EA Sports PGA Tour devs explain innovative online tournaments & rewards EA SportsEA Sports PGA Tour is looking to raise the bar regarding simulated golf, and the devs once again sat down with us to discuss their excitement for the upcoming project. What a perfect time to be a golf fan at the minute. In the real world, we\u2019ve already had Scottie Scheffler kickstart a promising season with a Players\u2019 Championship win, it\u2019s the beginning of the Majors season with The Masters now on the horizon, and EA Sports PGA Tour is going to release alongside it. The golfing world might already be crammed with the PGA Tour, DP World Tour, the LPGA Tour, and many more, but the addition of EA Sports PGA Tour will give fans the chance to become a pro themself. I\u2019ve been lucky enough to chat with lead EA Sports PGA Tour devs Ben Ramsour and Craig Penner for another in-depth interview to hammer home and understand the importance of this game, what it means, and what they\u2019re most excited about. Putting passion into their work The immediate vibe throughout the interview is one of excitement, eagerness, and a general sense of feeling that the team has created something special with EA Sports PGA Tour in 2023. \u201cThis is kind of our baby,\u201d is how Penner describes the game. It\u2019s very much that, as development has been ongoing for several years now with a ton of work going on behind-the-scenes to deliver the meticulous levels of detail we\u2019ve already seen in the pre-release trailers. Smaller features that have gone unnoticed such as the accurate implementation of lateral hazards to ensure the real rules of golf are followed stringently, to the ability to tinker with the length and firmness of the rough. \u201cWe make sure that that the parameters the players can change are still within the realism bounds of that course. So you\u2019re not gonna be able to change a Harbor Town into a St. Andrews, we\u2019re being cognizant of the attributes or characteristics of the course. We\u2019ve gone to a very high level of depth when we\u2019ve been on the grounds of these courses,\u201d Penner added. As we\u2019ve already alluded to, EA Sports PGA Tour looks to be a colossal step forward in terms of golf gameplay with a ton of shot types, 30 licensed courses (with more on the way), official PGA Tour pros, and in-depth career mode. They did provide some interesting details on player creation too: \u201cYou will have to make a choice, there is a max skill level which aligns you relatively to what the top licensed golfer is in the game. So you will have to make decisions and decide \u2018If I\u2019m gonna max out power, I\u2019m going to have to sacrifice something\u2019.\u201d So, you can temper those expectations of creating Super Tiger Woods circa 2003, but you certainly have the opportunity to create a golfer tailor-made (pun intended) to suit your preferences. \u201cI can\u2019t wait to play with my friends\u201d Ramsour made it abundantly clear from the get-go that the social aspect of EA Sports PGA Tour is one of the game\u2019s greatest strengths. He described how difficult it was moving away from friends many years ago, and how the game\u2019s online aspect is perfect for bridging this gap. \u201cI can\u2019t wait to play with my friends, moving to Orlando was a really hard thing, so with our 16-player mass, multiplayer online, I can\u2019t wait to dust off and play those with some of my friends who have been out of games for a little bit. I\u2019m looking forward to the social element.\u201d They explained how they\u2019re \u201cexcited to see millions of people experiencing it\u201d and one of the main underpins for the game\u2019s online mode is the intriguing new simultaneous tournaments. One will feature a large lobby of players all competing in real-time, everyone being able to see each other\u2019s shots, and a winner being declared at the end with instant rewards. The other focuses on \u201casynchronous tournaments made up of daily, weekly, or seasonal tournaments.\u201d As well as \u201cexclusive rewards\u201d and a high spot on a leaderboard, we all know that there\u2019s the principle of pure pride and honor on the line when you step into the online golfing realm. Authenticity is the heart and soul of EA Sports PGA Tour From the different cuts of grass on specific courses to the subtle differences in golf swings, EA have gone all out to let everyone know that the effort and polish in their game are unrivaled. Ramsour explained how he\u2019s \u201can audio guy\u201d and how he wants players to feel immersed in every facet of the game\u2019s fundamentals: \u201cWe worked with the famous composer Jonesie, to reimagine the Master\u2019s theme, modernizing it so that the broadcast experience feels new and fresh. \u201cOur goal is to immerse users to feel what it\u2019s like to be at these courses and be a major champion. We did a whole session where we hit all the different club types to record the sound effects, so again, it\u2019s hyperrealism.\u201d If you thought that wasn\u2019t enough, the team has also recorded hundreds of hours of commentator dialog with certain lines being incredibly rare, scenario-specific events that you may never encounter! \u201cI hit a shot recently that hit the wood around one of the greens and then it popped into the water and like, we had a line for that. I didn\u2019t even remember recording it or being part of that, I was like, fanboying. I was like, holy cow. Like did he just say that?\u201d humorously added Ramsour. No one is going to be able to accuse EA of not stumping up time, effort, and honest hard work when it comes to the full release of EA Sports PGA Tour on August 7, 2023 \u2013 with Early Access commencing April 4. With all the expectations and promise now weighing very heavily on the game\u2019s \u2013 and the developers\u2019 \u2013 shoulders, we\u2019re on the verge of finding out whether or not the game will be able to make the cut. For more on the game, check out if it\u2019ll be coming to Xbox Game Pass, and if it will feature any form of cross-platform progression or crossplay.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
EA Sports PGA Tour devs explain innovative online tournaments & rewards EA SportsEA Sports PGA Tour is looking to raise the bar regarding simulated golf, and the devs once again sat down with us to discuss their excitement for the upcoming project. What a perfect time to be a golf fan at the minute. In […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-80510","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dejan.au\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/80510","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dejan.au\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dejan.au\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dejan.au\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dejan.au\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=80510"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/dejan.au\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/80510\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dejan.au\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=80510"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dejan.au\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=80510"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dejan.au\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=80510"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}