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Zoe Marsh Golf Links
by Tim Hagen

Links Corner Course Database ID Number - 1338
Release Date CRZ Filesize Par Course Length
2003-09-24  52,996,440  bytes 71  7385 yards
Type Style CRZ Filename
FICTIONAL  WOODLAND  zoemarsh2003.crz 
Course ID Course Key
   

COURSE SCREENSHOTS

LINKS CORNER REVIEW

Reviewed by
Rick Priebe
October 2003

Designer: This is Tim Hagen's second release. His first was Zoe Lakes, released in July of 2001. I am not familiar with his first course.

General course information:

Zip File size: 47mb

Type: Fictional, Forest/Coastal Salt Marsh

Par and Length (Back Tees): Par 71; 7385 yards

Difficulty: Difficult

APCD Version: 1.5 (2003)

Included: Read-me, Cameo, Splash, Hole Previews, Sounds.

General Comments: 'Zoe Marsh Golf Links is located on one of the inland islands on the coast of South Carolina, south of Charleston. Hopefully I have been able to create a course typical of the Lowlands SC area. Zoe Marsh winds its way around the marsh surrounding the island bordered by the Intercoastal Waterway. The course is cut out of the tropical woods with many breath taking vistas along the marsh. The course was created as if Donald Ross had walked these ground and created another masterpiece.'

That quote is taken from the Read-me included with the course. In overall appearance, I believe that he has accomplished this goal. This very realistic looking course is carved from heavy forest and marsh, with little forgiveness for the errant shot. The holes tend to be long and narrow, with deep penal bunkers pinching off many of the landing areas, particularly if the marsh is not in play from the tee. This course places a premium on accuracy from tee to green, then challenges your putting with some difficult slopes and hole placements. The rough and light rough was playable, but caution was necessary as there are a lot of carries over water and marsh. Miss-hits are easy from the rough and being short is not always an option. The deep bunkers were in play both off the tee and on approaches to the greens. Because of the sand wrapping up the sides, I had many difficult lies in those bunkers, often costing at least a stroke on my score.

Textures: Most of the course uses reasonable texturing. The green, fairway, light rough and rough go well together. The detail is more blurred than we have been used to lately from 2003 designs, but I didn't find anything objectionable about it. There is however, an odd ring around the bunkers that is a much darker green than the rest and doesn't seem to fit with the rest of the grass textures. The sand texture has a rippled appearance, as if wind blown.

Eye catchers

Pluses: Good overall feeling of being on one of the low barrier islands along the south-eastern U.S. coast. Choice of trees seemed quite appropriate. Interesting layout, good hole routing. I think that there are many holes that would leave good memories if played at any level besides Elite. Good sounds included.

Minuses: There are numerous trees that are not attached to the ground. Most are elevated no more than a foot, but a few are 4-5 feet up (see screenshot), high enough to actually hit a punch shot under them. This course is very penal if you stray from the beaten path. It would seem to be aimed more at the Pro or Champ classic swing, as I found it very hard to negotiate in Elite. The fairway bunkers are deep with sand wrapped up the sides, making it almost guaranteed that you will have a very slanted lie. The greens also tend to be very slanty which alone is not a negative, but many holes are cut right in the middle of these slopes, making even moderate pins a steep challenge. I scored +17 with 35 putts, (8 higher than my norm) in Elite RTS, admittedly in my first time ever seeing the course. I could expect to improve on that with practice, but I doubt that I would ever manage to get down to level par. The hole previews are not up to the standard needed for Elite play, as they give no useful yardages at all. In my second round at Champ I used the topcam to be able to measure how far certain features or hazards were from the player. I scored considerably better on this round, +6 with 30 putts. Still a hard course, but playable.

Favorite Hole: The second hole really caught my eye. This is a longish, difficult par 4, requiring one to find the fairway off the tee in order to set up a long iron (or FW wood) approach across water to the green. Rough or bunker is a sure mandatory lay-up. For me playing RTS it requires a solid 5W off the tee to cut as much off the dogleg right as possible, leaving a 210 yard 6W to the green. As the marsh reaches almost to the edge of the green, you must hit a pure iron or fairway wood to land on the putting surface. The only real bailout is long or right, as anything short or left is frog food.

Rating: This is an interesting layout that plays really tough. I liked the overall feeling of playing in the salt marsh country. However, I got the feeling that there was still some finishing work to be done. The floating trees should have been caught in beta testing, the fairway bunkers could be toned down somewhat, as this course has plenty of other features to plague an erratic swing. More informative hole previews would make this more palatable for the Elite or natural player. I also feel that the hole locations need to match the pin difficulty selection better, not as many moderate pins cut in nasty slopes. It would be interesting to play this course with a few modifications. This course definitely ranks well into the top 50%, but I see it as just below the top 25% because of these issues. I strongly recommend it as a challenging layout, especially to those playing at Pro or Champ levels. I'm kind of surprised that there hasn't been more notice made of this one already.

USER RATINGS

 Votes cast
Ace5 %1
Eagle27 %6
Birdie45 %10
Par14 %3
Bogey or worse9 %2

The User Course Reviews and polls have been removed from the forum due to the low numbers of members. The information above is presented merely for historical interest.

This course is available as a FREE download.


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