287 · Jack Nicklaus' Greatest 18 Holes of Major Championship Golf

• No other game can match its graphics or its features
• NES Longplay
• Manual
• Bold claim from a golf game
• Jack Nicklaus
  • Can you be Jack Nicklaus
  • The women CPU players not being great is not a good look. Yeah there’s 1, but theres 2 bad ones
• 18 holes of golf, from all over the world, but as a single course. Interesting decision
  • Removing the filler courses and just keeping the notable ones
  • Two courses designed by Nicklaus are also featured in the game: Castle Pines (Colorado) and Desert Mountain (Arizona)
• The complicated nature of choosing a player
• No real sense of the course other than the top down view
  • You can move the cursor all the way to the left or right to completely change screens, but it’s not as intuitive as it could be
  • What does moving your swing to the left or right actually mean?
• Takes a while to load in the course and has to be done each time you check the map or go to another screen
• The balance of the power bar is not equal (see manual)
• The difference between Beginner and Expert
• The tips are in the manual not between screens. Some really small Jack color commentary between courses. This is my fav par 4. This is my fav par 3.
• Skins and Stroke
• 4 player golf
• Sequels and Spinoffs
  • The TurboGrafx-16 versions of the game were titled Jack Nicklaus' Turbo Golf, while the PC Engine version was titled Jack Nicklaus World Golf Tour for the CD-ROM format. A Game Boy version was released as Jack Nicklaus Golf in 1992.
  • Made up to Jack Nicklaus 6: Golden Bear Challenge
  • Jack Nicklaus Golf & Course Design: Signature Edition CD Compendium
  • Jack Nicklaus' Unlimited Golf & Course Design for SNES
• EGL
• Next week - Kid Kool
• NEStalgia Byte - Fire Emblem

Auto-generated transcript. Each paragraph starts with its timestamp. Speakers are not identified.

00:00 Jack Nicklaus' greatest 18 holes of major championship golf. No other game can match its graphics or its features.

00:26 And welcome to NEStalgia, a chronological exploration of every NES game released in North America. I'm Mike. I'm Sean. And I'm Joe. And that is a bold claim from a golf game of all games that no other game up to this point could possibly match its graphics or its features. What is it? Features of like, yeah, I guess like Super Mario Brothers does not have mini putt, right? Like you just can't do that. Yeah. I'm glad you led with that because that was the first. I mean, the features I'm sure we'll get into, but I just want to go off and say that other games have certainly matched. And maybe I'll say even surpassed by a lot. This game's graphics. Well, you know, you don't know that.

01:14 Oh, I know that. Oh, yeah. I'm the developer. What are you talking about, Sean? Are you talking about graphics from a, from like a fidelity standpoint or just visually? You don't, you can't look at two games and tell me which one looks better. I don't, I don't know why I said that. I really, what I really want to start off with here is do we know the actual pronunciation for Jack? Cause in my head it's Jack Nicklaus. Is that not correct? I almost said Jack Nicholson. Hmm. I would prefer that. You think, I mean, like Jack Nicholson's gotta be a golfer. You think the two of them ever get together on like a Sunday and just play 18 holes? I'm sure it's happened, you know, in the, the Jack, the Jack Nick, uh, society.

01:58 Um. Cinematic Universe. Yeah, with, with Jack Nickman. I stuck the landing on the pronunciation of the last name for a reason. I did just enough research to know about Jack Nicklaus without ever watching like a YouTube clip of how his name is pronounced because I want people to know that I really don't know a lot when it comes to golf. Good, good. But it seems like you don't either because you're not quite certain.

02:23 I'm not. Like I think the, the most exposure to, to Jack Nicklaus slash Nicklaus I have is I think his grandson played for the Buffalo Bills, but his last name wasn't the same. Like his first name was Nick. So I was like, oh cool. Um, but I've never seen him play golf. That's actually a wild little Easter egg. Yeah. No, uh, Nick O'Leary. He was a tight end for like three years. Then he went to the dolphins.

02:53 Huh? Uh, I, the only thing I knew about Jack Nicklaus was I looked him up briefly only to see if his head is actually as round as it is in this, in this illustration that comes up between holes. That's the high fidelity graphics right there. Yeah. It's like they're, they forgot a line. Like there's supposed to be like shading of where like it goes like into the Z axis, but they forgot a line there. So it all just looks like it's on the same axis or something. And it's a very wide face. I thought the guy kind of looked like a Chevy chase.

03:27 Yeah. Kind of. Yeah. And it's, it's Jack Nicklaus. All right. We're not going to play this game anymore of Nick Klaus. Like you guys can't just because you know, just because you know, Santa Claus doesn't mean you said Nick Klaus and I was, I was following you. I said Nick Klaus. That's who I was talking to when I said you. Oh, okay. I was talking to you buddy. That's why I specifically didn't say any name. So I could make it about either of you. It's just a weird way to spell it. That's all. Did you think he was still alive? I knew he was alive.

03:58 Like, you know, at some point within the, in the last 10 to 15 years. He is still alive. He's still making headlines actually. As of this recording, just 23 hours ago, Jack Nicklaus lost attempt to regain control of his own name and likeliness. And I only find that funny because he's losing control. Likeness. Yeah. Likeliness, whatever. It's not likely that he'll get that is what I'm trying to say. I just find it funny about the name thing. Cause it's like, maybe he doesn't even want control of his name. Cause there's debates over how you even say it. Maybe he could rebrand himself as Jack Nicklaus and be Jackie Nicky and just golf every Christmas with us. Santa Claus.

