Mario Golf: World Tour

Mario Golf: World Tour is a sport title for the Nintendo 3DS. It is the fifth installment of the Mario Golf series, and the third handheld installment in the series. The game also features gyroscope support and Wi-Fi capabilities, allowing players to participate in online Tournaments against other players from around the world. The game also makes use of downloadable content, in which extra courses and characters may be bought with real money. It is the first and thus far only Mario Golf game to have been released after its tennis counterpart.

Gameplay
The gameplay is similar to past installments of the Mario Golf series. Players have to hit shots while taking into account character attributes, wind, weather, and course topography. The power, accuracy, and spin of shots are determined by the timing when the player taps buttons or the touch screen as a target line slides up and down the power meter. A simplified control system, like the Auto control system from Mario Golf: Toadstool Tour, returns where the player has to worry only about the power of the shot, at the expense of being unable to add topspin or backspin. The touch screen can now be used for selecting clubs, initiating shots, and adding spin. Plus, the trajectory of the shot can be altered by moving the circle pad or by using the touch screen as the shot meter is in motion; this is similar to the impact zone feature of past games. A new feature, known as Item Shots, allows players to hit shots with different effects via items. These include burning through trees with a Fire Flower, creating Jump Blocks over water hazards, ignoring wind via Bullet Bill, increasing draw or fade by Boomerang, and freezing the terrain with an Ice Flower. These items can be collected by hitting ? Blocks on the course, although players sometimes start holes with items.

Menu

 * / - Select Option
 * - Confirm
 * - Cancel
 * - Star Character
 * - Make Character Left-handed

Golf

 * - Select Shot Path/Move Camera/Change Clubs
 * - Select Shot Path/Change Clubs/Select Ball Hit Placement (while swinging)
 * - Begin Swing/Confirm Sweet Spot Position (manual)
 * - Cancel Swing/Confirm Sweet Spot Position (manual)
 * - Select Shot Type
 * - Change Camera
 * - Decrease Power Bar
 * - Increase Power Bar
 * - Pause Menu

Castle Club

 * / - Move
 * - Talk/Confirm
 * - Pause Menu

Playable
The game includes 13 default characters as well as four unlockable characters, with an additional four available as downloadable content, making a total of 21 characters. When the bonus characters are unlocked or downloaded, they immediately get a star rank.

Below is a table of the playable characters. Note that Height is on a scale of 0 to 10, with 0 being the lowest-flying shot and 10 being the highest. Sweet Spot and Control are out of 11. When a character curves the ball, it is either called a fade or draw. A fade is when the ball curves in the direction of the dominant hand and a draw is when the ball curves opposite the direction of the dominant hand. When a shot is used with a curve on a hole with a higher surface, the ball can either over-curve or under-curve, resulting in misplacing of the ball.

Star-Character unlocking criteria
Stronger Star versions of the default characters can be unlocked by beating them in their respective character match in Challenges mode.

Non-playable
These characters appear as either non-playable characters in Castle Club that players can interact with or as background elements in many of the various golf courses in the game.

Customizable gear
There is a variety of purchasable gear that can be used to customize the player's Mii that will affect their stats. The game will have 500 customizable gear items. If a player equips a Mii with a full character gear set the Mii will play similarly to that character. Tournaments will grant the participants with a piece of gear that isn't available through the store until one of the four major tournaments has ended.

Items
Various items can be used during gameplay to affect the player's shots. They may either be found in ? Blocks or boxes with pictures of the item on it. They can also be obtained at the start of the game, with more items being received if more holes are to be played. In player-tournaments, a set amount of items can be chosen for the tournament players to receive before starting.

Courses
Mario Golf: World Tour has the most courses of all Mario Golf games, with 16, including the downloadable courses, making a total of 234 holes. The Castle Club courses have 18 holes and have championships that the Mii can compete in against other Mario characters. The Mario World Courses contain gimmicks based on different Mario games and have nine holes. All these courses can be accessed through both Mario Golf (quick round) and Castle Club. The six downloadable courses, which must be bought with real money, are taken from the Nintendo 64 game with updated music and graphics. Some of these courses have changed appearances to look like specific worlds from New Super Mario Bros. U.

