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The man is back. Tiger Woods has had a rough couple of years but they seem to have made him all the better since he is once again considered the best in his game. The game that bears his name is once again pulling off another excellent iteration.
Tiger Woods includes a number of gameplay modes. The game includes the typical game modes like stroke, best ball, and others as well as skills 18 where you need to hit the ball through a ring. For a more in-depth mode, you can head to PGA Tour where you’ll go through a season mode and be given quite a challenge from the pros. The game’s Legends mode is where you’ll likely spend most of your time. Here, you’ll go back in time to play some of golf’s past greats through the current greats. Names like Ben Hogan and Arnold Palmer are included, surely to strike the fancy of golf fans. Though the legends are initially quite the challenge, the latter legends will barely touch you since your created player will be too good by then. It’s a great feature, though, with comical touches like different, time-specific looks for your club house and era-specific clothing for the legends. The Gamecube version of the game does not include online play.
With Tiger Woods PGA Tour 06, EA Redwood Shores changed the controls about quite a bit. The most notable change is the shape stick, which intuitively enables you to influence the spin and flight of the ball by moving the right analog stick around. If you prefer, you can still play the game like it has always been played, making the shape stick an option not a requirement unless you want to play in tour difficulty mode, where it is required in order to make things a bit more challenging. Taking a page from its Street series, the game also includes a Gamebreaker mode which enables you to hit farther or more accurate, though not perfectly as in some of the Street games. To the dismay or enjoyment of some, last year’s Tiger vision is gone so you are no longer guaranteed a successful put. Lastly, a new feature is reactive Tiger Proofing which makes courses more or less difficult depending on your play ability.
The game’s visuals are great. The courses look excellent with plenty of details including animals moving around in the background to keep things interesting. The player models aren’t very different from last year but still look and animate great. The created players also look excellent and have much detail thanks to the extensive tool. With it, you can create players and adjust pretty much everything including height to something like ear shape. The inclusion of era-specific clothing in the create-a-player tool makes for some crazy looking yet widely amusing characters.
The game’s audio is top-notch, as expected. The sounds of golf are accurately recreated in the game. The commentary from Gary McCord who provides well-meaning commentary contrasts with the comical arrogance of David Feherty. The game’s create a player tool allows you to choose one of give voices for your character. All of the voices are pretty good and add life to the character.
Tiger Woods PGA Tour 06 features a number of changes that may or may not have too much influence on you. Nonetheless, it’s nice to know that the developers are continually working on improving the game. A superior golfing system and good presentation, largely because of the detailed create-a-player tool make Tiger Woords PGA Tour 06 an easy recommendation. -- Jake Wilson, PGNx Media
---- Oct 3, 2005
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