I've played golfing games on and off on the PC for many years and have enjoyed most of them. Tiger Woods PGA Tour 2005 on PC CD-Rom by Electronic Arts was a great example of the genre. I was therefore really looking forward to giving Tiger Woods PGA Tour 2006 on Playstation 2 a test drive.

Getting it loaded up was of course no problem at all and the intro screens were as expected. Creating a player profile can be a short affair if you wish to go the randomizing route, or it can be a lengthy task if you want your golfer to be a body double. This I'm sure is possible if you've got lots of time to spare and a wardrobe full of anoraks.

Playing with your newly created golfer is another matter altogether as you will be starting with minimal skills and power levels so getting as far as the green itself can take some time if your drives start in the 100-200yds region. That takes me of course to the method of controlling the shots.

EA have totally re thought the control method and analogue control provides the input method across the board. A twin analogue stick approach, one for controlling swing and power and the other for spin/fade/draw. These can be reversed (annoyingly going back to the default each time you load the game) but initially left stick for shot (swing/power) and right for Shape (spin/draw/fade).

There doesn't seem to be an option for any other method of controlling shots, more is the pity because this method is darned awful to my aged hand/eye co-ordination. I'm used to using a PC mouse with either two/three click method or true swing method and either of these are miles ahead of what EA Sports has developed for the PS2. There doesn't seem to be any consistency available in either power or direction and this is frustrating to say the least, as it's the major part of the game. You need to know how much swing will deliver the correct amount of power and try as I might, I cannot find a consistency and/or accuracy to the method included in this version.

Maybe it's a skill level I'm lacking, but it's the first golf game I'm finding a struggle. What about the rest of the game?

Well it looks and sounds fantastic, there are masses of different game types such as Skins, Matchplay, Four Ball, Battle. Name them and they are there somewhere. There's a rivals mode, which allows you to play against all time greats such as Nicklaus. There are lots of courses to choose from such as Pebble Beach, Pumpkin Ridge, Sahalee and Troon, plus many to unlock as you progress through the game. You can play as or against Tiger Woods, Colin Montgomerie, John Daly, Jim Furyk or as many others from the PGA Tour, all with differing combinations of Power and Skill levels to vary their games.

I really wanted to enjoy this game but could not master the controls to make it worth perservering with. There are many reviewers out there who disagree with this, take alook at http://www.gamespot.com/ps2/sports/tigerwoodspgatour2006/review.html?mode=gsreview for a completely different point of view.

I will return to my PC version for a more playable and enjoyable virtual golfing experience.

Review by Vince