Tiger Woods PGA TOUR 12: The Masters Demo Available Now, Post Impressions Here

[DivotMaker]

Re: Tiger Woods PGA TOUR 12: The Masters Demo Available Now, Post Impressions Here

Played the demo once more on tourney mode and just realized that not only do they not give you the pin distance but they don't even give you the green elevation like last year in true aim. They don't want you thinking about anything when you're on the hardest skill level. Even if you're able to totally turn off the caddie (which I doubt) the lack of pin distance and elevation is glaring and makes it pure arcade.

Ironically, I find the lack of distance and elevation to be more challenging. TW Online does this as well in its Expert Aiming mode and it does not take long at all to figure out the elevations as well as club distances. I also like the lack of aiming arrow when zooming to the landing area because it is more realistic. Not sure how you consider the above features making the game more "arcade" when actually it is the exact opposite (assuming the Caddy is off).

[acreyman]

Wow I guess I'm the only one that's pretty pissed right now with the demo and that fact you can't turn off the caddie option altogether because I think it just ruined the game for me.

The main reason being they ruined the true aim mode with this caddie thing. It turned everything into just stick swinging with no user input into managing the course and judging carrying distances. In other words they dumbed it down even on tourney difficulty. They don't give you flagstick distances and even worse thay don't give your golfer the yardage carry distances for his clubs. All you get are %'s of what the optimal shot should be. I don't even know if the % the caddie gives me is the carrying distance or is where the ball is supposed to stop rolling.

For example you have a couple of vague markers as to what the distance is on approach shots to the green but you can't compare it to your club distance because they are not made available for you to see. All you're given is a % of a certain club you should swing. (EG:65% of your 6 iron recommended by the caddie). You have no idea how much 65% fo your 6 iron is in distance because they don't provide the full distance or carry distance of your 6 iron. The only way around it I guess would be to write it down on a piece of paper from the club tuner screen but then your distance always changes as you apply XP points and who wants to always have to rely on finding that paper when you play.

That kills all the fun of true aim and all you do is follow the caddie's shot selection and it becomes incredibly boring. You can customize your shot but in some instances it was noticebly off from what the caddie suggested even though I customized the exact same shot. And it's a crapshoot anyways because you don't have the club distances readlily available to you. I thought that this option could be turned off but the only thing that you can disable seems to be his voice.

As a result they totally overhauled true aim and killed the fun of it and any strategy the user has in judging distances. Even when you move the LS upwards to see the layout of the course it moves to where your ball is supposed to end up almost instantaneously so you really have no good overview of the hole itself. So any trees that might be in the way are hard to see and you simply go by what the caddie tells you and for the 18th hole at Augusta it didn't work very well because he said I could lay up or try and fade it around the trees with my driver and I hit the shot perfectly with the fade he wanted but still ended up in the trees based on the aim he suggested. For Pebble Beach that's gonna be a nightmare.

It kills all the fun out of par 3's because you know whatever the cadidie tells you is the right shot so it simply becomes a game of whether you can nail the right % of what he tells you to hit. It takes all the strategy out of deciding whether to go up or down a club or using some backspin or topspin on your tee shot. It just becomes a mundane exercise of hitting the % he wants.

This is a major gamekiller for sim users. I can't believe they dumbed it down like this. The caddie does all the thinking for you and that was half the fun of playing true aim, well at least to anyone over 14. It's like playing God Of War and having a character in the game solving all the puzzles for you. EA is at it again. They have no concept as to why gamers loved true aim amd made it pointless. First they ruined FN Champion and now this.

Your not the only one that feels this way.....I am holding out hope that the retail version is different than the demo. But I feel the exact same way you do now that I have played the demo more.

[acreyman]

The Caddy will be able to be turned off in the full version.

Again, why you sit here and bitch and moan about the game when you don't even have EA's attention here? You are wasting your time posting your comments here (no offense Steve) if you truly want to get the Devs attention. Many others posting on the EA TW forums are expressing the same criticisms and they at least have the Devs attention. You don't here.

EA Devs have contributed to this webiste quite a bit over the years........and, correct me if I am wrong, they even invited regular posters to the Madden Studios a few years back for feedback pre-launch. They are reading... and probably wont post any answers until the big wigs and marketing gurus have ok'd the responses.

[DivotMaker]

Re: Tiger Woods PGA TOUR 12: The Masters Demo Available Now, Post Impressions Here

EA Devs have contributed to this webiste quite a bit over the years........and, correct me if I am wrong, they even invited regular posters to the Madden Studios a few years back for feedback pre-launch. They are reading... and probably wont post any answers until the big wigs and marketing gurus have ok'd the responses.

