By: Nintendo

"Ex, Ex, Ex, Ex, Ex, Ex, Ex, Ex, Ex, Ex, Ex, Ex, Ex, Ex, Excellent!"

For those of you who don't know what that means, congratulations! Your life is much better off than mine. You see, if you say it fast enough, it sounds like you're saying "sex."

Back in the day, I used to play tons of Mario Golf on the N64 and shockingly enough, I actually got the posse together to play a few rounds. I don't think any of them typically play golf videogames, which might explain why every game degenerated into everyone using their character's taunt button ad nauseum. Luigi's "Excellent" not only enthralled us, but captured our hearts as well.

Cue 2003, as Nintendo revamps Mario Golf for the GameCube with Mario Golf: Toadstool Tour. For those who are familiar with the original, you'll feel right at home. The game still holds true to the tried-and-tested golf controls where a gauge is used to initially set the power of the shot and then returns to the starting position to set the accuracy. However, beginners who are not able to grasp this concept can bypass the accuracy part and let the computer randomly determine it. It should be noted that if you let the computer determine the accuracy, it more or less always guarantees a pretty decent shot. It's not much, but it helps for those who are just starting and a great addition for multiplayer games pitting experts against novices.

Graphically... you know, who cares!? It's a golf game for Christ's sake (and one with Mario and his lackeys to boot)! It's fine and meets the high, childish standards we've come to expect from such Nintendo titles. The sound though, that's a whole different story. To coin a phrase by noted philanthropist Chris Rock, "Turn that shit off!" Back in the day, I was able to look past this in my Mario games, but I just can't handle it anymore!! Fortunately, you can eliminate all music from the game, leaving you with sounds of the wind blowing and birds chirping.

The game itself is very good, even though I had some reservations to begin with. The first time I played, I decided that I wasn't going to practice and went straight into a tournament. At first, you only have one course unlocked, with the other five becoming available by winning tournaments. After a few holes, I had already re-familiarized myself with the layout and controls, and my final score for the tournament was a respectable 7-under par, with second place coming in at something like five-OVER par. I thought that maybe this was done on purpose, with the learning curve developing over the next five tourneys, but I was wrong. In one evening, I won every tournament (except for the last one) and unlocked all the courses. The final course, Bowser's, is the only one which is actually challenging, but that still doesn't make up for the fact that the rest of the field sucks rocks, making it virtually impossible to lose.

That's not to say that the rest of the game isn't challenging or fun. Taken directly from the original, whenever you get a birdie for the first time on a hole, you earn a Birdie Badge. Collect enough and you can unlock one of four hidden characters. Challenging characters to one-on-one games are a blast and do get progressively harder, with the payoff coming in the form of improved stats for the player that you defeat (kinda odd that a player becomes better when you beat them). There are other modes as well, such as speed golf, skins games, slot machine golf (where prior to each hole, you pull the lever of a slot machine and can only use the three clubs shown, plus a putter) and ring golf (where rings are placed on the course and in order to complete the hole, you must send the ball through the rings and finish with a score no higher than par). New features include coin golf, an utterly pointless game where coins are scattered throughout the course and you have to send your ball to collect them. The mini-challenges are pretty fun and a great way to practice the finer points of the game, such as approach shots and putting. In all, you'll be playing for quite some time before you can unlock everything. It's just a shame that they didn't make the tournaments a little more challenging.

And for those of you who are wondering, yes, Nintendo brought back the taunts that made the game exponentially fun the first go-around. Every character has eight taunts, and most are excellent. Take Luigi for example, who gives us these classic lines (please note that I've tried to preserve the integrity of his thick Italian-American plumber accent):

"This-a very tense-a moment"
"You look ridiculous!"
"You unbelievalible!" (misspelled on purpose)

Wario also comes up big with the following gems:

"If you win, I hate you!"
"Who do you think you are, buster!?" (Buster? What the...?)
"Need a lesson, loser!"

Plus, all those unintentional sexual grunts and moans are back with a vengeance. I can only imagine the new perverse and twisted antics we could pull off this time around.

In the end, you're probably better off going for Tiger Woods Golf, but this game is still very good and a great rental or purchase if it's cheap.

JBo
Ten