APCD Courses

APCD Courses

The Real Courses 19-24

Royal Lytham & St Annes

Bill Bunning

6903 yards. Par 71.

Difficulty Medium/Hard

English Links

Real - 56mb

Jun 2004

Overall Rank 19th

Royal Lytham & St Annes hosted the 2001 Open and confirmed itself as one of the great majors venues. A typical Links course, its trademark is undulating fairways with a split mown grass cut which shows up as two shades, and this together with the many pot bunkers is admirably captured in this recreation. Aside the fairways are two cuts of rough including the deep wild grass rough which is beautifully planted up, and again captured well with some nice textures and superb blending used. For the designer Bill Bunning this is his only release, and it is a skillful creation originally made in April 2002 and now updated with all the best features available. This design accurately maps the real venue in both looks and playability, and fully uses local knowledge from the goundskeepers. Pot bunkers are deep and really must be avoided, green slopes are often quite tricky, and overall it plays tough but fair. The railway line that runs alongside the course is captured as a great sound effect. The tournament option is well worth a special mention, thick crowds and grandstands are provided in true Open Championship fashion, an excellent option making you feel completely involved in the tournament. The 3d clubhouses by Anders Bessermann now look amazing, and the 18th becomes an outstandingly tough finishing hole. A wonderful course design, it has some great attention to detail and also now has a much better panorama of the setting. Tee areas contain trademark brightly coloured boxes. There are already some great Links courses available, and this is one of the very best. For those who like real major venues this will become a real classic.

Hole Previews : Excellent

Tournament Option : Excellent

Quail Hollow

Tim Hagen

7437 yards. Par 72.

Difficulty Medium

Parkland

Real - 68mb

May 2005

Course of the Month

Overall Rank 20th

Quail Hollow Club is one of the finest courses in the Southeast United States, a private member club which hosted the Kemper Open from 1969 to 1979, the World Seniors Invitational from 1980 to 1989, and has more recently been a regular PGA Tour for the Wachovia Championship. This real course was originally designed by famed golf course architect George Cobb in 1961 to capture the beauty as well as challenging terrain of the Piedmont region. In the intervening years, the course underwent a series of improvements, including modifications of several holes by Arnold Palmer in 1986, and a redesign by Tom Fazio in 1997 and 2003. The manicured nature of the course is now captured in this superb Links design by Tim Hagen who cut his teeth on Zoe Lakes a few years back. This is a traditional tree lined course, with water becoming a key feature down the back nine, and the rough plays deep. There are also a number of doglegs so the driver will not always be your best club off the tee. Course highlights include hole 7, which is transected by a serpentine pond complete with waterfall and rock wall; the signature hole 17, a scary 217 yards shot over water; and a suitably challenging finish at hole 18, which must be negotiated over a deep creek bed that runs the length of the fairway. This reproduction is just exquisite, the textures are fantastic making this feel like Augusta in many ways, and the tree choice and planting is as good as any other course i have seen, all blending perfectly. When the lakes come into play the views are very impressive indeed. This is probably the most natural design so far, it looks and feels very accurate to the real thing, and seems much more like a simulation than a game. Ultimately i believe my fondness for it will increase as i learn it, but i rate this right alongside Augusta National in terms of its realism. Fantastic work, and a superb tournament option included too.

Hole Previews : Excellent

Tournament Option : Excellent

Dullatur Antonine

Paul Seaman

5916 yards. Par 69.

Difficulty Easy

Woodland

Real - 89mb

Mar 2006

Course of the Month

Overall Rank 21st

Watching the apcd talents of a designer progress in leaps and bounds is one of the more enjoyable features of reviewing courses. Paul Seaman started from humble beginnings and spurred on by his son Leigh produced a lovely joint fictional venture called Mordhel Golf & Country Club in April 2005. Since then Paul has spent time unpicking tutorials from the acclaimed masters of the apcd before completing this new release, a real course known as Dullatur Antonine. This design really lifts him into one of the list of all time great accomplishers with the apcd. Dullatur Antonine is a Scottish woodland course and set as a par 69 at 5916 yards it certainly wont be among the most diffuculy courses to play, but this brings its own rewards, feeling much more like a local club course, albeit a rather high quality one. This course has everything, a superb panorama (by Daniel Watson), neat and comprehensive ground level grass planting, a lovely mix of trees in realistic blends, telephone poles and electric pylons, a railway line and a beautiful 3d clubhouse which is a close match to its real counterpart. The views are very natural andbeautiful. Bunkers are shallow but nicely blended, and all the textures look excellent even with some worn grass patches in key areas. This is such an enjoyable experience to play, you can really play quite bold if you wish, but the course is quite undulating so there will not be too many flat lies around. You have plenty of opportunity to score well, so it really is best to crank up the difficulty level a touch more than usual and have some great fun with this excellent course. Check out the accompanying files too, including an extra animation with wooden clubs.

Hole Previews : Excellent

Tournament Option : Excellent

Burnt Pine at Sandestin

Lacy Gearheart & Chris Gormley

7099 yards. Par 72.

