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Eagle Mountain Tourney Edition
by F Briggson / R McMinn
| Links Corner Course Database ID Number - 1177 |
Release Date |
CRZ Filesize |
Par |
Course Length |
| 2002-12-08 |
47,009,634 bytes |
72 |
7127 yards |
| Type |
Style |
CRZ Filename |
|
FICTIONAL |
MOUNTAIN |
eaglemountain.crz |
| Course ID |
Course Key |
| 48158bbd077046f0abb2cfa2acb21d28 |
deac3b0f6edf4b1ed37f6bd29c8e7c15 |
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LINKS CORNER REVIEW |
Reviewed by Robert Rundel
December 2002
The first version of Eagle Mountain was released by Fred Briggson in May, 2001, and it quickly became one of my favorites. Now Randy McMinn has reworked the course with the APCD 1.5, and the result is quite magnificent. New textures have been applied, seams have been blended, plus you get shadows. There are new hole previews, with advice on hole play and stories about the eagles memorialized by the course. As an additional bonus, the new version is a tournament edition, with galleries, crowd noise, and tournament objects such as leaderboards.
Dave Campbell reviewed the original Eagle Mountain on its release, and gave it an excellent review with a rating of 91. He said, 'I may just run out of superlatives while describing this course to you. This is simply the best mountain course created so far, comparing favorably to Chateau Whistler itself.' I agree with Dave completely, and I recommend reading his review in full at http://www.sportplanet.com/links/reviews/user/dc/eaglemountain.asp.
In Links 2k3, Eagle Mountain is even better. The hole layout hasn't changed at all, but the course looks so much better with the new textures and seam blending, and the shadows add greatly to the realism. One of the best features of this course is the risk/reward decisions required on nearly every hole. This is exemplified by the first hole, a 435 yard par 4. For the screenshots I've turned on galleries and tournament objects, to show off this tournament edition.
From the tee, a bald eagle sits calmly in a tree watching the action (screenshot 1). There are two large bunkers on the left, one of which protrudes well into the fairway, just at the natural landing area. There's also a large tree on the right. It's not possible to clear the bunkers without a strong wind at your back, so the drive must be very accurate in terms of both direction and distance (screenshot 2). If you avoid the bunker, and aren't blocked by the tree, you have a medium iron approach to a large flattish green, which nevertheless has some subtle rolls and breaks (screenshots 3 and 4). The galleries and the noises (applause, an occasional ooohhhh for a great shot, and a sighing uhhhhhh for a bad shot) give a nice tournament flavor. However, as others have noted, the lack of shadows for the galleries detracts a bit from the realism. Usually I prefer to play with galleries off, and just concentrate on the shotmaking.
Eagle Mountain 2003 is a worth addition to the really great 2k3 courses already available, both from Microsoft and from outside designers. I can't recommend it highly enough. And it's only a 40 Meg download, which is quite reasonable for a 2k3 course.
Summary :
Details: Fictional mountain 18-hole course, par 72, 7127 yards, 4 par 3s, 10 par 4s, 4 par 5s, 5 tees per hole. Readme file with hole descriptions, a cameo and a splash screen with course pictures and eagles, hole handicaps, hole previews, hole signs, cart path, many custom objects, galleries and tournament objects. |
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CLIPNOTES by Ben Bateson (ousgg) |
Description
Fictional, mountain course |
Location
Tennessee, according to the readme. |
Conditions
There are reasonable pin placements, but a couple of greens struggle faster than M*/S*. You might risk F*/S* if you're confident. |
Concept 8/10
Eagle Mountain is a delightful course that represents the culmination of several iterations of improvement and redevelopment. Making heavy use of water hazards and tiered greens, it has obvious design influences from several top US courses - perhaps the cynics might say it's a bit too closely influenced. The presentation is outstanding, though, with strategically open hole previews which are very necessary on fantasy courses such as this. |
Appearance 7/10
Released in the early days of blending, the inconsistent seams are the weakest area here, along with the stock panorama. The textures still look excellent close-up, though, and the planting at all heights befits the forested mountain surround. The work disguising the water features is ahead of its time. I'd be happier without the stock tournament scoreboards that litter the course. |
Playability 9/10
Full of excitement, Eagle Mountain will test tee positioning, shot shaping and will reward accurate approaches. With an impressive variety of hole lengths, the Par 3s are universal tests of accuracy, and the longer holes straddle the 2-shot and 3-shot strategies very well. It's not difficult to see why this is still a popular tournament choice. |
Challenge 9/10
You'll need to carefully review pin positioning, but if you do then there's a supremely well-balanced game here, with a subtle gradient as you round the turn and climaxing to a superb risk/reward final hole. Although there's a lot of water on the course, it acts more as a distant warning than an in-your-face threat. |
Technical 8/10
Ongoing collaboration and improvement is always admirable, and the APCD work on Eagle Mountain has held up well other than a couple of little flaws which don't impact on play. The original flair for hole design has been well tempered by sure hands with planting and texture work as well as the subtle adjustments to the greens which have kept this playable. |
| Overall |
Still a must-own for any lover of fictional courses. Great in both conception and presentation. |
41/50 |
Please remember that Clipnote reviews are the opinion of one person and do not constitute an 'Official' Links Corner review of the course. |
This course is available as a FREE download.
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