41 replies to this topic

[shimonko]

Very realistic--even the flagstick has been stolen.

[Kablammo11]

The 17th at Sawgrass. It's always that one. They all use it... I hate it so, so much...

 

Peace, Blackadar... I agree that they are not very good in the communication department and that words like "hype" and "buzz" are missing from their vocabulary. I must confess that I actually enjoy that, in a nostalgic way: In this day and age, when absolutely everybody flings BS at you for every dimwitted, unnecessary product, here's a socially awkward little group who holds back on the BS (too much) for a truly important and essential product (to me, that is). I have a soft spot for ambiguity and silent misfits, so I have no beef with PP.

If you worry so much about their marketing strategy, feel free to send them your credentials and volunteer for some pro bono work on their behalf. I do not mean this sarcastically at all - because this here is one of the so few things where you could actually make a difference. My own, sometimes overbearing omnipresence around here is due to the fact that I could either sit on the fence and do nothing or hurl myself into the fray and engage into this project. Maybe this is the point at which the worlds most famous chiasmus needs to be adapted to this situation: "Ask not what this golf game can do for you, but what you can do for this golf game."

[shimonko]

That has to be post of the year.

 

PG don't have to market when they've got TGC doing such a splendid job for them, rounding up all the sim-golfers. All that matters in the end is how enjoyable the game is. The masses will come. 

[IanD]

I quite agree... very well put K11..

[Blackadar]

The 17th at Sawgrass. It's always that one. They all use it... I hate it so, so much...

 

Peace, Blackadar... I agree that they are not very good in the communication department and that words like "hype" and "buzz" are missing from their vocabulary. I must confess that I actually enjoy that, in a nostalgic way: In this day and age, when absolutely everybody flings BS at you for every dimwitted, unnecessary product, here's a socially awkward little group who holds back on the BS (too much) for a truly important and essential product (to me, that is). I have a soft spot for ambiguity and silent misfits, so I have no beef with PP.

If you worry so much about their marketing strategy, feel free to send them your credentials and volunteer for some pro bono work on their behalf. I do not mean this sarcastically at all - because this here is one of the so few things where you could actually make a difference. My own, sometimes overbearing omnipresence around here is due to the fact that I could either sit on the fence and do nothing or hurl myself into the fray and engage into this project. Maybe this is the point at which the worlds most famous chiasmus needs to be adapted to this situation: "Ask not what this golf game can do for you, but what you can do for this golf game."

 

You and I generally agree on their lack of marketing, but we don't agree on the impact it will have. Maybe they'll get lucky and "the masses will come". Word-of-Mouth worked for games like Terraria, Kerbal Space Program and Minecraft. But I wouldn't bet on it and that's a fools' hope. My overall point is that it wouldn't be too difficult for them to actually rectify the situation and that I believe it is important for them to do so ASAP. We'll see how it all turns out.

 

As far as me volunteering my services, if PP decides to give their product away then I'll consider giving my services away. But otherwise I'm not in the habit of volunteering my services for free so someone else can make a profit from them. Frankly, there's no reason for me to "engage" in this project when it's questionable how important this project is to them. I'm sure they're working on it, but given some of their actions, inactions, missed deadlines, lack of updates and "bent" promises, I think there's room to question their level of commitment.

[Mike Jones]

Blackadar, you're quite entitled to your opinion although I don't agree on many of your points. When it's ready PerfectGolf will be released, if people want to play it and be part of a creative community, that's great, if they don't well we'll still keep trucking because unlike some failed attempts at golf games in the past, we didn't put all our eggs in one basket.

 

Where are all the other golf games - like Links, EA's Tiger Woods series, The Golden Bear Challenge, Sierra sports PGA Golf? That's right - long gone. There may be a reason for that and I'm sure it's not because they weren't great games.

 

We'll learn from our mistakes and keep trying to get better. I still want to be working on and improving PG 20 years from now.

[KenR]

I want this game "yesterday" ; I've actually, like everyone else, been waiting for it for what seems like a couple of years now since I first heard of the work being put into it.

 

Am I getting impatient? Well, as I said I want the game "yesterday"; but as well as I "know" Mike and AJ from years past with their involvement with the Links series I have a pretty good idea of what we're going to get with PG and the Course Forge once they are actually ready for public consumption. I'm willing to wait for both, and hopefully that wait is getting shorter by the week.

 

I do understand the impatience being shown by many because this franchise has been under development for quite some time now. All I can suggest is that you hang in there, check back from time to time, and when, not if, the game becomes available the wait will have been well worth it.

