Links (series)

Links golf is a computer simulation that was developed from 1991 by the then Company Access software for the PC. The game impressed in particular by a graphic with an unprecedented level of realism.

Graphic

The graph supports SVGA, but make take a relatively long time, since each tree is loaded individually. All courses are original blueprints of real existing golf courses.

The designers of the game were Vance Cook, Kevin Homer and Roger Carver.

Screen resolutions

• Links: 320 x 200
• Links 386 Pro: 640 x 400 pixels or 640 x 480 ( 256 colors)
• Links LS: 800 x 600 (even higher, but with frame)

Control

The discount is controlled by the mouse. In the first mouse click, the strength of the discount is determined. The second click determines the accuracy. Quick reactions are needed.

Golf Courses / Classes

Other golf courses had an extra acquire the player by adding disks. They cost then each 60 DM course diskettes (3 1 /2 ") also work with the Microsoft Golf game for Windows ( based on links), but at a lower resolution.

In Links LS courses are all stored on the CD. However, the player must insert the original disk. By simply editing a file but all courses can be unlocked without a floppy.

The publication of the APCD ( Arnold Palmer Course Designer ) with Links 2001 it was possible to create your own courses. The supplied tool corresponded to the developer tool from Microsoft.

To date, the Internet many golf courses (real and fictional ), animations and equipment for the golfer and much more are available for download.

Predecessor

Leaderboard Golf ( for the C64, 1986 by Access Software )

Versions

• Links: The Challenge of Golf (1991 PC DOS, Amiga 1992, 1994 Sega CD)
• Links 386 Pro (1992, DOS)
• Links LS (1998-2002, Windows CD -ROM ) Sales by Eidos Interactive
• Links LS 2001 (2001, Windows)
• Links 2003 (2002, Windows XP)
• Links 2004 (2003, Xbox )

Links 2007 was planned for the XBOX360 for September 2006. But Take-Two has decided to discontinue the project, shortly after all the rights for links from Microsoft were purchased.

End of 1995, a simulation of the Company Peacock appeared with a right golf club (made of plastic ) containing a sensor and served instead of the mouse as an input device. The racket was extendable up to 65 inches and cost 349, - DM

Single course floppy / CD

• Banff Springs (1992 ) - Banff National Park / Alberta
• Barton Creek (1991 ) - Austin / Texas
• Bay Hill Club & - Lodge (1991 ) - Orlando / Florida
• Bighorn Mountains (1994 ) - Palm Desert / California (*)
• Bountiful Golf Course (1991 ) - Bountiful City to Salt Lake City / Utah
• Castle Pines (1994 ) - Castle Rock / Colorado
• Cog Hill 5 - Dubsdread (1996 ) - Lemont at Chicago / Illinois ( *)
• Congressional (1997 ) - Washington / Washington DC
• Devils Iceland (1995 ) - fictional: Bermuda Islands
• Firestone Country Club (1991 ) - Akron / Ohio ( *)
• Harbour Town (1991 ) - Hilton Head Iceland / South Carolina
• Hyatt Dorado Beach Resort (1991 ) - San Juan / Puerto Rico
• Innisbrook Copperhead South (1993 ) - Tampa / Florida
• Mauna Kea (island of Hawaii, 1992) - Kamuela / Hawaii
• Pelican Hill ( 1996) - Newport Beach, near Los Angeles / California
• Pebble Beach ( 1993) - Monterrey Peninsula / California (** )
• Pinehurst Country Club 2 (1991 ) - Charlotte / North Carolina ( *)
• Pinehurst Country Club 8 (1999) - Charlotte / North Carolina ( *)
• Prairie Dunes (1995 ) - Hutchinson / Kansas
• Riviera (1995 ) - Los Angeles - Pacific Palisades / California
• The Belfry (1993 ) - Birmingham / Warwickshire
• Torrey Pines (1991 ) - La Jolla / California
• Troon North (1991 ) - Scottsdale / Arizona
• Oakland Hills Country Club (1996 ) - Bloomfield Hills / Michigan ( *)
• Iceland Sea (1997 ) - St. Simons Iceland / Georgia
• Phoenix (1999) - Miyazaki / Japan
• Valderrama (1997) - Sotogrande / Andalusia
• Valhalla (1997) - Louisville / Kentucky

Most of these courses are now higher resolution and an updated design on the internet (see link ) are available. These are to be used exclusively with Links 2003 and version 1.07.

For courses that are marked with (*), at least one other course are at the same resort on the internet ( about Firestone North / Firestone South or Bighorn Canyon / Bighorn Mountains ).

( **) For the Course Pebble Beach, there is the Internet, a historic design according to records from 1930.

Golf collections within various links versions and additional packages

After 1997 there was to buy single golf courses more. Instead, there were several packets of higher resolution levels and also in each package contained several older courses several newly digitized golf courses.

- 1997 4 Left collections were published, been in each of which updates older digitized and published five courses with higher resolution.

