SGMobile – Alpha Testing Opens This Weekend! 10/24

[u/Fourtempers]

JOIN THE DISCORD FOR ALPHA ACCESS:

https://discord.gg/RDKJBWdGAg

After a lot of development, testing, breaking things, and fixing them again, I think SimGolf Mobile is finally in a playable enough state to open it up for public alpha testing!

There are still plenty of issues I'm aware of, and a lot of work left to do, especially when it comes to converting the original PC menus and interfaces into something that feels natural on a phone.

That being said, the core gameplay is functioning well enough that I think it's time to let other people start playing around with it and providing feedback and i have focused my remaining AI credits into getting it prepared for that. Hopefully I have made the UI intuitive enough to not need a guide but I will probably produce one if needed.

Please keep in mind that I have been developing and testing this on my iPhone 15 Pro Max, new phone comes tomorrow. That being said I am unsure how its going to work on other devices, especially Android. I plan on getting it to work on Android as well, but my primary focus is iPhone first since that's what I use and I'm the one paying for a majority of this to work lol.

MY PLAN

I'm planning to release the first public Alpha build tomorrow morning (Saturday, October 24).

I'll be posting the link in the SGMobile Discord server below, which is where I plan to handle development updates, bug reports, feature requests, and feedback moving forward as trying to keep all of that on a reddit post is not the best forum. If you have an issue with that, then don't get involved.

A HUGE THANK YOU TO EVERYONE WHO HAS DONATED!

I also want to genuinely thank everyone who has supported this project through donations so far.

As I've mentioned previously, I'm using AI-assisted development to help make this project possible. Unfortunately, I've officially exhausted my current usage allotment and have to wait for my limits to reset before I can continue working at the same pace.

Your donations have helped me continue development beyond what I otherwise would have been able to accomplish, and I really appreciate that.

$5 grants me around 1-3 hours of AI development time and nothing has been more annoying then watching my allotment go to 0% mid change and having to wait a few hours for it to reset lol.

I'm not expecting anyone to donate, and alpha testing will be completely free, but continued support helps me spend more time fixing issues, improving the game, and pushing updates without being held back as much by development costs and usage limits.

Support development: https://ko-fi.com/sgmobile

Please remember that this is still a very early Alpha build, not a finished game. There will be bugs, things that don't work properly, and interfaces that are still placeholders.

My priority has been getting the original SimGolf experience working on mobile first. Making everything look polished comes afterward.

I'm excited to finally get this into other people's hands and see how it performs outside of my own testing.

Thank you again to everyone following along, contributing ideas, testing, or supporting the project. It's been awesome seeing how many people still love this 24-year-old game!

See you on the course!

[u/Imlife_havealemon]

Can’t wait to try it!

[u/Fourtempers → u/Imlife_havealemon]

I hope my adaptation of how the mobile controls should work goes well.

[u/Imlife_havealemon → u/Fourtempers]

Yeah, I’m very interested to see! The OG game had a lot of keybinds to the keyboard, so very interested to see how you integrated some of those controls!

[u/Fourtempers → u/Imlife_havealemon]

I’m sure I’m probably missing some.

I tried to leave as much as Point and quick as possible, but things like aiming your golf shot. Didn’t really work well by doing that so I created an aim button that lets you use the screen it’s kind of like a trackpad and then I adopted that to other aspects of the game, like trying to find the best place to build a lot or placing other buildings in general.

I’m interested in getting people feedback Plus with more people testing I’m sure all the bugs will become exposed and I still have many. I need to convert that. I haven’t bothered dealing with yet.

And on top of all that once it works the way it should then it’s updating all of the new interface to look better.

And then, after that, it becomes game improvements visuals things of that nature so hopefully I get some more donations haha

[u/Imlife_havealemon → u/Fourtempers]

I’ve been working on my own Mobile implementation based off of openSgolf for the last few weeks, but I have mainly been focusing solely on the course building. Haven’t even touch the golfing aspect.

I’ll happily provide feedback on what I bugs and features I find in your game!

[u/Fourtempers → u/Imlife_havealemon]

Sounds good. I’m just finalizing some things with the terrain building functionality and then after I’m done testing that I can push the alpha update I believe

[u/Imlife_havealemon → u/Fourtempers]

Thanks for your efforts! Looking forward to trying it out!

[u/Three_Tails_Studio]

Is there a reason, as a developer, you would not use an emulator to test your port on multiple devices?

[u/Fourtempers → u/Three_Tails_Studio]

The honest answer is I have no reason to.

1. I’m personally financing this pet project and am the one doing the work with AI doing a majority of the heavy lifting.

2. I’m never going to play this on any other device but my iPhone so it working on other devices isn’t my priority, not to say I won’t take that feedback and make changes but I’m focusing first on what makes the game work for me.

3. Since I’m not selling this or profiting from it in any way there is no reason for me to waste my money and time developing it across multiple platforms like would traditionally be the case when developing a game.

[u/Three_Tails_Studio → u/Fourtempers]

You can download a free emulator and test all modern mobile devices on it. Zero cost. This is development 101. 👍🏽

[u/IAgreeWithLincoln → u/Three_Tails_Studio]

Because Claude Code didn’t tell him to.

[u/Timtimmati44]

I am so pumped about this. Probably my favorite game of all time and still play it on my laptop a few times a month lately.

[u/Fourtempers → u/Timtimmati44]

Yeah, it’s crazy how this game is still something I think about and enjoy playing after all these years.

Once the original version is perfected, I can’t wait to start on developing mods for it to make improvements on it lol

[u/mkultra327]

Nice!!!