Newb questions...

[vigilante]

Hey all. Newb guy here. I've been wanting to play this for years and am now finally getting around to installing it (PGA Champ Collectors ED). However, seeing as this is a 10+yr old game are there any issues I need to be aware of? I will probably be putting this on an fresh install of an optimized version of WinXP. What is the recommended way of installing? Just use the install disks and apply patches or use the install package supplied by this site? Any help would be greatly appreciated!

[bryce]

Vigilante,
Welcome to the forum! I would use the disks to install the game. If you wish to play online, you will need the patches from the utilities download section. Being that the game is 10 years old, the latest version of Windows that will work while playing online is XP. So if that is what you are looking to do, you will be fine with that. You will have to download a program to play online though (Cali, I think).

There are over 1600 courses to download, all for free. There are plenty of helpful documents in the Utilities section, under PGA 2000 listings if you are looking for a certain designer or to see which courses are better.

Always nice to see new people!

Doron

[vigilante]

Thanks for the reply! I will probably not be online right away, at least until I get a little proficient at it.

My goal is to build a dedicated cabaret cabinet around the game to put in my game room. (something akin to a Golden Tee arcade but smaller)

I have tons of computers, monitors and building materials to do it, I just need the time and the gumption if you get my meaning.

I'll probably have lots of questions but this seems to be a pretty active forum so that's good!

One that pops into my head right now is about the courses. I've been following the PGA tour for years. Have the courses that are being played currently some that can be downloaded? Would be cool to play the same course(s) as the big boys the same week they are playing!

I see that the TPC Four Seasons is on there but haven't looked up any others yet.

[SteveHorn]

Viglante! Of the appox. 1600 courses avalible for download in PGA 2000 I'd say about 300 are real courses. Many (about 80%) are what you see on the PGA tour play and a few from European tour. Make sure you install patch 3345 and any other downloads you may want out of the utility section. Many (fantasy coures) are just as good if not better then a real rendition course so don't neglect playing them. Dar (Tincup) has an A list and B list course guide avalible for download in the utilities section. I have a list of Pro players avalible. If you go to the courses section you can click on screen shots to see pictures of each course. Make sure you use the PGA 2000 section not WGC unless you want to ask Bryce about getting that game.

[vigilante]

Nice! I didnt realize the players were available also! I cant wait to get started on this. How many of them do you have?

[Indy Anna Jones]

Vigilante, there are also complete seasons available; I did the 2011 Tour last year and used all of the available "real" courses in the setup. If you're interested in using it, download from the utilities section, unzip the file, and drop it directly into the "season" file in your PGA program file. When you open up "seasons" on your game, it'll show up here. Utilizing a set of players, you can get started with season play immediately. Download a players file and drop it into the program's "players" file. (You still have to download the necessary course and library files, but at least you'll know what to look for.)

If you have any questions about using either of these utilities, don't hesitate to ask.

[SteveHorn]

Vigilante! The players list is in the utilities section. When I made it last fall it included the top 100 golfers rated from all over the world at that time. Also any winners over the past 2 seasons on both the PGA and European tours. Also many others who are still active and been playing for numerous years with at least 10 apperences on either tour. There's about 235 or so players total. Most tournaments fields are 150 max or less so I randomly pick who's in a regular tournament. I do this with a double deck of cards and go up and down the list 3 times elininating players for a standard tournament. This gets me close to that 150# I'm looking for. It takes me about 8 minutes to do this before I start a tourney. Bigger tourneys I pick the field differently or even some I let everyone play. I found that the cut after 2 rounds (70 players or within 10 strokes) is a little weird for this game so I have a 2nd cut after round 3 (70 players or within 7 strokes). HAVE FUN. This game does take time to play well so make sure your game is very good before playing on the tour.

[vigilante]

Ok. I'm off and running. I got me a PC formatted and installed with MicroXP. It's an older Dell desktop with a 1ghz, 512mb ram, 15gb left on the HD, and onboard video. The graphics look just fine on it.

I went ahead and installed the 50's & 60's, 2011, & 2012 player packs. The Collector's edition patch and the 3.3.4.5 patch.

I also got Dar's A & B list courses. (which I mistakenly thought were the actual .xcr files not just a couple big lists)

I then went ahead and let the machine run a quick 18 hole game to see if anything untoward would happen and it ran just fine.

Soo... what is the next step? Or what would you do in my shoes?

Is there any utilities that add different character sprites? Or how about different announcer audio's?

I would assume that the libraries are only for designing courses correct? They aren't needed in the program file to run downloaded courses?

Im not going to be online playing until at least next season, so no worries about kali and such.

I thought I read somewhere about having the game run in win2000 mode if you are running under xp because of some camera issues? Is that correct?

Also next up is starting on the actual game cabinet. I have the design rough drawn and most materials ready!!

[A Brandt]

I'll try to answer most of your questions

You will need to DL any custom libraries(and stock libraries if you're missing any for some reason) in order to play most downloaded courses. Some courses only use stock libs, so pay attention to what libs are needed for the course you're DLing.

I would strongly recommend installing the Cloaking tool available in the utilities section. This allows you hide courses and libraries so the game/architect doesn't get bogged down. This is especially useful if you have a large collection of courses/libs.

I don't believe there are any add-on characters or announcer audios.

I would recommend running the game in compatability mode for optimal performance.

Now I'm by no means an expert at computers, but I might think about adding some more RAM to your system if possible. Some of the better courses available are very detail heavy and I feel like 512MB may not be enough

[Indy Anna Jones]

Adam answered most of your questions, but I'm going to elaborate a little.

There's an issue called "the deadly white screen." You have available 9 different camera modes that you can switch into/out of by hitting number keys 1-9. #1 is behind the golfer at a slight elevation. #2 has the same shot as #1 but includes a "snap cam" that automatically switches your camera to a reverse landing view of your landing shot. Without using "compatibility mode" sometimes the screen will turn white and stay white until the shot is complete. "CM" pretty much eliminates this problem. Also click "disable visual themes." Just experiment with the other cams to find out what they do.

Unless you're planning on using the course architect to try to design your own course(s), the cloaker isn't really necessary unless after dl'ing a lot of libes/courses you find your game bogging down. As recently as 18 months ago I was playing on an old HP with a 512K RAM and with about 600 courses and 700 libes it worked fine. If you have any problems, you can change detail to suit your computer. On the first screen up, click on options then course and adjust your settings. This game was first made for W95 and weak computers but again I never had any problems with my HP and was always able to run the game with full detail.

Since it sounds like you might be trying a hand at designing then the cloaker is indeed a must; the arch will only accept around 70 libraries before it overloads and kicks you back out onto desktop. There's another thread on here in "course design" IIRC that has info about using the cloaker. MOST IMPORTANT when using the cloaker, DON'T try to open the game or architect; they're completely incompatible and one or the other is going to get messed up.

As far as sound utilities, there's only one: You can replace the sound of wooden clubs with metal clubs. It's in the utilities section. I think there's also some "Caddyshack" voiceovers but the quality is pretty bad. Unfortunately there's no way to update/change players, their looks or their dress other than what's already available... very retro, lol.