I’ve never played a round of golf in my life. I’m certain I don’t have the patience for the game (not to mention the skill) and I’m pretty sure I couldn’t get away with wearing the trousers. But after a little practice on Tiger Woods PGA Tour 14 anyone can attempt to golf with the best of ‘em.

Tutorial & Learning Curve

The tutorial that talks you through most of the terms and systems you will need to use to progress through the game is comprehensive. The problem I found was that the tutorial was explaining things I didn’t even understand at a concept level. The topics covered only became apparent as I progressed through the game.

To be fair my golfing ignorance isn’t PGA Tour 14’s  fault. Nor is it its problem. But the tutorial didn’t make much sense to me. It explains things that I’m sure golfing fans would understand but what use is that? An alternate tutorial for beginners in line with “golfing for dummies” would have been useful. At least for me.

Despite the almost useless tutorial I continued playing and started to figure out how things worked for myself. You will get told the basic functions several times outside the tutorial anyway so getting on and learning for yourself is the key.

Game Modes

There are loads of game modes on offer, especially considering we are by definition limited to golf. Among the quick matches and tour modes there is also the new “Legends of the Major” mode offering the chance to replay the greatest and most “exciting” rounds of golf ever.

There are also loads of golfers to choose from and I’m sure there is enough even for golf aficionados. The quick game options allow for a nice amount of customizability and you can jump into a round with the options of your choosing reasonably easily.

Meanwhile tour mode allows you to compete with a golfer of your choosing (or a custom character) and work your way through amateur divisions up to the PGA or LPGA tour. There’s a reasonable sense of progression and the inability to replay a tournament after you’ve finished it, whilst sometimes frustrating, can be rewarding if you’re successful.

Online games are reasonably painless and a timer ensures players don’t take too long to make a shot. There are also country clubs you can join, with up to 100 members, to compete and play together. Decent chat options have been added and connectivity is efficient.

Difficulty

One of my favourite features of any game is customizable difficulty. The options you have to make it easier or harder for you to get your desired shots are plentiful and I soon found the right compromise of challenge and usability. Although admittedly the settings I chose at first where unattainably ambitious, it’s actually very easy to alter these options – even mid-shot.

You can also alter the AI difficulty which essentially lowers the score required to win tournaments. You can change various settings regarding the UI which often make the game easier or more difficult respectively and most of the difficulty settings offer a small XP multiplier to reward more advanced players.

Probably the most irritating thing that can happen is you get through four (out of five) full rounds, each comprising of 18 holes, and manage to get a 6 to 10 point lead. With the separation between the other players this is almost a definite win with only pars and maybe even a couple of boggies.

All of a sudden, in the final round, an AI player that hasn’t even been in the leader board decides to do incredibly well and win the tournament. I may have been unlucky but there does seem to be a habit of losing in the final round, and only the final round, and this has happened several times.

I admit I’m not great at the game but on the settings I chose my deaf cat should have been able to win with ease. And she doesn’t play golf either.

The Menus (oh god the menus…)

The menus are truly painful throughout the entire game. From square one you are presented with appallingly dreary and uninspired overlays that often make it unclear where you are or where you want to be. They don’t get any easier or more dynamic the more you use them either. They’re just bad.

Then there’s the loading times. I have never seen loading times this appalling on a game running on a console from this generation. I only played the PS3 version and maybe the XBOX 360 version didn’t have these problems (I’m sure the option to install to HDD would help) but either way it’s inexcusable.

Levelling up is nice and progressive and before long you have usually levelled up and earned yourself some new clubs, a small stat increase and a nice new pair of socks. The only problem is that navigating the menus to check your new items and then equip them is a painfully slow process. Perusing your newly earned items and skills should be rewarding and the menus just sap any joy out of the process.

Audio

On the menus “EA trax” is present playing a selection of relaxing background tracks. During a round of golf the music stops and instead you get bird noises and commentators. The commentators are actually quite good and occasionally provide some surprisingly funny remarks.

Unfortunately the audio cuts out constantly. During games in the middle of comments or on the menus during music the audio isn’t smooth at all. You can’t miss it when it happens and it happens regularly. Try and think of another game where this happened. I’ve never seen it before and expect more from current games. Especially from a big hitter like EA.

Visuals

You have a character in a limited, reasonably unchangeable environment that stands in a very predictable position and can make a very limited number of movements. I expected the environments to look absolutely stunning. They’re so predictable they could nearly have got away with pre-rendering!

But tree’s look unrealistic and the grass just looks like a big green block with little apparent texturing. Usually grass isn’t something I’m really bothered about but in this game it’s a protagonist and I expected better.

The character animations aren’t bad but I’ve seen better. Usually EA Sports excel above all others in this area. There are some nice effects occasionally but this game is not particularly good looking.

Conclusion

Tiger Woods PGA Tour 14 can be an incredibly satisfying experience at times. But then it can also cause pad-destructing frustration. This total fluctuation at times lead me to never want to turn it off and at others to never want to turn it back on again and use the disc as a one-way Frisbee.

The mechanics are advanced and work very well if you know what you’re doing. Sadly flaws in the basics and fundamentals run so deep that PGA’s good qualities rarely get chance to shine as much as they otherwise could.

If the sound worked, the menus and visual effects where in keeping with modern games and the constant loading times where sub 30 seconds PGA’s better features would be apparent. But so often they are not.

PGA Tour 14 is unashamedly aimed directly at golf fans, which is not necessarily a bad thing. The more you like golf the more you will enjoy this game. For me, and other non-golfing folk, consider a casual golfing game like Everybody’s Golf. It’s nowhere near as advanced and probably won’t have the highs of PGA 14 but nor will you have to endure the abysmal lows.

Tiger Woods PGA Tour 14 really needs two scores. For the golf fans who can wade through and forgive all the problems this score wouldn’t be fir (sorry). But I am first and foremost a gamer and frankly this game is sub-par.

Tiger Woods PGA Tour 14 is available now for PS3 and XBOX 360.

Reviewed on PS3.