[Blackadar]

Where are all the other golf games - like Links, EA's Tiger Woods series, The Golden Bear Challenge, Sierra sports PGA Golf? That's right - long gone. There may be a reason for that and I'm sure it's not because they weren't great games.

 

 

I'm not sure what you mean by this because some of those companies are still around and with the exception of Link they didn't fail or succeed on the basis of a golf game.  

 

Actually, let's look that the ones you listed and see why they failed. And just to establish some credentials, this isn't coming from someone who is just guessing at this stuff. I was paid to review computer games during this time frame and personally reviewed a couple in the Links series, JNSE and TW. I have some idea what I'm talking about. It doesn't mean that I'm always right, but I do have a pretty good memory what happened during the "golf wars" in the late 90s. Mostly Tiger Woods happened...but more on that below.

 

The high water mark of Links was '97 and '98. By 2003 the game looked dated, the lack of a easily usable course designer hampered the game and the lack of a career mode hurt. They were summarily bumped from the marketplace by the Tiger Woods name, EA's marketing power and the fact the game had become stale. Links 2003 wasn't a significant improvement over '97 or '98 and that's a long time to keep releasing essentially the same product. Links lost due to a lack of product innovation and arguably becoming an inferior product to TW. After 2001, there was really no prevailing reason to buy Links over TW unless you had a strong game play preference. For an average buyer, the TW name, the graphics (note that I always hated the TW graphical look) and the more robust feature set made TW the more appealing choice.

 

Tiger Woods had a good run in the mid-2000s, but by 2006 the game was in decline. The PC version was often behind the console version in terms of graphics and game play. The PC version one year was often the console version from the year before. The game play had again become stale - for example the new console innovation in 2008 was "create a face" and had nothing to do with game play. There was virtually no PC development the last two years of the franchise and EA stopped selling the game on the PC until the disaster of 12: The Masters, which was abysmal. Then again, TW getting pulled from the PC back in 2009 went with EA's overall corporate strategy of pulling sports games from the PC.

 

Golden Bear Challenge died not because it was a bad game, but because it was a marketing failure next to Links and Tiger Woods (which was first released in 1998). The same goes for PGA Championship Golf, which was a decent game but again failed to make a splash next to TW and Links. GBC was the better game, but both were just buried in the marketplace. Lack of marketing really killed both games. Then again, I don't know if anyone could have reasonably marketed against the Tiger Woods name back in 2000. Nicklaus had a better chance because their product was better, they had a more established game base and the Nicklaus name still had a lot of clout. But it would have been tough...

 

So of the 4 games you mentioned, 3 of them failed in large part due to marketing failures, not corporate failures or product failures. The fourth, Tiger Woods, died due to a lack of innovation, public perception (TW's "problems" in 2009), a recession which massively contributed to the overall decline of general interest in the sport and a corporate direction to remove virtually all sports games from the PC and push them to consoles. Which goes back to my point - you can just build a game and hope buyers will show up, but that's a poor strategy in the best of times. When you have a potential 800 pound gorilla that is about to launch their competing game, you either get out your message or you run the risk of getting absolutely buried.

 

Look at it this way. If their product is good, then you have to cut through the noise to try to give buyers a reason to buy your product. If their product is bad, you have to cut through the noise to try to give people a reason to give the genre another chance. Both of those are far more easily accomplished if you've done your groundwork ahead of time to promote some public awareness, not after the fact.

 

Now as far as your corporate strategy of "keep on truckin" because your eggs aren't in one basket, I'm sorry but I really don't care. PG is what interests me, not your videos on public television or any other business ventures you may have. Plus, I'm not sure what you're trying to say with that comment. Are you saying that PG isn't an important part of your business strategy and its success or failure doesn't matter? If that's the case and you don't really care, why should anyone else care? If that's not what you're saying, then what message are you trying to convey?

[Stephen Sullivan]

http://www.gamersboo...t-Within-a-Year

[Mike Jones]

Blakadar I'm not willing to dive into the sea of possible scenarios and conjecture that you are swimming in but suffice to say we do agree on one thing - marketing is important. 

[spikel]

Blackader just one thing I wanted to correct you on with the PGA Championship Series and Tiger Woods. Tiger Woods 2002 on the PC was actually developed by Headgate, developers of the PGA Championship golf series which had its final iteration in 1999 with PGA Championship Golf 2000. The game wasn't a marketing failure or a failure in any way, Headgate, ahem EA Salt Lake, just got bought out by EA. The game continued to use the same old engine from 2001/2002 until its death in 08 on PC, so Tiger was obviously just a failure to evolve. 

