There are only a handful of topics that songwriters can use to make a chart hit (and I bet you think one of them is about you); and it’s the same for games. There are only a handful of genres, and in each genre there are certain things you look out for and expect.
So Digital Chocolate’s recent release on the Ovi Store, Mini Golf Challenge 99 Holes, has the interesting approach of taking the puzzle genre where you have to move through some sort of maze to an exit, and added just a splash of computer Golf into the mix to make it feel a little bit different.
It’s not that different from countless other implementations, but what it does have is a bit of thought going into the gameplay, clear and cartoony graphics so you can see everything that’s going on, and a good variety of levels that mix up the required tactics and skills you will need to reach the end of level door… err the hole.
Some of you might just say this is more “Crazy Golf” than a puzzle game, and you’d be partly right, but I’d say the balance is about 60/40 in favour of labelling this as a puzzle rather than a sports game.
The goal is simple, and just as you’d expect – get the ball in the hole with as few strokes of the ball as possible. Standing in your way are all the traditional obstacles you’d expect, including slopes that speed up, slow down and alter the course of your golf ball; rivers to jump over with the help of those handy slopes; corners to bounce round using the (not very high) wall at the edge of the course; magnets, fans, club wielding Ogres that flatten your golf ball… you get the idea, it’s all the genre favourites.
Digital Chocolate are specialists in getting as much out of the java engine as possible in their games, and while they do a great job here, the isometric 3d nature of the game isn’t served up as smoothly as I would have expected or hoped. Scrolling around each hole is done by tapping the edge of the screens on my X6, it steps quite a few pixels at a time. It gets you round the map, but it’s not particularly pretty.
The controls available to you as the golfer are also relatively simple – by tapping around the centre of the screen you change the direction of your golf stroke (handily illustrated by a dotted line), and then holding down a big red button to set the strength of the golf stroke, you control the golf ball's movement around the course.
To be honest, it’s not as accurate as I’d like it to be. The turning is not hugely accurate and trying to stop the strength of the stroke where you need it to be is more miss than hit. To balance that, the level design has a little bit of leeway when constructing your shots, so the margin of error is generous - your shot does not need to be pixel perfect. While the physics of the ball movement seem accurate, the collision and hole detection also seem rather… generous.
With the aforementioned 99 holes spread over three difficulty levels, this is not a quick game to finish, and by the nature of each hole, it’s something you can easily dip into and out of, so it does have value for money, but it’s not as addictive as other puzzle games I’ve played.
I’m tempted to say that Mini Golf Challenge is slightly over-priced at £4 for what it offers; but you have to take into consideration the volume of free and 99p games that are available in the Ovi Store. £4 is still good value for a game that provides a big challenge, has great level design, and plays successfully with two genres that have always been popular on mobile devices.
-- Ewan Spence, Feb 2010.