NHL Hitz 2002 is the first game of the series, developed by Black Box Games. It was released in September/November 2001 in North America, and in March/May 2002 in the PAL regions, except for the PS2 version which was released for PAL already in November 2001. During gameplay, three skaters and one goaltender in each team are on the ice, and three skaters in each team are on the bench. Because of this, only three fights may occur in each game; any player that loses a fight is taken out of the game permanently. If a player scores an uninterrupted hattrick (i.e. three goals in a row), that player becomes "On Fire", meaning that the player can make more powerful shots and is tougher to knock down. "Team Fire", similar to "On Fire", can be achieved if the team scores three uninterrupted one timers in a row.
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