Lexi Peters (a native of

Buffalo, New York Buffalo is the second-largest city in the U.S. state of New York (behind only New York City) and the seat of Erie County. It is at the eastern end of Lake Erie, at the head of the Niagara River, and is across the Canadian border from Sou ...

) became the first female ice hockey player to appear in an EA Sports NHL Hockey video game after appearing in ''

NHL 12 ''NHL 12'' is an ice hockey video game developed by EA Canada and published by EA Sports. The game was featured in the 2011 Electronic Entertainment Expo (E3). Steven Stamkos was announced as the game's cover athlete on June 22, 2011, at the NHL ...

''.

EA Sports

Origins

In previous experiences with EA Sports’ NHL titles, she spent hours with the custom team features in an attempt to recreate the Niagara Jr. Purple Eagles (an all-girls team Peters plays for). The various titles player creation options did not include a female character build. Peters asked her father why there were no female characters in past video games. Her dad suggested that she write a letter to the company and inquire about it. She has been playing hockey in the Buffalo area since 2007. David Littman, the lead producer of the EA Sports NHL Game received permission from the NHL and EA's lawyers to include Lexi Peters in their EA Sports NHL 12 video game (released on September 13, 2011). EA Sports informed Lexi that they were going to have her as the game's "default" female player that gamers would be able to customize.

Awards and honors

Peters was selected by

The Hockey News ''The Hockey News'' (''THN'') is a Canadian-based ice hockey magazine. ''The Hockey News'' was founded in 1947 by Ken McKenzie and Will Cote and has since become the most recognized hockey publication in North America. The magazine has a readers ...

on its annual list of the 100 People of Power and Influence in Ice Hockey. For the 2012 list, Peters ranked at number 100.The Hockey News, Issue Date: January 16, 2012, Volume 65, Number 14, Senior Editor: Brian Costello, Published by Transcontinental Medial, p. 30 Peters was included in the 2014 version of the Gamers edition of the Guinness Book of World Records.

References

1997 births American women's ice hockey players Living people University at Buffalo alumni Electronic Arts Ice hockey players from Buffalo, New York 21st-century American women {{US-icehockey-bio-stub