When you replay the six-game Stanley Cup Final, or explore the best of NHL history with the much-anticipated Hockey Heroes, you can enjoy the experience more than ever with Strat-O-Matic Hockey 2016.

 

            Strat-O-Matic’s Windows game, available soon, offers an improved authorization system, more visualization during the game, and post-game stories that capture the highlights of each contest.

           

            Version 2016 is necessary to play the 2015-16 NHL as well as the new releases for the 1991-92 NHL and the 108 Hockey Heroes (recently elected Hall of Fame players and other superstars).

 

            Any one of these three rosters will thrill gamers. They all benefit from the Version 2016 features, listed completely below. Three stars go to:

 

1.     The new authorization system remembers your codes whenever you transfer them to or from the server.

2.     Game stories that could describe the game-winning goal, the dramatic comeback and/or the game-changing individual performances.

3.     Visuals: You can choose to have the penalty scoreboard show time remaining instead of the board-game counters. The faceoff ratings of all forwards will be displayed in advance of each faceoff. And the “X-Reb” readings on the card images will be easier to see.

 

            There’s more: Version 16 can handle the NHL’s new 3-on-3 overtime rule. It adds important logic for the Online Draft feature and exterminates several reported bugs.  

NEW FEATURES
1) Game Stories – This optional feature adds a game story to the end of each boxscore.  The game story is a quick summary of the major events for that game.  One of the best feelings in the world is reading about your favorite team’s victory.  Now you can experience that same feeling with our Game Stories feature!  The typical Game Story recaps the story of the game in a paragraph which might mention such things as when the game winning goal was scored, the fact that a comeback happened in the third period, individual player highlights, great goaltending, etc.

2) Authorization System – The Authorization System has been improved.  It now remembers your authorization codes whenever you transfer them to or from the server.  Note that existing codes which have unlocked seasons on your system will not be stored in memory until you first transfer them back to the server.  Also, you should still maintain a manual backup copy of your authorization codes because if your hard drive fails the memorized codes will be lost.

3) Support for new 3-on-3 Overtime Rule – The new 3-on-3 overtime rule adopted by the league for 2015-16 is now supported.

4) Penalty Scoreboard – The penalty scoreboard now has the option of showing time remaining in each penalty instead of the board-game counters.

5) Faceoff Rating – The faceoff rating for all forwards is now displayed on the game screen whenever a faceoff is about to take place.

6) Standings Report – The League Standings report has a new section added that reports each teams wins, losses, and ties in the last 10 games.

7) Online Draft – The Online Draft logic for drafting players when an owner is not present has been improved.

8) Card Image  – The "X-Reb" readings on the card image was not visible on some machines where the background color was a very light gray or white.  The readings now show in red.

9) Help File – If you are unable to read the older help file format we are including a "New Help File" which can be accessed via "Start / Programs / Strat-O-Matic".  It is not accessible directly from the game, though.  Even if you are on Windows 10 you should be able to open the new help file.

10) Transaction Files – Transaction files for the following seasons have been included with this year’s version: 1991-92 and 2015-16 seasons.

11) Support for New Seasons – Support for the 1991-92 season, the Hockey Heroes set, and the 2015-16 season has been added to the game.

BUGS FIXED
1) Overtime Power Play – Identified and fixed a problem where both teams start the overtime period in a 3-on-3 situation (due to a coincidental penalties at the end of regulation) and the overtime then begins with a penalty to one team.  In that situation NHL rules dictate that a 4-on-3 power play should commence.  

2) League Leaders  – Fixed an Access Violation that occurred in the league leaders report for smaller leagues.

3) Prompt Home Team Line Changes – This  League Options Lineups was causing Access Violations on some systems.

DATA FIXED
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.

1975-76 NHL 
– Corrected spelling of last name – Morris Titanic, Buffalo

1980-81 NHL 
– Corrected the penalty minutes and rating for Mario Faubert of Pittsburgh based upon original research conducted by the Strat-O-Matic Community on the Patterson Forum.  Faubert had 118 penalty minutes in real-life, not 188.  His penalty rating is changed from "A" to "B".  And his defensive column has been changed so that result 7 is now "TP-OSO" and result 11 no longer has the "+ MC" designator.

1984-85 NHL 
– Added missing player Shawn Burr, Detroit (played 9 games)
– Added missing player Mike Hoffman, Hartford (played 1 game)
– Added missing player Edward Lee, Quebec (played 2 games)
– Moved Alan Kerr from NYR to NYI
– Moved Ron Handy from NYR to NYI

1993-94 NHL 
– Corrected spelling of last name – Turner Stevenson, Montreal

1993-94 NHL through 2002-03