Although golfing has always had a spot in the corner of my eye, it’s something I’ve never really pursued. Until now, thanks to a Playstation 3 game and a friend who’s been itching to go golfing again.
The video game, “Tiger Woods PGA Tour 12: The Masters,” utilizes Playstation Move controls for a realistic golfing experience. Players swing and putt just like they would on a real golf course, with the Move Eye camera registering every nuance of every move a golfer makes.
It’s realistic because I pretty much double bogeyed and tripled bogeyed every hole I played for the first few rounds of golf. And actually, I’d probably do worse on a real golf course.
The more I play the game, though, the better I get. As I learn to focus on the fake ball at my feet, my drives have become straighter, often landing on fairways 250 yards away, and my putts are improving to the point where sometimes it only takes two or three to get the ball in the hole.
I’ve gotten to the point where I’m actually parring, and occasionally birdieing, most holes. In fact, I won an amateur tournament in Arizona with a score of five over par, which was much better than the second-place golfer who had a score of 10 over.
Granted, it wasn’t a real tournament, but anything to boost one’s ego is always great. That’s probably why video games are so popular, because they offer an unlimited amount of such ego boosts.
When I screw up, I get angry at the Playstation Move controller, as well as my television. I’ve managed to curb the swear words, but that doesn’t stop me from huffing out some steam. I imagine on a real golf course, some of that steam will come in the form of a few swear words, as much as I hate to admit that.
My real life golf experience consists mainly of hitting balls at a driving range. In college, my friends and I often visited the driving range, because swinging at balls was a great way to forget about the stress of school. We would have golfed, but all of us were too poor to afford that experience.
I’ve only golfed one round in my entire life. A friend of mine from Wautoma took me out about seven years ago to learn the game. It was fun, and frustrating, but for some reason I never returned to the links.
I wasn’t sure I ever would, but the Playstation 3 game has inspired me. I knew my friend Brian liked to golf, but he hasn’t really been able to because none of his friends here do. So I sent him an email, asking if he would like to go golfing sometime, and serve as a teacher to me.
He was more than happy to oblige, and now we’re trying to arrange our schedules to hit one of this area’s many beautiful courses. I live just a quarter-mile away from SentryWorld, so we’ll probably start there. It’ll be like playing in my front yard.
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Originally published in The Portage County Gazette on Friday, Aug. 19, 2011.
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