04:43 There's people who probably say that as well. I'm sure. Anyway, long rant, but to get on the actual like topic of Jack Nicklaus in the game. Um, can you even play as Jack Nicklaus? Like I know he's in the game as a computer. Can you ever be Jack Nicklaus? Cause I certainly couldn't figure it out. I mean, I think the, like the sprite for the dude kind of looks like the dude. Yeah. But do you get like his stats and his ability?

05:12 Are there stats in this game? Of course there's stats in this game. The women computer players are awful. Well, sure. Because that's, that's just like, you know, what they're supposed to be, but it's not a great look for the game. It's not a great look. Like, yeah, there is one who's like somewhat good and has like other flaws, but there's just two that are just like in the manual. It says they're beginners. They don't know how to play golf. It's like, that's not a great look.

05:39 Got it. I, uh, I just played as a, you know, I just put my name in and you know, I check some boxes and I'm like, okay, that's, that's how you set up the game. Well, that's because that's how the game starts. Sean, it is a, it's a, it's a complicated nature of choosing the player you want to be or choosing a player you want to be, because as far as I can understand, you can only create a player. You can never play as any of these pre-generated characters and you must play as yourself,

06:06 which, uh, you know, that's fine, I suppose. Uh, but I, I guess I thought it was weird that you can't be, uh, these, uh, assigned characters that you read about in the manual. And instead you must kind of, as you were saying, uh, you know, fill out boxes and, uh, type in a name. And that is the player you will play as. So these other characters, it sounds like, aren't so much other characters with stats as it is like a difficulty mook.

06:37 Okay. So let's read like Lars, for instance. Okay. Lars calls himself Mr. X and likes to think of himself as an expert. Wait, haven't we had him before? Yes. Mr. X. Is that Kung Fu?

06:52 Yeah. Jesus Christ. Uh, he calls himself Mr. X and likes to think of himself as an expert, which is why he drives from the pro tees. He has a tendency to hook drives and pulls putts to the left. So, yes, it's not like, um, a stats thing, right? Like it's not RPG based, but I guess it's computer tendencies. So they're saying like, he will hook his drives purposefully. Like the computer will throw them a little bit. I get that. All right. It does. I guess it makes sense that they're, they're counting on you and your knowledge of what you should be doing with golf to be like, you know, you don't have to like build your stats up. Like this isn't an RPG.

07:38 Um, and they're giving that sort of variation to the computer opponents. It is 18 holes of golf from all over the world, but as a single course. And that seems like an interesting decision because on the one hand you're removing the, I guess, filler courses from, uh, filler holes from these course and just keeping the notable ones. Yeah. Like you're just, you're just filler holes is a funny. It's back when holes were like really episodic.

08:06 Yeah. Just being like, well, this one's forgettable. Yeah. No, it's like a golf mixtape. I think like if there is a sport where the, where that makes sense in any capacity, it's golf. Yeah. No, I want to see a football game where every yard is from a different stadium. Well, Joe, I think it'd be more interesting. You know, every football stadium is the same, right? So it'd be more interesting if it was like between innings, you went to different baseball stadiums. Yeah. I was joking about the yards to be clear. Okay. Very good. Uh, and then, you know, the two of the courses are designed by Jack himself. Um, they're featured in the game. It's a castle pines in Colorado and desert mountain in Arizona.

08:44 Uh, so I guess again, another good way to like, you know, get the, get the name that he allegedly doesn't own or at least doesn't own anymore, uh, on into the game. However, uh, you know, I just can't, I can't separate the idea that they robbed us of 18 potential courses and just gave us 18 overall holes instead. Like if you can't play as Jack Nicklaus, as one might assume, um, then I think the only real value that his name on the box gives the game is the fact that this is a curated list of, of Jackie's favorite stuff. So, I mean, I, I also don't know how you'd fit 18 courses in, in a game like this. Maybe it is not very data intensive, but I like the concept.

09:38 I, especially, I like the goofy one-liners he throws before you, you go to each hole. I, I like the, I like the concept if I'm a major golf fan, which like maybe, maybe most people who are buying this game were, but like, I feel like for a casual player who wants to just play golf, I would rather have variety, even like three courses or something. And like the, the gimmick, I'm calling it a gimmick for lack of a better word. I mean, but like of there being a different hole from different courses and stuff is completely lost on me.

10:13 I don't care. Like, I don't know what these holes are. I, you can tell me that that's true. I'm not, I can't verify it, you know, personally. So, uh, even, even with the high fidelity graphics that look so realistic, I can't tell, but, uh, it's just that I think that the average gamer would prefer more variety. Once I'm done with the 18 holes, I'd like to try something else.

10:34 Joe, you mentioned the high fidelity graphics and as they claimed on the back of the box, no game can match its graphics. I would say, as a comment about the graphics, I have never seen an NES game that looks so much like a computer game. And I'm not sure if that's just because of the way it draw, it draws on screen the graphics, which by the way, I thought the whole advantage of cartridges was that they wouldn't have loading. Yeah. That they're flash carts and everything.

11:02 Well, here's the thing. This is what I found kind of fascinating at the same time as incredibly frustrating about this game. And I think that I think what it's doing is it's like procedurally generating the course from like the best that an NES can from like the topography of the course that it has. So it's like, it's not so much loading data as it is trying to calculate what this is supposed to look like at any given moment.

11:35 And on one hand, like, yeah, I guess wherever the ball lays, you're going to get a different view of the course. But on the other, you're going to wait like a good five to 10 seconds before you can actually interact with the game at all. So I found it cool from a tech perspective, but not very.

