Text Golf Pro

Post date: 12-Jun-2016 19:39:26

Game by: textvoyage

Reviewed by: Simon Ferré

Golf. My experience of golf consists of hacking great big divots in the ground and occasionally hitting something Nick Faldo would have been proud of. I used to live close to the Belfry just north of Birmingham. There I went to watch some professionals playing, and unless you were in the right place at the right time, there really wasn't much to see. A text adventure based on this pastime makes more sense to me, considering I can touch type (although can one really touch type on a ZX Spectrum).

So, on to textvoyage's take on the great golfing experience. I'm even impressed with the loading screen that looks like it must have taken some time to create, and the usual problem of the ZX Spectrum overwriting part of the loading screen with the name of the next part being loaded (as can be seen in the second picture):

What's this? A text adventure with a graphical representation of each hole. Very impressive. I like the simplistic layout of each hole.

Once into the adventure proper, the game gives you a prompt where you can type your commands. The vocabulary is quite large, and I won't give anything away here (as is usually the case with a text adventure, it's up to you to discover what you can or cannot do).

The usual and familiar commands, LOOK, INVENTORY, SCORE, HELP and QUIT are provided and behave as you would expect, as well as the sort of things you would do while getting frustrated playing golf. I tried to select a club, tried to replace divots, tried to rake the sand in the bunker, tried to take the flag out of the hole and tried to nip for a toilet break between holes, but none of these commands were recognised. I suppose it is only possible to program a certain level of realism into such games.

I'm not a great golf player, so I'd be happier sitting at home playing this game than spoiling a good walk by interrupting it with numerous attempts to hit a small white ball into a small cup several paces away.

My scorecard was something that looked more like the scores in Strictly Come Dancing (remember that great! game from last years' competition). The real headache came from scoring an 11 on a par 3, but that wasn't the only bad hole. Still, that's my score for the round, and I hope you can do better.

Upon a not so close inspection, I feel that there are not many bugs (if at all) in the game. It's got just about the right level of simulation and excitement, with the varied elements of good and bad that occur. In my opinion, it's better than average, and not at all the type of game that should be in a crap game competition. Upon closer inspection, it would appear completely random with no skill elements at all. There's also a nice surprise if you BREAK in and LIST the program all the way to the end.

Score: Hole in One out of Fore!