olf has always played a pretty big part in the world of video games. Whether it’s played at home, in the arcades with a trackball or even the virtual golf sims, digital golf is everywhere. For an activity that many people claim to dislike or call the most boring sport around, there sure seems to be a huge market out there. Sony has built a pretty good history for themselves with their Hot Shots Golf series. We sat down with the latest title, Hot Shots Golf: Open Tee 2 on the PSP and played some rounds to see what Sony has been cooking up.
Since the first game debuted on the original PlayStation, there have been seven Hot Shots Golf games now spanning every Sony console to date. The name quickly became synonymous with video-game golf. The wacky characters and over-the-top graphics never took away from what has pretty much been a consistently great golf game. Building on what they created for the first Open Tee early in the PSP’s lifespan, developer Clap Hanz has nearly doubled the amount of content with Open Tee 2. The course total is now 12 with the six new courses added to the previous games course roster. The number of playable characters has also doubled and now tops out at 24. There are five different caddies that all have their own voices and looks. The biggest number is the game is 300. That’s the amount of unlockable items that span the single player mode—everything from clubs, clothes, accessories, hats, shoes, hairstyles and more.
In single player, there are four modes to choose from—Challenge, Stroke, Mini-Game and the self-explanatory Training. Stroke Mode allows you to just play a round of golf. Mini-Game is a hole-in-one game that has the play attempt to get the coveted one shot back to back. It’s made much easier to pull off by having three different holes with different point values of 10, 20 and 30. Each hole is sunk into a wide pit that is pretty easy to hit, and the ball will just drain down for the points. Missing a hole will result in a loss of 10 points from your total score. It’s an enjoyable little mini-game, but it’s pretty disappointing that it’s the only one coming with the game.
The real meat of the game is in the Challenge mode. This is where the career portion of the game is played. There are three main types of matches in Challenge mode—Head Card, Body Card and Accessory Card. Playing matches in each are will unlock items relating to the card. After 10 items are unlocked, it will level up a certain skill area—head being control, body being power and accessory being power. At first, there are only two characters to choose from but as you play through, one-on-one VS matches will become available. If you beat the CPU character, they will become available to play as, too. There is a little choice involved with changing characters, however, because as a player completes rounds of golf, they will gain loyalty like an experience system. As they go up levels, more outfits, power levels and more will be unlocked. Once a player finishes a set number of challenges, their overall skill level will upgrade, the first being novice to amateur. Doing this will also unlock a variety of new golf courses to play on. The game’s courses range from the standard cost-line golf course to the more over-the-top one that have pagodas or other obstacles scattered around.
The gameplay of Open Tee 2 is as familiar and solid as ever. The classic three-click system returns for precise swing-power management. If a player needs a bit of extra power, hitting the square button before starting a swing will put the character into power mode and they will gain 10 to 20 extra yards in a single swing. The amount of times this can be used varies with each characters power level. Putting also feels and looks familiar to anyone show has played a golf game in the past few years. A grid with moving highway lines and color coding alerts the player how the terrain is shaped and which way the ball is going to naturally travel.
We also took the multiplayer out for a few rounds via the PSP’s ad-hoc system. Up to eight players can choose from a full round of nine or 18 holes or a quicker game with less holes. Players can also partake in 16-player golf tournaments via wi-fi with global support. The great multiplayer support is another reason we wish Clap Hanz could have included a few more mini-game options to help mix things up.
On the presentation side of things, Open Tee 2 is pretty pleasing. The colorful graphics really pop out on the PSP’s bright screen. The environments are full of ambient sounds like birds and waterfalls (and a couple of strange unrecognizable ones). The best part of the package is the loading times. On a system that’s been notorious for long loading times, Open Tees 2 has little to none in the version we played. If you’re a power player, moving from hole to hole in a hurry is very easy.
Like the previous titles before it, Clap Hanz has put a solid effort into Hot Shots Golf: Open Tee 2. Even if the core game hasn’t really changed over the years, there’s still a really addictive quality to the game. Fans of the series have every reason to look in to this title, and it would make a great portable companion to the recently released Hot Shots Golf: Out of Bounds on the PlayStation 3. Open Tee 2 is hitting the PSP this June and carries an ESRB rating of E.