11:54 It broke up the flow a lot. Yeah. Now that you describe it, that that does sound cool. And that actually makes me like, again, makes me feel like, OK, this is a pure the purest they can get on the NES of like to matching this course. It didn't feel like that to me when I was playing. I was kind of like, what the heck is going on here with the way this thing generates on? And it's like so jarring and confusing to see where I am. But I also think that the that that purity of like accuracy is a little lost due to the fact that it's the game does not present itself to you intuitively. You know, like, I don't know. It's hard to explain if I compare it to NES golf.

12:37 Like you got the you got the little screen where you can see the close up of of your player. You've got the screen where you can see like the whole course on that screen. Of course, you see an arrow of which is the direction you're pointing. You can see like your you can see like your player, like what he's looking at. You see where he's facing in this. All of that. All of that that gives you like the context of like where you're looking is like this cursor at the top that just says, like, now you're facing this way, even though you're not. Or like now you're aiming this way, but it's just like you're just doing this like weird like geometry with this.

13:13 With this dot that is not a part of the environment of like, OK, I guess this would make me aim sort of that way. It takes me out of it completely, I guess. Like I don't feel like I'm looking through the eyes of or through a camera behind my player. And I'll just real quick disclaim that that is a guess. Like what I just described. I don't actually know how this game works. It just that would make sense to me.

13:36 But if that is what's happening, I guess that would make turning and visually showing you turning in any responsive way kind of off the table. So it has to do this weird like, OK, now pretend you're facing this direction and we're going to give you this abstracted little meter above the actual screen as to what it would look like for you to be looking in that direction until you turn so much. And this is something I only learned.

14:11 I halfway through a whole five or six that it now needs to redraw the scene because you're looking like directly to your right now. So. I don't know. It seems like this is like trying to put a fully 3D game onto the NES and it just yeah, it there's a lot of drawbacks here.

14:36 Yeah. To me, it felt like it was like I was to me. I felt like I was witnessing a lot of the math that that's supposed to be happening underneath the game. Yeah. Like it just felt like I was playing like it didn't feel like I'm oh, I'm playing golf. It felt like I'm doing the calculations of like what angle do I need to put this dot that is contextually not related to the scene in order to like, you know, make it go in the direction I wanted to go. So the way that the any particular stroke in in the golf game works is and it becomes an issue until you eventually see the flag in the distance wherever generates you.

15:13 There is a good portion of the screen where you see your player at your current position with the golf ball. And then to the left of you is a power meter that we'll surely talk about in a little bit. And then above you is this kind of like field goal with a ball in the middle that you are moving to direct your swing. So if you move the ball a little bit to the right, allegedly your swing will go a little bit to the right and then so forth to the left. And then as Sean was mentioning, if you move that ball all the way to the end of the current posts, your the screen will regenerate and you will be facing more in either the right or left, depending on which extreme you dragged it to.

15:57 From there, the real issue is, is that that ball that you are controlling above the screen where you are seeing your own golf ball is not one to one with the golf ball on the screen. And so you might think, you know, when you're further away, like, oh, on this course, when I checked out the overall view of the map, the hole was more to the right. So I want to or the green was all the way to the right. So I want to shoot all the way to the right. However, because you're using a driver since you're just starting on the on the course, it's more extreme than when you use a putter. And therefore, when you are putting, you actually do need to be very extreme with where you place the ball on the on the edges of these poles.

16:47 And so it it's as complicated as I'm making it sound by painting this visual picture for the listeners heads. But basically, the easiest way to solve this, in my opinion, was just make where your ball is and where the ball that you're moving from left to right be one to one with one another and then just have the wind be the factor that changes it ever so more.

17:11 The fact that how far away you are and what driver you're you or what club you're using be the thing that dictates how much this right to left sways could honestly take even a great player a very long time to figure out how precise they should be, because you will just want to move it a little bit away from the flag when you're starting out. And then when you're putting, you might need to be all the way to the right to successfully put one of these guys in, depending on the break of the putting situation, which is a whole nother thing you have to account for.

17:48 And we'll get into all the things you have to account for. But I feel like forget about it generating like where you are on the map and trying to visually represent that. There is just an issue with like there's no real sense of the course other than going back into the menu and checking out the top down view to see the entire layout, you know, from a top down angle and being like, oh, yeah, that's where the green is. Like, let me adjust my guy.

18:12 Like, it's not clear from the actual like action screen that you're presented. Yeah, you kind of do like you would get the feel for how how accurate, not so much accurate, but how sensitive these things are. If you played this game a lot, I'd imagine. But as it stands now, you do have to do calculus, basically, to figure out how this relates to how it ends up on the screen. And I will stand up a little bit for like the actual visual visual representation. Like it it it's probably the most realistic view we've seen, but it doesn't so much that doesn't so much mean that it's useful or fun.

18:57 So, yeah, you do. You would have to go back to that menu just like, oh, yeah, OK, now I can kind of make a connection between what this map in this whole look like and what I'm seeing through my digital eyes here.

19:13 But, yeah, I agree. And then I mentioned the power meter, which is interesting because it's not the balance of that power meter is not equal at all. And that's something that, you know, might be apparent, but really requires the manual to fully grasp that basically there are it looks it looks almost like the map for 10 yard fight, you know, where you have like the different yard lines and everything. And then the two touchdowns on the north and south of it.

19:46 Those are red bars. And basically there are three clicks you need to do on your power meter. The first click starts your swing. And then as it goes up, it is indicating your power. However, the power goes from like 0%, 1%, 2%, 3%, 7%, 22%, 44%, 50%, 88%. It's like the 50% mark is a red line that is not in the middle of said power meter. The 50% mark is closer to the top than like maybe it's like 75% of the way to the top. So, OK, the 50% is the 75%, but then the 100% isn't the full bar.

