Cursed to Golf review

Deck management is just as important as a powerful drive in Cursed to Golf. The creativity and pixel art are pleasing but the execution spends a bit too much time in the rough.

From a breeze that can influence the trajectory of a drive to the vigilant reading of a green, golf is about the little details. Video game franchises that deliver quirky recreations of the sport, such as Hot Shots Golf and Mario Golf, habitually include many of these minutiae. But Kyoto-based Chuhai Labs offers a bold departure with the release of Cursed to Golf on PlayStation 4, Xbox One, PC, and Switch.

With the injection of massive courses, random power-up cards, and offbeat contraptions on each hole, Cursed forces players to contend with rogue-like unpredictability. The result is a game that’s less about mastering the fundamentals of the sport and more about managing your way through each hole. If you’re seeking a deviation that still plays a decent game of golf, you’ll want to look elsewhere (like RPGolf). The game’s stroke mechanic is tragically uninteresting.

No Bogeys in the Afterlife

Games that draw inspiration from sports seldom offer much context, so it’s pleasing to discover even a succinct set-up. Cursed to Golf’s plot centers around an unfortunate athlete stuck by lightning as he’s about to sink the winning shot at an international tournament. Finding himself in golf purgatory, a character named The Scotsman hints that your escape might be possible by beating par on an otherworldly course. The implied joke is that the administrators of the between-world have set you up for failure. As such, tough boss battles and the disheartening forfeiture of cards are all part of the ordeal.

Much like Stickman Golf, Cursed to Golf uses a 2D perspective. The approach eschews some of the nuances of the game. On the upside, you won’t have to worry about wind and your magical club simplifies some of the decision-making. But there’s also no way to curve the ball around obstacles, spurring you to use a card from your deck when you encounter hazards like towers of TNT blocks.

Your single piece of equipment transforms into three clubs: a driver, iron, and wedge. Each has a distinctive flight path, with drivers striking the ball the furthest, while your wedge offers height and the only way to get out of sand traps. But since many of Cursed to Golf courses are meandering caverns, not clipping the ceiling is a persistent concern.

Facing the Ol’ Par Twelve

Cursed uses a traditional ‘click to swing’ meter, but precise timing is deemphasized. After your club selection and tapping to set the power level, you’ll see a shifting projected trajectory displayed. Once you lock in your swing, the ball traces the on-screen path. The only ambiguity is determining how far your golf ball will roll.

But mercifully, you can backtrack before the ball is hit, readjusting your swing to tweak where it will land. Unfortunately, you have a limited view of your projected path. Although you can survey the entire hole before swinging, once you’re in motion, you have a restrained perspective on things.

Holes are par five and putting the ball in the cup with five strokes is a near-impossibility. As such, you might want to aim for the silver and gold statues that provide two or four additional swings, respectively. But some of these can be red herrings, requiring two shots to get two shots back. You’ll also make amble use of your deck, which grants abilities like a mulligan (nullifying a bad shot), a free shot, or abilities that will do things like blow-up TNT, or drop the ball in midflight before it hits a body of water.  Play your cards right and you’ll open shortcuts or send the ball through a teleporter. But again, there’s some trickery here. Some of the teleportation devices can move your ball further from the hole.

Conclusion 

But since this is Cursed to Golf, torment is statutory. Sometimes fans will blow your ball directly into the rough. Other times, random conditions emerge, forcing you to play with one club, not look around the course, or even play the hole upside down. These kinds of disadvantages are great for multiplayer games. But in an exclusively single-player game like Cursed, they just feel punitive. Sure, their purpose is to interfere with your plan and make you think improvisationally. But without any reverse-curses, the game can truly feel like purgatory. And it doesn’t help that playing on a succession of thematically similar 14-stoke holes can feel like penance.

Between holes, there’s a branching course map with some risk/reward scenarios. You can earn a bit of extra currency by taking routes with money icons, but you’ll likely face a tougher challenge immediately after. There are also stores to spend your winnings and bonuses on booster card packs. And yes, you’ll lose some of your possessions if you run out of strokes on a hole. The good news is that you can store cards in protected binders. The bad news is that Cursed to Golf feels like 3-card deal Klondike. You’ll lose more often than you win. That’s probably what purgatory might feel like.

Cursed to Golf was played on PC with
review code provided by the publisher.