The Masters

cem_ea_id.baangus wrote:
Sorry, but there's simply no reason for complaints like this. Lower your sweetspot until it's no longer that easy. Lower your sweetspot to 0, and you won't be able to hit a fairway or green. I guarantee it.

Could not disagree more. The sweetspot sensitivity (L-R and R-L) is not at all realistic with a stock MS controller. Swinging the analog stick straight and ending up OB is not my idea of a simulation at all. And I should not be forced to buy or use a 3rd party controller that is guaranteed to hit straight to be able to use a 0% sweetspot.

cem_ea_id.baangus wrote:One thing this game very well -- better than any console or PC golf game has ever done IMO -- is provide the user with the ability (club tuner) to make driving and fairway shots as easy or as difficult as one wishes.

Tiger PC did the same thing years ago...

MAIN.JCauthen04 wrote:
The way I see it, a 12 power attribute with a club tuned to 100% power (and I won't touch the club tuning debate at this point), should average 315 yards off the tee. This would be in line with the PGA Tour leader in this category.

I agree, but something needs to be done to address the very real possibility of hitting a 400+ yd drive? Charles Howell III hit one 415 yds at Firestone this year, so we know it exists in real life. He wasn't playing on arcade mode. He may have been using power boost, though . That's what upsets me most about all this talk about lowering driver distances to make things more realistic. If our max drive (w/o respect to wind but w/ respect to slope) falls to 350yds, how are we getting any closer to resembling real life.

I know you weren't implying that MAX distance should be 315, but so many people on the board have raised concerns about 400 yd drives, that, as long as they are a rarity, are a very real part of golf.

The top average distance in the game should be 5-10 yds more than the top recorded by a pro on tour in the past 10 years. But that also means that the longest drives should also be within striking distance of the longest recorded tour drives.

MAIN.EAcom Golf Tim wrote:Could not disagree more. The sweetspot sensitivity (L-R and R-L) is not at all realistic with a stock MS controller. Swinging the analog stick straight and ending up OB is not my idea of a simulation at all.

Yes, baangus' bit about taking the sweetspot down to "0" is going to the extreme to make a point. It shouldn't take anything approaching that to have a game that produces more realistic results in Tour Pro mode. I've found a trade-off between frustration (as in two or three OB tee shots per round) and difficulty in hitting fairways in regulation at 12% sweetspot. I would be doing well to break 70 in the regular Tour Pro Daily tournament with this setup. I do good to break 63 with the 19% Driver sweetspot I use now.

The only way we're getting anything approaching realistic scores now is to set extreme course conditions, hence the evolution of the "EXTREME" Tour Pro daily. I play them just about everyday, but a lot of the time, the conditions are so otherworldly that it doesn't feel like golf all too much of the time.

Mike, I think if you guys adopt the notion that Tour Pro mode should be more about tempo and balance, you could negate some of the advantages of the Joytech and Hori controllers. They have less sensitivity and I would think they would be harder to regulate in a more tempo dependant swing interface.

I keep hearing about the possibility of a controller calibration routine that PC joysticks use for flight simulators as a possible way to level the input device playing field. Gamers would be required to complete a quick, simple stick calibration before being granted access to the online play modes. I don't know enough about the possibility of that being a solution, but I'm wondering if it isn't worth looking into?

ps3.Gcthunder wrote:
I agree, but something needs to be done to address the very real possibility of hitting a 400+ yd drive? Charles Howell III hit one 415 yds at Firestone this year, so we know it exists in real life. He wasn't playing on arcade mode. He may have been using power boost, though .

I wouldn't want to see this possibility taken out either. I think it could still occur under the right conditions with a model that would yield a 315 yard average. I certainly wouldn't want to suggest that 315 should be the maximum distance drive we'd ever see...

MAIN.JCauthen04 wrote:I can tweak the game to play more difficult in my own *house rules* world, but I don't have a snowball's chance in Hades online with them in effect. I would like to be able to play in live tournaments and online matches, knowing that everyone was playing under constraints that would yield more realistic results.

Right, okay. Yes, I don't play online so I seldom consider gameplay questions from that POV.

MAIN.JCauthen04 wrote:True! It does do this better than most, but I would argue that Links 2004 still did it better... it required tempo in the swing, even though it didn't have as many tweaking and tuning options.

Agree completely. The TW series is missing the swing tempo element, and until that's incorporated into the game, it simply can't be considered a sim golf game.

I was specifically referring to the club tuner. I understand it has limitations, having tested it for hours. Nevertheless it's a terrific feature and a great addition to the TW series.

The club tuner has been a worthy addition to the game but only for offline self regulation of how much of a personal challenge you want. I have my sweetspot set at 15% for all clubs and it can be frustrating, but its a challenge!! My argument against this is that the game, played at a high skill setting/level, should be a challange straight out of the box and not one that I have to manually create. With these settings, I have absolutely no chance of even competing online. Baangus, I disagree with your theory that most console owners only want arcade style games. All the EA Sports games are making great progress and becoming more and more realistic by the year and its a real shame that only the Tiger Woods series is being somewhat overlooked. For what its worth, I will not purchase next years game unless the developers place more emphasis on realism. I will simply keep this years version as I still enjoy playing the game. I think its good game, but it could be fantastic.

cem_ea_id.baangus wrote:
Agree completely. The TW series is missing the swing tempo element, and until that's incorporated into the game, it simply can't be considered a sim golf game.