20:29 The 100% is the end of the green. You can actually go above 100% into the red zone, the top of the bar, but then that's going to cause you to overswing. And it will, no matter how perfectly you swing, it will, you know, curve your ball a little bit because you overswung, which is, I understand, a mechanic in golf to just swing harder and face the consequences in exchange for gaining more yards. However, a really interesting setback is that in every other golf game we played on the NES for the power meter,

21:04 even to get to the very top, you have to be precise. If you want to hit 100 and, I don't know, 175% like this game lets you, you'd have to click the A button again at the very top. And this game does not do that. You only get one chance. And if you don't press the A button at all, you automatically lock in to 175% of your swing with no chance to, like, come back down and swing again. It just locks into what is the next A press, the one that controls, well, how straight on did you hit the ball?

21:40 And that you want to hit as close to where it started at 0% to line up a shot. And again, that could be something that is very confusing to a first-time video game golfer. We have played enough golf games that I think that concept is readily apparent to us. But I wouldn't say that that is obvious.

21:58 They should probably put a golf ball, like, next to, you know, like a visual representation of a golf ball next to the 0% to, like, lock in the idea of, like, oh, yeah, and then this is where I hit the golf ball. All in all, three presses, really just two that matter. But technically, if you're just starting off on the beginning of the course and you just want to hit the ball really hard, there's only one press that matters, and that's how close you get to 0%. Okay, so as far as the power meter goes and, like, how weirdly it's marked and, I don't know. I have some defense for it. Not saying, again, that it's well communicated,

22:40 but one would say if they're going for verisimilitude, I think, like, so it looks like it's going on, like, a logarithmic scale or something, and that sort of makes sense. Like, when you're going for a really low-power thing, you kind of feel like you have a bit more control over it. Like, if you're trying to putt two feet compared to if you're trying to putt, like, five feet, you might be able to eyeball that and, like, muscle memory that with your swing. But if you're trying to really hammer something,

23:17 but you're trying to, you know, shave however many yards off or add however many yards, like, that's going to be really hard to dial in. And I think that kind of makes sense. Like, if you are really whacking something like you would be at the top of this power meter, the variation is going to be much more wild. And so I think that that feels a bit more realistic than something that's just going on, like, a linear scale from zero to 100, even if there is some sort of, like, really crush it button.

23:55 And then I think that the accuracy or, like, I guess the hook or pull is pretty intuitive. Like, if you hit too early, then you're going to move in one direction. If you hit too late, you're going to move in another. Again, like, it could have been communicated more clearly, and I think the other aspects of this game that seem hard,

24:17 like, that are kind of encumbering, like the amount of time it takes to redraw and the fact that in the distance, it's hard to really tell where your ball is until the game is sort of updating your entire screen. Like, that doesn't help with giving you, like, live feedback. So I don't think that the power meter is crazy bad. It's weird that there's a red line for 50%, and it's a weird spot, because I didn't know that that was the 50% mark until much later. But it's not the worst design thing in the world.

24:55 I mean, I don't think in a vacuum it's the worst thing in the world. I do think that because it's used for every part of this game, it doesn't change. That's what bothers me the most. Where, like, I don't know, I need something different when I'm putting, and I'm three, and, you know, whatever. I'm two feet away from the hole. But, like, the visual meter didn't change at all. Just, like, what it represents changes. So, like, sometimes at the, you know, at my first stroke,

25:31 I'm hitting the same spot on the power meter as I am for, like, my putt when I'm, like, five feet away, because now it's, like, recalculated how much power this means, you know? And, like, again, looking back at NES golf, the putt meter looks different, and I can sort of contextualize it. It's smaller, and I realize, like, okay, it's smaller, I need to go with a smaller amount, like, of the percentage of this bar.

25:54 But this is just, like, I guess I feel like I'm just supposed to guess now. I agree. Putting is a completely different game, really. I feel like even between that, like, even when I'm, like, halfway to the hole, like, still going to 50 or going to 100% is, like, not going to give me the same result as it did on my first putt, like, depending on how close I am to the hole. And, you know, of course, in other golf games, that's true, too. If you're using, like,

26:22 if you're using a different club or whatever, like, it'll have different meters, but it's represented to me. This is just, like, okay, yeah, do it again. We've recalculated what everything on this meter means, and it's invisible to you. So, like, I'm still, like, kind of confused when that comes up. I will just add that, Sean, I do agree with you that I do think some of these are actually interesting changes to the way that, you know, the power meter specifically, interesting changes to the way you can play golf on the NES. And I'm not necessarily saying that they're bad. I'm saying it's just,

26:56 you know, I was just highlighting how different it is from the other NES golf games we've played and just kind of how, you know, to talk to Joe's point a little bit, how extreme hitting something softly

27:11 might be compared to hitting something really hard. Like, I think it's really easy to have a great first stroke in any course. Like, it's really easy to hit the ball hard. But it's really hard to perfect, like, that, you know, 30 feet away and so on section of the game because it is kind of hard to tell. And yeah, I guess it does help to know percentage points. And the manual does lay them out for you. It does help to know, like, what's 50% versus what's 100% versus what's 10% because they do also tell you,

27:47 specifically if you're on beginner mode, but technically if you're on expert mode, there's an easy way to find out in the manual. They do tell you how hard... 100% is. Yeah. Each thing can hit 100%. So theoretically, if you're stuck in the sand, but you're only 40 feet away, you could do the math on the, you know, the sand wedge at 100% hits for the men. It hits 80 yards. So if I'm 40 feet away, I want to hit this thing at 50%, give or take the wind,

28:19 to, you know, to get within the realm. It's just, it goes back to what you're saying about sometimes it does feel like you're doing more math than you're doing sports. You know? Like in baseball games, I never have to think about the kind of things that real life baseball players, you know, like the heads up stuff that real life baseball players have to do. And so I'm not sure why I have to do that in this golf game. Like why it can't be a little, you know, a little more laid back and a little more intuitive to the player.

