Everybody knows the story of one Eldred Woods. Golf prodigy, winner of numerous U.S. Amateur titles, conquers college golf at Stanford, and then becomes the most dominant player of golf in his generation with 10 major tournament victories. He also can team up with EA and make one helluva golf game, too. Tiger and EA have gone to great lengths to add the realism to golf, and the golf sim he has presented on the Xbox 360 will have you enthralled for hours and hours and days and days until they have to pry you off the couch.

FORE! OK, that was definitely cliché…
Golf has always been a niche part of sports gaming. Everybody is more interested in baseball, football, and basketball, and then Tiger comes along a few years back and starts putting out an EA golf product that would make golf fans happy. Here, on the 360, he does it again, with loads of great features, great courses, and of course, the man who can make you wet yourself at the notion of trying to take him on for 18 holes, Tiger Woods.

First thing you notice is how beautiful the courses are. When you start out in any of the modes, the first course you hit is the legendary Pebble Beach Golf Links from the Monterey Peninsula in California, home to some of golf’s greatest games and fondest memories. You can start a quick game as Tiger and maneuver one of the most beautiful courses in all of golf, and take out it’s trickerations and deceitfulness with your clubs and balls. In fact, try to get a double eagle sometime. Go ahead. (Writer’s note: I ALREADY DID! Not that I toot my own horn or anything…) The rewards you get for being so good are just, but more on the rewards later.

I Wanna Be Like…uh, Tiger, I guess.
Yes, the thing that everybody loves to do when it comes to Tiger Woods PGA Tour 06 is to be able to make yourself in the game, with EA putting a lot of emphasis on being able to make hundreds of different model designs for your golfer, and doing a good job with it, as well. The number of beards alone is incredible. You can choose from like 25 different beards, no joke, and make your golfer look as scruffy or as professional as ever. So you can look as suave as “The Big Easy” Ernie Els or look as scruffy as John Daly, or as stylish as, dare it be said…Mr. Eldred Woods himself.

From there, the My Career mode leads you down a path of discovery. Are you good? Can you win? Will you beat Tiger? Do you want your swing to look as bad (or as good) as Charles Barkley’s? You can choose from dozens of swing animations, along with celebration and negative animations, ranging from the Phil Mickelson Masters celebration to any of the negative celebrations Happy Gilmore did short of knocking out Bob Barker. There’s a multitude of clubs you can earn, and different balls to shoot with, along with great apparel from numerous golf designers. EA went the full monty with all the nuances in this game, and because of what has been included, the experience you get from it is quite nice.

You earn experience points toward your skills to improve as you go along the road in your career, and by winning challenges along the way, you get to find out just how big a golfer you are. The more money you earn for big shots, like double eagles (Heck yes, double eagles), or just a great tee shot into the fairways allows you to get the best apparel, the best celebrations, and the best equipment.

If you don’t care like playing as Tiger, or as yourself, you can choose to play in any of seven different styles of play, ranging from stroke to match to the high-scoring Stableford Scoring System, and so on. Online modes allow you to play against different Xbox Live players, along with EA sponsored online tournaments.



Tiger Woods 06

El Golfo is Muy Bueno
The controls for the game are the usual Tiger fare. The left analog stick dictates how you will hit the ball, giving you a chance to control your shot in different facets. You want to lightly use a pitching wedge to ease one up on the green? Just tilt back and forward in a continuous motion before you get to the top of your backswing. Want a high arching shot? Hold the right analog stick down and start your swing. The array of shots in the game are many, and it’s a testament to knowing the game and knowing the situation in order to use them to your advantage.

For a first shot at golf on the 360, it’s a good start, and a lot of fun. If you’re a fan of golf, you’ll most certainly enjoy EA and Tiger’s first efforts. It’s not exactly a Major contender yet, but you can most certainly win The Tour Championship with this one.