Everybody's Golf

[Joe Molotov]

[Bebpo]

Just like real golf

I know, this is why it makes me want to play real golf! 

You ever go just whack some balls at the driving range? You don't have to have any skill and it's really satisfying.

Yeah, been a few times. It's fun. 9 holes though is just a whole different ballgame. But yeah, might try taking some lessons. I have one old friend that I never really talk to much whose a big golfer, but otherwise none of my friends golf. If they did, I'm sure I'd be more into it.

[Mr. Nobody]

Reached Rank 7 2 weeks ago and I'm a bit spent on this so I went back to Hot Shots Fore.

Reeeeally wished this had training mode like the old games

[BobFromPikeCreek]

This game has like a top 5 character creator. When I started I just made a hideous man wearing lady clothes, but last night I sat down and tried to make myself, and it's a striking fucking resemblance. Thing's really damn flexible.

[BobFromPikeCreek]

The pay to win hubbub was massively overblown with this game. Had enough gems to almost max out the custom clubs once I unlocked them, and have over 40 warp tokens just laying around.

[Bebpo]

Beat rank 5 and DIDN'T UNLOCK THE FINAL COURSE

fuck this bullshit I'm out 

Like the amount of grind and stress for me to get through rank 5 as an average MnG player (typically birdies mixed with some par and some eagles; usually around -6 to -9 but hit shots that totally fuck up everything and make me quit and reset about 5-10% of the time) was A LOT, but during all that I was like I've never made it far enough to unlock the final course in any MnG game, my goal is to try to beat rank 5 and do it here, play the final course and few times and then shelve it and be done.

The 2nd vs character in rank 5, the gal that's a score match on vortex valley was super fucking hard and you couldn't cheese it like match plays where you can just keep resetting until you win on the first 3 holes. Kept getting bad wind and a bad shot that ruined everything a few holes in. On my 4th or 5th attempt an hour later I was pretty much on the verge of bailing on the game but had a real lucky run and got like a bunch of eagles and ended up with -8 when she had +0. 3rd versus guy wasn't bad other than the tiny holes but got lucky and kept getting chip ins on the first 3 courses for 3 wins in a row.

What's surprising to me is that having been playing all the rank course matches on serious mode, the VS characters feel tuned at that level. So it's been a challenge for most of them. But what about the normal player whose not playing on serious mode and is winning 1st place with like -1/+0 scores? How the fuck are they supposed to be progressing since the Vs. characters don't have 2 difficulty levels?

Anyhow, rank 5 was intense, I'm glad I cleared it. Felt satisfying. But I looked and the first Vs. character in rank 6 needs 3100xp grind which even in serious mode (and rank 6 serious mode might be kinda tough for me to get 1st) at is still like four 9 hole runs -> vs character x 3. And who knows how hard the rank 6 vs characters are gonna be.

Git gud and all that, but just pretty ticked off that I thought I'd finally see the last course in a MnG for the first time, since every rank unlocks a new course, but then they pull this bullshit and make you grind 2 ranks to get the final course goddamnit fuck

[AdmiralViscen]

I feel like that's where I wind up in all these games.

[paprikastaude]

This game worth anything in singleplayer? I'm not getting PS+ before MH World.

[Bebpo]

This game worth anything in singleplayer? I'm not getting PS+ before MH World.

I only play Single Player and luckily there's no forced MP or MP shenanigans. It still plays like a good fun single player HSG game with each tournament being a random variation of course/weather/wind/special conditions. There is a annoyingly long grind to unlock the 2nd course and 5th final course, but the pacing in the middle is pretty normal. The Vs character matches feel like the Vs character matches in the older games.

I don't think it's the best game in the series or anything SP-wise, but it's a solid fun entry with the grind being the only major negative. There's also a weird club auto-leveling system, but it's just a bit weird and not a big deal.

[Bebpo]

So I got over being mad and started rank 6 and I think I'm too hard on myself about my golfing skills. Got to the 2nd Vs character and pretty much demolished every tournament so far in rank 6. Even advanced from golf lvl.10->14 in the process. Been consistently getting like -6/-7 on 9h and -11/-12 on 18h on all 4 of the available courses while the CPUs are getting like -2/-3. I like how the tournaments use all 4 courses because it's neat going back to old courses and seeing how much better you are (and not talking about the extra distance from stronger clubs, but like landing shots where you want them to go, especially on the green).

