In Puckoff: Reloaded, Hockey Is About More Than Scoring Goals

What happens when five Finnish developers take the hockey they grew up playing on frozen ponds and turn it into a story about the greatest underground hockey player who ever lived?

When I think about my childhood, some of my best memories aren’t from school, holidays or birthday parties.

They’re from the ice.

Growing up in Finland, I spent enormous amounts of time on frozen outdoor rinks and ponds, playing hockey with friends. You didn’t need to organize it weeks in advance or check everyone’s calendar. You just went to the rink. Games happened. Friendships happened. Some of the people I met through hockey back then are still my friends today.

There was something special about those games. The rules could be flexible, teams could change, and somebody would inevitably try something ridiculous. That feeling became one of the starting points for Puckoff.

When we created Puckoff: Reloaded, we wanted to bring some of that feeling back. Many of the game’s rinks are frozen outdoor ponds inspired by the places where we grew up playing.

Then we asked ourselves a simple question: What if winning didn’t mean scoring more goals?

A Different Kind of Hockey

In most hockey games, you know what you’re supposed to do: Get the puck. Score goals. Win the game. In Puckoff: Reloaded, there are a few more options. You can score. Set up a teammate. Make the perfect pass. Or you can knock someone out.

And nobody in this world seems particularly bothered by that last option.

That’s the world we wanted to create: a story-driven hockey game where fighting isn’t a random side activity, but part of the sport and its strange underground culture. I’ve played a lot of the big hockey games over the years. They’re great at what they do, but I always found myself thinking: “Why can’t I just do that?”

You know the feeling. An opponent does something you don’t like, and you want to give them a little… extra attention. But the game tells you no. That’s when I realized one of the things I love about games. They let us experiment, cause chaos and do things we wouldn’t necessarily do in real life. So, I thought: what if a hockey game actually embraced that? That’s how Puckoff: Reloaded began.

In our version of hockey, scoring goals is still useful. It’s just not the only way to win.

We’re Not Just Making a Hockey Game

I’ve always loved storytelling, and for years I’ve had a particular dream: What would it be like if a big hockey game actually had a real story? Not just a career mode where you play a season and upgrade your player. I mean a proper story. Characters you care about. Mysteries. Rivalries. Friendships. A reason to wonder what happens next. That’s what we wanted Puckoff: Reloaded to be.

Between matches, the game uses a visual-novel-inspired presentation to tell a larger story. The hockey games aren’t disconnected challenges. They’re part of a journey. And that journey is about finding a legend.

The Search for Dominator

At the heart of Puckoff: Reloaded is a hockey legend named Dominator. He’s been playing underground hockey matches for decades, and nobody really knows how he’s managed to keep going for so long. What everyone does know is that he has never lost a game.

For the player character, Dominator isn’t just another hockey player. He’s the reason to keep playing. The dream is simple: find Dominator and eventually play alongside him. Getting there means meeting the people who inhabit this underground hockey world and proving you’re good enough to belong in it. Eventually, that leads to the Cage.

Welcome to the Cage

The biggest fights in Puckoff: Reloaded don’t happen in a traditional hockey arena. They happen underground.

The Cage is where some of the game’s most dangerous opponents are waiting. These boss matches are different from ordinary games: you’re not simply facing another team and trying to score more goals. You’re facing a character with their own identity, abilities and way of playing. And if you’re going to get closer to Dominator, you’ll have to get through them.

Our Dream is Bigger Than This Game

I’m proud of what our five-person team has created, but I also see Puckoff: Reloaded as the beginning of something. My dream has always been to make story-driven hockey games with the scope and production values of the big-budget games. I want hockey games where you remember the characters as much as the matches. Stories that make you care who wins. I want a game where you can spend an evening playing hockey with your friends, laughing when somebody gets knocked out—and then come back the next day because you genuinely want to know what happens to the characters.

We’re not a huge studio. We’re five people in Finland making the game we wanted to play. For me, that’s what Puckoff has always been about. It started with the frozen ponds where some of my best childhood memories were made. Now we’re taking those memories, adding a ridiculous amount of fighting, creating a hockey legend who hasn’t lost in decades, and turning the whole thing into a story.

We just have to find Dominator first.

Puckoff: Reloaded launches on Xbox Series X|S today.