It's almost as though they're floating. This makes it very easy to take a well positioned defender right out of a play when moving to take out a rushing winger, and very difficult to regain possession of the puck under opposition pressure in your own end. The control isn't nearly as precise as it needs to be. Shooting works well once you become accustomed to how long to hold the shot button for either a wrist or slap shot. Checking is a little dicier, especially as you move up in difficulty, but this is more an issue of AI than control.
Fights break out with predictable regularity, but look kind of foolish.
Thankfully they're over in a hurry, with the victorious combatant raising an arm in triumph. What drove me to turn them off though, is that it always seems to be the guys least likely to fight in real life that decide they want to tangle in the game. Any hockey fan knows that powerplays are an important part of the game. Not in Faceoff 99. That's total, as in both teams.