To say nothing of the stunning visuals and a sense of complete immersion, remarkable even for VR, a disturbing number of the things that happen to me on real courses are uncannily reproduced in this frustrating, challenging, but achingly addictive game. Topping, slicing, shanking, numerous air-hits, followed by that manic, overbalanced clubbing which so often results in one being corkscrewed into the ground. Oh, and let's not forget sand-fly fever, contracted from spending so much time in bunkers. It's all here, your lack of skill, indolent posture and flaky swing, all writ large, validated in code and preserved for posterity in your scorecard hall of shame...

HOWEVER, in other news, what a game! What a bloody-minded, ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥, haughty, flirty, discourteous fish-wife of a game. Those of you with the same dogged persistence and catalogue of ruined Sunday afternoons behind you will know what I mean. The course is there to be beaten of course, it never dangles too far out of reach, it merely requires a better class of player than you will ever be. But, on the right day, with the right club and sufficiently garish flannels, with that crushed drive soaring, arrow-straight, climbing, climbing, climbing into the azure sky... You are familiar, dear aspirant golfer, with the same trouser-tickle of achievement, the same dopamine hit that rivals any amount of luck at the roulette wheel. And, with the same unfailing regularity, the next spin will be a dud and the house wins. But this time it was different and - who knows? - next time may be different too.

In other words, this is not a golfing simulacrum that permits one to attain, by a nurturing of benevolent algorithms and digital hand-holding, the handicap of your dreams. It *is* of course possible to choose the easy settings and take the shortcut to wish-fulfilment, but if you are one of those people who can do that and still look at yourself in the clubhouse mirror afterwards, by all means go for it. Be aware though that it will be implicitly understood by the rest of the golfing fraternity that you number among those few laughable, Quixotic golfing mountebanks who routinely drop zeros from their scorecards and kick Titleists from the undergrowth with nary a pang of conscience. Enjoy your victory, Pyrrhic as it may be...

For the rest of us, keep the faith and understand the nature of the word 'addiction' in its truest sense, as your correspondent, at this very moment, prepares to slather deep heat on a pulled shoulder and cinch a lumbar support to its tightest setting in order to play another round. Pain is relative, while handicap is absolute. But one thing I know, when stepping up to the tee, full of codeine and misplaced optimism, this time, it's gonna be different...