28:50 Intuitive is the operative word there, I think, because I think golf as like in its essence, like the very core of golf is making calculations of how you should hit this thing because that's really all you're doing. Like there's no, there's no twitch reflex. There's, it's all about what's going through your head before you swing and then executing that. So I think that you're always going to have this sort of, this, you know, napkin math be a part of these games. It's just, how do you make that feel more breezy

29:30 for the, for the player? I mean, that's exactly what I was going to say too, where it's like, the intuitive is a good word for it because like, I don't golf, but I got to imagine that like, even like the best golfer is not doing numerical math in their head. They're doing intuition math. They're doing visual things. They're saying, okay, if I, I feel that, if I feel like if I hit it this hard, it'll go this far. And again,

29:53 bringing it back to NES golf, like, that's what that felt like to me. I was never like, okay, what's the, how many yards do I need to hit it? Okay. 15 yards. And I, and at this percentage, that'll be about this. I'm just like looking at it. I'm like, okay, it's, it's about that distance and the arrows pointing this way and the wind's going that way. So I bet I got to go about to here on the meter roughly, you know, I'm like, it felt more realistic to like how I would be thinking in golf. On the other hand though, I feel like this,

30:19 like with the percentage points being all over the place on the power meter, I think that makes it almost easier. Like if you're not really focused on being as precise as possible, I think that the, the way that they have it set up makes it easier to kind of just sort of

30:36 go with what feels right. I guess what, what made me have like the problem with that is, is the part a couple of times. Well, yeah, the putting, but like a couple of times, like I, I, I take my first drive and I, I go straight to the, the red line or whatever. And like, it gets me so far or whatever. Then I'm putting and I go straight to the red line and, and it's a good putt. And I'm like, okay, did I have to do, why didn't I have to adjust anything I was doing to putt? Like if I could close my eyes or, you know, block out the other side of the screen and just look at the, the meter and do the same thing and have a great putt and have a great drive,

31:12 just depending on like how far away I am. And like, I feel like I'm not, I'm not changing like what I'm doing to make it feel like, okay, now I'm putting. Okay, now I'm chipping, whatever that even means. But like, you know, that's what bothered me about it. It was, it never felt like I, I was the one making decisions. Like, okay, we've changed it now to putting mode. Do the same thing you did. Okay. No, I get that. And the funny thing is, is that, uh, you can choose as a player to be either a beginner or an expert.

31:38 And, uh, you know, at first that idea intrigued me and obviously I stuck with beginner. But when I moved to expert, uh, just to see how the mode worked, I noticed, uh, that there really was just like, it was just hiding game features from me and pretending, like, that's what being an expert is, is just knowing that stuff. But instead it just makes it this way. It doesn't recommend, uh, the next club you should use. Uh, so it just uses the one you previously selected and it hides the, uh, you know, how far, the max distance.

32:10 So, guess what? I own the manual. I can just look it up. Like, you haven't really done anything. Like, they actually hide the distance with the words EXPT to, to reference that you're on expert mode. but that doesn't mean that it's not possible to get that information. The game itself has given it to you. But it's harder to get the information because you gotta open the manual.

32:30 Yeah, I think the spirit of the concept works. It's just, if it's gonna, if it's just gonna be in the manual, like, I mean, that's, that's the substitute for actually have, have played golf, I guess. Like, you know, your dad could have all of that information, you know, as a gist of that information in, in his head. So, you need the manual. The lesson here is that the next time you need help with your math homework, go to the golf course.

33:20 There are two modes of play in the game, and that is, there's skins, and there's stroke. And I said it specifically in that order because I think it's a little dirty the other way around. Ha ha ha ha. And, the difference being that stroke is more like, you know, the kind of golf game you're used to where you just play the 18 holes, there's a par, and you try and, essentially hit the par each time, and, you know, if you took seven strokes on a course, your score is plus seven, and so on and so forth. Whereas skins is when, like, you're on the course, and, you know, you're, you're not playing for money,

33:57 but, so you're trying to have some fun, but you're actually, you still want there to be some stakes. Like, after you lose a hole, you have to take a piece of clothing off. Uh, close. Uh, I know you're joking. Um, but it's funny because it does sound like that. Uh, that skins would eventually, if you don't, or even just shirts versus skins would be a funny mode in this game. But, unfortunately, what we got instead was a, uh,

34:23 obscenely detailed, uh, betting game inside of this, which makes me feel like they did present an option for two people who are very good at this game to actually play for money because you can customize the dollar amount that's on the line, you can customize how much each hole is worth, and then it will give you the results as it goes along. And, obviously, the, um, the way that it would work in any such game is that, uh, by default, if it's, let's say, $10,000, it makes it so that the starting holes are, uh, less expensive than the later holes. And so, it doesn't care, it doesn't matter if you triple bogey on, uh, hole number one because you're only losing X amount of dollars, whereas you wanna,

35:10 you know, do your best later on. And you can customize it to be like, you know, I know I'm really good at number seven and number 12, so I'm gonna put more money on those. But, uh, then your opponent can say, like, well, I know I'm really good at these holes and I'm gonna put more money on these. And it's very interesting, uh, it's just way too detailed that it actually does make me think that they intended not just to simulate, uh, how a game of skins might work, but to also have it be done amongst, you know, NES golfers. I don't doubt it. I can see this replacing golf in, in reality completely.

