Golf Sim Clubhouse Forum

SteveHorn wrote:Steve! That's some interesting info on your time with Headgate. How did you get hired to be a course architect for them? Were you previously working for a developer or publisher of games?

Got an email from Vance Cook one day asking if I'd fly to Salt Lake City for a few days to be part of a four person focus group. They hit up about eight guys from the JN4 designers that had a public reputation on the web. I think Scott Chesney and Brian Silvernail gave them some names when they couldn't participate. Only the four of us could make it on short notice (time off work, etc.). After that, they paid us to do some courses for 99 and the 2000 version. It only came out to be around $20 an hour...IF that. We alpha/beta tested the game and designer as part of that deal. It sure was a lot of fun!

Steve - what an awesome trip down memory lane! You were always one of my favourite designers from the very beginning in PGA - a real inspiration - so it was a pleasure updating Abernathy with a more modern library and some of the techniques we've evolved over the years. Lovely to see you back on the boards - really hope we get another Opfer original soon. That would be VERY cool

What LinksLegend said

I bought PGA2000 when it came out just so I had a golf game for my PC (I wasn't aware of PGA1999). After playing a fair few rounds I started messing around with the Architect and it wasn't long before I started creating a course which I eventually released (Hallam Valley). I spent hours on the Sierra Teetime forum and then the Copyright Club looking out for tips and tutorials, of which there were plenty. I was aware of these 'Godlike' designers like Steve Opfer, Brian Silvernail & Ken McHale (could list many many more but my memory fades), and I made sure I downloaded anything they'd done and played them to death. Being on those forums I was also aware of the 'names' behind Headgate like Vance Cook.

I then joined in with one of the many design competitions where the plot was given to you and you made of it what you could without changing the major elevation work and water features etc. I never managed to get anywhere near finishing my effort in time for the submission deadline so I totally re-worked the plot and spent six months creating Mayfield Manor and a couple of libraries to go with it. And then that was it. This course got a very good reception and no matter how much I tried, I never thought I could better it and so never released another course. I've still got about half a dozen unfinished courses on my hard drive and I occasionally open them, tinker with them, and then close them again without saving.

The fact that Steve Opfer has graced us with his presence and seems to have rekindled his love of PGA Championship Golf may get me opening up the Arch again and actually doing something with my unfinished efforts.

seopfer wrote:

bryce wrote:Steve, that's awesome that you were one of the original designs....I didn't realize that. Also dogs not know that Jim Dickson had passed. Sorry to hear that. He was one of my favorites from the beginning. Duncan and I did our newer versions of Abernathy and Jocassee at the same time, but I feel I may have under achieved the Dickson original. There wad one other course on the architect that hasn't been redone yet. Maybe someone will take it on.

Now that I think about it...I may be wrong on the name. I think it was Jim, but I could be mistaken. Maybe the last name was Crittenden... Jeff Jones or Ken McHale might remember better.

It must have been somebody else because Jim Dickson did some courses for WGC as recently as a couple years ago. I haven’t heard from him lately but as far as I know he’s still around.

I actually played around with Mecklenburg in the architect when I first started with PGA 2000. I sort of played Rees Jones or Mike Davis with it if you will and toughened it up with some extra tee boxes and altered green sites. I didn't ever think it was anything worth releasing, in fact if I remember right I only worked on the first 6 or 7 holes before I moved on to my own thing. But just because nothing was ever released doesn't mean it didn't provide some value.