Even got my first hole where the ball hit the flag and then did a homing shot in.

Been using the big air set the whole game fwiw, max distance is about 312y right now at lvl.25.

Depending on how tough rank 7 is, might actually try to beat it and finish the SP campaign.

[Bebpo]

So beat Rank 6 earlier, at first was worried about the final Vs guy because rough/bunker is +1 but it actually worked to my advantage since the cpu would hit in the rough at least once a course and put them +1 behind me. One thing I learned in all my HSG playing is that instead of just going the full distance every shot, sometimes it makes more sense to play safer and use the 2nd strongest shot if it's not going to cost you an extra shot later for the lost distance.

Then the ending yay. I guess it makes sense since Rank 7 is post-game and infinite with no "clear"
Did the 5th course a couple of times. Some pretty tough bits with all the hills and bunkers. Didn't do too bad, got under par each time but still tough.

So now that SP is sorta done, I went back to the MP and
Did the 5th course 9H for the day and ranked 78th out of 85 ;_;
...but on hole 3 I got 2nd best shot of the day so I got the little statue of my custom character next to the hole. That was cool. I took screenshots.

Then did the daily 9H and on Kona Beach and placed 2800/3500 ><
Yeah, since there's zero chance of me ever being competitive online, and SP has no more xp and you can't beat Rank 7, probably just gonna do the MP daily selected 9H here and there.

One thing that's nice about MP is it's the only place with instant restarts. I wish you could do that in SP. I probably spent like 10% of my HSG gaming time watching the loading screen. There's definitely too much loading in the game. On the other hand even though MP is quick with instant restarts, since you can't skip animations in MP like you can in SP, courses take like 20-30% longer in MP to run which is a bit sucky. Oh well.

Overall I definitely got my money's worth. In fact I super regret buying the game on disc because it's the kinda game I'd like to turn on and play a round here and there over the next years. When it's on sale I'll probably double dip and buy the digital at some point.

I'm also pretty surprised a few months in now and a patches in that they still haven't fixed some obvious stuff:

-Still no way to filter leaderboard by friends
-When your in an online course, is there no way to go directly to the course selection and jump to another without having to LOADING go back to the main home LOADING select a new one?

[Akala]

I got really mad one afternoon and haven't really played since!

[BobFromPikeCreek]

The Rank 7 Vs dudes are bruuuuuuuutal and mostly unfair. The second you get one round ahead the AI rubberbands HARD and it's holes in one and chip in Eagles from half course.

[Bebpo]

I got really mad one afternoon and haven't really played since!

I think everyone who plays this can relate.

I mean let's talk for a second about some of the super fucking ultra bullshit in this game: Like forget the shots where the wind/some tree/elevation/etc... something goes wrong and your ball lands in the wrong spot and flies down a hill into a lake or something. What's really bullshit is how sometimes you miss the exact timing and get a mild bunny shot and a mild bunny shot makes the ball fly up and suddenly curve 90 degrees and go off the course O.B. because you slightly miss a shot that had plenty of mistake room on either side where it should have gone if it had just been off by a dozen feet either direction.

But then sometimes you hit bunny or turtle and it barely moves off course. The randomness is the worst, especially when like 8 holes in and up -3 or -5 and then a single slightly off bunny shot gets you a triple bogey and fucks up the entire run. 

The Rank 7 Vs dudes are bruuuuuuuutal and mostly unfair. The second you get one round ahead the AI rubberbands HARD and it's holes in one and chip in Eagles from half course.

This too.

[Akala]

Yes, and the one truly awful shot never comes on like...hole 2. It's always way in there. It's unfair and it wastes all your time.

I am sure I'll come back to it because hey hot shots, but way too much to play right now to slog through anything.

[paprikastaude]

I think after two days I'm already done with the game. I guess it's good enough at golf gameplay, but I started to realize that from the very beginning on they already make you replay the same courses way too often. And the courses aren't terribly exciting either, it's hard not to get birdies on a constant basis. Also the audiovisuals in this title aren't what I call pleasing.

[thisismyusername]

I think after two days I'm already done with the game. I guess it's good enough at golf gameplay, but I started to realize that from the very beginning on they already make you replay the same courses way too often. And the courses aren't terribly exciting either, it's hard not to get birdies on a constant basis. Also the audiovisuals in this title aren't what I call pleasing.

That's Mina No Golf in general. I love the series, but the grind is real.