35:48 That's what every golf game is trying to do, right? They release, uh, Tiger Woods and now, who is it? Um, Rory McIlroy or whatever his name is. Uh, I don't remember. Yeah, it's the PGA golf games. They release those with the intention of killing PGA golf. Right. Yeah. Just cannibalizing it altogether. Same reason MLB, the show is so detailed is why watch baseball anymore. Let's kill that and just have you play it on your PS5 instead. Yeah. You don't need a, you don't need a pitch, pitch counter, pitch timer, uh, in, in the show, you know, pitch clock. Yeah, it's a pitch clock. It's a pitch clock, but you did make me now, like, I did not play this year's version of the show. You made me wonder if there's a pitch clock. I would hope not.

36:36 Well, they let, um, referees make, uh, mistakes in Madden games just as way you can challenge. That's true. There's no actual holding. Don't shut. Sean, very early on in this episode, you mentioned that you like the little quips from Jack between courses. And it's funny because I thought at first that those were going to be like tips, but all the tips are in the manual. It's just like, oh, this is my favorite hyper specific thing, uh, in all of golf. Sean, he literally says, this is my favorite par four. And then like three courses later, he goes, this is my favorite par three. There's not even, that's not even. No, no, no. It's like, this is my favorite short par four

37:19 with, uh, X modifier. Like that. These are like the sub genres of holes, like not just like a par four, par five. Um, I mean, he also has them that just like, oh, this is just like my favorite ever, but they get super specific. Like this is my favorite par four that you have to like, that you have to hit really hard on the first one, but like really softly on the second. Now, do you think they selected all the courses and then just like called Jack's agent and said, can you just get his thoughts on these? I don't know if he actually wrote these. Yeah. Like one of them is just quote longest par four in major championship golf, unquote, but like, that's not like a Jack Nicklaus thing. That's not like his opinion or something. He just, he,

38:10 I don't know. I was going to say he Wikipedia at it. He, he encyclopedia at it, uh, when they called them and then, uh, just spit out a fact. You can play up to four players,

38:20 uh, in a game of golf and that's for human players and there's no multi-tap required. Uh, so kudos for that, I suppose. But, uh, I couldn't actually, I didn't look back at all of our other golf games to confirm whether that's unique or not, but I guess like four player games in general amaze me this early on because I really thought like four player wasn't a thing until the 64 bit. how do people, but how do you get like somebody to play defense if there's only like one controller? You mean the other people who are trying to, uh, they're on the course and they're trying to whack your golf ball back. Yeah. Like in the PGA.

38:56 You're thinking of field hockey. Yeah. No, it makes sense for these games. Like, uh, you know, even isn't, um, I can't think of it right now, but I feel like if there's only one player playing at a time and you're just alternating, like you can have 16 players, which they should, right? I mean, aren't there like 64 people that compete in the, uh, like in the golf majors, like should just be able to keep entering them. And yeah, it'll be the longest game of golf in your life, but just keep going. Just keep doing it.

39:28 This is, uh, a little bit before the sequels in spinoff side, but I thought it was worth, you know, uh, just a little commentary on Jack himself. Uh, it's, it's worth mentioning that the guy has won more majors than anybody else. In the history of golf. And that surprised me because I would have thought that Tiger had that surely, but he has it at 18 majors, but he's tied for third in wins. So I was like, all right, who's number one in wins. And it's actually a tie, uh, for who has the most wins of all time. Exactly 82 between Tiger Woods and Sam Sneed, uh, who played from 1936 to 1965.

40:10 Uh, no real like stat or thought here on that. Just funny that, um, I, you know, Tiger Woods won exactly the same amount, like a tie for first on exactly the amount of wins does feel a little strange, especially when they're separated between so many eras of golf. Yeah. Well, how many times did a Jack Nicholas get to regionals?

40:34 That's a good question. Um, I don't, I really don't have the answer for you there, but, uh, Jack also played for 25 years and Tiger played, uh, so far for 24 years remains to be seen if he'll continue competing. Uh, so I guess that also solidifies, um, Jack pretty soon as, uh, the best golf majors player with 18 because, you know, it's like home runs in baseball, you know, technically no one's hit more than 60 because Babe Ruth did it in X amount of games. And then everybody who ever hit 61 or more did it in 162 game seasons on the sequels and spinoff side, uh, a couple of different like notes here about this particular game.

41:19 There was, uh, obviously a PC version first and that's why I think this game looks so much like a PC version. And that came out a lot earlier than this one, uh, maybe like four years beforehand, 1986, 87, but a turbo graphic 16 version of the game came out, uh, called Jack Nicholas's turbo golf. And, uh, it's the same exact game. They just thought because it's on the turbo graphics, they could call it turbo golf. However, it's not the turbo graphics everywhere in the world. It's also known as the PC engine, same system, if you didn't know. And there it was titled Jack Nicholas's world golf tour. So I guess because that's the international version, the PC engine, um, that, uh, it had more of a world appeal to it. So we've got the world golf tour.

42:05 Uh, you know, this is me really just trying to make this section interesting. If you, yeah, no, it's good. I would just hope that in those versions, the, the course loaded faster. Like I hope that if you're on the PC, it doesn't take this long. Yeah. It's CD ROM. So you would hope so, but I actually think it would be longer, right? Like on a CD ROM, like it's spinning and everything. Like, well, again, I think it's, I don't think it's loading data. I think it's actually trying to make calculations and like draw not, not polygons, but like, you know, I think it's more of a, like a processor thing or, or maybe a, a memory mapper.

