Links Golf - In-depth Written Review of the Amiga HAM Game
Links: The Challenge of Golf
Amiga, 1992 (Original DOS 1990)
Access
$59.95
*Alphabetical list of writings
*Game shown on its designed NTSC hardware, pics of 4:3 CRT screen
*Game shown on its designed NTSC hardware, pics of 4:3 CRT screen
From day one the Amiga was a computer known for her graphics. During the launch of the Amiga at the Lincoln Center in New York, Andy Warhol would famously offer his distinct style to a portrait of Debbie Harry. Apple had originally approached him to work with them for the Macintosh launch, but he had passed on that opportunity noting the unimpressive black and white display. When asked live on stage what computers he had worked with in the past, Andy responded that he hadn't worked on any, that he had"... waited for this one.", referring to the Amiga.
The PC world in 1985 wasn't much better than the black and white Mac, some would argue worse. Featuring primarily CGA 4 color graphics from a palette of 16, chosen for their use in business applications and ability to be distinguished on monochrome monitors. EGA would increase the on screen colors to 16 from a palette of 64, but again these colors were there to be functional, not pretty. Displays on the Amiga included 320x200, 640x200, and 640x400 for NTSC machines, with an added 56 pixels in the vertical direction for PAL models. The two higher resolutions could display up to 16 colors on screen from a palette of 4,096, while the lowest resolution could show 16, 32, 64, and yes, even all 4,096 colors as an officially supported graphics mode. Most games for the system tended to use 16 or 32 colors for speed/memory/compatibility purposes, some might hack individual scan lines to display hundreds of colors, but only a select few ventured into HAM (Hold and Modify) 4,096 color mode, Links might be the most stunning of them all.
^Starting, driving range, Bountiful course in Utah
The Amiga was five years old by the time the original DOS release of Links had been released in 1990. 256 color VGA games were becoming the norm, though I'd claim the Amiga fared quite well during this time period. Amiga original games were still coming out and their DOS ports wouldn't always reach the same level, despite the increased capabilities of PC systems. DOS games, when ported with love, could often look just as or nearly as good as their VGA counterparts. The developers of Links, Access, started designing games in the early 80's for the Commodore 64, switching to the PC near the end of the decade. Though they never made an Amiga original, their ports to the system always showed care, often besting the original.
Seemingly unwilling to downgrade their award winning golf simulation for the Amiga, they decided on 4,096 color HAM graphics. In the process they may have created the most stunningly, beautifully realistic game to ever see the light of day for the system. What made Links so special was its 3D world, golf games prior to this (and many after) could only provide a feeling of three dimensions in travel distance from the tee to the hole. Even in this field, a 300 yard shot often felt exaggerated on screen. Distances in Links look realistic, and for the first time elevation would become a factor. This golf game would feel no less impressive as a flight simulator.
^Course introduction, maps, sand, elevation
Look behind you or to your side when first teeing up; you might see the 18th or 9th hole, along with the clubhouse. Most golf games could only render one hole at a time, severely hampering the landscape beauty of the scene. If a ball is hit outside those confines, it's an out of bounds penalty. Not so in Links. As long as your ball stays within the physical confines of the entire course, feel free to make your way back to the hole you started from, or just explore. Anything that's not obscured by a tree or object, you can see.
Trees, buildings, and objects along the courses were photographed and digitized, placed in their real world locations. While I did note an occasional tree which looked suspiciously similar to another, indicating some copy and pasting, I found a wealth of unique trees placed throughout the courses. Some of the objects I found even had me investigating the actual courses to find more information on what I was seeing. In the background of some shots at Firestone Country Club I noticed a space needle looking building off in the distance, which peeked my interest. Upon searching online I found out it's a giant tee and golf ball located in the parking lot.
^Views of greens, wet ball
While I've long loved various golf games, the sheer realism I felt poking around this 1992 Amiga gem had me getting more into golf in general. Despite having clubs, golf has never been a sport I've had much desire to play, the occasional putt-putt round being the rare exception. During my recording phase I found myself watching men's and women's tournaments on the weekend. Here in Detroit there was a U.S. Open qualifying tournament I found myself researching, and I even pulled up some classic Jack Nicklaus, watching the final round of the 1986 Masters.
On the Amiga I can remember playing and watching my father play World Class Leaderboard Golf, an earlier classic from Access themselves. There was Mean 18, I even remember designing my own courses in Jack Nicklaus' Golf, and of course the classic from EA, PGA Tour Golf. The PGA series would remain a favorite of ours onto the Sega Genesis, DOS, and Windows, and I honestly don't remember some of those later EA entries looking as good as this game right here. At this point in my video review I compared some of those earlier Amiga games with Links, noting that while not coming close to the reality markers of this title, they sure managed to be quite a bit of fun.
