This by far the best Tiger Woods game to date and is also the most challenging.
First of all, the single-player portion of the game is primarily based around the “Tiger Challenge” mode as well as the PGA Tour Season. In addition, you can play rounds of golf for pure fun against A.I. too. The Tiger Challenge consists of you creating a golfer using the character creation feature (which is more in depth than ever letting you create any kind of golfer you can imagine) and then using him to compete against various golfers in match play games of the 9 hole and 18 hole variations. You can also use rookie Tiger Woods if you really don’t want to make a character. Once you beat everybody who there is to play in the ladders you have to face Tiger himself. The PGA Tour Season is exactly that, a PGA Tour Season. You must take your character and play through a season trying to win as many tournaments as possible, and eventually the FedEx Cup which is new to both real golf and the game.
There are a few new gamemodes added this year with the big ones being Greensome and Bloodsome. Although they cannot be played online, they are both fun to play when friends come over (or you can always play against the A.I.). Greensome consists of 2 vs. 2 best ball, but your team picks which shot they want to use instead of playing both. Bloodsome is the same except the other team picks which shot they want you to hit. The online play is vastly improved over last year’s. There is little to no lag in the actual game itself once it gets going, but you occasionally may lock-up or freeze in a game lobby or when hosting. The community is very good for this game with very few people quitting early and hardly any trash talkers. When you log on regardless of your time zone, there is always somebody who wants to play. I have played around 70+ matches and have had fun in every one of them.
Some more pluses in this game would be that it has a more realistic feel to it. Rarely do you hit a ball perfectly straight in this game. Different layers you will meet online play fades and draws on purpose, but some play them on accident which makes the game even better. The putting also seems to be more difficult online, and an extra little bit of challenge is always nice.
The graphics are improved over 06, primarily the character models. The most noticeable difference would be that Tiger Woods doesn’t look like he has eye liner on. The courses themselves look very good, but the background and water sometimes look ugly with all the jagged edges.
The sound is pretty good, but some of the clubs don’t sound like their real life counterparts and the sound the ball makes when entering the cup is completely off (I play a lot of golf and notice the little things.)
The only big negatives I have with the game are some of the online issues, and the fact that the “Try 5 online tournaments” achievement doesn’t work at all, otherwise this game is a lot of fun and is a great golf sim.
If you are a golf fan, or at least a fan of the Tiger Woods series I would highly recommend that you purchase this game. It is not only a challenging game, but has good multiplayer and gamemodes to keep you busy far after you finish the singleplayer.