Game modes
There are two main modes of play: Mario Golf (Quick Round), and Castle Club.

Mario Golf
Mario Golf (Quick Round) is similar to past Mario Golf games, where the player can select a Mushroom Kingdom character or a customized Mii. It features a variety of modes such as Single Player (including Stroke Play, Match Play, Speed Golf, and Point Tourney, all of which provide coins for the player), Vs. (Local Play, Online Friends, and Community Match), and Tournaments (Mario Open and user-created Private Tournaments). Additional regional and worldwide online tournaments are available on the entry floor of the Castle Club.

Single Player
This mode allows players to take on a round by themselves, and against the clock or a computer opponent, as well as Challenges, where courses, Star characters, and Mii costumes can be unlocked. The first four modes allow the player to select any unlocked course. The following settings can be adjusted: number of holes (three, six, nine, or 18), order of holes (normal or mixed), wind strength, whether or not to use items or club slots or have coins on the course, whether to start from hole 1 or hole 10 (when playing the holes in normal order), what tees to start from (front, back, or tournament), and whether or not to display the shot trajectory. Playing rounds may earn the player Best Badges and will randomly unlock Mii Gear for the player's Mii to use.

Stroke Play
A standard round of golf, where the player's score is compared to par.

Match Play
The player competes against a computer-controlled opponent. The winner of the round is whichever player wins more holes, although if the players are tied by the end of the game, it will proceed into Sudden Death and go through the selected course again until someone wins. The player may choose the opponents skill level, ranging in five different varieties, two of which need to be unlocked.

Speed Golf
Instead of counting strokes, the player's score is determined by how much time is taken to sink the ball.

Point Tourney
Scored via a modified version of the Stableford scoring system. The player is awarded eight points for an albatross or a hole in one, five for an eagle, three for a birdie, two for a par, and one for a bogey. A double bogey or worse scores zero.

Challenges
Each of the game's courses, including downloadable courses, have ten Star Coin challenges and ten Moon Coin challenges (the latter are more difficult, and unlocked by earning 90 Star Coins). They take the following forms:
 * Star (or Moon) Coin Collector - A Star (or Moon) Coin is placed somewhere on a hole. The player must hit the coin with the ball, then complete the hole in par or better.
 * Ring Master - Multiple rings are placed around the hole. The player must hit the ball through all of the rings, then complete the hole in par or better.
 * 100 Coins - A three-hole challenge where Coins are placed around each hole. The player is given a number of shots two less than the hole's par, and attempts to hit the ball into 100 coins over the course of the three holes.
 * Score Attack - The player must complete nine holes of stroke play, and match or beat the given target score.
 * Character Match - A nine-hole match play competition against a Mushroom Kingdom character with a set difficulty. Winning this match also unlocks the star version of that character for use.
 * Time Attack - The player must complete three holes within the given time limit.
 * Point Challenge - A three-hole challenge. On each hole, Club Slots are spun, which limits the player to no more than three clubs (plus a putter) for the duration of the hole unless the player lines up three Stars on the slots, in which case they will have all of their clubs available. One way to make this happen is to stop the first two slots on Stars, making the third slot spin fast and always land on a Star no matter when it is stopped. Point Tourney scoring applies, and the player must earn at least the given target number of points within the three holes.
 * One-On, One-Putt Challenge - Sky Island only. If a tee shot misses the green, the challenge is failed. If a birdie putt is missed, the challenge is failed. To succeed, the player must clear all holes consecutively by landing the ball on the green in the first stroke (the fringe will not count), then putting the ball into the cup for the next. Getting a hole-in-one will also mark the hole as cleared.

Vs.
This is the game's multiplayer mode. Local play is available for up to four players, but it does not support download play. During multiplayer, all players play at the same time, which speeds up play significantly because players do not have to wait until it is their turn to play. However, all players must finish the hole before they are allowed to move on. Players can see the ghost shots of other players and on-screen icons also show how the player's shots measure with the other players' in terms of distance. Players can send taunts or cheers to each other by pressing icons, as well as emoticons. Matches with online friends and community matches can also be played from this menu.

