Platform: Microsoft Xbox

Developer: Hypnotix

Publisher: Simon & Schuster Interactive

Release Date (NA): November 15, 2003

Genre: Sports, Golf

Nerd Rating: 4 out of 10

Reviewed by Nerdberry

Violence makes golf better. If you don’t believe me, then you obviously weren’t a big fan of golfing during the 1990s when the greatest golfer of the decade said, “Why don’t I just go eat some hay? I can make things out of clay, or lay by the bay. I just may. Wuddya say?” Rival golfer Shooter McGavin may have wanted Happy kicked out of the league and banned from professional golf, but the fans had spoken and golf was more popular than ever now that an edgy and colorful character had emerged on the scene. And if you ask me, Outlaw Golf owes a lot to the beloved golf superstar.

The premise behind the only 2 full-length Outlaw Golf games is simple: Strong and solid golf mechanics, outrageous characters with hilarious back stories, and over-the-top commentary. But no matter how wild the antics or how ridiculous the commentary, the strength of the gameplay never played 2nd fiddle to any other aspect. The beauty behind any Outlaw Golf game is that you get to play some serious golf in beautifully animated courses all while getting tons of laughs in a laid back atmosphere. While Outlaw Golf was at the top of its game, the mega movie rental chain Blockbuster saw a chance to get in on the hype and cash in on the Christmas holidays simultaneously with a Blockbuster-exclusive golf game titled Outlaw Golf: 9 More Holes of X-Mas. The game was a follow up to 9 Holes of X-Mas which was released a year prior. Both titles were sold at Blockbuster chains for just $5.

To review 9 More Holes of X-Mas is essentially reviewing the original Outlaw Golf game, except this game is on a much much smaller scale. This bargain-priced game gets you 2 golfers and 9 [more?] holes of golf set in a wintery landscape. Everything about this 9 More Holes of X-Mas game is identical to the original, and it even has the same lengthy character introduction where they show all dozen or so golfers with their names and all, yet we can still only play with 2 of them.

Ice Trey and Summer return with their caddies, except now everyone is wearing snowy weather gear, maybe, to keep warm. The commentary is exactly the same, which is still very humorous, but they make no mention whatsoever of the fact that we are playing in snow. 9 More Holes of X-Mas gives an embarrassing performance and is obviously the original game dumbed down with a fresh snow-white coat on everything. Hell, the water isn’t even frozen! Talk about LAZY! But the crowd is full of elves, so I guess that’s cool. But it’s obvious that the grass and trees are exactly the same except they re-coded the color to white instead of green. An occasional snowflake will fall down, but that’s about as deep in the snow as 9 More Holes will go. What’s worse is now I can’t tell the difference between a sand trap and regular snow-covered grass as the colors are the same.

While generally this “game” sucks through and through, it IS still an Outlaw Golf game, which is actually a pretty fun game. Steve Carell does the commentary with his signature style of enunciation and word-emphasis, plus what he is saying is downright hysterical sometimes. As with any Outlaw Golf game, there is a “composure” system which rewards players for great shots and punishes players for bad shots. As your composure gets better, you will play better and have more power when you reach max composure. The opposite happens when your composure reaches rock bottom and you’re “in the gutter” as the game puts it. But the difference isn’t really all that noticeable. So now that I mention it… It’s sort of pointless.

One of my major pet peeves about this game is how easy it can be! There are unlimited mulligans and help systems to make the game easier such as placing markers every 25% on the power bar and telling you how much power you need to land where you placed the cursor. 60% is easy because you stop your power bar just a little bit past the halfway marker! Geez! It’s just not that challenging. The only real challenge is beating up your caddie to perfection. By pressing the Y button you can cash in one of your special tokens and beat the everliving tar out of your caddie. It is quite enjoyable indeed.

Overall, Outlaw Golf is a decent game but Outlaw Golf: 9 More Holes of X-Mas is a lazy extension pack. In fact, it’s the laziest game on my shelves. While not a freebie or giveaway game, $5 should warrant something a little more special than this. But considering how expensive it was to rent a video game back then ($5 was a normal rental price), for just five bucks you could own a small piece of the whole Outlaw Golf game, which is much deeper than most people probably remember. Not saying it’s a deep game… I said it’s much deeper than you likely remember. Open your ears. I digress… 9 More Holes of X-Mas isn’t worth any amount of time and I’ve wasted enough of mine and yours. I won’t even get 25 cents for this at any used game store, and it’s not worth the space it takes up in my collection. So I’m going to throw it away. Like the POS game that it is. The game plays fine and all, but I’m cutting the score way down because this tiny expansion demo game didn’t do enough to differentiate itself from it’s big brother. You can’t mask the smell of poop with anything… You just have to get rid of the poop.

Nerd Rating: 4 out of 10

Reviewed by the sorriest gamer ever… Nerdberry