Tiger Woods PGA Tour: Still Gold Standard of iPhone Games

Over 100,000 apps. Let's be honest. That's a lot of crap. Luckily there are some quality apps like EA's Tiger Woods PGA Tour, $4.99. The game play is intuitive and graphics are great. The only downside, no online play?? Come on EA – an online Leaderboard would be huge. Imagine the bragging rights! This is an amazing app with just about every feature a serious fan could hope for out of an iPhone golf game. There are 126 holes on seven courses (Pebble Beach, St Andrews, TPC Sawgrass, The K Club, Doral, Fancourt TPC Boston), real golfers like Tiger, Vijay and Annika, invitationals and tournaments, and a control scheme that truly feels great. Adding spin to the ball is easy and hitting is like Golden Tee. To begin, you create your very own golfer from a competent character generator. You get to pick skin color, short or long pants and short or long shirts. See me in the purple and gold on the right. I look like I’m on the LSU golf team. Once you have your model you can either practice your shot or jump right into the extensive tournament schedule. When addressing the ball there is a button that gives a raised camera view which covers the entire hole giving you a bird’s eye view of how to play the hole. Another thing I like about this game is the money. You start with $50,000 and you have to buy your way into tournaments. You won’t be close to winning at first. However, you still make bonus cash by hitting good shots. Make a great drive or hit a good putt and you get bonus cash. You use this money to buy better clubs, gloves, tees all of which improve your spin, power, control and putting. This is nice since you will not make the leaderboard the first few times you play.The swing meter is great. As I mentioned it totally reminds me of Golden Tee. Remember teeing off with a bottle of brew in your left hand! Love that game. Pictured here on the left you just slide your finger down and then back up. Once you hit the ball you can swipe your finger across the screen to give it a little hook or draw. You must be precise. A little off and you are in the rough and its much harder to play from there. So after playing this game for hours I finally realized that putting is quite simple. When on the green your “caddie” gives you the read in text on the left. Something like 1 foot short and 6 inches left. You don’t have to look at the grid just go with his tip and you’ll be draining putts left and right. See the leaderboard to the right. Who’s that leading at -2 after 8 holes. Yes, that’s your man iPhone4! I’ve played 18 holes at work many times with no battery drain issues. Play a couple of holes, take a call, relaunch the game and you pick up right where you left off. Not surprising that EA made such a quality golf game for the iPhone. I’d give it a 9 out 10. Get it online and it’s a 10. To get a real feel for the game watch me dominate a couple of holes in this video on my blog.