Tiger Woods PGA Tour 10

Developed by EA Tiburon, this is the fourth Tiger Woods golf game for the Nintendo Wii. What is it exactly that seperates PGA Tour 10 from the past installments of the franchise? With MotionPlus support this time round, how well will this new feature translate into a golf-sim game? As part of the Summer wave of sports titles, here is Tiger Woods PGA Tour 10.

Having briefly played Tiger Woods PGA Tour 07, the only other golf game I’ve played on the Wii is the one in Wii Sports. While the latter is enjoyable because of its simplicity, a more hardcore golf fan will look to something like a Tiger Woods game in order to satisfy the “want”  for a more complete and substantial game. Golf fan or not, if you want a “proper” golf game, this franchise seems to be leading the way at the moment.

However, it’s not without its faults. Several people I know complained about about the often inaccurate controls of the early PGA Tour games on the Wii. Although appreciating the functionality of the game, something wasn’t quite right. PGA Tour 09 generally received good reviews; regarded as the best one since the franchise’s debut on the Wii. I think with the MotionPlus support, Tiger Woods PGA Tour 10 could be the best one to date.

As soon as you load the game up, it’s obvious the game is packed with content. A series of rather useful tutorials are available when you start the game, which run you though the basics of the the controls. Everything from applying draw/fade to your shots, to putting on the green. The tutorials can be accessed and played through again at any point you wish.

Having only played 8-holes once when I was a teenager and smacked a few balls down the golfing range several times, I am obviously not a golfer. But I enjoyed what limited exposure I had to the game. So knowing that this game supports MotionPlus which should make the experience all the more real, I kind of expected to be rubbish at it.

Everyone knows the aim of the game when it comes to golf, and there’s not a lot to figure out. So what was EA’s remit when developing this game? To make it as realistic as possible? To make a fun golf game? Well, either way, I think they have achieved both.

You start your career as an amateur, attempting to qualify for Q-School where you can earn your PGA Tour card. Enter various tournaments that are on your calendar and begin your journey to the top of your game.

For an in-depth golf simulation game, this has pretty much everything you’d expect or want. Asides from the standard choice of club to use, an icon showing the wind speed/direction, there’s also all the little things that when combined, adds up to an extensive golf-sim. Such as altering the angle at which the head of the club hits the ball, choices of control methods, golfing attire, caddy tips, and so on.

Short of having photo-realistic graphics, Tiger Woods PGA Tour 10 has some pretty nice looking renders. The trees and the courses in general look detailed enough. Sometimes, the player renders don’t look as polished as the majority of the courses. The leaves on the trees look defined and generally speaking, the courses look really lush. I’m not sure how advanced the physics engine is but when you see the ball bounce after smacking it with an iron, it does so with plausibility. Sometimes the accompanying thud sounds a bit hollow and lets it down slightly.

When a shot is heading nicely onto the green, the game switches to a more cinematic look (well, there’s letterbox-styled black bars that appear) and you can hear a heartbeat accompanying the rumble from the wii-mote. Whilst having the rumble feature of a controller representing a heartbeat is nothing new, it does suit a game like this very well. When even the slightest mistake can be costly, it does raise the tension somewhat.

During career modes, you can earn extra bonuses during play by pulling off nice shots in a variety of categories. These tend to be related to power, accuracy, concentration, putting or spin. Bonuses provide Experience Points which can be used to increase the stats of your golfer.

Thanks to the MotionPlus, putting is split into two methods. Classic Putting gives the player a choice of clubs to choose from and power is determined by the backswing. For gamers who are after more realism or a challenge, Precision Putting utilises the MotionPlus and takes the backswing, follow through and amount of force used into account to create a more real but more difficult experience.

Within the career modes, you can earn Experience Points that can be assigned to different skill attributes. Every gamer will prefer to build on different aspects of their game, whether it be Ball Striking, Power, Putting, Luck or Spin. To an extent, this will offer gamers an opportunity to customise their golfers and make them their own. However, it will come to a point when every skill is maxed out, in which case all golfers will pretty much play the same. Not that that will be easy.

