Pong and Beyond

453rd played so far

Genre: Sports
Platform: Game Boy Color
Year of Release: 1999
Developer: Camelot Software Planning
Publisher: Nintendo

In general, we like Mario games – they are done well, whether it’s an RPG, a platformer or a racing game. A branch that we haven’t really covered are his (semi-)sports games. We’ve also covered enjoyable golf games – at least in Golden Tee Live.

The combination then, while not entirely natural, seem like they should work together. Well enough to end up on this list at least. We shall see.

Our Thoughts

This did not work. Unlike Golden Tee‘s trackball, cursors and swinging bars to have different rules for each implementation just don’t work well. It doesn’t feel like real golf and it doesn’t feel like it’s more than a puzzle reflexes game that has no bearing on anything.

With that said, if the game was just like any other golf game, we could judge it as such and accept the limitations of the genre. The other part of the title, however, adds to the aggravation. In a game in the Mario franchise, one named after the main star, you’d expect him to show up. You’d expect to play as him, or otherwise at least have him show up in a major part. What shows, however, is that this was an existing title with the Mario license inserted. He’s talked about as one of the best golfers (the end boss of sorts) and would show up as that in some capacity, but for the most part he just isn’t there.

Graphically it looks pretty standard, nothing special. It’s all pretty bland really – as the entire game, unfortunately.

Final Thoughts

This game, despite what everything should suggest, is just pretty bland and uninteresting. As a Mario title, it should at least look better and feel more interesting, even if the basic gameplay stays the same. Such a waste.