each opponent is listed along with the team’s wins, losses, ties, overtime losses, goals for and goals against that opponent. This information is also displayed on the main tab of the Team Notebook.
 

5) Box scores and Play-by-Play Accounts – The box scores and play-by-play account files for manually played games are now automatically saved into the league’s Print file subfolder if the option to save these is checked on the League Options Autoplay tab. This will allow you to have all box scores (for auto-played and manually played games) located in the same folder. This will also be useful if you enjoy the Daily League Recap feature, as it will then be able to display the box scores for manually played games when you click on the link.
 

6) Limit Injuries to Current Game – A new option located on the League Options Lineups tab allows you to limit injuries to the current game only. This option has been requested by some draft leagues who would prefer not to have injuries carry over from one game to the next. It might also be useful for certain replay projects where you want to control the lineups yourself, yet you still want the possibility for an injury to occur in the simulation.
 

7) Player and Goalie Notebooks – When using the Improved Game Screen interface the player and goalie notebooks were not displaying when you double-clicked the players name on the ice surface. This functionality has been added to this interface.

 

8) Draft-O-Matic Log – Draft-O-Matic now creates a text log file in the league’s Print subfolder that displays all of the picks made through the Draft-O-Matic dialogs. This will allow league commissioners to email this text file to all league members following a draft conducted with Draft-O-Matic.
 

9) Chat Support Added to Improved Game Screen – When using Netplay you can now use the built-in chat support with the Improved Game Screen interface.
 

10) Social Media Updates – Facebook, Twitter, and Tumblr all reworked their APIs since we released the Social Media features. Tumblr dropped support for our type of desktop applications, so we can no longer offer support for that service. Facebook and Twitter rewrote their APIs, and we have updated our Social Media program to use their new APIs. You will see some differences in how things work due to the changes introduced by Facebook and Twitter. Please refer to the Social Media topic for more information.
 

11) Trade Files – Trade files for the following seasons have been included with this year’s version: 1953-54, 1982-83, and 2012-13.
 

12) Support for New Seasons – Support for the 1953-54, 1982-83, and 2012-13 seasons has been added to the game.

 

1) Faceoff Location following delayed penalties – When there was a delayed penalty and the team on offense scored a goal (which nullified the penalty), the subsequent faceoff took place in the zone of the team that was penalized, instead of at center ice. Also, in certain penalty situations generated from the Secondary Penalty Charts where the faceoff should have been held at center ice due to both players receiving equal penalty minutes, the faceoff was taking place in the defensive team’s zone instead.
 

2) Faceoff Location following Secondary Penalty Chart penalties – In certain penalty situations generated from the Secondary Penalty Charts where the faceoff should have been held at center ice due to both players receiving equal penalty minutes, the faceoff was taking place in the defensive team’s zone instead.
 

3) Blank League Abbreviation or Name – Blank league abbreviations or names are not valid, however, the program was allowing somebody to type in a space for these fields which was leading to other problems. You can no longer do this.
 

4) Injuries following goals – In rare circumstances goalie injuries were causing a major problem if the injury occurred when a goal was scored and if the goalie was replaced due to fatigue. This was similar to the problems caused by injuries occurring during rebound situations. The code has been changed to prevent these problems from occurring.
 

5) Goalie Notebooks – The main block of information on the Statistics tab of the Goalie Notebook was overlaying the lower section display area.
 

6) Notebooks at Start of Manual Game – The View Player Notebook and View Goalie Notebook buttons were disabled when viewing the computer manager from the Select Lineups dialog which appears at game start-up.
 

7) Injuries to Goalies – In certain circumstances the wrong goalie was being removed when a goalie was injured.
 

8) Injuries when Power Plays were underway – When injuries occurred during a power play the injured player was sometimes left out on the ice.

 

Note: These data fixes cannot be used for seasons already in-progress. You must reinstall a fresh copy of these rosters in order to see these changes.
 

1) 1958-59 NHL – Default computer managers for this league had 15 active players instead of 16.
 

2) 1958-59 New York –  Gump Worsley’s starting percentage in the computer manager was changed to 96% so that the team would total 100%.
 

3) 1958-59 Montreal – Jacques Plante’s starting percentage in the computer manager was changed to 96% so that the team would total 100%.
 

4) 1980-81 NHL – Default computer managers for this league had 15 active players instead of 17.
 

5) 1980-81 New York R –  Doug Soetart’s starting percentage in the computer manager was changed to 49% so that the team would total 100%.
 

6) 2011-12 Colorado – Mark Olver’s last name was spelled incorrectly.
 

7) 2011-12 Colorado – Matt Duchene’s last name was spelled incorrectly.