RPGolf Legends [Xbox]
Developed by ArticNet, RPGolf Legends is a hybrid RPG-Golf game, in case the title didn’t give that away already. An evil power has cordoned off all of the holes in every golf course in the world, putting a halt to everyones’ beloved sport. You’ll take on the role of a young girl who absolutely loves golf, so this is a pretty devastating turn of events for her - leading her to head out on an adventure to restore all of the golf courses and banish the evil.
There are different modes available for both battling and golf; Assisted Mode and Normal Mode, with these being able to be selected independently, as well as being able to be changed at any time. Assisted will give you visual cues for fights and quest items, as well as when making a shot during golf. It also allows for a starting coin bonus when chosen for battles, and easier golf challenges and hole unlocks for golf. The ‘Normal Mode’ option for both sides is the ‘intended’ mode from the developers, but with the modes being able to be switched out at any time - this allows you to not have to worry about tying yourself in to anything.
As well as the Golf mechanics, you’ve got battling, which has you attacking with A - and holding A for a special attack - as well as blocking with the RB, however this is as complex as the battling gets. The fighting feels a little strange, as it often has you just running around in circles on screen, trying to keep some distance from enemies whilst getting the odd hit in. These battles will increase your meter to unlock and progress onto the next holes, which you’ll often find to be a tad grindy due to the unlock mechanic taking the form of a slot-machine styled spin once a hole is complete, in order to level up the bar (or replenish your health and mana), and this often leads you to having to replay the same hole countless times and hunting down every enemy you can find. There are different classes to play as once you’ve unlocked them, gaining you not only a new appearance, but new skills and special items too, that affect you for both golfing and battling - and this encourages you to try out each of the options available.
As well as the main two aspects of battling and golf, there’s other stuff to keep you busy; there’s fishing, which can be done anywhere there’s water, and there’s also fishing tournaments for you to compete in. Crafting requires blueprints, and this allows you to make golf balls in a variety of colours, as well as new clubs and much, much more from the crafting tables that you’ll come across. You’ve got a compass that will point you in the right direction of your next task, and you’ll gain a boat that you can use to travel across the water to other islands, including a quirky little arcade called Gaming Bois that is filled with pinball machines and arcade cabinets (sadly, none of which you can use since you ‘only like golf games’), as well as a couple of vending machines.
The world has a very cute, pixel style, with different areas having varied appearances from forests and deserts to tundras and more. There are tonnes of NPCs to speak to and gain side-quests from, ranging from simple tasks such as playing a game of Rock, Paper, Scissors, to lending them money to get their businesses up and running again. Thankfully you’ve got a Quest Journal to keep track of all of this, as it would be pretty easy to forget what you’re doing without it. There’s a little dude standing outside the Golf Apparel shop who can tell you anything you could possibly wish to know about golf, which was quite funny - as you will find him outside this shop no matter which island you’re on. The soundtrack has a decent selection of tunes, and these can be switched out from the radios you’ll find around the world, giving you the ability to listen to certain tracks if you have a preference. You’ve also got access to a fun little 8-bit golf mini-game via an arcade machine in your house, and whilst it’ll cost a coin to use - it’s fun, and challenging too!
Overall, we found RPGolf Legends to be a decent little golf game, but it sadly felt like something was missing, that we just can’t quite put our fingers on. For the most part we really enjoyed it, but the near-endless loop of replaying holes in order to progress did become tiresome. Priced at £26.99 on Xbox, it was a little more expensive than I’d have anticipated, so I’d recommend you pick this up during a sale, as it does offer plenty of content and we still had a great time with it.
In the end, we decided to give RPGolf Legends the Collecting Asylum rating of 7.5/10.
Are you interested in RPGolf Legends? What do you think of it?
Let us know in the comments below!
- V x
Thank you to KEMCO for the RPGolf Legends Xbox review code!
