Tiger Woods PGA Tour 09 News: Simultaneous Play Blog

Patrick Bellanca from EA Sports has posted a blog regarding the Simultaneous Online Play, new to this years game. 

Simultaneous Play

Posted 06.25.2008

What’s up Tiger Woods PGA TOUR fans!  My name is Patrick Bellanca and I am a Development Tester, working on the Wii version of Tiger Woods PGA TOUR 09.  This has been a very exciting year for us, since it’s the first time we at Tiburon have had a chance at a Wii title.  We decided early on to read as many forums as possible and set a plan to address our audience’s suggestions from previous years.  We’ve learned that one of the biggest features that you guys wanted to see on the Wii last year was online gameplay.  So this year, we are proud to announce that Tiger Woods PGA TOUR 09 offers a unique online experience for the first time on the Wii. 

Tiger Woods PGA Tour 09 News: Thoughts on New IGN Videos

IGN has posted four different videos for Tiger Woods PGA Tour 09.  You can access them by clicking here. Below are my impressions for each video:

Video 1: “What a Putt”

This video shows Tiger with an approach to the green followed by a lengthy putt for birdie.  In watching the high-res video, I do notice that the course looks fairly vivid.  I also like the subtle in-game graphics for how your ball is lying and where you’re wanting to go with your next shot.  They seem to flow well, and color-wise do not detract from the course.  What disturbs me is the commentary though.  I have no problem with Kelly Tilghman in this clip, but Sam Torrance seems to be very dry and very boring.  And gone is the enjoyable banter that McCord and Feherty had.  Hopefully this is just one bad situation as we continue on through the clips.  I did notice in the top left corner for the putt preview that there is a 1x, so there may be a setting to let you select how often it can be used for a shot.  Other than that, there is not really anything earth shattering about the game play compared to past Tiger Woods PGA Tour Golf games.

Wii: Tiger Woods PGA Tour 09 All-Play IGN Preview

June 16, 2008 – With its tactile feel and gestural gameplay opportunities, the Wii remote has always seemed perfectly suited to golf titles, which is probably why just about every developer, from Nintendo to third-parties like Tecmo and EA, has taken a “swing” at one or more such efforts since the launch of Nintendo’s popular home console. Of course, it’s a task easier said than done. Wii Sports golf, for example, got the one-to-one swing mechanics down pat, but it completely ignored draw and fade, necessary options for true golfers. Oppositely, previous iterations of Tiger Woods PGA Tour included sometimes wonky draw and fade controls, but dropped the one-to-one swing and in turn the sensation that you’re in direct control of the club. Don’t even get us started on Super Swing Golf.

We’ve got some great news to report, though. EA has gone back do the drawing board with Tiger Woods PGA Tour 09 for Wii and the end result is a game of golf that feels both much more tailored to the Big N’s platform and more polished than it ever has before. You will notice this newfound presentational finesse from the moment the game boots complete with a new interface overhauled with pointer-ready menus, and even better, enhanced in-game graphics. And when you pick up the remote to drive the ball, you’re going to see Tiger’s swing move at a one-to-one ratio with your own — finally.

Tiger Woods PGA Tour 09 News: Barbosa Blog on Club Tuner

Click here for the EA Sports link, or enjoy the info below:

Posted 06.18.2008

This is Carlos B. again on Tiger Woods PGA TOUR® 09 with another blog.  This time around I wanted to talk about another one of our new features.  This one deserved its own blog entry as its impact can be tremendous.  I’m talking about the Club Tuner and it is the first time in a Tiger Woods PGA TOUR® game that you have complete control over how your shots feel and perform.

One of the big questions we wanted to answer this year was the control sensitivity.  For new users it’s a bit tough, but veterans to the franchise find it easy.  It dawned on us that we may never get it perfect, and thus, Club Tuner was born.  Let’s dive into what you can do this year.

The Club Tuner gives control over different properties that affect the performance of the club.  You tune the club on a driving range by adjusting sliders and testing your changes right away.  You’ll be able to get immediate feedback of how the club feels and your coach, Hank Haney, will be on hand to help you out.  What’s really cool is that you’ll get the ability to hit back to back shots in a rapid fire mode.

