Intelligent Game Reviews

Intelligamer
Intelligent Choice

Carnoustie, Scotland was recently the site of the British Open. It must be exciting to play golf where the sport was first created, especially when a Scot puts together such an amazing last round to take the tournament into a playoff. The game has progressed significantly from a stick and a rock, but the spirit remains the same. And so has Sierra Sports‘ PGA Championship Golf 1999 in it’s latest incarnation.

Basics of Play

It has been a long time since the PC Golf game genre has had a shake-up. Sierra Sports seems determined to bring new competition for the title of “Best PC Golf Simulation,” and their latest offering a big step in the right direction. Gameplay has a different feel from other golf titles, but still accomplishes the same task, a refreshing thing if you ask me.

Every golf game I have ever played before this one always had very similar controls. Before you swing you chose your club, check the wind and terrain, place the aiming pole, and triple click to execute the perfect swing. PGA Championship Golf 1999 deviates from this formula slightly, to mixed results.

Let’s be honest, golf games are popular because we can do things on the computer that can’t be done on the course, at least not on purpose. It’s also a lot cheaper than flying to Scotland to play, and the weather is always the amenable. PGA Championship Golf 1999 includes 8 of the world’s best courses. Black Diamond Ranch, Coeur d’Alene, Pasatiempo and Royal Birkdale to name four. I have personally played two of the courses. Coeur d’Alene Idaho is a beautiful course, and well represented. The Sahalee course is also amazing.

Typical golf games give you a pole to move around the course before you swing to show where you are aiming. PGA Championship Golf 1999 doesn’t have one of these. You can still check elevation by moving the mouse pointer around and holding down the right button, but there is no universal aiming device. What you can do is rotate the golfer, using an arrow from the ball, and line up your shot where you want it to go. This is another step in the right direction but does provide some frustration at times. The arrow isn’t quite big enough to micro manage where you want to place the ball and you don’t get a guide line on your swing bar as a suggestion for strength.

Speaking of the swing bar that too has changed. The Links series came up with the circle triple click swing and most games followed in line. Sierra uses a flat bar at the bottom that is activated when you either point at your golfer or the bar.

There are 3 different types of swings you can use. The triclick method is the default, easiest to learn, and the most widely used. A click starts the bar moving, another click sets the power used and another click sets the control. The new TrueSwing can be done in two ways, either horizontal or vertical. Trueswing lets you use the mouse as your club by moving it like you might a golf club. You move the mouse (horizontally or vertically) in one direction to simulate the backswing and then in the other to simulate the swing itself. The distance you can get using TrueSwing is greater than the Triclick method, but the shorter the club you use the harder I found it to control. Putting is already difficult enough, and it is clear I’ll need more practice if I want to use Trueswing there.

The greens look the similar to other games you may have played, with the option to have a grid on or off to help judge the break of the ball. This is very important as the default camera angle can really mess with your perception of the green. One feature I used a lot on the green was the ability to move the golfer around away from the ball and to redraw the hole from that position. You can walk around the ball and plum bob your way to the perfect read (sorry, golf speak). One thing I found annoying was that if you are a long way from the pin you can’t always get the ball to the hole in one stroke. If you are more than 50 feet away from the pin on the green, swinging with all your power won’t get the ball to the hole, a potentially serious flaw in the game. I don’t know about you but I have the ability to play a whole round of golf with my putter, not that I would recommend it, but I digress.

One point of golf games that I get frustrated at is the way wind is handled. Getting used to the physics of the game is essential to good shot making of course. The problem is each game treats it differently. I have even played games where wind effected putting. There is nothing more frustrating than looking at the wind, judging it on previous experience, hitting the ball perfectly and then the wind has little or no effect. The wind was crossing the course so it should have helped your ball away from that fairway bunker, but it didn’t. At least PGA Championship Golf 1999 takes into account that wind plays less a part in shot making with your shorter clubs. A 50 foot chip onto the green doesn’t really move around much where as a 300 yard drive might get pushed around a lot.

Other special things you can do with your swing are fade and draw the ball. In golf this is accomplished by shifting the placement of your feet relative to the ball. In the game all you have to do is bring up the shot setup menu and select what type of shot you want to make.