Not in the Golf forums they haven't....

[countryboy]

Re: Tiger Woods PGA TOUR 12: The Masters Demo Available Now, Post Impressions Here

I'm an enjoying the demo very much so. Cannot wait to play the full game.

While its not in the demo(except describing it) I like the way the career mode is done.

[yesrushdt]

Re: Tiger Woods PGA TOUR 12: The Masters Demo Available Now, Post Impressions Here

The Caddy will be able to be turned off in the full version.

Do you mean completely turning the caddy off so you can't see him at all during a round? I sure hope that option is included. It's a pain having to press B all the time to get him off the screen.

Will turning the caddy off in options also get rid of the shot recommendations that automatically set your swing to a certain percentage when selected? I would much rather have complete control over how long my backswing is. Sure you can select the custom 100% and do it yourself, but the selections clearly show the percentages. I'd rather figure that out myself versus the game spoon feeding it to me.

I'll post this in the EA forum, but figured I'd post it here too considering how buggy that site is. Civil posts seem to disappear over there for no reason.

[Hurricain]

Re: Tiger Woods PGA TOUR 12: The Masters Demo Available Now, Post Impressions Here

Played the demo, was entertaining. The caddy is easy mode though. I mean all the game comes down to is swing percentage, what fun is that? I'm going to buy the game though, dlc in career and saves in round are GREAT additions.

I am very interested to see how the caddy things plays out in the final version.

[N51_rob]

Played the demo, was entertaining. The caddy is easy mode though. I mean all the game comes down to is swing percentage, what fun is that? Just a very strange feature and if I'm not able to turn off (before I get into a game) this sadly won't be a purchase for me.

Its the 2010/2011 EA montra; simpler, quicker, deeper. Caddy does the work you swing the stick. I liked the Caddy off the tee and in the fairway giving club option. I don't like him on the green giving the exact spot to putt too.

Sent from my DROIDX using Tapatalk

[Araxen]

Re: Tiger Woods PGA TOUR 12: The Masters Demo Available Now, Post Impressions Here

This game was going to be a day 1 purchase for me since Augusta is finally in the game but they went and mucked the game all up. They took out the view I used to line up the shots. It's very frustrating to line up shots now because you can't get that view anymore. I'm not buying the game at all now. So disappointed.

[Seymour Scagnetti]

Re: Tiger Woods PGA TOUR 12: The Masters Demo Available Now, Post Impressions Here

The Caddy will be able to be turned off in the full version.

Again, why you sit here and bitch and moan about the game when you don't even have EA's attention here? You are wasting your time posting your comments here (no offense Steve) if you truly want to get the Devs attention. Many others posting on the EA TW forums are expressing the same criticisms and they at least have the Devs attention. You don't here.

I am smart guy, I'm Yosemite Dan over there. And the EA guys aren't exactly visible on the issue except to offer vague convoluted statements which they are excellent at doing.

I'm posting here so I can inform other sim guys here like me that they don't waste thier money on this game that has gone right back to thier cartooney ways.

And no one has confirmed anything about turning the caddie completely off in the full version. All we are getting over there is double talk about it can be disabled, which we already knew, but you're still stuck seeing the caddie's optimal shot selection staring you in the face beside your custom shot so it's hardly disabled. And even you could turn if off completely the true aim mode is still hopelessly broken if they they don't give you pin distance, elevation or club distances because you go into a hole completely blind. And no one at EA has said that these vital things will be insituted back into true aim a la TW11.

[Seymour Scagnetti]

Re: Tiger Woods PGA TOUR 12: The Masters Demo Available Now, Post Impressions Here

Ironically, I find the lack of distance and elevation to be more challenging. TW Online does this as well in its Expert Aiming mode and it does not take long at all to figure out the elevations as well as club distances. I also like the lack of aiming arrow when zooming to the landing area because it is more realistic. Not sure how you consider the above features making the game more "arcade" when actually it is the exact opposite (assuming the Caddy is off).

LOL I honestly thought that not even you could defend EA on this bonehead design decision but you found a way. You would have to play this game 24\7 to remember elevations of every hole for all the courses or have to write them all own. You gotta be kidding me. They should be easily provided like every other golf game I've played. And the reason it isn't is because EA wants you to use the caddie exclusively and just be brain dead when you play.

And what's the excuse about giving us an easy indicator of flag distance so we don't have to go leaf thru the hole overview to try and figure out. Making it incredibly user unfriendly does not make it sim.

The aiming arrow I don't care about and am not complaining about that.