42:43 Jack Nicholas's greatest 18 holes of major championship golf at the time was considered the longest title for any video game. I pretty sure it no longer has that distinction, but it's worth it. Is that, did you make that up? I did not make that up. It's even, it even has a source next to it. Jack Nicholas red in the middle of the holes. Yeah. He actually says that after you, if you beat the game with a perfect score. Wow. They did make a bunch of Jack Nicholas games. They got all the way up to Jack Nicholas six golden bear challenge, which sounds like it became, instead of golfing, he just switched careers over to hunting or something and started hunting the golden bear.

43:23 Clearly not the truth though. Obviously there's golden bear must be a reference to some course or particular hole or whatever. So that's the challenge. Let's not even look that up and just go with that. Yeah. And then there's Jack Nicholas's golf and course design signature edition CD compendium. Now that might be longer than the Jack Nicholas's greatest 18 holes of major championship golf. So he clearly asserted himself with the world's longest title for a video game. What is even half of this mean?

43:57 Okay. Go slowly. Say it again. Okay. Jack Nicholas. We know who that is, right? That's, that's the guy, the man that met the legend, most major championships golf and course design. Okay. So Jack Nicholas golf, I'm going to assume, right? Like it's Jack Nicholas's golf. And then it's also a course designer, right? It's not like you're not designing anything about golf. You're just designing the courses. So let's interpret. You can't add new rules. Yeah. So Jack Nicholas golf and course design signature edition. So this is, but what do we think that there was a Jack Nicholas golf and, and course design like OG? Yes. I, that's what I'm thinking. I'm thinking the signature edition. Now he like fake autographed the box.

44:44 You know? Uh, so that's that CD. Yes. Okay. Now CD, uh, I think there's some conjecture here because I'm looking at the box and I just see CD ROM, like playable directly from CD ROM sticker. I don't see. Oh no. I do see where CD is. Okay. Nevermind. CD is part of the official title. It's well hidden. Yeah. Give them credit for that. Um, actually it's so well hidden that I would call this game. Jack Nicholas golf and course design signature edition CD image of a disc compendium,

45:21 cause there's also an image of a disc behind this. Uh, and then compendium. So apparently compendium was added as well. So there was a signature edition and then they added signature edition compendium. Uh, is this all just DLC stuff? Is this all just like, yeah, it sounds like,

45:41 yeah, uh, a collection of all the different versions of this course designer with like pre-made courses. I hope you still get to make your own courses. Cause that sounds pretty cool. Uh, maybe that you could never do that. And that's just a part of the title and not a description of what happens in the game. I don't know. You're the one with the information, Mike. Yeah, no, uh, it's just, just to, uh, you know, really, uh, talk about how many courses they included. It's 15 courses, which I guess on CD is pretty damn cool. Um, because if you think about that's 15 times 18 is how many holes,

46:19 uh, you'll play. but the course design thing is not something that I have any screenshots of. Although of course, of course, little golf humor, uh, you must, you must be able to design, uh, like make your own courses in this game. Otherwise what's the fucking point? I want to create a course where the green is on top of an impossibly steep hill. Um, and so most of your,

46:50 we'll make it like a, a five par, you know, just to make it seem a little balanced, but you do get to make your own courses law breaking news. Uh, it says on the back of the box, still thirsting for more acres of green, get creative and use the design mode to devise your own personalized course. You could even copy your local course right down to the divot. You wouldn't download a golf course,

47:15 uh, with 256 color VGA, graphics and intense sound effects. You can almost smell the grass cuttings. I think that's really funny. Intense sound effects mixed with, you can smell grass cuttings. I mean, based on the description that we had at the beginning of this game, I don't know how trusting I am. And like the, the realism that they're trying to describe. Joe, they put a photo real Jack Nicholas as the character that swings.

47:45 Wow. We've made it. It's like an FMV style. This was after, this was after mortal combat. Yes, this is, uh, cool. Yeah. This is 92. Just confirming. Yep. Uh, all good. So that's, uh, Jack Nicholas's greatest 18 holes of major championship golf. But here's nostalgia's greatest essential games list vote of all time. CD compendium signature edition. Image of disc.

48:15 I have no doubts in my mind that people enjoyed this game when it came out. I just don't think it's holding up today. I feel like a game like NES golf, which we have talked about a lot, but also have just, you know, I think it was like in our top five games of the launch games, uh, held up a lot better because of how simple it is on the NES.

48:40 Sometimes going, going simple is the, is the way to longevity. It's the way to replay ability. It's the way to, uh, become a classic because nobody quite likes doing math or, uh, having trouble visualizing where exactly you are on the hole. And then if you need to figure it out, you go to a top down view and then you go back and you realize it all has to load in again. And by the time it's finished loading, you're like, wait, what was I doing before this? So you go back to the top down view, knowing that it's going to have to load in again.

49:13 So then you say, okay, well the ball was a little bit to the, uh, the flag was a little bit to the right of this, or the green was a little bit to the right of this, or, oh shit, wait, what was it? So you go back to the top down view, let it all load in again,

49:24 do the swing, swing the shot. And it goes into the fucking sand. And you're like, oh, thank God I'm playing on an emulator. Might as well just rewind. And you're like, wait a minute. They can't rewind in golf. And this is going for ultra realistic simulation. So am I really even playing the game the way it was designed? And then you start having some kind of existential crisis. And that's not good for any kind of essential game. Essential games don't, they should be challenging, but they should be challenging in a way that is fun and, uh, comfy and makes you want to continue to challenge yourself.

