ProStroke Golf: World Tour 2007 Review

ProStroke is perhaps a little too complex for a handheld game.

ProStroke Golf was released for home consoles earlier this year, doing its best to gain a share of the market dominated by EA's Tiger Woods series. Its big selling point was control; more control than any golf game that's gone before it. This made for a great game for hardcore golf fans, but one that didn't exactly appeal to casual players. Now on the PSP, is ProStroke any more likely to slice into EA's monopoly?

ProStroke is perhaps the most serious sports sim I've encountered in quite some time, and initially came as quite a shock to the system. After playing EA's glossy Tiger Woods series for the last few years, ProStroke's ambivalence towards style and presentation was more than a little jarring, but it's gameplay on the course that matters, and not how many million colours can be used on a menu screen. Still, initial impressions weren't overly impressive - even for a PSP game.

While the basic mechanics of the golf swing in the console games were familiar to most players, on the PSP the swing mechanic has been completely changed, so it's very much worth taking a look at the training mode. Seeing as there's only one analogue stick on the PSP, the swing has been moved from the sticks to the left and right shoulder buttons. Holding the right shoulder button determines how long your backswing is, and you then switch to holding the left shoulder button to bring the club face back down, releasing the button as close as possible to the start point on the swing meter. You can even add extra power to your shot by transferring weight to the front foot a little before the backswing is complete, by having both buttons held down for a fraction of a second, before then releasing the right shoulder button and completing the downswing. It sounds complex, but in practise it's not nearly as hard to understand.

Ball position, stance, and club face also all play a major part in the outcome of a shot, and these are controlled by the d-pad and analogue stick. The d-pad lets you move your stance so the ball is at the front or back foot for a more lofted or flatter shot, and foot placement can be altered to add draw or fade the ball. The analogue stick lets you hit the ball off-centre, and mixing these different shot options will let you play pretty much whatever shot you desire, but it'll take time to get your head around everything.

Ball position, stance, and club face also all play a major part in the outcome of a shot...

As you improve as a golfer you'll be able to hit the ball further and further, but this means that early rounds can be a little troublesome, particularly when faced with a long Par 3. Hitting the green and making the ball stop isn't easy when you're using a driver or fairway wood, so it's not until you can reach with an iron, and apply a bit of spin, that things become a little easier. Having said that, some of the hole lengths seem a little off, with even perfect swings seemingly not good enough to reach the green in regulation. It's all about practice though, so don't be too put off if your early drives aren't cutting it.

Aside from the expected quick play, single round and tournament game modes, you also get the PSG Career mode. Here you get five calendar years to prove yourself to be the best golfer, according to the money list. A number of events litter the schedule for each month, although the big money events require something called Renown. This is basically your rating as a gofer, and until you've built up your renown you won't be able to take part in the big events. If you're after a mode to play through instead of simply playing in single events, it serves its purpose, but the PSG Career isn't the most thrilling game mode you'll see in a golf game.

ProStroke Golf 2007 isn't the most attractive golf game to hit the market, but on the PSP the visual shortcomings aren't quite as pronounced as they are on consoles. The gap between this and Tiger Woods on the PSP is certainly far less than on other platforms, although the overall presentation is still someway short of EA's now finely tuned series. Audio isn't too hot, with some generally awful and often nonsensical commentary, made all the more unbearable by some rather repetitive music.

It doesn't look bad, but is pretty dull.

With online play sadly totally absent and local wireless play being something that's unlikely to be an option for most players, all that's left to cover is the course designer. Course designers always sound great on paper, but when you get to use one, especially when it's on a console, it's never what you had in mind. ProStroke Golf's attempt isn't bad, but it's far from accessible. If you can get the hang of it, and its rather hard to use menu system, you'll probably be able to create some nice courses, but it'll take an awful lot of effort. Thankfully, the game features eighteen courses, which is more than enough to ensure things don't become stale.

Spoiling the whole experience somewhat are a few little problems, which, when put together, can really aggravate. For example, you'll pitch the ball on what looks like the green, and the commentator will say you've hit the green, but the game says you're off the green. While you can switch to a putter if you like, you can't bring the green grid up manually, so you're forced to guess which way the putt might break. Putting itself can be annoying simply because the onscreen information takes so long to disappear, forcing you to wait so you can get an unobstructed view of the shot. These are minor issues, but the game would have been far more playable had they been resolved before the game shipped.

While the control scheme for the PSP version of ProStroke Golf is a great attempt to bring the console game to the handheld, it doesn't quite feel as intuitive, and ends up being a little over complex for a PSP game. Whether or not you should buy ProStroke on the PSP comes down to whether or not you want more control than the Tiger Woods series gives you. The EA game has better presentation and is far simpler to get to grips with, but ProStroke has more depth and is the more rewarding game if you're willing to invest the time into a handheld game.