Yeah sure you could go to club tuner and write down your distances on a piece of paper but why should we have to? And what about when you're building your golfer with XP and adding distance to the clubs regularly? You have to rewrite the distances almost daily. That's alot of paper and completely idiotic.

No matter how you try and defend it, it is simply an unfinished mode that obviously got little attention and no regard how good true aim was last year and thought it needed to be dumbed down with a caddie for some inane reason. If EA was so sim about this then they should have gave us the options to recreate last year true aim which I have faint hope of happening.

Why not keep it the same as last year and not give the stupid %'s which is arcadey no matter how you slice it. What real life golfer goes by %'s of his swing when playing. It becomes a game of try and swing the right % rather than full swings with lesser clubs trying to figure out carrying distances that are not given.

And not to mention the overview camera with the LS that gives you a look at where your ball is supposed to land. It is lightning quick and you have no chance to see any real estate prior to where the ball lands and if you reverse from there with the D pad then you can't see trees or any other obstruction on the fairway. That will make some courses unplayable unless you use the caddie the whole time. No matter how you slice it the true aim mode was meant to be played 100% with caddie recommendations and that's why you won't be able to turn it off completely in the full version. It's hard coded into the game. And you just swinging the stick and doing no strategizing = arcade golf.

[kerosene31]

Re: Tiger Woods PGA TOUR 12: The Masters Demo Available Now, Post Impressions Here

I was reading some comments and thought this couldn't be as bad as people are making it... but I downloaded it and it is.

The caddy is terrible. You can't even adjust your aim. I don't mean to offend anyone, but who would want this? I want to play the game. Having a caddy give advice would be great, but having them limit my decisions? No thanks.

This isn't a golf game, it is a "can you move the left stick as you're told" game.

Someone let me know with 100% certainty that I can play with true aim just like TW11.

I don't even think I was playing on the Road to Augusta. It felt scripted like I couldn't miss.

Even if I can turn off the caddy in the final version, then what am I buying? Augusta and then I lose all my TW11 dlc courses. I think I'm skipping this year until I hear something significant.

[Hurricain]

Re: Tiger Woods PGA TOUR 12: The Masters Demo Available Now, Post Impressions Here

Alright, so after I posted I gave the demo a shot again. My wife was in the room and wanted to give it a try. This is the person who could not walk in Halo because she couldn't get the controls down.

Using the caddy she shot a -1 on the San Anton 5 holes. She then said, "Wow, this game was made for me."

I just laughed and cried inside.

I hope you can turn off the caddy before a round.

[kerosene31]

Re: Tiger Woods PGA TOUR 12: The Masters Demo Available Now, Post Impressions Here

The Caddy will be able to be turned off in the full version.

Again, why you sit here and bitch and moan about the game when you don't even have EA's attention here? You are wasting your time posting your comments here (no offense Steve) if you truly want to get the Devs attention. Many others posting on the EA TW forums are expressing the same criticisms and they at least have the Devs attention. You don't here.

The game is out in a few weeks and is not going to see any significant changes at this point. It is probably close to going gold if it hasn't already.

[RumbleCard]

Re: Tiger Woods PGA TOUR 12: The Masters Demo Available Now, Post Impressions Here

Alright, so after I posted I gave the demo a shot again. My wife was in the room and wanted to give it a try. This is the person who could not walk in Halo because she couldn't get the controls down.

Using the caddy she shot a -1 on the San Anton 5 holes. She then said, "Wow, this game was made for me."

I just laughed and cried inside.

I hope you can turn off the caddy before a round.

That's hilarious.

I am smart guy, I'm Yosemite Dan over there. And the EA guys aren't exactly visible on the issue except to offer vague convoluted statements which they are excellent at doing.

I'm posting here so I can inform other sim guys here like me that they don't waste thier money on this game that has gone right back to thier cartooney ways.

And no one has confirmed anything about turning the caddie completely off in the full version. All we are getting over there is double talk about it can be disabled, which we already knew, but you're still stuck seeing the caddie's optimal shot selection staring you in the face beside your custom shot so it's hardly disabled. And even you could turn if off completely the true aim mode is still hopelessly broken if they they don't give you pin distance, elevation or club distances because you go into a hole completely blind. And no one at EA has said that these vital things will be insituted back into true aim a la TW11.

I appreciate everything you've written about the game here. I haven't really browsed this forum as much as I should have even though I planned to buy the game. I thought true aim was a huge step in the right direction last year. A few improvements here and there and I figured they could really polish it up for TW12.

This new caddy thing along with the lack of on screen information in regards to true aim I can easily say that I'm out. I won't be getting the game unless there's a substantial patch or work around for distance and elevation along with true aim.

What a disappointment.