Skins Match
In addition to Stroke Play, Match Play, Speed Golf, and Point Tourney from the single-player mode, Skins Matches are playable, though exclusive to multiplayer. They are very similar to Match Play in that the goal is to earn the most points. However, this mode can be played by 2-4 players, and rather than having a set point goal, the player with the most points after a set number of holes wins. This mode does not support simultaneous play.

Castle Club
Castle Club is a story mode where the player's Mii tackles different tournaments (similar to the story modes from previous handheld Mario Golf games). The building is the Mushroom Kingdom counterpart to real-life golf country clubs. To the left and right of the entrance are the boys' and girls' locker rooms respectively. At the center of the lobby are two staircases leading to the basement, where the player can enter regional and world tournaments and ask the purple Toad for advice on golf terminologies. To the left of the doorway to the Castle Club's exterior is the boutique, where the player's Mii is able to use Coins to buy equipment that will affect its stats, such as drive distance and shot trajectory, similar to the Mii customization feature in Mario Tennis Open. The player can change his/her gear by accessing the pause menu from anywhere in the Castle Club, or by going to the locker room of the Mii's gender and pressing when in front of the locker. Above the boutique is the Royal Room, where most of the Mario playable characters can be met. Located opposite the boutique is the gym, and on top of that is the trophy room. Just outside the Castle Club is the Caddie Master's booth where the player can sign up for a handicap tournament. After completing that, the player will be allowed to compete in tournaments, located on the Forest Course, the Seaside Course, and the Mountain Course in that order. The entrances to these courses are located to the right of the booth, and when the player goes into one of them, he/she can either go for a stroke play (front tees are used) or the course championship (back tees are used). Completing either of these modes can raise or lower the player's handicap, and when a tournament is won, the player appears in the Royal Room to receive his/her trophy from Princess Peach.

To the left of the Caddie Master's booth is the Royal Garden, which has pipes leading to the six Mario World courses, and a passageway to the Royal Room. Entering these pipes will put the player in a practice round on any of the courses, where the player uses the front tees, starts out with a few items and can grab more from Item Boxes around the course, and hits the ball through coins that appear as well. At the far left of this garden is an aura which will summon Kamek when the player approaches it. Kamek can exchange play coins for game coins, change his/her dominant hand, allow mulligans (the ability to redo strokes), or change the player's swing type, all at a cost of a huge amount of coins. After all three course championships are won, Costume Challenges will begin appearing in the Royal Garden, where players can unlock costumes by completing objectives such as collecting a certain amount of coins, finishing in a short period of time, and beating a target score using Club Slots, all on Mario World courses. Unlike in Quick Round, where the challenges only cover three specific holes and the front or back tees are used, Costume Challenges take place on all nine holes and tournament tees are used. To the right of the main course entrances is an area with entrances to training grounds where players can take a golf tutorial (no gate) and practice their drives (purple gate), approaches (blue gate), and putts (green gate). The practice sessions come in different levels, and the goal is get the ball as close to the pin as possible -- or even sink the ball -- to earn practice points. Succeeding 20 times in the training games each for drives, approaches, and putts will give the player costumes of Bee Mario, Cloud Mario, and Boomerang Mario respectively. Past the practice grounds is the entrance to Sky Island, where the player takes on the One-On, One-Putt challenge, which requires the player to get the ball onto the green in one shot, then putt that ball in the next for nine consecutive holes. If the ball misses the green or just lands on the fringe, or the putt is missed at any point, the challenge is failed. Upon completion, the course will be unlocked and a 18-hole version can be played in Castle Club in its stead. Taking the One-On, One-Putt challenge again and clearing all 18 holes will award the player with a Propeller Mario costume.

Online tournaments
Mario Golf: World Tour also features a variety of online tournaments for players to take part in that reward the player's Mii with (gold, silver or bronze) trophies and a varying amount of coins depending on their performance, as well as some equipment for participating in the tournament (barring DLC ones). They can either be made by Nintendo, other players from across the world in the form of Private Tournaments, or made by | Callaway Golf in partnership with Nintendo.

