Review: The Golf Club 2

Paul Byron

The original Golf Club felt like it was put together a little quickly but soon became a hit with golf fans due to its unforgivingly realistic style of gameplay and the connected competition based events. The Golf Club 2 aims to vastly improve on its predecessor in every way.

Things start off less well, with a bare bones unstoppable tutorial that takes you through the basics, but it’s certainly required for new players. Taking notes from other games,  HB Studios have added a fairly decent character customisation in to their sequel and there’s a huge range of options to choose from over the fairly basic last game.

Once you’ve designed your character the impressive roster of events and options is presented in a squared off table.  It’s a little confusing at first without any help from the game to tell you where to go, but dive into a course and you’ll get the option for rounds, single holes or the ability to enter online events.

Campaign mode is par for the course (sorry, couldn’t resist at least one golfing pun) with a trip through each course, but it’s the online modes that shine here.  You can play live games with 4 people but it’s the asynchronous online multiplayer that really impresses.  Can’t make it to a game at the same time as friends?  No problem, each of you can play at different times and watch your friends take their swings while you play.  It’s not a new idea in general but for golf it works pretty well.

In addition to the courses here the game excels at course creation.  The tools and method are solid for quickly coming up with simple courses or, with more effort, providing some really detailed and exciting games to inflict on the community.

All of this is backed up by a robust control scheme that, just like the first game, has provided a split between those who love it and those who hate it.  It’s true that the game makes things like putting harder than it should really be, but as everyone’s on a level playing field it’s not so bad.

With some amazing scenery and the best online system for a golf game out there, The Golf Club 2 is a great way to play against friends.  Just be warned that it takes no prisoners in terms of the control scheme and difficulty level.

The Golf Club 2

The Golf Club 2
8

Overall

 8.0/10

Pros

  • Courses look great
  • Controls still tight
  • Much better campaign and course selection
  • Good online event system

Cons

  • Still difficult
  • Commentary is still too repetitive
  • Control scheme may split players

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