Rotnac

Yes. Yes he is.

Welcome

Hello! Welcome to The Hockey Discussion Thread 2.0!

Whether you're a hardcore fan or just being introduced to the sport of Ice Hockey, all are welcome to post. The NHL will probably be the most commonly discussed league in this thread but discussion is open to other levels of hockey such as the AHL, ECHL, KHL, AIHL, NCAA Hockey etc. This is not solely an NHL Discussion Thread.

I will do my best to maintain and keep this thread/OP as reasonably current and up-to-date as possible, much like the other respective sports/wrestling focused threads on Giant Bomb. That being said, I don't have all the free time in the world so if there's something newsworthy I've missed and should be noted then feel free to @ or DM me and I'll get to it asap.

Rules/Guidelines

Current Happenings in Hockey

Vegas Golden Knights official team name

Owner Bill Foley announces decision five months after being awarded expansion franchise

This. Not sure how it isn't a poll option.

I completely forgot that GB's default fonts were something else until I saw this thread. For years I have been using the "Exo" font on Giant Bomb with a Font Changer extension on Google Chrome.

I'm running on a GTX 750 Ti and regardless of any settings I use, I will always get a bit of frame hitching. Performance varies drastically depending on certain areas I'm in. The smoothest consistent performance I've managed to push up to (albeit still with occasional frame hitches) is to run the game at 720p with mostly medium settings and some stuff turned off.

My biggest issue I have with the game are the absurd load times. Whenever I start the game up (or if it crashes and I restart) I've timed it taking anywhere between 1m30s to 2m16s to load a save.

It is disgustingly rotten that my pre-order bonuses are all one-time use. If that's supposed to entice people to pay money on multiple playthroughs then they've fucked up. Microtransaction trash is the new norm in multiplayer and I've come to accept that but it's ethically unforgivable to include one-time only microtransactions in a full priced AAA single-player game. If that's how SE wants to do business then they'll get none of my business. They will not get a cent from me even for the season pass.

SummerSlam was more like the biggest bust of the summer this year. Complete opposite quality of show than TakeOver.

AJ/Cena was probably the highlight. Genuinely concerned for Sasha and whether shes seriously hurt or suspended. That one spot with Charlotte just dropping her was brutal. I just can't believe they booked the two major titles before a mid-card title match and Brock/Orton. Also the Universal Title is ugly af. Looks like a blinged out Fruit Rollup. The execution on the final match was super poor. I'd give the whole thing a 2/5.

My guess is it might have to do with this botched(?) spot where he tweaks his left leg. Weird time for the ref to intervene if it was because of that though. Only other thing I can think of is his left shoulder/arm got messed up when he got slammed to the mat just before the finish.

Well, considering we got a great PPV and a great RAW the night after, having 3 good shows in a row was probably wishful thinking. I hated almost everything about SmackDown Live. It's become nothing more than WWE's TNA Impact but here are my pros and cons:

Call me nitpicky but I'll start with the cons since there's way more of it:

• As I mentioned in my previous post, almost the entire presentation felt like Impact.
  • The graphics and new shade of blue WWE is using for SD Live is extremely close to what Impact is currently using.
  • The new SD Live logo looks like a knockoff Impact logo with a heavily modified SmackDown font.
  • The new theme music in my opinion is a downgrade from their last one (which wasn't great either but wasn't the worst).
    • It sounds like something they'd use for Superstars/Main Event.
  • More than a handful of returning ex-WWE superstars being added to the SD roster? That's basically an Impact thing (kinda).
    • They've already raided a bunch of top ex-TNA guys and stuck em in NXT. Wouldn't surpise me if they end up on Impact SmackDown LIVE with Styles!
  • The only thing that's missing is: a better new theme song to fit their new Tuesday night mold, a six sided ring, replacing JBL & Otunga with Josh Mathews & Tazz, and a man with a #BROKEN condition.
• Moving away from the Impact comparisons, tonight's show largely felt like thesame old shit (50/50 booking) which I think many were thinking is what RAW would've been after the brand split.
  • JBL! Fucking JBL! He would talk over and cut off Mauro at almost every chance he could get and it was more aggravating thing ever. I love Mauro a whole bunch, he's the best wrestling play-by-play WWE has had since JR left, and JBL took a big fat turd all over it.
    • Cole has almost always been shit. But you take away JBL and put in Graves and suddenly RAW has the superior commentary team. Cole was tolerable on Monday. Mauro could barely get any words in tonight.
  • That mess with the women after the Becky/Nattie match that led to absolutely nothing.
  • Shane and DB kick off the show saying it's about the talent, not them. Fast-forward to the end of the show and they come out to the ring in separate entrances after the main event. Wut?
  • It was pretty much a forgettable show. Absolutely nothing about it showed me that it was the "A-show". It felt small-time more than anything

To at least end this post on a positive note, some things I liked were:

• There was more wrestling than talking.
• The Heath Slater stuff is interesting, not sure if that's gonna bleed over to RAW too though.
• Rhyno back on SmackDown means no more Rhyno on NXT. This is a good thing.
• Shelton f'n Benjamin is coming back!
• Eva Marie's new completely over-the-top entrance with the voice guy is so incredibly stupid that I can't not love it. Shame we can't have Graves sell it even more though.
• The main event was okay. Just okay. The finish was unpredictable so I can't complain. Even if it's Ziggler who won.

Not even five minutes into the first match JBL can't stop talking over Mauro and it's insanely aggravating! I've never liked Michael Cole but it's evident at this point that JBL was the problem all along. The commentary Monday night was actually tolerable. Graves compliments Cole very well.

Going back to SmackDown LIVE though... Between the new logo, graphics, presentation being extremely similar to what Impact has, the show being on Tuesday nights, and old former WWE talent returning, everything about it screams WWE's TNA Impact so far.