Checking out EA Sports PGA Tour - Preview
It has been a few years now since Electronic Arts revealed that they would be stepping back onto the green. While for a number of years it was Tiger Woods PGA Tour and then that one entry as Rory McIlroy PGA Tour, going forward the series will just be called EA Sports PGA Tour. The new name isn’t the only change the series is going to offer and I got the chance to hear direct from the developers about this next generation golfing game.
Taking me through the presentation was David Baker, the Lead Producer on the game, Ben Ramsour one of the games Producers and Craig Penner a Gameplay Designer. Each of them talked about different aspects of the game, from the courses and players, to the way you can play and beyond, so let us start with where and when you can play this new game.
Platforms
EA Sports PGA Tour will arrive on March 24 for Xbox Series X|S, PlayStation 5 and PC via Steam, Epic Game Store and EA App. The game will offer up two editions, the game on its own or a Digital Deluxe Edition. Anyone who pre-orders the game will get a digital goods pack which includes:
The Players Gear
The Grand Slam Bundle
Scotty Cameron Putter
For those players who want more, the Digital Deluxe Edition comes with the pre-order content, no matter if you pre-order the game or not, but if you do then you will also get:
3 Days Early Access
Early Access to the Augusta National event
PGA Tour XP Bundle
The Masters Gear
1,500 Premium PGA Tour Points
Orders are available today, meaning there is just over 2 months to go until you can tee off.
Gameplay
Now that you know when you can play, it is time to learn how you can play. Gameplay in EA Sports PGA Tour will feel familiar to anyone who has played any golf game, but there are a host of additions that will give you new things to try. The game uses a system that they call Pure Strike, which is made possible by the inclusion of the ShotLink and TrackMan data, obtained from the PGA Tour themselves. By making use of all three aspects to the Pure Strike system, players will be get into the swing of things pretty easily.
The system is broken into three parts, the swing mechanic, which allows for highly accurate control over the backswing, speed and follow through. The balls behaviour, allowing it to roll and bounce just like it would in real life and finally the courses themselves, impacting how you can play shots, just like you would in real life. All that sounds impressive, but lets break it down, starting with the swing.
Swinging is more than just flicking the stick, though I am sure you can do that if you wanted to, but instead it will require you to learn how to take advantage of everything the game presents you. New to the series are shot types, of which there are 20 and combined with the club you choose will select one of the 1,300 hundred physics profiles to make it work. What they do is generate ball speed, launch angles, spin rates and shot dispersions, to give your shot more of a realistic feel. These are not randomly created things, they are built using the data from ShotLink and TrackMan, so it should be the same as if you were hitting the ball on a real course.
When it comes time to actually take a swing, the game will give you a number items on the HUD, including the club you are using and the shot type that is attached to that. You can move the target on the ball, for where your club will come into contact with it, in order to put spin on it. You can also take a trip down the course, in order to ensure you know where any hazards might be, so you can be sure that as you drive the ball down the fairway, you don’t drive it right into a sandtrap. Once you have got everything ready, it is time to take the shot and that is where the swing arc comes into play.
The swing arc is a thin white line that appears on the screen, and as you move the stick back to prepare for your shot, you will see another line appear along side it. The second line is your arc, the one that you are going to take and you want to ensure that your line, matches as close to the one the game presents. If your aim is to far off the line can appear red, meaning you will hook the ball something horrid and other colours have other meanings. If your swing is perfect, your line will be white and overlap the one from the game, giving you a much thicker line than before, a nice way of seeing how it all works. As for when you push forward, well as you pull back on the stick and your arc begins to appear, you will see a marker on the swing arc and when your line hits that, you will want to push the stick forward. Push too soon or too late and you can easily mess up the shot, this will require practice to get right, but it looks like once you do, things should fly.
When it comes to taking your time and putting the ball into the hole, well that will be fairly familiar to most players. The grid, the same thing that appears in every golf game, will show up, giving you an idea of the elevation and direction of the slopes, so you can add or remove power as needed. You can also take advantage of the Shot Types here as well, to help you out. For example the Pick option, puts a bit more spin on the ball, which could help you get some more ground.
All of that is connected to when your ball is on the ground at your feet, but what about when it is not? That is where the games advanced Ball Behaviour comes into play, with the system able to determine the type of terrain you are on and react appropriately. What this means is that if there is a strong headwind, the spin of the ball might be impacted, where it lands could determine its bouncing options and even the grass types. That might sound familiar, but the team behind the game even verified their system against a number of courses, meaning that the way it works in game is the way it works in real life.
