Excellent Rectangle Inc. is bringing the ice back to our PCs in 2023 with their newest title, ‘Tape to Tape’, a rogue-like ice hockey game where you need to make sure you make all the correct decisions to earn the G.O.A.T. title.

With your beginner hockey team, you are given the option to choose from a couple of special characters to join your team for your first match, before you are thrown into a minimap that vaguely resembles the path from old Super Mario games.

You need to select the different matches you’d like to do; You are given options, such as a “Special Match,” or more mundane things like ‘Training’, which improves the specifications of your team. The Special Matches have all the risk and all the gain, with the risk being that you could go back to square one, whereas the gain is winning special characters for improving your overall team.

The special characters are a unique twist to the hockey games, with different characters having different special abilities, varying from things like the puck being a slingshot to you being able to headshot someone with the puck. These are presented like cards, and when you finish a match, you have the option to upgrade your team’s special characters and enable more perks for them.

The controls really surprised me with this title, and I was not expecting a keyboard to be so smooth, particularly for ice hockey. It’s one of those sports where every move counts; you’ll either get cleaned up or do the cleaning up.

The controls are extremely simple, with the main movements being controlled by the usual WASD, and things like shooting for goals making use of the space bar. The game also allows the use of the Xbox controller, something I’m more used to with ice hockey titles, but I really enjoyed how this played on the keyboard as it was a much smoother experience.

The sounds were unreal in this game, and I’ll be honest, I was not expecting much, but it surprised me with the realistic organ tunes we all know from movies about sports. With the awesome music in the main menu, and the sounds in the actual gameplay, everything was done so well.

When you score points, you get those awesome little tunes to celebrate, but with more of a heavy metal feel, and the sound of a puck hitting someone in the head when making those special shots, or hearing the ice screeching as you spray it over your opponents was so polished it almost felt like you were there. This game has it all!

The art style had me glued to the screen. The characters are kind of a 2D hand-drawn cartoon, with other elements, like the puck and the ice rink being of some 3D elements. The characters have some butter-smooth animations, and the rinks, while not differing much, were packed with amazing detail, including reflections on the ice. As simple as it may sound, Tape to Tape looks incredible.

Since the preview, I have noticed a couple of changes in the title, one being most noticeable that the hitboxes on the enemy team seem a little nerfed and easier now to obtain a strike. It does not feel like you need to hit the opposing team’s player properly but as long as you’re close enough it’s good enough. The controls feel a little looser. I also didn’t find myself having the puck intercepted so much by the opposing team. Overall, the game is still playing absolutely fantastic and the controls even feel like they have been tweaked that little bit to feel that little more crisp whilst playing.

I loved playing this title so much. It plays really well on the PC, the character models are incredible, and even though they’re a little bit similar to each other, the ice rinks are packed with detail. It perfectly mashes an arcade hockey game with the rogue-like genre, and even if you’re not a fan of sports games, this one could very well persuade you to think differently.

Written by: Hayden Nelson