Golf + Ninjas = Bodacious

The 1980's were the Decade of the Ninja. Ninja Turtles. Ninja Gaiden. Ninja High School. American Ninja. You couldn't walk ten feet without tripping over something that had been ninjafied. The ninja craze didn't escape the notice of the folks at Atari, but instead of churning out yet another hack 'n' slash ninja game, they came up with... Ninja Golf.


Unlike other golf video games, Ninja Golf isn't about picking the right club to get to the green from 75 yards out in a 10 mph cross wind. You don't pick clubs at all. In fact, the actual golf part of this game only takes up about 30 seconds of a nine hole game. But hey, you're a gamer. The only reason you even know there's a difference between a sand wedge and a pitching wedge is that you spent a week straight playing Tiger Woods '07 when it was released for the Wii.

No, Ninja Golf is all about kicking the crap out of ninjas and giant frogs. Once you've teed off, you've got to run to the spot your ball landed to take your next shot. Along the way you'll encounter other ninjas, fight off cobras as you traverse the sand traps, cross shark infested water hazards and dodge dirt clods thrown by giant gophers. The fighting element is a basic side-scrolling karate game, i.e. Kung Fu. Your character can jump, kick and throw ninja stars, which are plentiful on the course along with other power-ups such as temporary invincibility and health.


Once you've reached the green, you don't putt, which is fine with me because putting is usually the most frustrating part of a golf video game. Instead, you fight a fire-breathing dragon by throwing your ninja stars at it in a blatant Shinobi rip-off. Rather than die in some glorious fashion, the dragon simply flies off after you hit it enough, licks its wounds and tries again next hole.

The dragon fight is the best looking part of the game. Everything else is very blocky, even for a game this old. The sound effects are serviceable, but unspectacular. The whole audio-visual experience is very underwhelming, even with cute additions like playing the Jaws theme when you're underwater.

Judged as just a golf game or just a fighting game, Ninja Golf is below average at best. The combination makes for something just off-beat enough to be fun despite its flaws. If, for some reason, you don't have an Atari 7800 (the only system this game was released for, eat that Nintendo) or an emulator, there's a cumbersome flash version, but stick with the original if you can.