When you play a sports game, are you the type that forgets everything and just plays or are you the type who spends half as long tweaking your line-up as you do playing the game. If you are the later, you should give EHM: FE a try. This is a text-based sports simulation, with no actual 3D game attached. It places you in the role of manager of a professional hockey team in any one of twelve countries.

This game is not just the NHL, as the name implies, but a simulation of the global hockey world. You can manage teams in the hockey hotbeds of Canada (CHL, which includes the WHL, OHL and QMJHL), the United States (NHL), Russia, Sweden, Finland, Czech Republic, and Slovakia, as well as the smaller hockey markets out of Denmark, Norway, Austria, France and, of course, Great Britain. All of these countries boast a full compliment of real players and staff that give NHL EHM and unprecedented level of depth. In addition, there are countless more leagues that exist with real players, but cannot be human-controlled, further increasing the realism of the database. If you get bored of chasing Lord Stanley's Cup (or just want to pretend the NHL is on strike), you can try and gain promotion from the lower Finish leagues, or win a Memorial Cup in the Canadian junior circuit. This depth gives NHL EHM total replayability.

In the game, you are a General Manager with your own career. You start by selecting a team to manage, but once that initial backdoor into a good job is out of the way, you are on your own. Your performance on and off the ice dictates your reputation, which can lead to job offers from higher reputation teams and other accolades. The developers have played the game hundreds of years into the future without issue, and you can do the same. There is no need to start a new game if something is not to your liking. After ten years leading the Columbus Blue Jackets in the NHL, I quit my job and joined a Russian team. Later I would move to the Canadian Junior Circuit, and on to manage the French national team (the game has a full slate of international competitions), all without starting my game over. Worst case, you can retire your manager (perhaps you started in Great Britain and want to move to the NHL, but have not earned the reputation) and create a new one, again getting to select a job. If you do want to start over, don't worry, last game's superstar may be this game's super flop, and given "new players" (new players don't really enter the NHL until 2008, the database is so detailed that it includes real 14 year olds in obscure leagues around the world) is generated in each game, the experience will be greatly different.

The day-to-day activities consist of managing your staff (you can hire an assistant manager, a head coach, a fleet of assistant coaches, scouts and physios), searching for the next big star by sending your scouts to scour the world, signing/buying/trading (it depends on the rules of your league) for players, dealing with the personalities of your players (low morale or a badly timed trade demand can throw your team off course), tweaking your teams tactics, setting up training schedules so your young guns develop into the stars they promise to be, and finally setting up your lineup and coaching the games themselves. Most the work is really done in advance, as you prepare your team for the game, and I often let my head coach handle the actual game, but you can observe the game in real time, at least in the form of play-by-play commentary and a full array of statistics to help you. Perhaps the game is not going your way, tweak your tactics, juggle your lines, change your goalie; you do whatever it takes to get the win.

There are however some problems with the first edition of this game, which can be expected given the scope. The user interface, which is obviously insanely important in a text-based game, can take a bit of getting used to. Given how addictive the game is, you will soon get used to it, but this is something the company has promised to improve in future versions. Computing times can also be a bit of a pain; the wait between each day usually makes this a good game to play with the TV on in the background. Trading, in the NHL, is also a bit quirky. Occasionally, a team will spam you with requests for a trade you have turned down. However, these are all minor blemishes in an otherwise top-notch experience.

The biggest disappointments were in reality no fault of the developers, but rather the lawyers. NHL EHM omits many important leagues, as the company could not secure the rights. Among these are the AHL and other minor-pro North American leagues that feed the NHL. As a result, the minor-league affiliates of NHL clubs are stocked full of mostly real players (if their contract is directly with the minor team, their name will be generated) on fictional teams. The NCAA is stocked full of real teams and fake players (especially frustrating if you're a fan of say the New York Rangers, as your top goalie prospect Al Montoya will have a randomly generated name), and the Finish and Russian leagues (both playable) have fake team names. Also conspicuously absent are the high caliber German and Swiss leagues. All of these issues are a direct result of licensing agreements, or the lack thereof. Sports Interactive conducted the research, and built these leagues (a pre-release demo had the AHL), only to have to pull them out at the last second for legal reasons.

It has been nearly a year, and I continue to play NHL: EHM religiously. If action is your thing, NHL: EHM will not be. For those of you that like management games, even if you do not particularly like hockey, this is a game to pick up. Sports Interactive has gone to great lengths to ensure the game is accessible to the non-hockey fan, just as I can play World Wide Soccer Manager (the North American version of Football Manager, previously the Championship Manager franchise before their split with Eidos) without a clue about soccer. Slightly daunting, but a wonderful experience nonetheless.

The future looks bright for the EHM: FE franchise and I eagerly await the next installment. Each year promises to bring more leagues, a more detailed database and more of the same fun. If progress is anything like that of their soccer franchise, each fall will be a time to mark off the calendar as your new addiction arrives. Eastside Hockey Manager is the pinnacle of sports management simulations, a must-have rivaled only by the same company's admittedly more mature yearly soccer offering