 

Links just got shifted with Microsofts new focus towards the console market and thus Links 2004 was created. Possibly the best console golf game made, however, the market was not on Xbox but PC. So Links did not die due to failure to evolve, but rather neglecting the audience that had made it such a household name. Links finally had non-static environments and such, but only on Xbox!

 

Also I believe PP is just stating that since they have their other ventures, they can have a more realistic attitude toward the golf sim part of the project. Golf sims on the PC are not blockbuster titles, they do not have explosive sales. It is very smart to be able to use the same engine to design courses for golf broadcast by commission and golf simulators. The folks at Red Chain did the same thing, these days it's the only reason we get a golf sim on the PC now and then. It's not a lack of focus or care toward the PC market, it's just how life works.

[Sinewiz]

In actuality, Links started it's slow death the day Microsoft got a hold of it.

[shimonko]

Seems like the Greenlight program is disappearing within the year:

 

http://www.gamersboo...t-Within-a-Year

[IanD]

Well, that's alot of type for something that still lacks alot of other reasoning.. I won't even begin to comment upon the TW scenario as I never bought anything but one version for the Wii... and for me personally, it didn't do it for me. Graphicswise and playability, it wasn't my cup of tea.

 

However, the TW series seems to have a huge following.. it's still going on, albeit less without a latest product.

 

The Links series, is still active too. If another version released, they'd buy it today (myself included). Communities are built through products too. These can encourage add-ons, as Links certainly encouraged this with courses and packs, that then allowed participation online via the official site (Country Club).

 

Whatever you believe Blackadar, in terms of how these products died, isn't necessarily how things were or will be. Links was developed way back, originally from the Leaderboard days. The Carvers began the thing, and Access published (there ya go.. a little google search lol). However, my point being, that was when it it bloomed... the late 1990's... when advertising on the internet (which was still breast feeding users) wasn't even directed. Online gaming was still developing and far from what it is today... and then what happened.. Microsoft got hold of Links, and added a course designer. I could say more regarding the animations and other things they began laying bare, such as the tournament launcher etc but they gave up on it... not those playing it. They decided to allow EA, full momentum regarding the TW series and pursue something else. That hasn't sat well with Linksters ever since... never will.

 

So in terms of marketing.. back then it was limited. Microsoft advertised on TV rarely, and that was only on release of an office product. Games advertised on TV were few are far between, but they were around... so it was the internet and magazines. As there were no social sites, it was down to forums and other limited discussions. Hardly anything back then can be comparable to what is possible today. Even without any marketing, those buying the product today can spread news of it across the globe within an hour.

 

Whilst certainly beneficial to have it... for that I will agree, marketing isn't done in one way. It's more of a beast that can only be controlled if the product isn't right for the user. If it's right... marketing goes the way it wants, and further..

[Stephen Sullivan]

I certainly still feel more involved with Links as I have something to play. 

 

Did feel quite upset that I wasn't asked to beta the Course Forge, but obviously my designs for Links were not of a good enough standard.

[FixAmer1st]

In actuality, Links started it's slow death the day Microsoft got a hold of it.

Amen Sinewiz.

Jerry

[IanD]

I certainly still feel more involved with Links as I have something to play. 

 

Did feel quite upset that I wasn't asked to beta the Course Forge, but obviously my designs for Links were not of a good enough standard.

Highly unlikely Stephen...

[Dazmaniac]

The fact that Greenlight is going will mean that Valve will look at other ways for Indie developers to get their products on Steam instead of going through the Greenlight process.

 

Games that have been Greenlit will be unaffected as they have gone through the process and are now moving towards either putting the final release on Steam or using the popular Early Access option.

 

If you look at the comments on Steam for Perfect Golf, steps are already underway to get things moving. The user with the name 'Perfect Parallel' posted this in the Comments thread on 24th March:-

 

Thanks everyone! We are Greenlit! We really appreciate your votes and getting us to the next level. We are filling out the paperwork and will work as fast as we can to get our goodies into your hands. Once again thanks for the support. See you in the Perfect Golf World soon

 

Hopefully Valve will tick all the boxes and let PP get to work giving us something to play with.

 

[karma4u]

Yikes, a JFK quote relating to golf and golfers. Well, such is life in our evolving world. I congratulate PP and all the folks that are contributing to bringing this game to fruition. Waiting patiently, for its release.

[Unique]

Stephen Sullivan, on 28 Mar 2014 - 01:14 AM, said:

I certainly still feel more involved with Links as I have something to play. 

 

Did feel quite upset that I wasn't asked to beta the Course Forge, but obviously my designs for Links were not of a good enough standard.

You're a talented designer Steve, I wouldn't take it personally. We'll have our turn soon enough.

 

Peter