- In subsequent years, 4 more supplemental packages revised older courses and additional courses appeared included:

• Links LS 2000 ( 10 Course Pack ): 9 revised older courses with higher Ausflösung and additionally Three Canyons ( 2000) - fictional San Diego / California

• Expansion Pack: Thanksgiving Point - Lehi / Utah

• Expansion Pack 2: Stone Canyon Club - Tucson / Arizona,
• Trent Jones Golf Club - Los Angeles / California
• Ayrshire Dunes - Boston / Massachusetts

• Championship Edition: The Judge - Los Angeles / California
• Oakmont - Oakmont / Pennsylvania
• Royal Melbourne - Melbourne / New South Wales

- More digitized golf courses existed in the subsequent versions of the LINKS Simulation:

• Links 1997: Latrobe - Latrobe at Pittsburgh / Pennsylvania ( 2 versions for summer and autumn)
• Kapalua Village, Kapalua Plantation - Lahaina on Maui / Hawaii

• Links 1998: Kapalua Bay - Lahaina on Maui / Hawaii

• Links 1999: Entrada - St. George / Utah,
• St. Andrews Old Course - St. Andrews / Scotland

• Links 2000: Hapuna - Kamuela / Hawaii
• Covered Bridge - Sellersburg / Indiana
• St. Andrews New Couse, St. Andrews Jubilee Course - St Andrews / Scotland

• Links 2001: Aviara - Carlsbad / California
• Chateau Whistler - Vancouver / British Columbia
• Prince Course ( Princeville ) - Kauai / Hawaii
• Westfields - Virginia Beach / Virginia
• Mesa Roja - fictitious: Arizona

• Links 2003: Cabo del Sol - La Paz, Baja California Sur / Mexico
• Gleneagles - Perth / Scotland
• Otsego - Gaylord / Michigan
• Cambrian Ridge - Mobile / Alabama
• Kauri Cliffs - Auckland / New Zealand
• Skeleton Coast - fiction: not concretely locally assignable in Africa

In the Internet are currently over 1800 Course load, including many well-known real places that are updated regularly, as:

• USA: Augusta National - Augusta / Georgia
• Spyglass Hill - Mornington Peninsula / California,
• Santa Barbara Resort (3 seats) - Santa Barbara / California
• Doral Golf Resort (2 places ) - Miami / Florida
• Woodland CC / TPC (2 places ) - Houston / Texas
• TPC Sawgrass - Ponte Vedra / Florida
• TPC Scottsdale - Scottsdale / Arizona
• La Quinta - Jefferson / California
• Key Biscayne - Miami / Florida
• Brown Deer - Milwaukee / Wisconsin
• Ayrshine Dunes - Boston / Massachusetts
• Capitol Hill - Pratville / Alabama
• Crystal Pines - Worland / Wyomimng
• Desert Canyon / Washington
• Medinah - Merion / Illinois
• Oklahoma - Fort Sill / Oklahoma
• Stone Canyon - Tucson / Arizona
• Stonebriar - Ponte Vedra / Florida

• Canada: Stonebridge - Ottawa / Ontario
• Northern Dunes - Hepworth in Owen Sound / Ontario

• Hawaii: Pacific Breaks - Kaumakani on the island of Kauai

• Scotland: Glenmuir - Edinburgh
• Muirfield Village - Falkirk
• St. Andrews Backward - Saint Andrews
• Gooseneck Bay - Inverness
• Centenary - Perth

• Ireland: Druids Glenn - Dublin
• Roganstown - Dublin
• Royal County Kilderry - Dingle

• England: Royal Lytham and St Annes - Manchester
• Tudor Park - Maidstone / Kent

• Germany: Oak Ried - Bavaria ( near Munich)
• Gut Kaden (3 combined 18- track courses: 2 times per nine sheets of 3 courses ) - Alveslohe in Hamburg / Schleswig -Holstein
• Good Lärchenhof - in Cologne / North Rhine -Westphalia
• Lucia van Rheden - Hameln / Lower Saxony

• Austria: Enzesfeld - in Vienna / Lower Austria

• United Arab Emirates: Dubai Emirates

• Sweden: Leaffield in Gothenburg

• Spain: Las Brisas - Granada / Andalucia

Furthermore, the internet to find many extraordinary fictional scenarios, including:

• Devils Iceland 2008 ( an Indian scene, presented the flag poles as stake and a pirate ship as a backdrop )
• Rivendell (based on the legendary RPG series " Ultima " together with fantasy castle as a backdrop )
• Piazza Metallica ( a rehabilitated industrial landscape in the Ruhr area )
• Netherlands: Kanaal New Course ( a fictitious Dutch landscape with windmills and numerous streams )
• Shadowlands - a typical links course and is invested in Scottish style
• Brydestone - a parkland course in the Scottish style with numerous streams and large height differences
• Avalon Coast - even a golf course in the Scottish Design
• Gooseneck Bay - on a cliff in the Scottish style with difficult obstacles and high Rough
• A landscape of craters on the moon under a glass dome ( " Craters of the Moon" ), see http://linkscorner.org/courses/index.php

Projects

Since 2013 the company "perfect parallel" (see link) is tested an improved graphics engine. In the alpha version animations (moving leaves and grass in the wind, waterfalls, running water), 3D effects ( and Others glare backlit ), weather-related effects ( inter alia, fog, clouds ) and nighttime conditions with floodlights included.

The full version is a conversion program to include Links2001/2003-Kurse (*. Crz format) to be able to use the new format required and be equipped with a golf course editor.

The development is currently at the stage of a alpha version and already here is a sign that the hardware requirements are very high (recommendation: PC at least 4 GB of RAM and 512 MB graphics card memory with DirectX 9). It can be downloaded a trial version.