^Shadows, hills
I found Links to be fun and enjoyable, but in a different sense compared to those other games. In fact I am tempted to say I still find PGA Tour Golf to be the overall more fun "game" to play. Links is fun because it's so realistic, those other games are fun because they're not, or they have a blending of arcade and realism. Despite this games beauty, I actually found it quite difficult to initially get into. Inspired by its graphics I first attempted to play this game earlier in the year but didn't find myself getting very far. The swing meter required pinpoint timing, and being used to PGA Tour I found myself swinging for power only to slice wildly in Links. Part of my problems here was my insistence on starting at the highest difficulty level, the easiest mode should be fit for kids.
Club selection is your problem on the highest difficulty setting, and even on easier modes you're never told how far a given club is going to take a ball at any given power level. The game required me to do some homework, taking to the driving range and testing out each club. I filled an entire sheet of paper with my notes on club and power distances, gaining a greater understanding of what club to choose for a given shot. I mean that's exactly what you'd have to do in real life; Go to the range and practice your shots with different clubs, gain a feel for your best choices. If you're going to like this game you'll likely need an appreciation for simulations and/or golf in general, gamers looking for quick fun should still experience this beauty, but will likely prefer other titles over Links.
^Finishing Bountiful, Firestone's fall colors
As is often the case, beauty comes with a price. Links was not only noteworthy as a game which utilized HAM graphics, it climbed the rarity scale yet again by requiring a hard drive on the Amiga. Despite coming out on only two floppy disks, due to the math calculations setting up the 3D vectors at a given position, the drive is often being accessed. There's actually conflicting information on the hard drive requirement, with it being expressly written as needed on the box, the manual, and in several reviews for the game. I noticed later reviews had a different story however, often saying the game was unbearable on floppy, but indeed worked. Support for floppy systems may have been added in a later version, or hidden well from the beginning, I'm not sure.
I have no desire to test out the games performance from floppy myself, given how it's anything but fast loading off the hard drive. The initial loading of a course felt like a good three to five minutes, with me abandoning the computer to find other things to do during my wait. Upon taking a shot, the time spent redrawing your position varied greatly depending on the complexity of the course and area, but 15-45 seconds feels like a good estimate. In no way did this get on my nerves. I nearly always chose to view a replay of my shots from the point of view of where the ball ended up landing, utterly engrossed by the games beauty. I was in no rush to get to my next shot, laying back and taking in all the scenery. It's still faster than a real game of golf, and it's actually mind blowing how fast the Amiga version ended up being when the DOS release was noted for having the same loading issues from a 25mhz 386!
^Par 3 at Firestone
Beyond that initial loading of the course and the redrawing for each new shot, actual gameplay elements run smoothly. A digitized golfer with many frames shows off various swing motions. I read a female golfer had also been captured to be put into the game, but ended up getting cut due to space concerns. You can even create your own customized swinging stance, though this is not an area I bothered to explore. Wind seems to be a realistic factor in Links, quite a departure from other golf games of the time. Here wind tends to come from a certain direction, only varying slightly on a single hole. Seeing how you're following the actual layout of a real course, the next hole might have the wind change direction because you physically are facing a new direction, not because we seem to be caught in a tornado like other games. Wind speed can reach stupidly high storm levels in other games in a matter of seconds, having a large impact on where your ball will land. Here the wind will slightly effect your ball, but it's never the ridiculous factor which is found in other games of golf.
Links shipped with only one course, Torrey Pines along the Pacific Ocean. Despite the sheer amount of work I know went into this game, one course would have been a major dislike on my end when this was new. From the start they promised more, but of course those came with a separate price tag. My favorite course by far was Bountiful in Utah, which had a wealth of elevation changes located on hills, and featuring the Rocky Mountains as a glorious background image. This was only a $10 expansion when new. Firestone Country Club in Ohio featured some stunning fall colors, but ended up my least favorite course (still worth playing), and that one cost $25 when new. These three courses would end up being the only ones available for the Amiga, but three courses is about what I would expect from a single golf game. Several more were released for DOS, and courses there were also forward and backward compatible with the newer Links 386. I was unable to straight transfer DOS courses to the Amiga version, but would imagine it wouldn't be all too hard for a talented Amiga coder to port those courses over.
