Golf is one of the few sports that I actually enjoy in video games. I can’t stand watching real Golf, but something about playing Golf in games is just way too much fun. Cursed to Golf combines Roguelike procedural generation with Golf and adds a card mechanic to spice things up.

In Cursed to Golf, you play as a pro golfer, who gets struck by lightning right before winning the Eternal Cup Championship. Afterward, the golfer finds themselves cursed in Golf Purgatory, and must work their way through 18 holes of pure golfing madness so they can ascend back to the land of the living. The catch is that if you fail to meet par on any hole or fail to beat the boss golfers on their holes, you must start from the first hole all over again.

At the start of every hole, you have 5 total shots. However, scattered throughout the holes are shot idols that increase your number of shots. You can also use Ace cards, which can be collected between holes, at shots, or at certain intervals to increase shots or pull off a variety of crazy moves. You’ll need the ace cards and skillful use of each of your golf clubs (driver, wedge, and iron) to succeed.

Cursed to Golf is not easy. In fact, I’d say it is the hardest Golf game I’ve ever played. However, I can’t say that it isn’t enjoyable. I’m not even sure how the developers could tweak the difficulty. It isn’t unfair, it is just a tough challenge. If you like that sort of thing, Cursed to Golf might be for you.

The levels are unique and colorful, the various characters you encounter are fun and interesting, and there are a lot of unique mechanics and concepts that unfold as you play. Every golf hole is procedurally generated too, so you won’t have to play the same holes over and over. It also adds some fun variety, because the difficulty of the holes can fluctuate through the run, instead of just getting progressively more difficult.

The boss holes are a little annoying, since you can do everything right and still lose if you don’t stall the bosses using stun idols. However, they add a bit of variety and keep things from getting stale, since each boss has a unique mechanic. Overall I think Cursed to Golf is a great way to pass the time if you just wanna sit down with some mini-golf action.

Some may not find it relaxing, but I enjoy it quite a bit. The controls are easy to understand and the gameplay loop itself is fairly simple. While the holes themselves might be hard, I think any fan of Golf games could get into this.

A Nintendo Switch Review Copy of Cursed to Golf was provided by Thunderful Publishing for this review.

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Cursed to Golf

$19.99

9

Score

9.0/10

Pros

• Lots of Replay Value
• Endless Strategies with Ace Cards
• Fun Characters and Environments
• Interesting Premise
• Simple Controls

Cons

• Steep Difficulty Curve
• No Progression Systems or variable difficulty