What do you get when you combine 18 holes, three golf clubs, and a dead guy cursed to golf purgatory with the only one means of escape? Cursed to Golf, the latest game announced from Chuhai Labs.
You might remember Chuhai Labs from their love letter to 1080 Snowboarding. Carve Snowboarding released on the Oculus Quest earlier this year to rave reviews, but it being a VR game meant that it never quite received mainstream appeal. Chuhai’s next game, however, is aiming for two platforms with far greater penetration: the Nintendo Switch and Steam.
Cursed to Golf is a 2D puzzle platformer roguelike with pixel graphics and a "hole-some" story. The game has you play as a pro-golfer who meets an unfortunate end when they get struck by lightning on the last hole of the big golf tournament. Sent to golf purgatory, the only way to escape is to golf your way through 18 holes with the help of a few ghostly companions.
The crux of each dungeon-like hole is to hit the ball into the hole while avoiding all the various traps. There are the usual sand and water traps, but there are also vines, teleporters, TNT boxes, and spike traps that will just destroy your ball immediately. You've only got a limited number of shots to get from the start to the hole, and if you run out you'll be forced to redo the level.
Besides the aforementioned ghostly caddies helping you out, you'll also get several drive-and-putt-assisting abilities. Birdie-Eye lets you look ahead on the course to spot traps, while gold and silver idols will give you back shots towards your par. Ace Cards are the real strength to being an undead golfer as they'll let you perform powerful moves like rewind time, shoot more than one ball, or just have your ball make a U-turn and go where you want it to go.
Cursed to Golf will arrive on the Nintendo Switch and PC via Steam sometime in 2022.