There’s one thing I’ve noticed with Tiger Woods PGA Tour 10, there’s a lot of emphasis put on customisation. EA Tiburon has really put some effort into making the game play the way you, the gamer, want it to. Everything from the huge choice of game modes, to the customisation of your golfer, to the tuning of your clubs, it’s clear that a lot of thought has gone into making this the best golf game it can be.

Even the create-a-player is quite extensive. Everything down to facial features, body dimensions and even attire too. With more clothes and equipment to buy using the in-game money you earn, it gives the player a fair amount to customise their golfer with, only they have to earn it, which I like.

Online mode allows gamers to compete in live tournaments or head to head in simultaneous play. If you have already signed up to an EA Online account via another EA Sports title, then a majority of the registration process can be skipped. Gamers can select a Mii to have as their avatar and the flag of their country will be displayed next to it.

New features in Tiger Woods PGA Tour 10 include the addition of 7 new courses. These are officially licensed courses from around the world that bring the game’s total to 27. This season sees you teeing off in places like Banff Springs in Canada, and the sunny beaches of Torrey Pines Golf Course in San Diego, California.

As online play is becoming more and more common place in video games, EA Tiburon has not let us down in the slightest here. New to the franchise are the Live Tournaments, where gamers can play single-rounds, or full four-round tournaments. You can also post your scores on the online leaderboard and compare them with your friends. In Play The Pros Tournaments, you’ll be competing against real PGA Tour scores. Now you can see how you perform when up against the professionals.

A nice extra bit of content is the Disc Golf mode; where you utilise the MotionPlus once again, but in a Frisbee kind of manner. Using the same premise as ordinary golf, the aim of the game is to accurately throw the disc - shot after shot, and attempt to land it in the hole. Well, an imaginary basket. Sounds very trivial but actually quite fun, thanks to the MotionPlus.

What’s interesting about Simultaneous Play is that there’s no waiting about for the other players to take their shot first before you can take yours. As the name suggests, you will play at your own pace. 2-4 players can join in on the action in a Stroke Play match with shots being represented in real-time by coloured shot-arcs.

Tiger Woods PGA Tour 10 features an all-new Live Weather System that connects to the Forecast Channel from the Wii Menu and accurately places the real-time weather onto the courses in-game. Very cool indeed. It may sound trivial but it’s a feature that I think adds another layer of authenticity to the game. And really, to any game for that matter.

If you want to take a break from the career modes, you’re spoilt for choice. Whether you’re on your own or with friends, there’s a variety of play modes and party games to choose from. It’s exactly the kind of additional content you’d wish was provided had it’d been a straight forward golf-sim.
With lots of arcade-style games and party-style minigames to choose from, it is certainly one of the most impressive collection of side-content I have seen in a game.

Overall, I am very impressed with Tiger Woods PGA Tour 10. Not a particularly major golf fan myself, take my word that you don’t have to be one to enjoy this game. I tip my hat to you, EA Tiburon. I suppose it was a matter of time before I or anyone else would declare that if one should buy the MotionPlus for any game, it should be this, or that. Hear me, I’m saying it should be Tiger Woods PGA Tour 10.

Now I’m sure somewhere down the line, they’ll be others (at least I hope so). As for the present, this game tops the list. An excellent golf game that’s packed with features that shouldn’t be missed. It’s such a shame the game is not as impressive if played sans MotionPlus. That said, should you be in the percentage that doesn’t own one, the features only easily make this the best in the series so far.

This game is an absolute joy to play and I can’t recommend it enough without sounding like I’ve received a back-hander from EA. The satisfaction you get from making a great shot is one of the things that makes this game great. Partly because of the challenge, partly to do with the realism. Sheer excellence.

+ MotionPlus adds realism and substance
+ Lots of modes/features to choose from (single & multi-player)
+ Courses look great
+ Various online modes
+ Level of customisation is very good
+ Lots of replay value

- Without MotionPlus, game feels less impressive
- Sometimes the player renders look awful compared to the scenery

Score - 9/10