This week features a double-header. I’ve played more than enough of Bandai Golf: Pebble Beach Challenge and Jack Nicklaus’ 18 Greatest Holes of Golf and now it’s time to tell you all about them.
Bandai Golf is a faithful recreation of the popular Pebble Beach course. A common site for major championships, this course is full of history and is embedded in the minds of golf enthusiasts. While the course is decent enough, showing elevation changes on a seperate line, the aiming is a serious problem. One hole forces you to choose between a sand trap and a water hazard.
This game uses the same three-click method, but you can’t overswing. It’s strange. Clicking after the max power is reached results in the golfer whiffing, but the swing won’t register on the score. Odd. Once clicking, a boring charcter appears overlain on the course. This is a fast paced game, but it’s also incredibly boring. The inability to aim really destroys the replay value, as most times there’s only one viable shot on each course. Best score: +16.
On the other side, there’s Jack Nicklaus’ 18 Greatest Holes of Golf. Guess what? Many are from Pebble Beach, and they play WAY better than Bandai Golf. Ha. Unfortunately, this game seems to be ported from an Apple IIGS, and includes load times between each shot to create an unfaithfully ugly rendition of each hole. Beyond the graphics, though, this game has some merit. The holes are generally fun, and the swing meter doesn’t move at a ridiculous pace. You get to name your character (mine’s always Punchy), but because of loading, this game takes a long time to play through. It has a generous sweet spot, and it has the distance of each club listed.
Putting can be difficult, as the break is generally an amalgamation of the path of the shot. If it says it’ll break right, that means on average, there’s more of a break to the right. Now, I’ve had the unfortunate opportunity to play on a course one week after a professional event. Let me tell you, these greens are insane. The camera can’t convey the diffuculty. While this game didn’t resort to the awful arrow-painted-on-the-green system, putts tend to go where they want to. On the other hand, this is the only game so far that has a decent short game. Chips are easy to control. It’s too bad the putting can ruin this so easily. It can be fun, but it takes a long time to play through. Best Score: +9.
-mlbradley
durden26@comcast.net