If you hit the ball into a tree when you play Links-The Challenge of Golf, you will hear the above phrase from the PC speakers. In those days, I did not have the Soundblaster card, but Links TCOG was able to emit realistic sounds though the crude PC speakers. Incredible! Even LS 98 has this soundbite after all these years.

Hazards

Trees are just one of the obstacles you will face when you play golf. Bunkers are another. There are also water hazards in a golf course like lakes or streams. If the ball lands in the water, you would incur a penalty stroke (add 1 to your score), and then drop a new ball at the boundary of the water, and then hitting the ball from there. In real life, dropping means holding your hand horizontal and just dropping the ball onto the ground. There are lots of rules concerning hazards and dropping, but I usually do the above in the computer game.

Other kinds of hazards are out-of-bounds areas, which are...well, out-of-bounds.

The Clubs

The rules say that you can have at most 14 clubs in your golf bag. Why do you need so many clubs? The reason is that each club performs differently and is suited for different situations on the course.

When you're at the tee making your first shot, you will normally use the driver. The driver is the club that can make your ball fly the most distance (rated 275 yards in Links) because the ball have a very low loft and will travel very far.

Next comes the woods (>200 yards) and irons. The woods and irons are numbered, like 3 woods or 5 iron. The higher the number, the shorter distance the ball will travel. After 9 iron comes the pitching wedge, sand wedge, and loft wedge (80 yards). These are clubs with very high loft. You use these when you're in the sand or near the green.

The last piece of equipment is the putter. You use this when you're on the green. The putter does not make the ball to fly at all. It has a clubface that is perpendicular to the ground. Putting is very important in golf. Half your score is determined on the putting green.

Putt here for my tips on playing Links LS.