Virtual Practice
I’ve always loved golf, and growing up, that meant playing a lot of golf video games. I spent countless hours in front of the TV, playing N64 or PS2, competing with friends or just keeping myself entertained.
As an adult, I don’t play as much anymore, but every once in a while I’ll pick up the controller. And since I’ve started to focus more seriously on improving as a golfer, I’ve developed a new relationship with these games, and started learning how to apply course strategy.
Golf might be the sport best-suited to using video games to practice. After all, it’s hard to imagine learning how to run a pick-and-roll from playing 2K, or how to do a kickflip playing Tony Hawk. In golf, however, strategy and execution are uniquely separate, and it’s possible to productively practice the strategy on its own. This is because you need two separate skillsets to succeed as a golfer: playing and caddying. (This is what Timothy Gallwey would call Player 1 and Player 2.)
Playing is what most of us would probably think of as skill — hitting long drives or consistent iron shots. But caddying is just as important. No matter how well you can hit the ball, you need to make good decisions about where to aim, what club to use, and what kind of shot to hit. Video game golf helps you practice being a caddy.
So here are four of my favorite golf games, with some notes on what the gameplay can teach us about course strategy.
Tiger Woods 2005
This is the game I played and loved the most growing up. Of course, there’s a whole series — my friends had the 2004 version, so we mostly played that at their house, and as I grew up I also played many of the later installments (the 2012 version featuring the Masters is also a highlight). But for me, for some reason, nothing stuck quite like Tiger Woods ’05.
The game itself is wildly unrealistic, which is most of the fun. I once shot a 33-under-par 39 for 18 holes from the front tees at Coeur D’Alene (an achievement of which I’m quite proud). Hitting 350-yard drives, putting ridiculous sidespin on the ball midair to correct a bad swing, and using Tiger Vision to make 70-foot bombs is a blast. But it’s not really anything like the actual experience of golf.
If anything, this game probably made me a worse golfer. Once your player’s stats are maxed out, you can pull off pretty much whatever shot you want. The key lesson from this game is that, if you’re good enough, you should always aim for the pin and try to make birdies or eagle on every hole.
Mario Golf (N64)
In some ways, Mario Golf is surprisingly similar to the Tiger Woods franchise. It’s not that hard to hit good shots. It’s weirdly easy to chip in from off the green. Once you unlock the longer-hitting characters, most par-5s are reachable in two, and there are plenty of drivable par 4s.
The main challenge comes not from trying to execute good shots, but from the course design. The more difficult courses later in the game are hilarious, tricked-up, near-impossible setups. This creates a fun balance where you have plenty of control over the ball, but are aiming for extremely small targets.
The other element I’ve come to appreciate is that “mis-hits” have real consequences. If you make perfect contact, which happens a good percentage of the time, the ball will go exactly where you aimed. But if you’re just a hair off in either direction, you’ll miss significantly to the left or right, and the ball won’t fly as far. This adds some real risk when strategizing around hazards, forced carries, and OB. Plus, it mirrors real life, where (at least for me) the ball doesn’t always go exactly where you aimed.
Waialae Country Club
Dating from 1997, Waialae Country Club is a pretty bare-bones golf simulator game. You can only play one course (the titular Country Club), and the golfers you can play with are generic 2D models which can’t be customized. Overall, the graphics and gameplay are abysmal by today’s standards. It’s roughly equivalent to having a friend describe a round they played while you look at a series of low-res pictures of the course. Golf Digest even calls it the worst sports video game ever.
But what’s great about the game is the difficulty level. Since it’s from 1997, your drives mostly go somewhere between 250 and 300. The iron distances are pretty close to my real-life numbers. There are a couple of par 5s you can go for in 2, but it depends on the wind, and there’s also one true three-shotter (the 18th). Overall, this forces you to make much more realistic strategic decisions if you want to shoot a good score, even on ‘Easy mode’.
The main gameplay screen includes a yardage-book-type view of the hole on the right. On the tee, you can see where the pin is, and figure out where you need to place your tee shot to have a better angle. Some pins are pretty much impossible to get near — if the pin is tucked over a bunker on the right side of the green, and the wind is blowing hard off the right, you’ve got no chance. You’ll quickly recognize the importance of staying conservative in those scenarios and getting aggressive to attack when the pins are more accessible.
The other, smaller takeaway I’ve found from this game is about distance control in putting. For some reason, it’s very easy to leave putts short, even one- and two-footers. It’s beyond frustrating to keep leaving 5-footers for par in the jaws. So the game drills into you the need to be aggressive with speed on makeable putts. I just wish I could translate that to the course better.
Playing Waialae again as an adult was a revelation. It’s not a great game, but it is a pretty faithful simulator, and it gave me a new perspective on how to put course management into practice.
Golf+
Golf+ is a VR golf game for the Oculus. It features real-life golf courses like Sawgrass, Wolf Creek, and Valhalla, alongside some made-up fantasy courses. Wearing your headset, you’re completely immersed in the course, and you hit shots by making full swings with the controller.
There are some pros and cons. The pros are obvious: even with so-so graphics, the immersive experience is incredible. I played Sawgrass in VR during the week of the Players, and it almost felt like I was there. I could really feel what it must be like to play some of those shots.
But there are real drawbacks, too. The headset is unwieldy when you’re trying to make a golf swing and can get hot in a hurry. Distance control is also tricky in this format, especially when putting, which can be frustrating.
Overall, though, this feels like a new frontier for strategy in golf — a way to feel out your decision-making in real-time on real courses, without the real-world consequences. It won’t fix your swing, but it can definitely sharpen your thinking.
The Future
In the end, I suppose the ultimate “golf video game” would be a home simulator, combining a range session with realistic on-course strategy and allowing for convenient practice rounds at any time. Maybe someday I’ll get up to that level. Until then, I’ll just keep grinding away in VR and at Waialae Country Club.
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