Difficulty Medium

Lakeside

Real - 30mb

Apr 2002

Course of the Month

Overall Rank 22nd

Lacy Gearheart has quickly become a most respected designer and here he has released a rendition of a real course at Destin, Florida, now updated as a 'Special Edition' in April 2002. It is another beautifully crafted design with a rich dark texture to the rough, contrasting with lighter green fairways and tee areas. The fairways are well rounded and offer on the whole fairly generous landing areas. The difficulty on the course is maintained by the rough which is deep set and will be hard to judge approaches from, looking an excellent deep lush green, but offering a fairly wide catchment area before the trees. The greens are beautifully sloped and will sometimes provide a tricky challenge to your putter. The hazards on course are most excellent, bunkers are fairly deep and perfectly edged, containing lovely white powder sand. Lakes are visually oustanding, and the banks are planted up with rocks and grasses, and have ducks, herons and geese populating the waters, which is an excellent touch, and brings everything to life. The ground level planting is very pleasing with varied trees and superb ground level grasses and bushes, together with some beautiful wild overgrown hazard areas containing brighter yellow flowers. A sea panorama has been added to the 'Special Edition', and the tree line has always been excellent. Object wise there is the customary leaderboard at the 18th, hole signs at the tees, distance markers, and the occasional shack to see. This course really comes into its element at the tougher play levels when the rough plays a greater part in proceedings. Par 5's are quite long, and most need some wind assistance to reach in two shots. Generally this is a bold, rich green looking course, but there are areas of brown pine needles alongside the holes in which trees are planted, and this offers a good visual variation. The new beach area down the last few holes now gives this a little extra feature, and makes this into one of the best ever designs, everything has an extremely high quality, and it is one of the most beautiful visually due to the lakes and contrasts in colours used. The addition of amazing hole previews and crowds just make this course a complete experience. A new 2005 version by Chris Gormnley is also available and has added new 2003 textures and made the greens more mod friendly.

Hole Previews : Excellent

Tournament Option : Excellent

Olympia Fields

Ken Boltz

7198 yards. Par 70.

Difficulty Medium

Woodland

Real - 78mb

Sep 2004

Course of the Month

Overall Rank 23rd

Olympia Fields Country Club, North Course is created by one of our best designers, Ken Boltz who gave us the fictional course Hunters Wood. This real majors venue is located near Chicago, Illinois and was originally designed by Open champion Willie Park Jr. The club is famous for its English Tudor clubhouse and 80 foot high clock tower. Host to many major events over the years, it recently hosted the 2003 US Open Championship won by Jim Furyk, and is ranked at 36 on the Golf Digest list. This is a woodland venue, with trees that are fairly tight to the fairways and causing all sorts of shot selection choices. As a par 70 at 7198 yards, this is not an easy course to score well on. Visually this course is just about as natural as you can make it, and it is so impressive. The tree selections are above excellent, i barely saw any foliage or trunk which looked out of place, it all blended perfectly and was on a par with Brookline which is one of my favourites. This kind of attention to detail makes it extra special. At ground level there is some grass planting here and there, but it is kept low key and together with the occasional bushes seemed just right and in the right places to make it feel like a well kept real course. The texture choices are great from the lighter fairways and greens to a deeper darker rough and orange shade of speckled sand. As previously mentioned, this is a tough course and fairways are quite tight with river creeks winding around some of the fairways. As far as i can recall, this design is very accurate and matches the routing of the US Open. The hole previews and deep crowds and tourney objects are superb. This is a top quality real venue, beautifully created and on a level with the very best.

Hole Previews : Excellent

Tournament Option : Excellent

The K Club

John Aherne

7366 yards. Par 72.

Difficulty Medium

Woodland

Real - 121mb

Nov 2006

Overall Rank 24th

The K Club is one of Irelands most prestigious golfing venues, located in Straffan, County Kildare where two venues are hosted, the Palmer and Smurfit courses. Home to an annual European tour event, the Palmer course (named after its designer Arnold Palmer) recently hosted the 2006 Ryder Cup, which was convincingly won by the European team. Links designer John Aherne who cut his teeth on Esker Field has skillfully re-created this course as a 'Ryder Cup' edition, and it is easily his best creation to date, ranking alongside some of the best we have available in the game. Not only is the apcd work at an extremely high standard, but the tournament option is extensive and realistic and the course itself is magnificent to play. Visually this is a bright and sunny course, the trees are carefully chosen to have light leafy foliage which looks fantastic and reminds me of the early Belfry version by Access. The grass textures and planting adds depth to the rough at the fringes of the course. There are plenty of lakes and streams winding around the course and they will affect many tee and approach shots, and it is this aspect that makes it such an amazing matchplay venue. In terms of strategy it is perfect, fairways are a decent width but finding them is so important or your approach to water guarded greens will become immensely tense. If you are confident and playing well you can score low, but the hazards are always there to catch you out. The closing holes in particular are amongst the best in the game offering excellent choices with 2 reachable par 5’s and all three have water in play. This is a beautiful course, typically European in style but with the added stress of an abundance of testing shots. There are many grandstands here in this edition so you can re-live the Ryder Cup in all its glory. Oh, and the start up screens are just fantastic.

Hole Previews : Excellent

Tournament Option : Excellent