There are five sliders in Club Tuner.  The first one is Power, and it affects how far the club can hit.  The second one is Workability and it affects how much you can shape your shot with draw and fade.  These two sliders allow for more control and distance from you shot, but the trade off is Sweetspot, which is how easy it is to hit the ball.  These sliders allow you to balance the swing sensitivity and performance of the club.

Poll: Which feature are you most excited about for Tiger Woods PGA Tour 09?

Feel free to vote and post comments and what you think!

 

Tiger’s 2008 Season Over…decides on season-ending knee surgery

From ESPN & AP:

Tiger Woods has decided to have surgery on his left knee, which will end his 2008 season.

Woods said on his Web site that Woods will have surgery on his anterior cruciate ligament. He also wrote that he needs time to rehabilitate a double stress fracture of his left tibia, which he said was discovered just before the Memorial Tournament in late May.

Woods skipped that event, but played 91 holes in winning the U.S. Open in a playoff over Rocco Mediate.

Woods said no date has been determed for the surgery.

Tiger Woods PGA Tour 09 News: Podcast with Hank Haney & Will Kinsler

To listen to the podcast (13:36) please click here.  This podcast features an interview with EA’s Will Kinsler and Tiger’s swing coach Hank Haney.  Hank gives Will some great insight towards the reason why Hank loves to coach golf, how he began to work with Tiger, and what steps it takes for casual golfers to have success in the game.  Hit the jump below to view the highlights of this podcast.

Gamespot: Tiger Woods PGA Tour 09 First Hands-on for 360

Click here to access the Gamespot article, or enjoy the article below:

Tiger Woods PGA Tour 09 First Hands-On

While Tiger attacks Torrey Pines, we take on EA Sports’ upcoming golf game.

By Brian Ekberg, GameSpot

Posted Jun 16, 2008 4:13 pm PT

SAN DIEGO–Although the world ran out of superlatives long ago to describe Tiger Woods’ talent on the golf course, you can still sit and watch, mouth agape, as he continues to rewrite the history books with each major outing. You need look no further than the third round of the 2008 U.S. Open for proof of that; playing on a surgically repaired knee that was clearly bothering him, Tiger managed to counterbalance his inaccurate drivers with some amazing recovery shots, phenomenal putting, and, as evidenced by that miraculous chip-in on 17, not a little luck. The only way that most of us will get anywhere near that kind of performance is in a video game. While in San Diego to check out some U.S. Open action, we also had a chance to see and play the most recent build of EA Sports’ latest golf game, Tiger Woods PGA Tour 09, a game that aims to help you become the best virtual duffer you can be.

Amid all the new features in Tiger 09, perhaps the most visible addition is that of Hank Haney, who serves as Woods’ real-life golf coach and, in Tiger 09, your mentor in the game (read about our time with Hank on the GameSpot Sports Blog). When you first fire up the game, Haney will be there to assess your skills in four crucial aspects: power, accuracy, short game, and putting. Playing through each of the four sets of minigames is similar to the challenges in previous Tiger games but, at the end of your skills evaluation, you’ll be given a numerical assessment of each of your four skills. Thanks to the dynamic attributes in Tiger 09 (which replace last year’s confidence system), it won’t be long before those baseline attribute scores start quickly going up. You can achieve a maximum score of 10 for each rating, which can be boosted a further two points depending on the kind of gear that your golfer’s using.

www.backnineblog.net is up and running!

I have a domain for the Back Nine Blog now – http://www.backnineblog.net

If you have this site bookmarked you can go ahead and change it to the new site now as it is up and running.  In addition, go ahead and spread the word to anyone that visits or would like to visit the site.

Feel free to browse all of the news on the blog by clicking the logo at the top, and also feel free to leave your comments about the articles as well.  Thanks for stopping by!

Wii’s Tiger Woods PGA Tour 09 Has Different Cover

As opposed to the sweet lime green Nike polos on the other console covers, the Wii version has this cover.  I think the reasoning behind this would be because the Tiger game on the other consoles is for the serious golf gamer, but the Wii version is more about fun and doing so with friends and family.  Therefore we get serious Tiger shots on the PS3/360 versions, and a shot of a happy Tiger on the Wii.