The screen is set up up consistent with other computer golf games. On the bottom left there is the club selection and shot selection menus. The bottom right holds the elevation and yardage indicator, the status of your ball (is it in the fairway or the rough?) and the wind conditions. In the upper right corner you have the player status showing the name of the player whose shot it is, their score, the hole, the par and the stroke they are playing. There is nothing in the upper right hand corner which is where I placed a camera view from above the hole.

Camera views can be placed anywhere. There are preset positions with distance from the player and hole which include elevation as well. These are a pretty nice addition but I didn’t have much use for anything but the above shot.

The Course Architect

One of the features that has long been lacking in the Links LS series is the ability for players to create their own courses. The only significant game to include this feature was the Jack Nicklaus games. Now PGA Championship Golf 1999 has added this capability, and it is great! No longer are you stuck with just the courses included in the box.

While the course architect is a complex piece of 3D modeling software specially designed to lay out a Golf course, it is easy enough to use that, as of this writing a scant couple of weeks after the release of the game, more than 20 player created courses are already available for download from the Sierra site supporting the game. Of course, these are of mixed value, but the fact remains that having a way to extend the game will add tremendous long term value in a title that is already more than reasonably priced.

Playing With Actual Humans

I have never seen a game with so much multiplayer support right out of the box. To support PGA Championship Golf 1999, Sierra has a dedicated server to set up multiplayer games. WON (World Opponent Network) is a place to go to talk about the game, set up pickup games or play a tournament. There is typically a tournament each week to play in and some even award prizes to the winners.

WON has things like a message board, game news, strategy guides and tournament information. Games are easy to set up and chatting is simple to figure out. Starting a game is simple and unless you already know who is going to play with you, invitations can be sent out to invite people to play with you.

Multiplayer was just as smooth as single player. T
o cut down on the time required to complete a round, the game allows you to shoot while other players are taking their shots. Players tee off using the “honors” system (whoever scored best for the last hole) and unless your shot hinders the other player, you can finish the hole while the other player does the same thing. This makes a round of multiplayer golf a lot faster and much more fun. Simply a great idea to streamline the game.

Graphics, Sound, etc.

PGA Championship Golf 1999 has excellent graphics and great sound. The course and surrounding area show many colors and the different courses are well represented. From the rolling hills of Royal Birkdale to the lush green grass of Sahalee golf course, the environment looks great. Along with the graphics around you the backdrops are cool too. Graphics options allow you too set the horizon mark and usually a backdrop is set for things further away than that. On the Coeur d’Alene course (which I have had the pleasure of playing) backdrops include the lake on one side of the course and the red clay hills on the other… quite nice!

The animations of the players are interesting and annoying at the same time. When you take too much time to hit a shot you will see your player do miscellaneous things to indicate boredom, laying down on the grass sometimes or tapping the foot like they are waiting. This is funny but then when I was ready to hit I would feel uncomfortable hitting while my player wasn’t up to the ball. It is only perception of course, but it felt like it messed up my timing.

I have yet to find a green where the hills and breaks were easy to figure out on the computer, and this game is no exception. Whether the grid is enabled or not it is still very difficult to judge a put. You can however move around the green to see different angles but that doesn’t help as much as you would think.

You have the option to have announcers comment during the game. They do not always pipe in with their opinions but when they do they are pretty accurate. The down side is that they don’t have a very large repertoire of things to say and by the time you make the turn you will undoubtedly hear the same comment you have before. It gets annoying to hear them say “That’s on the putting surface, but I don’t think you can hear the band from there.” multiple times in a round. A witty comment I’ll admit, but not every other hole.

Other background sounds like a player’s swing, a ball landing on the green or in the water are very good. Whether hitting out of the sand or from the fairway you can hear the different sound representing the terrain.

The User’s Guide included with the game is excellent. Whenever I had a problem, whether with connecting to WON, or figuring out the Course Architect it had the answer, or knew where to find it. It was also a booklet, and not something online. Thank you Sierra Sports!

The Verdict

While the single player game may not be quite up to the daunting Links LS standard, multiplayer is better and the Golf Course Architect is a great addition. PGA Championship Golf 1999 is quite simply the best all around golf game I have played.

PGA Championship Golf 1999 Screenshots

While the course graphics are not spectacular, they are reasonable and the golfer animations are very detailed.	There are plenty of options to choose from, with all of the things you’d expect to see.
The game tracks your round statistics so you can keep track of how you are doing from a variety of perspectives. I need to work on my putting…	With built-in support for WON.NET, getting a multiplayer game going was very simple.

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