Links LS and other golf sims
 

It happens that I found OOT through a lurker here, I was only reading the TV forum (LOL) at the time and he pointed me to it. It was way down at the bottom of the forums at the time and I may have never found it. I was astounded by the volume of the forum and the wittiness of most of the regulars. Eventually a thread came along that I was interested enough in posting in that I regged. Kinda funny it took that long because back in the day visitors had to read in threaded mode (ugh).

Anyway, I knew said lurker from my many years playing Links LS and contributing to its forums. In fact, that is the only other online communitah I've ever invested much time in, and the only other one in which I've met various posters.

I loved that game. One of the happiest days of my internet life was in 1996, when Access Software introduced the patch to play online. A couple of things that contributed to it getting old: you could only connect to one other person, so unless there were multiple people at one end or the other (very unusual) it was only heads-up. Also, the pin positions were fixed, for whatever reason you were stuck with the same flags every time you played online. Somehow the script didn't allow for sending different hole locations, even though in those versions there were five per hole.

Not too long after this changed and you could play things like alternate shot, Wolf, scramble, etc. and it was really super awesome. Our site even had a mock Ryder Cup in 1997 and me and a friend took on two Aussies in the middle of the night ("Ryder Cup" needed to allow for all non-US players out of necessity). The site spawned the best Links LS players in the world, but when Microsoft bought the game and eventually allowed a click-thru to get to a lobby and discussion area the other sites sort of faded. They're still in existence though.

Does anyone have any experiences to share with Links LS, Jack Nicklaus Golf, or Tiger Woods golf?

Re: Links LS and other golf sims
 

VG Forum, n00b [img]/images/graemlins/tongue.gif[/img]

I had this version of Jack Nicklaus that I used to play obsessively on a 386sx bopping along at 16 MHz.

I was very surprised, given the primitive graphics, at how easily recognizable most of the holes were when watching The Memorial on TV. Best score at Muirfield Village was either 58 or 57. [img]/images/graemlins/grin.gif[/img]

Re: Links LS and other golf sims
 

oT,

Heh, I know about that forum but golf sims are worthy of their own thread in this forum IMO. Did you know that at its peak Links LS was the best-selling sports title in PC history?

I bought one version of Jack Nicklaus, and was really impressed with some of the courses people made. The APCD (Arnold Palmer Course Designer) is supposed to be super hard to work with, else I - an obsessed golf course architect - would have tackled it a long time ago. No clue why they didn't make it more user-friendly, unless perhaps it's way more technically accurate than the Jack Nicklaus one so it's a matter of mastering it. I have heard good courses take upwards of 200 hours to make.

Re: Links LS and other golf sims
 

Also, I really enjoyed watching PGA events at courses that Links LS had released. Torrey Pines, Riviera, Kapalua Plantation, Firestone (zzzzzzz...), Oakland Hills (ZZZZZZZ...), Castle Pines, Bay Hill, Harbor Town, Cog Hill Dubsdread, Pebble Beach and no doubt others were among early releases of courses that the Tour visited every year or regularly.

Re: Links LS and other golf sims
 

I actually had trouble googling info on Link LS. It looks like Links 2003 is the newest, is that right? Is it worth getting? Can you still play online against others?

First golf game I ever played was Pebble Beach for the 8 bit. It was awesome. After that came Hole in One Golf for the Super Nintendo. Also awesome. Despite only having one course (we're so spoiled with golf games these days), I found it pretty darn replayable, and more difficult than Tiger Woods. Play Tiger Woods now, but not online. I imagine the replay value is a lot higher if you play online.

Re: Links LS and other golf sims
 

[ QUOTE ]
oT,

Heh, I know about that forum but golf sims are worthy of their own thread in this forum IMO. Did you know that at its peak Links LS was the best-selling sports title in PC history?

I bought one version of Jack Nicklaus, and was really impressed with some of the courses people made. The APCD (Arnold Palmer Course Designer) is supposed to be super hard to work with, else I - an obsessed golf course architect - would have tackled it a long time ago. No clue why they didn't make it more user-friendly, unless perhaps it's way more technically accurate than the Jack Nicklaus one so it's a matter of mastering it. I have heard good courses take upwards of 200 hours to make.

[/ QUOTE ]

I have a short attention span LDO so I never got far along with the designer...even on TW2004 which is the last game that I bought. It just takes too much time.

Speaking of Arnold Palmer, there was an AP game for Sega Genesis that was ridiculously easy. The swing bar was fairly slow and graduated, so if you were going second and your opponent nearly made a hole-in-one, you were at least 50-50 to hole it out yourself.

Re: Links LS and other golf sims
 

[ QUOTE ]
I actually had trouble googling info on Link LS. It looks like Links 2003 is the newest, is that right? Is it worth getting? Can you still play online against others?

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Yes. Not sure why Microsoft stopped building the brand in 2003. I guess they decided the game engine was as good as it was gonna get and wasn't worth investing in improvement. Still, for a universally popular title like that you'd think they would at least try.

I think it is still the most popular PC golf sim, even better than the Tiger Woods brand. Evan and I PMed last year about meeting up for a game or setting up a league of some sort but nothing ever came of it.

Re: Links LS and other golf sims
 

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
I actually had trouble googling info on Link LS. It looks like Links 2003 is the newest, is that right? Is it worth getting? Can you still play online against others?

[/ QUOTE ]
Yes. Not sure why Microsoft stopped building the brand in 2003. I guess they decided the game engine was as good as it was gonna get and wasn't worth investing in improvement. Still, for a universally popular title like that you'd think they would at least try.

I think it is still the most popular PC golf sim, even better than the Tiger Woods brand. Evan and I PMed last year about meeting up for a game or setting up a league of some sort but nothing ever came of it.

[/ QUOTE ]

Worth $7?

Re: Links LS and other golf sims
 

LOL, yes. Definitely worth $7. I paid $40 for every version that came out. You can play online for free and also download a ton of courses for free online, including Augusta National. The release of the APCD led to a lot of designer gurus releasing courses that are famous but were never done by Access Software for whatever reason (including, no pun intended, access re: Augusta National and some other places).

Re: Links LS and other golf sims
 

according to my dad, i was playing/designing courses on Jack Nicklaus at the age or 3 or so. his coworkers would come over during lunch and challenge me, lol. i think i've still got some on some floppies that are buried in our basement.