Pacific Trails Golf Resort (WCOD Entry)
Jan 27, 2020 17:06:00 GMT -5
jwfickett, joegolferg, and 10 more like this
Post by csugolfer60 on Jan 27, 2020 17:06:00 GMT -5
Pacific Trails Golf Resort
7066 Yards, Par 71
Welcome to Pacific Trails, probably my first realistic golf course in any of the TGC games so far.
Carved out of a stretch of remote Pacific Ocean beach, Pacific Trails is designed as a remote getaway, focused on golf as it was meant to be. The course does have golf carts, but it's best experienced walking. Guests of the resort are also encouraged to walk the trails during the day and enjoy spectating the golfers on the course. The designer himself has played a few times, but has retired after several unfortunate incidents resulting in lawsuits from errant tee shots.
Pacific Trails is designed with beginner/intermediate TGC players in mind, and is also designed as a simulator-friendly course. The greens remain quite slow on a daily basis compared to most tournament venues, but they can still be firmed up and cut low for a tour-quality challenge.
A few questions from the public for the designer -
1.) Why is this course so easy?
This is the first course I've really tried to design with a realistic point of view. This translates to a fairly benign experience for most advanced TGC pros, but is very playable for beginning and intermediate TGC users, and real-life simulator players.
2.) Why are the greens at 144?
The simulator crowd has an easier time with putting at this speed, so the course was originally designed with this speed in mind. HOWEVER, "unofficially", all the hole locations tested so far have been compliant with 187 green speeds in-game, so please feel free to crank that up and give it a try. It's pretty fun at firm and fast.
3.) Why is the landscape so barren?
It has to do with the way that TGC renders landscape. When looking toward the "lighthouse" end of the property, the "sandy soil" renders perfectly to represent the type of scruff that you'd find on a beachy, waste area. However, when looking away from the sun, it renders as a flatshaded, uniform sand. The former is perfect, while the latter can be ugly. However, I tried for weeks to find a planting scheme that looked good throughout the entire course, and couldn't find one that looked good in both circumstances compared to the texture itself, so decided to leave it.
4.) Are you lying? It looks really lazy.
Nah, I tried really hard, just couldn't make it happen. However, it does have the added benefit of being good performance-wise on weaker computers, and also for the sim-crowd, since the visibility is a lot better, and there are less objects to get in the way when higher handicap players get out there.
5.) What's up with the beach?
We needed to get some extra height on the beachhead to make sure that the course didn't flood during some particularly nasty weather. It's really dangerous to go down on the beach, so we've marked it OB just in case.
6.) Why are there hazard markers next to the OB markers on hole 15?
The super screwed up and left them out there after we made the change to make the beachhead OB. I got my design fee, not my problem how the staff handles it.
Happy Golfing!
