There’s no denying that EA Sports has created
some of the best sports games on the market today. From the
incredibly fun Triple Play series to the mind-boggling good NHL
series, EA easily dominates the sports gaming scene on PC.
But when it
comes to golf, EA (and every other company) has long been trying to
catch Access Software and its king-of-the-hill Links series. Thanks
to its gorgeous graphics, outstanding features, and realistic
gameplay, Links LS has been atop the leader board ever since
its release last fall.
This latest
update of EA’s PGA Tour series may not blow the Links dynasty
out of the water just yet, but it does comes close to matching
Links LS in one way: the graphics. The courses look almost
photo realistic. From the clean-cut greens and the reflections on
the water to the shadows of the trees, EA has created another game
that is absolutely stunning to look at. And you never see the
graphics redraw -- even on a slow machine. The only time you’ll
question the look of the game is when you are stuck close to a tree.
The trees tend to get a little pixelious up close, but the rest of
the time, the graphics are incredible.
Faithful
recreations of PGA Tour Pro’s three courses help show off
these stunning graphics with awesome results. The Tournament
Player’s Club of Scottsdale Stadium is a sandy, wide-open course in
Arizona that is a great course for getting used to the feel of the
game. Once you feel confident in your hitting, tee off at the Bay
Hill Club in Orlando, Florida, which is long and mostly flat, with
lots of water and sand traps to give you trouble. But if you want
some real fun, load up Pebble Beach Golf Links. Located on the
spectacular California coastline, Pebble Beach (provided on a
separate CD) gives you plenty of breathtaking views -- and lots of
hills, water hazards, and sand traps.
EA provides
three Picture-In-Picture (PIP) windows to let you view all aspects
of these great courses. They also give the game a nice TV-viewing
feel and a fluidity that you don’t find in most golf sims. On PIP 1,
you can have a tower-cam view, which watches the ball from the side;
a gallery view, which follows the ball from a fan’s perspective; a
ball-cam view, which trails along behind the ball; or a blimp-cam
view, which follows the ball from overhead. You can also randomize
PIP 1 to spice up the viewing. On PIP 2, you can have a view from
the pin or from where your ball is landing. PIP 3 is a targeting
PIP, which shows you the shot you are aiming for after you set the
targeting arrow. This is great for hitting a tricky shot when you
can’t see where your ball is going to land. Each of these PIPs is
easily customizable to your viewing pleasure.
What isn’t so
customizable is your player. You can play as one of four different
amateurs or one of 14 pro players, including Fuzzy Zoeller, Davis
Love III, Chip Beck, and Craig Stadler. All of these players look
fabulous in their video-captured form -- even if their shadows are
always falling the same way. But because they are video-captured,
you can’t customize your player’s look in any way.
After you see
the beautiful players and the gorgeous graphics, you’ll soon realize
that that’s the best PGA Tour Pro has to offer. EA has made
the fatal mistake of offering style over substance.
When you start
playing a round, you’ll notice some strange things. First off, when
you select a club from your bag, PGA Tour Pro shows you what
distance you can expect to hit with each club. But in many
instances, these ranges are misleading. The distances are set up for
maximum hits with stiff club shafts and don’t reflect the player
conditions you set up, so you never know for sure how far you can
hit your clubs. You have to guess distances depending on whether
your player uses stiff, regular, or flexible club shafts. Obviously,
this makes club selection a dubious process.
Club selection
is even more dubious when your caddie gets involved. Many times, the
caddie suggestions for club selection are woefully wrong. If you
have a long second shot to the green, you’ll most likely be given
your driver to hit off of the fairway; this is not a typical
club selection. And one time, I was surprised to see the caddie give
me a 5 wood to hit the ball 91 yards -- out of a sand trap!
Once you’ve
ignored your caddie’s club suggestion, you’ll want to try ignoring
the targeting arrow, too. It’s supposed to tell you how far you
should be able to hit with your selected club. But in reality, it
limits your playing ability. There are many times when your
targeting arrow won’t let you hit the full distance of the club
you’re holding -- even if you are using stiff shafts. For example, I
was stuck in a sand trap that was 91 yards from the pin. I picked up
a sand wedge. The club selection menu said I could hit a sand wedge
90 yards, but the targeting arrow would only let me hit the ball 40
yards. Granted, I am hitting out of a sand trap, but with a good
hit, I should have been able to hit it farther than that. I switched
to a pitching wedge, and the targeting arrow would only let me hit
the ball 43 yards. So I gave up and hit the ball hard and accurate
-- and only went 40 or so yards, so I was stuck chipping the ball
the rest of the way in because the computer wouldn’t let me hit the
full distance with my chosen club.
After you’ve
overcome the obstacles of the club menu, your caddie’s poor advice,
and the targeting arrow, there are few surprises in rest of
PGA’s game. You’ll use the same swing meter found in most
golf sims where you try and perfectly time three clicks of the
mouse, to hit the ball. This isn’t nearly as intuitive as FPS:
Golf’s TrueSwing approach, where you use your mouse to hit the
ball in much the same way as you do in Virtual Pool, but the
old swing meter does the trick pretty well. EA has added one new
element to the meter, though. It’s called the Risk Meter. It doesn’t
affect your hitting in any way, but it does tell you how risky the
shot you’re planning is. It’s a handy little device that becomes
helpful when hitting tough shots.
Another strange
situation found in PGA Tour Pro is chipping. When you’re near
the green, it’s only natural to attempt a chip shot. But PGA Tour
Pro doesn’t switch to its chipping meter; it stays on the normal
swing meter. This seems strange at first, and reveals yet another of
the game’s weaknesses: The chipping meter will only let you target
the ball to go up to 18 or so yards. Any farther than that, and you
have to use the normal swing meter and just barely hit the ball. EA
would have done better to either do away with the chipping meter
altogether or lift the targeting restrictions that plague every
aspect of the game.
When you reach
the green, you can use two different guides to help you make your
putts: a putting grid or putting lines. The lines are a great help
in determining the slopes of the greens. Unfortunately, neither the
lines nor the grid will show you the breaks in the green all the way
to the hole on super long putts. So, just like in real life, you are
left to your own instincts to make your putts.
Possibly the
strangest thing you’ll discover about PGA Tour Pro is your
ability to change course conditions for each player. You don’t set
up course conditions when you select which course you want to play.
Instead, you determine the course conditions when creating your
players. So Player 1 could be playing on the tough course conditions
of breezy wind, fast greens, and heavy roughs while Player 2 could
be playing with no wind, slow greens, and short roughs. This is just
silly, unrealistic, and downright odd.
The most
unrealistic part of PGA Tour Pro has to be the system
requirements. Don’t expect to play the game on the required system
requirements and enjoy it. PGA Tour Pro runs incredibly slow
on
a Pentium 120;
even on a P166, you’ll have to wait three to four seconds to see a
shot executed. If you want to really play this game without a wait,
you’ll have to have a P233 or better.
If all of these
negatives don’t turn you off, you can play PGA Tour Pro
against your friends with a LAN, modem, or the Internet. EA makes it
real easy for you to play any of these ways, and you can even
compete in Internet tournaments of up to 80 players. Whew! That’s
some competition.
Unfortunately
for EA, PGA Tour Pro is no competition for Links LS.
The graphics are incredible to look at, but the gameplay just
doesn’t hold up to the same high
standard. |