Presentation
Any game built up for the current generation of consoles and PC, should look amazing and thankfully that seems to be the case here. The game will present things, much like many other golf games in the past, sweeping shots of each hole, commentary by a knowledgeable team and with tv style overlays to bring it all together. The commentary team it’s a bit larger than you might be expecting and features five voices including Rich Lerner, for pro Iona Stephen and 6-time Major champion Sir Nick Faldo.
The game itself is running on the Frostbite engine, which is the same that powers Madden, Battlefield and Need for Speed, it is the engine of choice for Electronic Arts. What that engine allows for is 4k 30fps, meaning the game will look stunning and the team were looking at a 60fps option, but decided to lock down a 30fps option, to ensure the game ran as smooth as possible.
All that visual prowess would mean nothing if there were not some amazing courses to play on and EA Sports PGA Tour will offer 30 courses out of the box. Here is some of the list so far:
Augusta National
St Andrews (Old Course)
Pebble Beach
The Country Club
Southern Hills
TPC Sawgrass
Evian Resort
Teeth of the Dog
TPC Scottsdale
Tara Iti
The Ocean Course at Kiawah
Chambers Bay
Wolf Creek
Liberty National
Bay Hill
Riviera Country Club
PGA West
As you can see, some of the courses in the list are very big names, they will likely mean something if you are a real fan of the sport though. The courses will take players from the United States, up to Canada, Scotland, France and even New Zealand. The course list that is here now, is not the full list but there will also be more released after the game launches.
Each of the courses have been recreated using state-of-the-art equipment such as drone technology, custom LiDAR, flight helicopters and more, with some courses like Augusta National granting the dev team access to their software that tracks the health of the plants, including their placement and even the elevation. That means that when you see trees and plants, they will look exactly like they do on the course itself. As this is a game on Frostbite, the team were able to use photogrametry to make everything look as close to the real world as possible.
It isn’t just the grass and the trees that look great, the crowds are going to be plentiful thanks to the tech inside Frostbite. But even the vistas will look stunning, Pebble Beach runs along the coast, with lots of rocks along the shore, with waves crashing upon it and boats watching it all unfold.
It isn’t just the courses that look like their real world self, the players will look in game, just like they do out on the course. Players from both the PGA and the LPGA tours are included and you can play as them or create your own player to play against them. Some of the players include Scottie Sheffler and Nelly Korda, the number 1 for the Men’s and Women’s leagues. The reason why the players look as good as they do, is that the scanning rig the team used, contains over 130 cameras, something like you might see used in a Hollywood production. The same tech was used to create the crowds, which when combined with the crowd system mean that you will see a lot of people watching you play and they won’t look like 2d cutouts.
Now the final aspect to the players looks are the brands, can’t have them out their in their Nuke or Puna golf wear, which is why Nike and Puma, along with more than 30 brands are included. This isn’t just about the hat or top your player wears, but everything from their golf clubs and golf bags to the shoes they walk in. But don’t worry, if you buy a club using the in-game tokens you can earn, you can tweak it still with the blueprint system, so it is uniquely yours.
Modes
But what about the modes, what can you play? Well you can join in any of the cups and play through, or if you want to rise up from the bottom, you can do that as well. Multiplayer fans will enjoy the inclusion of local couch play, where you just pass a controller around. For those who may not live near their mates, online options are plentiful with matchmaking with everyone, private matches for you and your friends and more. There are also tournaments that you can take part in, where you submit your final score and it goes onto the leaderboard and the higher you place, the more points you can earn.
For those who want to create their own character, which can be male, female or non-binary and with them rise up the ranks, there is a lot to dive into. As your character plays matches, you will earn xp and once you have earnt enough, you will level up. With each level comes skill points that can level up different attributes of your character. Maybe you want to have more accuracy in your hits, or you need to add more control in your short game. The more you play the more you can level up, giving you a more rewarding experience. The best news is that you don’t have to play the career mode to level up, no matter what mode you play, you will earn skill points. There are even challenges to undertake, which change weekly and with them you can test your skills, if you want and they too help you level up.
As you can see, there is a lot going on in EA Sports PGA Tour and if they can nail all the modes and features, it could be one swinging game. Of course, they are promising a lot of post launch content as well, including new courses and a swinging mechanic that is based on buttons, but we will have to see how long that goes for. When this game releases on March 24th, it will have been 7 years since the last golf game from EA and so far, it looks like the time between games has been well spent.
