Tiger Woods in Wii Scam Scandal

A TV advertisement for the video game Tiger Woods PGA Tour 09 has been banned for misleading consumers.

The ad showed Tiger Woods swinging a Wii controller with characters from the game mirroring his movements. However, the footage was taken from the Xbox 360 version of the game, not the Wii.

Although the end of the ad featured the statement, "Available on All Formats," viewers felt that the advertisement was misleading, especially when the footage was joined by the Wii Logo.

Today EA confirmed that the footage was indeed taken from the Xbox 360 of the game, but pointed out that the end text was meant to avoid confusion.

The publisher further maintained that the footage was demonstrative of gameplay on all the platforms and was not impossible on Nintendo's Wii. Furthermore, since the Wii gameplay would be of a low resolution, it was deemed not of broadcast quality.

The Advertising Standards Authority felt that the false footage and Wii-specific logo at the end of the ad was enough to cause confusion and make viewers think that the graphics shown were representative of the Wii version of the game. The ASA thus deemed the ad misleading and breached advertising standards; "The ad must not be broadcast again in its current form."

This seems to be a common occurrence for Nintendo Wii games. That is, showing footage not representative of in-game graphics. And we all know why.