REVIEW: ‘Cursed to Golf’ Is One Tough but Creative Roguelike (XSX)

Would you believe me if I told you that Cursed to Golf, a golf-based roguelike from developer Chuhai Labs and publisher Thunderful Games, is one of the hardest rogue-likes I’ve ever played? Because this unique low-res indie game is a doozy. When your character is struck by lightning on the final hole of a golf tournament, they’re instantly sent to Golf Purgatory. There, you meet The Scottsman, who introduces you to the ever-changing 18 holes you must clear to Ascend.

At its core, Cursed to Golf is pretty similar to most every arcade-style golf game you’ve ever played. You have three clubs to switch between, you button to press for power and distance, and away you go. But this isn’t a normal golf course. Your eternal soul is on the line here. And as such, you begin each hole with only 5 strokes. You must use your skill, smash stroke-giving idols, and use various power-ups and shortcuts to make it into the hole before you run out of hits. And believe me, it will not be easy. You must be very precise and, sometimes, pretty lucky to sink your ball on each hole.

The controls are generally pretty fair. While they don’t always feel perfectly calibrated, that’s a bit of the challenge of it too. The distance and power meters run on a sliding scale you stop by pressing a button on your controller. While you can cancel out of the power, you only get one chance to hit the distance you want. Most of my runs died to a miscalculated button press that sent my ball into a wall. On the one hand, because the meter is consistent, it feels like it should be on me to get better at my timing. But on the other hand, I did find it a bit uneven that I could cancel out some parts of my stroke and not others. It would have been even harder if you couldn’t cancel anything, but at the same time, it may have forced me to actually use the driving range to practice and be more patient.

The courses themselves are not all that varied. There are different zones within the golf course that give slight variations to the aesthetic and obstacles, but there are only a few kinds—your typical sand bunkers and rough alongside some fans, teleporters, and explosive TNT. I did see some courses more than once, but there are a pretty big variety of possible holes to traverse each round. Would it have been cool if these holes were somehow procedurally generated and less repetitive? Sure, but you’re not exactly likely to master any of these holes too quickly either, so it didn’t feel stale either. Just a bit blasé, perhaps.

What does spice things up are the cursed holes, where every few strokes, some kind of curse like only being able to swing going left, a bouncy ball, or a 60-second timer make your life much harder, temporarily. You don’t have to take these on. The path up the golf course often splits and lets you decide whether to take an easy route or a cursed route with a larger reward of coins, power-ups, or a shop to spend coins to buy power-ups with. It’s up to you to choose how badly you think you need those power-up cards. They can range from extra swings to mulligans to lead balls that don’t bounce and balls that split into three and let you pick which one to keep.

The other element that will keep you on your toes is the occasional boss holes. In these, you face off against a ghastly opponent in a head-to-head round. For every swing you take, they take one too, and it’s the first one to the hole who wins. You’ll have to use every skill you possess to get to the hole first, as well as smash special stun idols that prevent the opponent from taking a swing for just one turn. These are exceptionally hard because it’s not just about making it to the hole with swings remaining, you also have to get there first. And the other golfers typically have stronger and less fair swings than you. Fortunately, at least, they’re just as fallible as you and may wind up in the water along the way.

Visually, the game uses a retro 16-bit style effectively. It’s nothing groundbreaking or stand-out, but it’s got its charm with cute animations for your character. I particularly enjoy the ghostly spectators and your golf cart. The audio is similarly satisfying. The soundtrack is perfectly pleasant for hitting high-stakes golf balls to.

Cursed to Golf is a very creative and far more difficult than expected roguelike. It’s definitely going to scratch your golf game itch, given how truly few there are on current generations, as well as spice up the genre with its unique gameplay and concept.

Cursed to Golf is available now on Xbox, PlayStation, Nintendo Switch, and PC.