Tuesday, September 6, 2011

Fore! Hours Spent Playing Tiger Woods PGA TOUR 12: The Masters

If you had a big enough cup, a golf hole flag could be used as a coffee stirrer!
Coffee Beans
     Tiger Woods PGA TOUR 12: The Masters (TW12) was released on March 29, 2011 for the Wii, with a MSRP of $49.99.  TW12 was the first game of the Tiger Woods golf games to feature and allow players to compete at the Augusta National Golf Club.
     The game was developed by EA Tiburon, and published by the EA Sports branch of Electronic Arts.  The game was also released on the PlayStation 3 and Xbox 360 on March 29; and just today, September 6, Tiger Woods PGA Tour 12: The Masters released on the PC and Mac platforms.
     TW12 received an "Everyone" rating from the ESRB, and has no content descriptors listed for parents/gamers to be aware of.

     How many hours have Wii owners spent golfing in Tiger Woods PGA TOUR 12: The Masters since the game released?  Let's take a look!

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Approx. Number of Players Having Reported Data
     Tiger Woods PGA TOUR 12: The Masters has about 2,911 Wii owners that have reported game-play data through the Nintendo Channel, with 160 days possibly reported.

Average & Total Game-Play Hours
     TW12 has 52,188 Total Hours of game-play reported, with an average play-time of 17 Hours 56 Minutes "Per person" reporting data.
     The game's average play-time is 2 Hours 3 Minutes per day/session reported.

Amazon.com Sales Information
     Tiger Woods PGA TOUR 12: The Masters has an Amazon.com sale rank of #523, and it is currently on sale for $36.16.
     (Sale rank and price recorded around 7:30PM on September 6, 2011.)

Review Score Averages
     TW12 has a "professional" review score average of 84.19%, based on 8 reviews on GameRankings.com.

     The game has a 4 out of 5 Stars rating on Amazon.com based on 41 customer reviews.
     Tiger Woods PGA Tour 12's customer review score average is 80.00%, when the reviews are converted to a 100% review scale.
     (Review score averages recorded around 7:30PM on September 6, 2011.)

Filtered Thoughts
     While I enjoyed Wii Sports' golf game, I have never purchased a golf video game outright.  I do own one of the Tiger Woods golf games, but it is one of the PlayStation 2 games that a friend gave me, and I have never even played it.
     If you have not seen any footage of Tiger Woods PGA TOUR 12: The Masters, the video below shows how EA was making The Masters a big part of the game, and they wanted to make sure potential buyers knew about it:


     Tiger Woods PGA TOUR 12: The Masters is the sixth Tiger Woods golf game to be released for the Wii.  Do the math, and that is more than one release per year for the series, since the Wii released.
     I think the reported average game-play hours "Per person" of nearly 18 hours is pretty good for the game, though I don't know how long it would take to play through the career mode, if there is such a thing.  Also, with how EA has their own online multiplayer servers, I don't think the hours reported for TW12 are exactly accurate, because the online multiplayer hours may not be reflected here.
     Seeing TW12 data debut in under 6 months is decent for the game, though not great compared to other Wii games.  I know the Tiger Woods series has seen a sharp drop in sales over the last few years, and I wonder if EA will continue yearly releases for it as they have with the Madden series, or if perhaps giving the Tiger Woods series a break would benefit it in the long run?  I guess we will find out in another 5-6 months.

Questions
     If any of you have played Tiger Woods PGA TOUR 12: The Masters, what do you think about the game?
     If you are a huge Tiger Woods game fan and have played multiple games from the series, what do you think of Tiger Wood PGA TOUR 12: The Masters compared to older games in the series?
     Is The Masters a game you would recommend to other gamers, and perhaps one you would recommend far above the older Tiger Woods game?

If any of you are interested in Tiger Wood PGA TOUR 12: The Masters, you can see links for the different versions on Amazon.com below:
     

9 comments:

  1. I love this game, actually. I find it has tremendous replay value... but I've liked every version of Tiger Woods since 2005. I don't golf in real life, but I find teeing off on wii to be relaxing.

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  2. I haven't had a chance to play this one yet - I have TW 11. Golf, hockey and baseball are titles I tend to pick up once every few years, and not every year like I do Madden and NBA 2K series. One of my friends does have this on the Wii though, so I've gotten to play it a few times, and while he kicked my butt, I thought the game itself was quite good.

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  3. @jb:
    So, have you purchased every Tiger Woods Wii game, or just played all of them?
    While I haven't played the Tiger Woods series, I enjoyed my time with Wii Sports' golf, so I can see how people enjoy the golf games.

    @Chalgyr:
    Was TW11 the first one to use WM+ controls? I can't remember now.
    I always wondering how much of an improvement the controls were with WM+, and whether that control option would make the game to realistic for some players.

    Thank you both for the comments/feedback!

