The Prelude
Surprisingly EA Sports basically has a monopoly on all sports games despite being considered the worst video gaming company in the world by many people. The Tiger Woods PGA Tour series was first released in 1999 with the original developers being Adrenalin Entertainment and EA Sports only licensing the product. In 2002 EA Sports picked up the development as well and hasn't looked back. Not a single other company has attempted to release a professional golf game since 2002 (with the exception of CyperTiger which did awfully). With the additions from 2013 and these new ones, we can say that EA Sports will be releasing a game with written home about.
After the poor rendition of this long series was released in 2012, EA Sports needed the next couple of Tiger Woods games to be phenomenal. Sure in 2012, for you Tiger Woods nuts, they did release the Master's theme, so I'll give the game that. However, the overall viewpoint was that the game didn't change much in its dynamic. The new move controller accuracy was very questionable along with the fact that the core feature set just wasn't even edited (or if it was very little). However, the release of 2013 brought the game back up to the dynasty status it deserves. EA Sports added kinect features, great new game modes, as well as the big one: Total Swing Control. If EA wanted to bring something innovative to the table, which they are notoriously bad at doing, Tiger Woods PGA Tour 13 was the game. With that being said, how could 2014 be better... at all?
The Features
Let's take a look at each one of the features EA Sports put on their website and see exactly why Tiger Woods PGA Tour 14 is going to be unreal.
Go For The Slam
I put this first on the list because although highly credited, I do believe this will be the part of the game more people will enjoy than Step Into The Past, which differs from what everyone else thinks. For the first time in the history of the franchise, users will have the opportunity to do what every golfer dreams of doing, winning the Grand Slam. For those of you unfamiliar to golf this includes the four majors: the Masters Tournament, U.S. Open, The Open Championship, and the PGA Championship.
This is where the game will become very interesting and I know it's the first thing I'm going to do. Let's face it, everyone wants to see if they could win nineteen or even twenty major titles and break Jack Nicklaus' record of eighteen. Also, I know there will be no better virtual golf feeling than when my simulated character puts on his green jacket for the first time. This goes without question as the greatest thing that EA Sports has done for this franchise because this marks the chapter of the game where it will compete for the best game. Every other game has it's championships in it; may that be Madden NFL or NHL. Now that Tiger Woods PGA Tour has the major's and makes the tour that much more realistic makes this game bar none the best sports game to date.
Step Into The Past
This is where everyone else thinks the most gameplay will be, and for good reason. EA Sports nows allow players to go back in time, clothes and all, and play against nine of the games greatest players in the game mode tentatively named Legends of the Majors. You will be able to go back and play against some of the best, as in: Arnold Palmer, Jack Nicklaus, Seve Ballesteros, Ben Hogan, Bobby Jones, Gary Player, Sam Snead, Lee Trevino, and the great Tiger Woods himself. You work your way through each era, hoping that you can consider yourself one of the greatest golfers of all time. My only skepticism comes from NBA 2K12 where the player could go back in time and play as Michael Jordan throughout his career. As entertaining as that was, the record books are the record books and people usually don't tend to care to change them. I believe this will be kind of like campaign mode for most shooter games. You'll do it because "it's apart of the game" but once you finish it, you'll never play it again. It's just something to get your gamerscore up and maybe your Tiger Wood's profile look a little nicer. I will enjoy playing it for the simple fact of their names, but my attention won't be focused on it.
Other New Features
Tiger Woods PGA Tour 14 brings more to the table than just these two new additions to game modes. Some of the most important aspects of the new game are the little things.
New Championship Courses
The game now also offers twenty championship courses, more than ever in the franchises history. These feature: Augusta National Golf Club, the Old Course at St. Andrews, and TPC Sawgrass. These should all offer a new great addition to the game, as well as it make it more customizable. I hated the lack of courses before, but twenty?! I can handle that.
Character Selection
After a few searches there is no telling exactly which golfers will be in this game, but you can rest assure there will plenty to choose from. However, EA Sports does give the number thirty-five as the low end of the scale. They said in an article about the game, "A robust roster of more than 35 playable golfers, representing the PGA and the LPGA." Later going on to only to include Bubba Watson, Keegan Bradley, Rickie Fowler, Lexi Thompson, and Paula Creamer as names of playable characters. However, I presume we will see roughly twenty-five playable male characters and ten playable female characters. That number may be skewed higher in the male favor, but this is the first time they will be introducing any LPGA players into the game so I'm assuming we will only see the greatest of their gender in the first round of LPGA virtual players.
LPGA
Finally the athletic girls in the world can play a video game that can be directly tied to their gender... if their a golfer. Being able to play in the "first major" (since it's female I guess it gets quotation marks?) of the year does seem pretty cool, but I really don't see the feature getting used much. People will do it to try it out, but realistically the only gender that plays video games is male and realistically if a girl is a golfer, she's probably playing golf. I don't really see a lot of females who are like myself and a fan of the sport before an athlete in the sport, but maybe I'm wrong?
Play In Any Weather, Any Time
Let's face it, it's cool when you play Madden and you're at home as the Packer's and you have that Wisconsin snowfall coming down. Well, now that feature comes to Tiger Woods. It's cool because it tracks live weather feed from the actual golf course, therefore you're playing in that courses weather! That is cool to me because it brings something to the game that we've never gotten to experience before... NIGHT GOLF! I think this is one of the cooler features and it really doesn't have to be "used." It's just a thing they did that will make this game UNREAL
Swing Style
As an engineer I can say this is the most exciting "update" for the game that I can't wait for. The new physics engine within the game really takes it to a whole new level. The shot shaping is going to be much more advanced than in 2013 which is great because I always thought that was one of the things in the 2013 I disliked the most. Although I haven't seen a prototype for it yet, sources say that there will be a new swing meter as well. I will like to see how this pans out because I was a fan of the old one, so hopefully it blows me away. The ball itself is suppose to "better replicate real-life golfing" says EA Sports, however this will be the most challenging. The ball has always seems very "generated" from the point of view of a gamer but it's hard to change that, most balls look bad. However, I am a man who underestimates, so hopefully this will be something that really makes the player feel like they are outside golfing. I think a cool addition they also are making is adding in twenty-four new swing styles. This really will give us the feel of "playing yourself," however this game is far behind those before them who have stances involved (I believe MLB video games have had every players stance in them since the early 2000's.)
The Conclusion
With all of these new updates and features it is safe to say that Tiger Woods PGA Tour 14 will be the best to date and make a standard for future sports games to come. These are but a few features that have been released and there are plenty more to come. One of which could be a Members Only Club, where you can invite up to 100 friends to be in your clubhouse. Features like this will only make the game more appealing, and will only make it sell that many more copies. Golf is one of the most popular sports and Tiger Woods revolutionized the game in real life and now virtually. Be on the look out for the review when the game is set to release on March 26th (March 28th everywhere besides North America.)
Follow me on twitter at @BrandonJPScott
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