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Steam News4 November 20258mo ago

Update 2 - The Big One - November 4th 2025

Hey! It's hockey season! So here's a new update to celebrate! Update 2 was intended to just be another small polish patch, the keyword here is "intended".

In this update15

Full notes

Full World Hockey '88 update

Read the full published notes in a cleaner layout. The original post stays linked below.

What changed

18 fixes19 additions8 changes3 removals
  • Events
  • Gameplay
  • Fixes
  • Performance
  • UI and audio
addedHey! It's hockey season!So here's a new update to celebrate!
changedHey! It's hockey season!Update 2 was intended to just be another small polish patch, the keyword here is "intended".
addedHey! It's hockey season!This is the largest update to the game thus far, and by far, overhauling many components of the game, and adding lots of key new features!
addedHey! It's hockey season!There's still lots of features on the roadmap so continue to stay tuned for new updates!
addedNew ways to play!Alternate win conditions! You can now play non-timed matches with a target goal count.
addedNew Teams!Added Mexico and Spain to the roster for a total of 30 teams! (+8 Secret Teams for 38 in total)

World Hockey '88 changes

addedSo here's a new update to celebrate!
changedUpdate 2 was intended to just be another small polish patch, the keyword here is "intended".
addedThis is the largest update to the game thus far, and by far, overhauling many components of the game, and adding lots of key new features!
addedThere's still lots of features on the roadmap so continue to stay tuned for new updates!
addedAlternate win conditions! You can now play non-timed matches with a target goal count.

Hey! It's hockey season!

So here's a new update to celebrate!

Update 2 was intended to just be another small polish patch, the keyword here is "intended".

This is the largest update to the game thus far, and by far, overhauling many components of the game, and adding lots of key new features!

There's still lots of features on the roadmap so continue to stay tuned for new updates!

New ways to play!

  • Alternate win conditions! You can now play non-timed matches with a target goal count.

New Teams!

  • Added Mexico and Spain to the roster for a total of 30 teams! (+8 Secret Teams for 38 in total)

World Champion

  • Now keeps track of your best outcome per difficulty level, and how many times it's been completed.

  • World Champion mode now has achievements!

  • Fixed screen-shake missing from VS card

  • 'Game Rules' submenu is now consistent with Exhibition mode with additional polish.

  • Fixed Team Setup missing gamemode header

Online Multiplayer

  • Decreased likelihood of desyncs by increasing the minimum frame delay and adding leeway for ping spikes.

  • Fixed major crash caused by change in most recent patch

  • Fixed lobby player list carrying over from previously hosted lobby.

  • Fixed team setup changes not applying to other players in the lobby.

  • Fixed allowing the host to start the match pre-maturely resulting in crashes or erroneous states.

  • Friends list now shows which friends are online!

  • Join Lobby will no longer display lobbies running on different versions of the game.

Tournament Mode

  • Fixed opening submenus during a transition causing a transition to erroneously freeze.

  • 'Game Rules' submenu is now consistent with Exhibition mode with additional polish.

  • Cleaned up Tourney stats

Practice Mode

  • Player Settings are now always available in Practice Mode.

Default Settings

  • Zoom Mode now defaults to "Fixed" rather than "Dynamic".

  • Default game speed is now faster (MODERATE instead of STEADY).

CPU Behavior

  • Fixed an airbourne puck not bouncing off of goalies properly.

  • Harder difficulty CPUs will now slowdown less (or not at all) before taking a shot.

  • Improved difficulty balancing across different gameplay speed settings

  • Improved legend difficulty goalie balancing.

Internal Improvements

  • Performance optimizations across the board.

  • Fixed baseline alpha-cutoff being too high. (may not have a noticable impact, translucent effects may be smoother)

Puck

  • Puck is now smaller and proportions have been fixed. (Collision is also smaller to match)

  • Added settings for changing the pucks color.

Audio

  • Added Crowd & Goal Horn volume settings

Cosmetic

Scenes

  • Goal sequence can now be skipped by the scoring team (or always if it's a CPU player).

  • Goal sequence camera has been improved and made more consistent.

  • Fixed various issues with the lighting in the pre-game sequence.

UI

  • Added UI indicators for off-screen players.

  • Added setting to enable/toggle common abbreviations.

Arena

  • Added ceiling light reflections!

Menus

General

  • Added smooth transitions to nearly all menus.

Match Results

  • General Polish

  • Added MVP players.

  • Added displays for game length (in real time) and game speed.

  • Game Rules can now be viewed and modified from the results screen.

  • Penalty minutes now won't display if penalties/fights are disabled.

  • Winning team now has a crown over their flag

  • Exiting to main menu is no longer abrupt and is now consistent with other menus.

  • Fixed prompts being inconsistent with other menus and not considering other players.

Game Setup

  • Now more consistent with Team Select menu.

  • General polish / cleanup.

  • Fixed player settings, team lineups, and CPU difficulty settings sometimes not saving.

  • Fixed occasional inconsistencies between 1-player and 2-player prompts.

  • Fixed prompts not always using the correct font.

  • Fixed right-side input prompts being incorrect in CPU vs CPU mode.

Pause Menu

  • Fixed crash when a controller is disconnected while the game is paused.

  • Player Settings option is now available in the pause menu of all game modes.

  • Gameplay Settings are now accessible (only in exhibition mode).

Source

Steam News / 4 November 2025

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