The issues and hurdles involved in going for a World Record that kinda doesn’t exist… but does?

The game is GOLF on Nintendo Entertainment System. The name of the game already leads to problems when googling “GOLF” on NES world records. It is one of those games that everyone’s uncle had back in the late 80s to early 90s and almost everyone’s experience with the game usually lasted under 5 minutes.

It’s absolutely not a game one can pick up and be good at. You need to get the timing down, learn the course, and learn about how the wind affects your shots and how to use it to your advantage with slicing or hooking the ball appropriately. Once you master that and have a feel for each club and how to get good scores, the game unlocks itself and become something much, much greater and I love getting in a “flow state” and shooting really good scores.

This game is more like a proof on concept game. Something you would show your boss to prove that, if given the time, you could create a decent game. There are absolutely no bells or whistles. You don’t have to choose a course, since there is only one. You can’t choose a character, since everyone has to use Mario’s uncle. Player 1 gets White Shirt Mario. Player 2 gets Red shirt Mario. There is NO MUSIC at all, which to me is the worst thing left out. I would of loved it if guy that made the Tetris music would of created a few tracks for this game. The only noises that come from the game are as following: when ball is in the air it gives off a tonal whistle. The higher the shot, the higher the “whistle.”

I dabbled with the game as a kid, but never put the time and practice one needs to when they want to be one of the best players out there. In 1998 though, I visited my aunt and uncle in Los Angeles for a 3 week vacation. Now that I’m older, I realized it was more a vacation for my parents and for my aunt, it was a free baby sitter during the days she went to work. I didn’t mind watching over my 6 year old lil cousin. She was a good kid and listened to whatever I said. I was only 14 and in a city that required a car to get about on the highways. Highways everywhere. I still remember that. So my cousin and I were stuck at my aunts house, and in the back room, there was an older tv with a old Nintendo hooked up to it. There were 3 games there. Mario Bros (of course!), Tetris, and Golf. In those 3 weeks, I got really good at Tetris and great at Golf. I would play all day and whenever I got a killer score on either game, i would pause it and wait for my uncle to get home from work, and then he would try to beat my score from that day.

My Golf scores got better and better. More importantly though, i got more and more consistent at getting those good scores. I remember getting a -14 under and being super excited. The round didn’t have any bogeys in it and i was very proud of myself. By the time I left Cali, I shot an -18 and birdie all 18 holes. The internet was still just mostly used for emails and chat rooms. There was info on popular video games, but for a game like “GOLF” on a 15 year old system, well, that was nonexistent. I went back home on the east coast, and my GOLF days were behind me… I thought.

Fast forward to 2018 and I was bored. I was randomly at a video game store that bought and sold older video games and right there in front of me was a used NES and they had a solid lineup of games for sale. I bought the NES and got a bunch of games that I loved as a young kid in the early 90s. I brought home Tetris, Legend of Zelda, Mario 1 and 2, Wizards and Warriors, StarTropics, and finally GOLF. Within a couple of months, all those games were in a drawer and out of sight. Golf however, stayed in my NES and hasn’t left since.

I decided in April of 2018 that I was going to go for the lowest score ever on the game. First off, i had to find out what WAS the lowest round in the game. Ive found a couple -22 and one or two -23. On reddit however, i found this screenshot and my heart ached.

Legit?

In the World Record universe, this picture alone is not enough to verify the score as legitimate. In my eyes though, not many people stream or record there GOLF outings and I’m not surprised there isn’t a full video run of this score. And honestly, this was always the score that I had in my mind as the perfect round. This is the score Ive been trying to achieve for the last 3 years now.

Stay tuned, as for I plan on posting a Hole by Hole breakdown on what I need to do to score that “perfect” 24 under!