Play It: Wonderputt

Wonderputt is a unique online mini golf game from DampGnat at Newgrounds.com. If you’re thinking “How can a mini golf game be unique at this point?,” you have a right to your skepticism. For years, the only major change in most golf games worth trying was the style of course. You’d still drag back with the mouse to power up and aim the club and let go to hit. You’d deal with either an overhead 2D or angled 3D perspective. It felt like the same game over and over.

Wonderputt has a big novelty factor going for it that I haven’t seen before. The entire course is on the screen from the first hole. You just don’t know it yet. Every time you sink that last putt, the environment moves to create the next hole. One minute, your golfing in a pasture a group of cattle just ate through. The next minute, a cloud arrives to fill the screen with snow, transporting you to ski slopes. It’s refreshing enough to make this mini golf game a must play.

wonderputt Play It: Wonderputt

The game is clean and graphic. The controls are responsive and the music and sound enhance the experience. The cut-scenes to produce the next course are clever and often unexpected. Even the difficult ramps up in unexpected ways. It’s not that the course becomes progressively more challenging. It’s that the challenge is constantly shifting in ways that change your playing strategy. Even turning one hole into a near-mirror image of the previous hole is enough to keep the game interesting.