50:01 I did, uh, I think nine holes of Jack Nielsen's golf. Um, you know, before I never finished a course, I guess, is it a course? What do you call 18 holes? It's a course. Yeah. Never finished a full course. And I got my fill thinking, I don't need to get par. I'm okay with being triple bogey or whatever I wind up being, because that's just the kind of golf game they made for me. The kind of game where I'm either going to have to spend a ton of time, or I'm going to keep putting and putting and missing and getting close.

50:39 And then I'm so close that I can't possibly miss. So I just get it in, but it doesn't feel good because I had a chance to get it in from like, 19 feet away. And I just didn't understand how the meters worked. So I didn't quite do it. You could chalk that up to me, not understanding the game, but I think the game doesn't understand its core player base. Sean. That was very profound.

51:05 I'm going to use this time in the essential games list vote to continue describing the course I would make in Jack Nicklaus course designer, as I was rudely interrupted while I was describing it before. And I don't want you to be deprived of, of this fun golf golf hole thing. So, okay. So it's like a big hill in the middle of, of the fairway. And it's like an impossibly steep angle, you know, like you, you would have to like hit at max power with like a wedge just to get it up there. And you'd probably need like the wind to help you too. But like, that's not where it stops. The green itself is all at a pretty, not like a steep, uh, whatever you call it grade,

51:59 but enough that if you were to like, just, just miss, just miss it a little bit, your, your ball would then fall off of this like plateau that we've created. And the, the hole is at the top of this plateau and on like right in front of the hole are these sort of like very, uh, misleading sort of gutters. Like they would, they would sort of kind of like, so that if water went in, it would just sort of, it would drain it away, but it would just take your ball if you weren't precise enough and just filter it right off the plateau. Um, and I would just like to see if anyone could actually make that hole. Um, also it would give actual golfers the feeling that I feel whenever I play golf, because to me it's physically impossible.

52:51 Um, on the other hand, the game itself, you know, not great, not the worst, but not essential. Joe. Um, so I always try to separate the part of myself that just doesn't enjoy sports games. It's just a fact about me. I don't enjoy them, but I try to like look at these things objectively and, and, and factor that out and decide like, okay, what was good about this game? What was it? And I really think this is bad. I do. I don't know. I, I like, maybe there are some redeeming qualities, but like, I don't feel like I'm golfing in this game. It, it takes so long to load everything. I, I can't visualize what's going on. Maybe it's just because I'm not a golfer, but like I had so much more fun with other golf games that,

53:42 that makes me think either I'm just such casual that like, that this isn't doing it for me or this is doing something wrong. Uh, so I am going to say this is not an essential game. All right. There you have it. Uh, different coloring opinions there. But, uh, if you know it, whether you agree with the essential games list votes or not, or whether you agree with Sean's course design or not, uh, please give us more feedback about, uh, Joe, Sean's course. That was a Joe's course design. Do you have a course that you want to talk us through? Sure. I don't want people to think that was deleted from the show.

54:15 All I, all I want is to make a full, a full golf course size, mini golf course. So like you're just golfing normally, but there's like actual real light, real size windmills. And like, instead of a little loop de loop, maybe there's a little like roller coaster that takes you like 40 yards and you know, all kinds of little like things. There's like big clown that like swallows up your ball and like, you know, all kinds of things like that.

54:39 And live animals. Yes. Yeah. I mean, I get that Jack Nicholas was going for simulation and he's got water and sand, but like, where are the, uh, you know, windmills and, and shit like that. And the course pigeons, every, every golf course that I've gone to has at least like a couple flocks of course pigeons that you have to avoid. Yeah. And the spectators who run on and try to like steal your ball. The defensemen. Yeah, absolutely. Next week, we are not playing any more golf. We'll be playing a game called kid. Cool. Uh, spelled with a K. So, you know, he's cool.

55:18 Uh, I guess look forward to that. And, uh, if you're not looking for, so enthusiastic about it. Yeah. If you're not looking for, well, you know, K with a cool is one of those things that like doesn't fly anymore. Right? Like it's, it's so dated to put K's on things to make them cool. I think the Gen Z's have made it cool again. With a K? Yes. Uh, I think it would be like kid. Zool with a Z because they're, uh, you know, Gen Z and all that. Um, shows how well I know them. I'm really in touch with that base. That wasn't very based of you. Yeah. For real.

55:52 Uh, anyway, uh, if you're not into kid cool and you weren't into Jack Nicholas, don't worry. There will be good episodes of nostalgia again, but there will also be a whole nother show. You might've heard of it. Nostalgia bites. It's only on Patreon, patreon.com slash nostalgia. And believe it or not, we're up to our 20th episode already, which means we've done 20 months of this. So, you know, we're dedicated.

56:12 You thought like, man, they've been doing the regular show for 286 months, but there are 286 weeks, but there's no way they're going to commit to the podcast. Uh, the other one. And it's like, nope, we are. And we're on our 20th month and we're playing a big one. The very first original fire emblem, which believe it or not has an official translation. So that's pretty cool.

56:32 Uh, it just never came to, uh, you know, the States back then it only came out like for Nintendo switch or whatever. So we're going to touch base on that one. We're going to talk about it, but again, it's only for those cool people who join us at patreon.com slash nostalgia. You also get the discord. Uh, you also get to personally meet kid cool. He will come to your house and, um, we're doing an AMA on the discord. Yeah. With kid cool. And he'll come to your house, give you tickets to a kid cool game, uh, show and you'll be able to win awesome prizes. Uh, we're working out the details on that one. So don't subscribe for that, but that could happen.

57:11 It might just be Sean dressed up like kid cool coming to your house, but you'd have to give us your address. And it might be me with the video camera pretending like I'm not me, but you wouldn't know it was me anyway. Cause you don't know me.

57:48 But they, they know you. Thank you.