I thought I could give my appreciation of this game. I played from NHL 2001 to NHL 2006, so I've saw the evolution of this EA franchise. After, you could offer your appreciation too.

Play it on Playstation 2

Strength:
- The visuals are exceptional! First year I play it on a console, and the graphics have really impress me.
- The computer are way better than the year before. NHL 2005 have put the standard in this domain. Before, I had to create a team, and take the worst player of the team to have some difficulty to win. Today, I'm losing 1 game out of 5 with NHL teams versus regular competition, which is great.
- This year was the first year where I could make a perform a decent powerplay just like in the NHL. I'm able to pass the puck from one player to another, to the D and try to find the best way to score, which I really like.

Weaknesses:
- The goalie are so horrible it's not even funny. No style at all, they're throwing their body anywhere. The visual are great when the goaltender save a puck in the upper part of the net, but that's all. Also, they always take penalty because they go take the puck outside where they can, which is very frustrating! They really need to improve that!
- Sometime, the commentary of the analyst are useless and make no sense, I hope they could arrange that for 2007.

For NHL 2007:
- I want to be able to make a dynasty mode and make a fantasy draft. Moreover, I want them to establish the salary cap, just like in the NHL.

Overall:
- Great overall game, I have a lot of fun playing with it.
8,5/10

I really think the EA NHL games peaked with NHL 2003, that was probably the best version of the game I've played and it seems like every year since they've done something to step backwards from that. The thing that kind of turns me off about EA games is that they focus too much on good graphics over good gameplay, and it end up making a great looking game thats not really fun to play, or not as fun as it could be I should say. In the end not all hope is lost for the game, I bought the PC version so I can mod it a little bit and mess around with the settings till I get the gameplay closer to what I feel is a more realistic representation of the game.

I no in the 2K6 there are tasks you need to accomplish to unlock a hole lotta stuff, but it's still not as good as EA's. When 07 comes out on the 360 it is gonna be awesome I can hardley wait.

I think the 2k6 Goalie control is pretty cool so I'd like to see that in 06.

Something that they should add to 07 is called Player Mode were for each game you have the option to be a play from is Point of View. You add in all the nesacary stuff like waiting on the bench for your shift to come back. That would be wicked fun for a video game.

They have something similar to that in 2k7 but it's only for the goalie and you only take control of them while trying to make saves.  This would definately be cool to see though, a first person view from one player would undoubtedly make fighting a lot more fun as well .

I like 2006, but I really miss the "party games" they had in 2005. It was always fun to play my friend in the free skate game where its you vs your friend vs defenseman + goalie. I always loved getting the golden helmet. Also, I think the console versions are a lot better than the PC games. I think they are easier to manipulate (the set up and menus) and I can't play sports games w/o a gamepad.

I think NHL 06 is wicked, my main problem with it is, defense, I cannot play defence. Like on difficult, Id win every game of the season, but the scores would be like 23-8, with a good goaltender in my net too. I found it way too hard to play D, and way too easy with scoring. But that doesn't really bother me cause im sure its prolly just my style of how i play it. The main thing is, more in depth Dynasty mode. 2P dynasty mode too, where you could play your games but your friend could be yer opponent, no matter what team he was playing. One of those bars, which tell you during a trade how interested the other team is would be pretty great too, and soo simple to put in im sure. Bunch of other stuff id love to be in it, but i cant think on it now. I loved '06 all the same 9/10.

I've been playing the series since NHL 93 (I thought it went by a slightly different name that year) all the way through to 06 though I can't remember any of 2000, '01, or '02 for some reason. Honestly, I think NHL 06 is probably the best one so far. The only thing I don't enjoy is the goalies because they aren't that intelligent. They go sprawling on their backs if you simply skate by them with the puck, and when the computer decides that your goalie wants to skate out of the trapezoid and earn you a penalty that gets annoying too.

NHL 2005 was the most fun, least realistic.
NHL 2004 was fun for me because I was insanely good, but the gameplay was kind of slow and there were certain spots to pick up easy ugly goals.
NHL 2006 is a good combination of 04 and 05. I find the computer is fun to play on hard, they can pretty much score at will when they want to but it's a good challenge. I'm not playing it all that much, only about 70 games online and maybe a full season offline so I still find it fun since I'm playing around .500 hockey.