Tiger Woods PGA Tour 08

"Knock around some balls with Tiger Woods"

After skipping the last two years of Tiger Woods on the DS, Electronic Arts brings us back up to date with Tiger Woods PGA Tour 08. Does this game actually stand a chance of being even halfway decent?

The short answer is yes.

I will admit, when I stuck this game in my DS and powered it up, I was not expecting much at all. Boy was I in for a rather nice surprise. When the game first loads up, you select a save slot, and proceed to create your virtual golfer. First you build the physique, selecting from such things as the stance, body size, and skin color. Then you move on to clothing choices. While this is a nice feature, it suffers from two very glaring problems. First, the selections are extremely slim. Six different faces, two skin tones, and a rather weak smattering of clothing options. The other major problem here is that there is no way to zoom in on your character nor is there a way to rotate him. This makes it extremely difficult when choosing a face, hair style, or type of hat. You just can't tell what your golfer looks like until you get in-game.

Once you have created your miniature golfer, Tiger Woods PGA 08 allows you to choose to play single player, multi-player, edit your golfer, or load up a different created golfer. In single player, you can choose to play a quick game, practice, do some Tiger Challenges, or golf on the PGA tour. If you want to start out on the tour right away, don't purchase anything in the shop. You start out with $25,000, and that just so happens to be the entry fee for the first PGA event. As for the shop I mentioned, it is hiding in the My Player section of the Main Menu. In multi-player you can choose between local wireless play, download play, pass play (multiple people playing on one DS), and playing over the Nintendo WFC. Yes, they have included online play. Although you may have a hard time finding any opponents on the golf course.

Delving a little deeper into the single player mode, I would like to talk about the Practice mode. Not only can you practice any hole you want, but you can also practice the games you get play in the Tiger Challenge. Want to practice your driving game? Sure. Want to practice hitting ball into bunkers? Well you better as one of the Tiger Challenges involves landing your tee-shot into one.

The rest of the Single player mode is fairly standard fare for a Tiger Woods game. Tiger will have you golfing from Pebble Beach all the way over to St. Andrews. There are 8 real life courses to play on, so you do some variety here. The Tiger Challenge mode consists of a collection of mostly taget based mini games. Here you'll get to work on the the previously noted Driving Challenge, Putting, Approach shots, and 333.

The controls are the shining point of this game. You can choose between touch screen swinging (which is the real draw here), and the classic three-click swing (tap the button to start the swing, tap it again to set the power, and a final tap for accuracy). The touch screen controls are for the most part great. Everything from your club selection to adding spin to your ball after the shot is handled with the stylus. The only caveat here is with putting. Sometimes it doesn't seem to register your swing of the putter correctly. I've always had a problem with putting in the Tiger Woods games, so this might just be with me. Of course, I have sunk a put when it looked like I missed the hole by a few inches, so it could be a graphical issue also.

The visuals of Tiger 08 look pretty good for a DS game. I would put it on par (no pun intended) with a Playstation 1 game produced in the later half of it's lifespan. The player animations are done really well which helps add to the realism of the game. The presentation is just as good. The first time you select a game mode in Single player, you are treated with a video clip of Tiger or some other pros. These videos are really high quality and are some of the best videos we've seen on a DS game. The menus are easy to navigate with either the stylus or the d-pad and buttons. The sound of golf are translated well here. When hitting the ball with different clubs it is noticeable, and you get all the clapping and cheers from the invisible crowd.

Tiger Woods PGA 08 for the Nintendo DS is a solid golfer. If you are a fan of the Tiger Woods series or you just looking to knock a few balls around, you will not be disappointed with this game.

Gameplay: 7
Graphics: 7
Sound: 7
Control: 8
Lasting Value: 8

Reviewer's Score: 7/10, Originally Posted: 08/30/07