PGA Tour 2K23 continued 2K’s solid legacy in the golf gaming world. It felt good to play, and the course creation tools provided almost unlimited content. However, EA Sports’ return to the genre was a notable piece of news from Spring 2023 as well. Returning two years later, even as EA’s PGA series has gone back in to hibernation, 2K still seemingly comes into this cycle needing to up their game again for PGA Tour 2K25.

Having spent three hours playing the full game at 2K’s London HQ, it was clear to me that this year’s release is certainly an improvement, addressing many of the complaints fans had with the last entry.

PGA Tour 2K25 Hands-On Preview

Swing Mechanic Improvements

The main gameplay changes come in the game’s altered swing mechanics. The official description of EvoSwing, the name of the new mechanic, is hard to fully understand. Essentially, it makes the game adapt to your swing rather than forcing you to adapt to the game.

If you have a swing or setup that is biased towards a draw, the swing direction will be tweaked to take advantage of that. You can then follow a swing path that’s tailored to you rather than simply flicking the stick in a perfect line.

It does work really well. Particularly when on the tee-box, swinging feels smooth. The swing indicator is larger than it is in EA’s PGA Tour game, which provides you more information about the quality of your swing. This only helps you adapt and improve.

When using Swing Stick shots instead of three-button, that also means you need to build additional draw or fade into your swing shape. You can preset the draw or fade and then swing straight to follow it, like you can in EA Sports’ game. You can’t immediately fire a drive over the trees on a dogleg hole, which adds complexity to progression and improvement.

I did find shots from the rough and bunkers less satisfying. Of course, hazards and longer cuts will affect the lie of your ball, but I found that the swing mechanic itself felt less natural, rather than the in-game shot being affected.

If you do want to sit back and relax, 2K has added a wonderful feature that’ll make PGA Tour 2K25 much more accessible than any other golf simulation game. Called Perfect Swing, the difficulty mechanic allows you to sit back and swing without having to worry about where the ball goes. Your swing isn’t affected by any changes or directional issues, always moving as you intended. You still have to aim your way around every hole, but you won’t be hooking drives into the woods unexpectedly when playing with Perfect Swing active.

Putting is also a lot less forgiving than it is in other golf games. I don’t know if the handful of courses I played had particularly challenging greens or not, but I found greens that slant in any direction really hard to read. When a ball moves from left to right or right to left when putting, it moves drastically and I was missing by a long way at times. I lost count of the number of times my shots ended up further from the hole than when I started after a five foot putt.

Of course, some of that will come down to getting used to PGA Tour 2K25‘s putting mechanics over time (and we’re generally always in favor of challenging experiences in our sports games), but you may find yourself hitting some high scores in your first handful of rounds.

Massive Visual Upgrade

Where PGA Tour 2K25 needed to really improve to challenge EA’s series was in the visuals department. EA Sports’ game blew 2K’s last out of the water when it came to atmosphere, lighting, and course recreation.

Thankfully, 2K25 is a massive improvement. Golfers themselves still look a little robotic, but there’s significantly more life to every course. The lighting is a massive step up, really adding to the majesty of some locations.

When you’re on an 18th green, with the crowds huddled around closely, the atmosphere really adds tension to your shots. The shadows below trees and lighting at certain times of the day look phenomenal. I don’t think it’s quite at the level of EA’s PGA game, but it’s not far off. (Some of that also may be down to 2K25 simply not having Augusta National as a course option. For me, that is the pinnacle of golfing beauty.)

However, the course collection is impressive overall (plus, you still obviously have an entire course creator as well). The three other majors are included, which is a big deal, as well as a good selection of famous and less-famous real-world courses. Add in the community created courses and there are plenty of holes to try your hand at.

During my preview, I didn’t get the chance to play around with this year’s course creator in any significant way. However, it’s great that a “curated list of courses” will be playable in the career mode, so you’re not just limited to real ones. Provided the “curated” list is big enough, that’ll ensure that the career mode has plenty of variety as you progress past the first year of competition.

Other Notable Additions

Elsewhere, it’s great that a gear XP system has been added for PGA Tour 2K25. The actual Pro creation tools are deeper than they’ve ever been in a PGA Tour 2K game, but every ball or club you use can now be improved as you play.

It makes kitting out your bag with what you like all the more important. Previously, I’d just use whatever I unlocked first and forget about it. In 2K25, doing that would be stupid. Of course, I didn’t play around with different gear much, but it’ll be interesting to see how much gear improves as you earn more XP throughout MyPlayer.

Finally, in a really cool addition to the Pro roster, you can play as Chris McDonald in PGA Tour 2K25. If you don’t immediately recognize the name — he won’t have been at the top of real-world PGA leaderboards — you’ll certainly know his face.

He is the actor who plays Shooter McGavin in Happy Gilmore. He’ll be returning for the movie’s sequel later this year, and you can play as him in 2K’s new game. While that’s cool, it’s a real shame that he’s essentially a skin of the other Pros in the game. He smiles and fist pumps like any of them. There’s no signature “Shooter” celebrations. I guess you’re playing as Chris McDonald and not Shooter McGavin, but inclusions like that would have been fun. If there is one obvious licensing downside that plays into all this, it’s that the official roster is very limited with just 11 pros at launch.

Bottom Line

Overall, while it doesn’t do anything mind-blowing, PGA Tour 2K25 is certainly a step up for the series. The swing mechanic changes make for a game that feels much better, and the visual improvements are significant across the board.