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  4. It's not very surprising the amount of time people have spent on TW12 even considering the low(ish) amount of consoles reporting data. I have TW10 and while I think it is a great game, I've only put in 20 hours so far. (more backlog and time constraints, though it is my second-highest played game being beaten only by wii sports) I'd think part of the hours also has to do with being set at Augusta and the level of detail and accuracy they put in the game. Having been there in person several times I'm very interested to see how it looks and feels. Part of me wonders if it would be a better experience on 360/ps3 merely for the visuals. (seriously everyone should go there at some point for a few days of Masters practice rounds)

    @Coffee: I believe TW10 was the first to support WM+ and I feel it makes a noticable difference. I've played in both modes and it responds much better and more accurately with the WM+ attachment. In either mode it's a huge improvement from the standard Wii Sports Golf. Though as compared to real life, it's still a bit iffy. :)

    @jb: How does TW10 compare to 12 beyond the setting of Augusta? I am very impressed with virtually every aspect of 10, though I haven't looked closely enough yet to decide on purchasing 12.

    One thing I am glad to see are different commentators in 12. No offense to Kelly Tilghman, but I was getting tired of listening to her and welcome Nantz and Feherty.

    Hopefully 12 still retains alot of the fun features that made 10 great like:

    - Various challenge modes (accuracy, etc..)
    - Online mode and tournaments.
    - Career mode to build your player
    - Unlockable characters

    From looking at amazon (pretty nice price right now) it does have some pretty cool sounding features:

    - Balance board
    - Historic masters moments
    - A real caddy
    - 4-player support on or offline
    - more built-in content instead of DLC that's on the ps/360 versions. (so I hear)


    One thing I wish the Wii version had (perhaps all versions are the same) is more interaction for online rounds. The last time I played online with TW10 it was kind of boring actually. I don't believe you could communicate at all with the other player and it was like both of you were playing the same hole at the same time and sort-of just finished together. I don't think you could even see the other player swing, just that the ball went somewhere.

    (I'm really hoping that I'm just dead wrong about that.)

    It's a shame too as I have some old EA Sports "PGA Tour" PC games had good online support. (circa 1999? hey, it had Peter Jacobson in it) I know it had text chat and am pretty sure it even had voice chat as well which was pretty cool for the era and made the round much more fun. I mean who doesn't enjoy some good hearted trash talk when you dump a shot in the water? :)

    I guess that brings us back full circle to the WiiSpeak conversation or custom mic support that they included in CoD and possibly the conduit 2, but very little else.

    @Coffee: As for the reported hours for online mode, I don't know either. Though in TW10 you do access the EA servers directly inside of the game so I imagine the Wii will keep track of how long you're in the game and online time is included.

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  5. @coffee - you know, I can't recall if my friend had it with the WM+ or not - my copy of TW 11 is actually for the PS3 - which does work with the Move and handles pretty well for the most part. I will say though, my friend's Wii TW did seem a bit more accurate and responsive with the motion controls

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  6. @Robert:
    I know you mentioned you think WM+ makes it respond much better, and more accurately than Wii Sports' golf, but what Wii Sports Resort's golf game? Have you played/compared those?

    The Balance Board support seems to be an interesting addition to the game, and I can imagine it may even help people in real life golf perhaps with form factor, if they're using the sensors to provide feedback. I wonder how well that functions in the game.

    As for your question, "I mean who doesn't enjoy some good hearted trash talk when you dump a shot in the water?"
    I wonder if the PS3/360 versions have online voice chat? I think Wii Speak COULD work well for this game if the unit itself was decent enough, because there isn't a lot of background music/sound in a golf game I don't think...

    As for the reported hours I guess it does make sense that the Wii would track game time based on usage overall, and not just online. Just some Wii games that haven't debuted yet, I find really odd and are from EA(Harry Potter for one).

    @Chalgyr:
    Speaking of Move support, Sony REALLY seems to be stepping up the promotion/bundles with the Sony Move unit now.

    Thank you both for the comments/feedback!

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  7. @coffee - agreed, Sony has been pushing it more and more. I've actually got a fairly large series of Move articles coming in the somewhat near future. I won that one back last year and got some playtime out of it, but I've never really felt like it was a must-have item for the ps3. In fact, it became trade fodder very recently toward getting me a new PS3 when the old one died.

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  8. @Coffee:
    I actually haven't played Wii Sports Resort at all. I bought TW10 with the WM+ bundled then got another WM+ adapter by itself. My guess is that the game does respond better and more accurately than before, though it can't compare to the EA PGA series as far as realism and options.

    As far as the balance board, I'd like to learn more about that and see if it enhances the game. Now, being more realistic sometimes doesn't mean enhanced. If my weight shifting is all wonky and causes the game to detect a bad shot, then maybe I'm not going to use it. :)

    Now that I think of it I think a friend of mine was doing something with the balance board and maybe even Wii Sports Resort golf and really liked it. Said he thought it even helped his real swing some.

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