There is a game that is so exclusive you can't even buy it in a shop. So mysterious that it's maker doesn't even have it listed on their own website. So rare that there is only half a picture of it on the whole of the internet. So limited in it's edition that you can't play it on any home console or computer. I have played this game - I have found the holy grail.

The game is Vijay Singh 3D - a golf game for a mobile phone. Phwoar! I mean... fore!

Golf is sexy, okay!

Let's face it - golf is a pretty mind numbing sport. Stand in the cold, hit a ball with a stick, walk for miles, hit the ball with a different stick, maybe get a ride in an electric buggy, have some idiot shout "Go on!" when you're about to try to hit a ball to win some money. Only after a day of all this hassle do you even have the chance of a beer. Doesn't sound like much fun to me!

That's the beauty of games machines, you see. They let you side step all this nonsense and strip golf back to it's rawest elements - it's all about reactions and judgement. Playing video game golf, all you have to do is press a button a few times and maybe judge an angle or two. Sorted. Of course, video games extend the simple interface to create an engaging experience. Back in 1987, issue 89 of Compute! magazine stated that "A simulation of this type needs to possess three key ingredients if it expects to gain recognition in the competitive field of sports simulations: It must be challenging, yet fair; it must faithfully simulate the sport; and it must be aesthetically pleasing." Who am I to argue? My favourite golf games have dressed up the basic mechanics of the game in a number of varied ways.

It all really started for me with Leaderboard Golf, it's slowly rendered representation of a golf course was cutting edge at the time. It felt as much like real golf as anything at that time, and it's triple-click power and snap control mechanic became a blueprint that has been and continues to be used by golf games even today. Sure, it was essentially two dimensional in terms of it's physics, but at least it's balls were in the right place. After that it was all a bit rough. Sure, Leaderboard morphed into Links and set it's sights on bigger things and Accolade released numerous versions of Jack Nicklaus, but it was all more of the same. Five or six years went by and then I read in ST Format about an upcoming golf game from simulation experts Microprose. Lee Hodgson had written a golf game for Microprose and it offered something new. This was a golf game whose convincing courses were constructed in three dimensions - with hills and valleys, uneven bunkers, trees of more than one size and obstacles that weren't rendered as simple sprites. It allowed control of everything from jersey colour and club selection, through to tee height and action replays from a number of camera angles. This was real golf. My dad, brother and I played this game so much we managed to get our character profiles down to scratch. I can still picture all the courses now: Fenham Valley, Ballybrook, Fairdale Park, Buckland Heath, Mountsummer Point and St Augustine - amazing stuff. Some time ago I emailed Lee and he told me that the DOS version had been recompiled under Windows 95 and released for free to support the Prize Golf website, which offered weekly cash prizes to the best players. The dot com boom put an end to that, but I still like to think I might now be driving round in a fancy car had I known about it at the time.

Nice bit of wood action.

Since then there have been tonnes of other golf games but the quality is variable, to say the least. The great Mario Golf is firmly focused on the arcade side of things - it plays a fantastic game of golf coupled with character progression, numerous courses, side games and tutorials - and (thankfully?) Mario's hardly in it. Everybody's Golf carries that same balance over into three dimensions, some eight years after Microprose did it. At the other end of the spectrum, there's Links which goes all out to provide as accurate a simulation as possible, making the game realistically dull in the process. Tiger Woods is a strange beast, offering a somewhat innovative analogue swing control method but pitches it's mix of gameplay on uneasy ground somewhere between sim and arcade. One moment it's as sim as Links the next your ball leaves a trail of fire behind it - make your minds up you muppets! The only shift in how things are really done comes with Golf? from Chronic Logic which transports the sport into a world of drunken robots, animated grass and persistent trajectory lines making real life look dull for a change.

So, where does that Vijay Singh 3D fit in to all this? In short, it's all that is or ever has been great about golf games distilled into one beautiful 375kb java archive. It's obviously been a love of labour, as it plays like a dream. It comes with numerous modes, from a tutorial to get you used to the controls (typically four direction buttons and an action button, but you can be clever and press some more if you fancy) to quick play and career modes. You can win (virtual) money and spend it upgrading your character attributes in a number of ways. There are numerous trophies to be won as well as players and courses to be unlocked. The game looks lush and plays beautifully. Absolutely nothing feels out of place and the controls and screen display are pitched perfectly at the essentials you need to know and the easiest method of playing the game. You have to pit your wits against the lay of the land, the wind and of course the pressure of competition. Sound effects are sparse but good - atmospheric effects play during opportune moments whilst ball and crowd sounds play more regularly. The only music that you'll hear is on the title and menu screens and, very occasionally, in game when you achieve something special.

The game adds some great new touches of it's own: putting is made very pleasant with the inclusion of a grid that maps the contours of the green. Nothing much new there save for the inclusion of small particles that flow along the grid showing the the direction and severity of any slope. Also (and this is the bit that really made me smile) at certain points - more often than not when you've landed yourself in a bit of a pickle - the game goes into TV mode. This puts you in certain money making scenarios such as "our sponsors will give you $25,000 if you chip the ball in from this bunker" which, coupled with a vibration heart beat effect, really gets you on the edge of your seat. The vibration effect is also used sometimes when putting to make you that little bit more anxious as to whether or not you've got your angles right. Great stuff. I'm hoping there'll be downloadable courses when the time comes, too.

I know we've used this image 9 times now, but see
- the trophy looks a lot like a cock AND SHE'S
KISSING IT. DON'T YOU SEE? KISSING SOMETHING
A BIT LIKE A COCK. IN PUBLIC. COCK?

The trouble is, you can’t buy it and you may never get the chance. Pity poor Vijay, he sold his soul to the videogame licensing gods and yet remains doomed to remain in game development purgatory. Unless gameloft come to their senses and do a proper rollout of of this work of art.

Here's hoping they make the fairway.

February 2006

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