Swingers club

by ERIK LEIJON

When it comes to sports-game adaptations, no sport comes out more dramatically different when converted to the small screen than golf. On an actual course, golf is slow, methodical, quiet, strategic and taken way too seriously. Video games usually tend to have few or none of these qualities, so when a game like Tiger Woods PGA Tour 10 (Multi/EA Sports, EA Tiburon) strives hard for both stringent realism (down to real-time weather) and video game brevity, the final result isn’t necessarily a frame-by-frame reconstruction of the sport.

The main issue with making a golf video game is reducing the time it takes to play a standard round of 18 holes. Although four-and-a-half hours is an acceptable timeframe for a golf game, Tiger Woods 10 has to pack all the emotion and challenge into less than an hour. It helps that there’s no walking involved, and unless you’re the type of miscreant I tend to play behind at local courses—one that takes eons to size up their putts, only to miss by a laughable margin—there are no frustrating pre-shot routines to go through. A round on one of the many real-life courses in Tiger 10—including 2009 U.S. Open host Bethpage Black—is fast, with few shanks and plenty of highlight reel shots.

In recent years, the Tiger series has included more online community features, since no one wants to get their first hole-in-one without any witnesses. Players can save their favourite shots with a simple button press, and there are more options in terms of live tournament play.

In a sense, neither are intrinsic to the experience but playing a round for fun and being issued minor challenges such as being notified that Player X stuck his approach shot to within a foot of the cup, is at least something immediate to strive for.

It’s a shame the career mode is still a complete waste of time, where one gives up the chance to play as the best PGA and LPGA pros for a custom created bushwhacker unable to hit a fairway or sink the easiest of putts. The only way to improve in career mode is to play for hours on end by yourself, so the reward for putting in the time is minimal and it’s more fun to smack 295-yard drives with a leggy Paula Creamer than struggle with an awkward looking fictional character.

As fun as the online challenges and long drive-type mini-games are, Tiger 10 is best played with fellow golfing buddies on rainy afternoons when the local courses are closed. It’s gripping and ripping to an extreme level of speed, and being able to put up the types of low scores most weekend warriors could only dream of is part of the fun. To that point, authentic equipment and real courses don’t add to the enjoyment since one simply cannot appreciate the small pleasures of golf when it’s in digitized form.

The Tiger Woods series still has its head in the bunker concerning the unplayable career mode, but as a simple golf game, it’s a weekly tee-off time worth booking.

Chip off the RTS block

Lego Battles (DS/Waner Bros., Hellbent) does a good job of proving a Lego-themed game can succeed by its lonesome, even without a bigger brand name like Star Wars or Indiana Jones involved. This Nintendo DS traditional real-time strategy game has its issues: too simplistic for true RTS fans, confusing picture-based menus and very little Lego involved during the actual missions, but the Chaplin-esque slapstick movie cutscenes indicate a universe of mute Lego characters can carry a video game.