I was specifically referring to the club tuner. I understand it has limitations, having tested it for hours. Nevertheless it's a terrific feature and a great addition to the TW series.

Agree completely with statement #1.

Agree pretty muych with #2, but without the above improvements to swing tempo, it is still lacking.

cem_ea_id.holeinonesock wrote:Baangus, I disagree with your theory that most console owners only want arcade style games. All the EA Sports games are making great progress and becoming more and more realistic by the year and its a real shame that only the Tiger Woods series is being somewhat overlooked.

This is the point I have been trying to make. Well said holeinonesock. Every single one of the EA Sports titles recently released are striving to make their games MORE realistic and simulation-like because it is really the only area that needs marked improvement. If the other EA Sports developers are making these strides for increased realism, why not the TW Dev Team? Seems the added realism in the other games is sparking interest with old users as well as attracting new users who used to stay away from EA Sports games because of the LACK (perceived or real) of realism....

cem_ea_id.holeinonesock wrote:Baangus, I disagree with your theory that most console owners only want arcade style games. All the EA Sports games are making great progress and becoming more and more realistic by the year and its a real shame that only the Tiger Woods series is being somewhat overlooked.

A problem IMO is that there are a bunch of arcade, pick-up-and-play golf games already out on the market for kids to enjoy. Those games are in direct competition to TW. And that's not the case with football, hockey or soccer. I had my two nephews visiting this summer -- they're 12 and 14 -- and I couldn't get them interested in playing TW 10 with me. It's just not crazy-arcadey enough for them. They see it as a boring game for old folks. That's what EA is up against with this series, and I've always assumed that's why so many elements of the TW console series cater to the younger crowd. If EA turned this game into a true sim with an authentic PGA Tour feel to it, its sales would nosedive.

cem_ea_id.baangus wrote:If EA turned this game into a true sim with an authentic PGA Tour feel to it, its sales would nosedive.

That is not what ANY of us are asking for. Real simple, leave the arcade gameplay for those who want it and offer a more realistic option for those seeking that. All the other EA Sports games are offering this, why not TW?

MAIN.EAcom Golf Tim wrote:

cem_ea_id.baangus wrote:
Agree completely. The TW series is missing the swing tempo element, and until that's incorporated into the game, it simply can't be considered a sim golf game.

I was specifically referring to the club tuner. I understand it has limitations, having tested it for hours. Nevertheless it's a terrific feature and a great addition to the TW series.

Agree completely with statement #1.

Agree pretty muych with #2, but without the above improvements to swing tempo, it is still lacking.

Did TW07 have a tempo element to the swing? It was the first TW game I ever played, and I remember the first few times I picked it up and played with friends I was hitting worm burners and short drives, while my friends (with the same stats) were airing it way past me.

Also, TW10 on the Iphone has an interesting swing mechanic. If you try to draw/fade to hard you either hit a ground ball for 30 yds or miss completely.

ps3.Gcthunder wrote:Did TW07 have a tempo element to the swing?

TW 10 has a tempo/penalty element to it. But it's so insignicant as to be essentially non-existent. No, the only console game (that I know of) was Links 2004.

And speaking of driving distances and swing tempo, it was possible to overhit in Links, something that's missing with TW's swing system. There are times in golf where one gives the swing 100% plus a bit. Tiger even mentions it in one of his challenge intro videos in TW 10. Say my 3 wood goes 230 and the green is 240 yards away. In Links, it's possible to hold the upswing a moment longer to get that extra 10 yards distance (at risk of an accuracy penalty, of course). That's not possible in TW 10, and it's a programming dynamic/distance modifier that I would like to see incorporated into the swing.

MAIN.EAcom Golf Tim wrote:

cem_ea_id.baangus wrote:If EA turned this game into a true sim with an authentic PGA Tour feel to it, its sales would nosedive.

That is not what ANY of us are asking for. Real simple, leave the arcade gameplay for those who want it and offer a more realistic option for those seeking that. All the other EA Sports games are offering this, why not TW?

Tim:

I guess every suggestion for an ADDITIONAL simulation gameplay mode needs to be prefaced with "leaving the default arcade mode as-is".


-MERACE

MAIN.JCauthen04 wrote:
I keep hearing about the possibility of a controller calibration routine that PC joysticks use for flight simulators as a possible way to level the input device playing field. Gamers would be required to complete a quick, simple stick calibration before being granted access to the online play modes. I don't know enough about the possibility of that being a solution, but I'm wondering if it isn't worth looking into?

J:

I think I read that suggestion somewhere too.


-MERACE

xbox.MERACE wrote:I guess every suggestion for an ADDITIONAL simulation gameplay mode needs to be prefaced with "leaving the default arcade mode as-is".

No need to preface anything, given the arcade stuff will no doubt always be part of this series. That's understood. I guess the difference between myself and others is I'm not expecting TW to morph into a console golf sim any time soon. Just allow me to set and cap my club distances and I'll be a happy camper.