^Finishing Firestone and heading to Torrey Pines
Graphically the Amiga version is unquestionably at least equal to the 256 color VGA DOS release, and I feel it can be claimed as being better due to its use of HAM mode. A comparison with DOS can be found at this point in my video review. There were several slight changes which I happened to prefer, like the color of the wind indicator, and the picture of Firestone Country Club. The colors of the shadowed grass under heavy tree cover looked to go deeper on the Amiga, and those fall colors in the trees looked much better to my eyes. The major difference with the Amiga is actually in a choice of the overall tone of the grass colors. Here on the Amiga it is noticeably more lush, the greens are more green than they are in DOS. Remnants of the original DOS subdued colors can be found on the Amiga when selecting a drop location in the practice area, showing this was clearly a choice they wanted to make, and one I feel makes the game look better.
The sounds of a golf game are usually scarce but welcomed. For DOS I read a complaint saying that the voice commentary was loud and clear while the nature sounds (birds chirping, etc) were of a lower quality. On the Amiga I felt it was the opposite, where the nature sounds were nice and clear, but the voice commentary had a dip in volume. I felt the game could have done with a few more commentary lines and nature sounds. Remarks on how you hit a tree, splashed into the water, got a par or birdie are nice, but there was nothing for my eagle or bogey. Of course when compared with other golf games of that time, you were unlikely to hear birds, let alone voices.
^Views of the Pacific Ocean at Torrey Pines
Magazine opinions of the time period appear divided on cultural lines. American magazines, with no exceptions that I could find for DOS or Amiga, had nothing but the highest praise for the game. Amazing Computing called the Amiga version the ultimate golf program, Amiga World praised that the game had been rewritten for the Amiga instead of simply ported and concluded that if golf is your game, then Links should be on your hard disk. Computer Gaming World called it so detailed that you'll feel like you're on the course and offered to raise a glass to Access. Links won the 1991 action game of the year award from CGW, and would go on to place as the fifth most innovative computer game of all time from a special 1996 issue. I found a readers best of chart including Amiga users input placing Links as the 12th of 100 games, and an actual sales chart placing it as the 2nd best selling Amiga and DOS game for the month of June in 1992.
Europe was a different story. Some loved it, some had mixed thoughts, some thought it was the worst golf game ever. Amiga Format incorrectly pointed to the European publisher, U.S. Gold, as those responsible for its Amiga conversation (Wiki also cites this publication as "proof" of this), they are wrong, and even admit so later on the same page. Unsure how a company with absolutely no in-game credits managed to convert a game for the Amiga which had already been released a couple months before in America by Access themselves, before Europe even saw it. This historical inaccuracy aside, they called it the best golf game ever, and awarded it an "Amiga Gold" rating of 92%. As a budget release over a year later, Amiga Format gave it an 8 out of 10. Amiga Power had a mixed reaction, calling it the most playable golf game on the Amiga, and also the slowest game ever to make it onto the system, saying this was unforgivable, and awarding it a 70%. Amiga Action, showing screenshots of only the first hole, were unwilling to wait all day for the beauty and gave the game a 23%. Amiga Computing, again with screenshots which prove they did not take their jobs seriously; said it contained some stunning graphics but could only be recommended to dedicated golf fans, giving it a 40%. Computer and Video Games called it the worst golf game ever.
Personally I have little respect for the way the European publications presented their opinions. If you want to say it can be a little slow loading in a new view, and that other games might be more fun, I can respect that. But for these people to throw away what could be the most gorgeously realistic game to ever come out for the system is a travesty. Most of the negative reviews couldn't be bothered to do enough research to even mention that Links is a HAM graphics game, their ignorance on the Amiga is staggering. All of the magazines which said it was the best golf game had no problems noting the slowness, but saying it was worth the wait. Perhaps someone else may not think it's worth that wait, but if you can't be bothered to get past the first hole then a lot of wonderful games will likely not be worth the wait for you. I believe a true golf fan will find nothing for the Amiga that looks or plays better. Those who may like golf games but not necessarily golf will surely enjoy something like PGA Tour Golf more, as that is more of a blending of arcade and simulation. Links is about as simulation as it gets, so it won't appeal to everyone. Nevertheless, I firmly believe all Amiga fans should play a round or two and experience the stunning beauty that Access managed to wring out of a 1985 computer.
I hope you'll check out my video review, where I'll show off the box, read from the manual, and check out all the magazines I previously mentioned. Readers of this article may also enjoy my looks at Flight Simulator II, TV Sports Football, or Wing Commander.
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