Going clubbing
(This
review is spoiler-free!)
While I can’t say I enjoy real-life
sports by any means, I’m not one to turn down a more arcade-style sports game.
When I was a kid I dabbled in Mario Golf,
Tennis, Baseball, Strikers, Hoops 3-on-3, and basically any others that had
the red plumber’s name on them. Nowadays those games are basically extinct
aside from being in minigame collections on the 3DS or the increasingly tired Mario and Sonic at the Olympics series,
but they hold a special place in my heart.
Enter Everybody’s Golf. While it definitely takes a more realistic
approach to golf than Mario did back in the day (no fireball shots here, I’m
afraid), it’s just as much fun as the old classics and brought me back to when
I was a kid playing Toadstool Tour.
Despite this, it has a few UI problems that make the game a little trickier to
play than it needs to be, especially as someone who can barely play mini-putt
without sending my ball into a river.
Easily the most fun I had with the
game came before it even truly began. Everybody’s
Golf boasts an extensive and varied character creation system, where you
can create the golfer of your wildest dreams to play as. Using this, I set out
to create a golfer so incredible that he’d put Tiger Woods to shame. Here he is
in all his glory:
I think he’s a cucumber, but I’m not
100% sure.
Equipped with the greatest specimen
the sport has ever seen, I set out to conquer the course and become the greatest
golfer known to man. The only problem is that I'm terrible at golf.
Overall the mechanics in the game are
pretty solid. If you’ve played Mario Golf
you know what to expect here: you’ve got a sliding meter used to power your
shot. If you hit it in just the right area, you’ll shoot the ball perfectly. If
not, you’ll need to go again. Keep swinging until you cross the fairway to the
green, and then try to get the ball in the hole. Simple and easy.
The hole design is well done, being
neither too hard nor too simple. I would’ve liked a few more creative holes,
such as some of the small ones that you can get a hole-in-one on. There aren’t
any egregiously bad examples, but I would’ve liked a bit more twists.
Things start to get a little messy
when putting is brought in, though. Maybe it’s just my golfing ability, but I
found it really hard to see precisely where I was aiming the ball. Oftentimes I
would think I had a straight shot to the hole, only for the ball to veer way
off to the side. You can adjust the camera up and down a bit, but that doesn’t
give you any better idea where the ball’s gonna go. I think a reticle showing
the precise direction you’re aiming would’ve helped a lot more, because I would
often wind up with a double bogey while putting after a near-perfect run on the
fairway.
If you’re a fan of golfing, Everybody’s Golf is the best modern
virtual take on the sport I’ve seen since Mario
Golf: Toadstool Tour on the GameCube. The character creation is hilarious
and a ton of fun, the overall charming and positive atmosphere is delightful,
and the golfing is well balanced and stellar. I would’ve liked to see a better
UI system for shooting the ball though, as especially when putting I had a
tough time seeing precisely where I was going. Despite this, I think this is a
game I can definitely recommend giving a look.
FINAL SCORE
7/10
Good
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