It really is the best hockey game yet.
I've been a devout NHL gamer since NHLPA '93, and I've been very very happy with the latest edition of this award winning series. For the first month I was pretty much addicted to the new HUT mode, opening packs of cards and bidding on players. It was a lot of fun, but I eventually lost interest.
What's been the mainstay for me in this series, aside from playing EASHL every now and then is the Be a GM mode. Now unfortunately, there were some glitches in it to begin with, but they have been addressed with a recently released patch.
I admit I had to do some googling for "the" sliders, but I've found an incredibly enjoyable, seemingly random hockey experience is to be had with this game once you find the settings that work for you. I couldn't do that with NHL 10, the CPU was too laid back and I couldn't make the game challenging enough. That's not the case with NHL '11, with the sliders I found each game really is different. One game can be a low scoring goaltenders duel, the next will be a blowout of sorts, either way. I win or lose, and it's always enjoyable, because I'm amazed at how real it all seems.
This is the best hockey gaming experience I've had to date, and with nearly 2 full decades of NHL gaming under my belt, that's saying something.