Tiger Woods PGA Tour 10 is a revolutionary update to EA’s popular golfing series. After last years’ release raised serious questions as to the future of the series (particularly the weak All Play branding and superfluous new content) and the lack of progress over the last six years, EA has rolled up its sleeves, put its nose to the grindstone and assembled a game which effectively blows all other golf games away. The main ingredient in Tiger Woods PGA Tour 10’s successful formula is the Wii Motion Plus, but there is a whole boatload of other features that make this one of the best golf games in years.

If you have played a Tiger Woods PGA Tour game on the Wii before, you will have had some experience using the Wii Remote as a club – it has always had a few issues with accuracy and movement detection. One could easily lose track of how many times the game would not read the entirety of your swing and send what should be a 250 yard drive less than 80 yards, or cause the player to fail what should have been an easy putt. That is where the Wii Motion Plus comes in; the extra equipment provides a tremendous boost to movement detection, not just for wide motions, but also to subtle movements like small twists and flicks of the wrist. EA takes a few liberties with how your swings translate to the game, a necessity, given that the average player is not exactly a professional golfer, but few players are likely to notice. The result is a swinging mechanic that feels natural and gets players more involved in the game. It’s not just the accuracy though – the whole control system just feels much more refined than in the past.


Upon starting the game for the first time, players will have the option to run through a fairly thorough tutorial with Hank Haney, Tiger Woods’ coach. Hank will guide you through the basics of swinging, putting and club selection, as well as more advanced techniques like draw and fade shots. Players can customise their swinging and putting style to suit their skill level, with greater levels of assistance and less complicated mechanics able to be put in place for less experienced golfers. It’s vital that you feel comfortable with your control setup before you get too far into the game, as setting the right mechanisms (particularly putting) can be the difference between a birdie and a triple bogey.

Most of the territory beyond the fancy new swinging mechanics has been well explored in previous Tiger Woods games. Players have all sorts of on screen aids to help them position their shot correctly, and a useful little putting preview feature to help land those tricky putts. There are a few minor new features this year like dynamic weather data for each course provided by The Weather Channel, and the Play the Pros feature, where players’ scores can be posted online and compared to those of real professional golfers. These make for nice bullet points on the back of the box, but are not entirely crucial to the experience.

Career mode is still a major draw in Tiger Woods PGA Tour 10. Players can create a golf pro and join the professional tour, competing in all sorts of minor and major tournaments, racking up cash to buy new gear and filling their trophy cabinet with silverware. A few new tournaments and courses appear, including the US Open and USGA Championship for the first time in the series’ history. The Wii version of the game features some 27 courses including Pebble Beach, St. Andrews, TPC Sawgrass and Wentworth Golf Club –almost double the number that feature in the Xbox 360 and PS3 versions. Many professional golfers appear in the game; 19 from the PGA Tour and six from the LPGA Tour, including favourites such as Vijay Singh, Colin Montgomerie, Adam Scott and Annika Sorenstam.


Online support in Tiger Woods PGA Tour 10 is really good, putting many other online efforts on the Wii to shame. Players can compete in solo matches as well as regular tournaments on a daily and weekly basis. In these tournaments, players play a round and their score is posted to a leaderboard, with the best players making the cut into the next round. Tournaments are run separately based on difficulty to give rookies a chance, but raw skill is not the only element at play, as you are represented online by your career mode player. Since skills carry over between the two modes, you will need to play through a few offline tournaments to build up those basic skills before you hit the online links.

Presentation has never really been a strong point of the Tiger Woods series, but the 2010 game does look pretty good compared to most other Wii sports games. Golfers have all of the necessary details and animate well, though there is a certain roughness to the whole aesthetic. The courses are based on the real deal and come together pretty well, though they obviously look better on the HD version of the game. A new commentary team is on board to replace the lifeless banter we endured last year, giving the game a more professional feeling. Hank Haney’s voiceovers still sound like they were recorded in one take, but the script he is working from is much better than before.


The serious side of Tiger Woods PGA Tour 10 is only half of the package. Players also have access to a wide selection of golfing based mini-games. There are all sorts of short challenges, putting challenges, even a few holes of mini-golf, but the game that stands out the most is Disc Golf. A popular game at universities and colleges around the world, Disc Golf is exactly what it says on the tin – golf with a flying disc. Of course, you are not out there on the links whacking a disc with a club; instead, you throw the disc down the green, with the eventual goal of getting it into a basket where the pin would normally be. Disc Golf is exclusive to the Wii version of the game and requires the Wii Motion Plus to play. The Wii Motion Plus allows players to have full rotational control over the disc, so when you get close to the basket, you can turn the remote on its side and lob the disc in with little effort (does that make me a dirty cheat?).

With the Wii version of Tiger Woods PGA Tour 10, EA Sports has done a lot to silence those critics who thought the series was becoming something of a lumbering dinosaur. The integration of the Wii Motion Plus practically redefines the way we will approach and play golf games from this point forward – it’s good to see that EA is leading the charge. It’s got the main ingredients you need like a good interface, a packed career mode, the major professional players, and an absolute ton of courses, but it also packs in a few neat little extras like Disc Golf, which players will enjoy for a long time to come. Tiger Woods PGA Tour 10 is arguably one of the best sports games of the year.