Trophies earned from Regional and World Tournaments in the Castle Club appear on the trophy hall's display (a maximum of ten normal trophies can be on display at any one time), and trophies from major tournaments appear behind the glass display towards the centre of the room. Trophies are sorted by the type of trophy (gold > silver > bronze), the type of tournament it was earned from (world > regional) and the end ranking the player received from highest to lowest (eg. rank 346 > rank 408). These are the varieties of tournaments known thus far:

Regional Tournaments
In the Castle Club's basement, the player's Mii can go into a pipe on the red entry machine to join Regional Tournaments. These restrict participants to those in the chosen region(s). The clothing prizes for these tournaments are obtained individually, and are themed after the playable characters (not the downloadable ones), and some enemies and items. Additionally, has teamed up with Nintendo to produce Callaway-based regional tournaments, which will give the players sponsored Callaway Gear for the Mii to equip during the tournaments and to keep afterwards.

World Tournaments
On the other side of the Castle Club's basement, the blue entry machine has a pipe leading to World Tournaments, which pit the player against the whole world. The clothing prizes for these tournaments are earned in complete sets and designed like Nintendo gaming devices and themed after the major tournaments.

Mario Open
In addition to Castle Club Tournaments, Nintendo has also created Mario Open tournaments which allow the use of Mario characters, and are played on Mario World courses and downloadable courses. All of these tournaments are world tournaments, but they award pieces of clothing for the Mii in the same way as the regional tournaments. Some tournaments limit players to a specific character or item, and in the former case, the character to be used is not allowed to have a star rank. Players can also make their own unofficial Mario Open tournaments under rules of their choice for other players to enjoy.

Demo
On the 17th of April, a demo of the game was released on the Nintendo eShop for Europe, making this strictly the second Mario game (preceded by Mario & Luigi: Dream Team) to have a publicly released demo for download. The demo was later released in North America on April 24. It uses 873 blocks when downloaded and offers ten uses (fifteen for the North American demo).

The demo lets the player go through a tutorial covering camera and shot control or play through either holes 1, 2, and 3 of Seaside Course, holes 1, 2, and 6 of Wiggler Park, and holes 1, 5, and 6 of Yoshi Lake. The demo also allows the player to play the Star Coin Collector mode on hole 9 of Peach Gardens, and the Ring Master mode on hole 14 of Mountain Course. The only playable characters available are Mario, Peach, Yoshi, and Bowser.

Critical reception
Mario Golf: World Tour has received generally positive reviews among critics. IGN gave the game a score of 8.6/10 (a "great" rating). They praised the game's learning curve, training options, large quantity of unlockables, and multiplayer, but criticized the map in Castle Club, saying it was "confusing". Joystiq gave 3 stars out of 5, being more critical, while praising the basic gameplay and online options, criticizing the Castle Club for being sparse and dispensable and noting the safe, conservative approach to the game such as the uninspired environments. Thomas Whitehead of Nintendo Life compared Mario Golf: Word Tour favorably to Mario Tennis Open. He praised the attention to detail that gives the game its charm, such as in Castle Club as well as its reasonable skill curve that allows both novice and expert players to enjoy the game. He gave the game a score of 9/10. The game was scored 83% by Official Nintendo Magazine. Mario Golf: World Tour currently averages a score of 78 out of a possible 100 on Metacritic. Overall, the game was praised for its gameplay and graphics, but criticized for the lack of content in the Castle Club and, by some reviewers, for being too safe.

References to other games

 * Super Mario Bros.: The loading screens portray various golf scenes that use sprites from this game. The music used in Cheep Cheep Lagoon is a cover of the underwater theme. The music of Bowser's Castle has some parts of the castle theme in it. The overworld theme is heard in part of the music for the credits.
 * Super Mario Bros. 3: The music used in Sky Island is a cover of this game's Athletic Theme. A Super Leaf clothing set and Tanooki Mario costume appear, with golf clubs and balls to go with them.
 * NES Open Tournament Golf: A costume, golf clubs, and a golf ball appear based on Mario's attire in this game.
 * Super Mario 64: The music of Bowser's Castle has parts of this game's Bowser level music. Additionally, the stained glass portrait of Peach appears on hole 16 of Mario's Star as terrain.
 * Mario Golf (Nintendo 64): Playing without a flight path reflects gameplay from this game. Toad Highlands and Koopa Park return with an updated appearance, while the other four main courses appear in a new iteration.
 * Yoshi's Story: Yoshi Lake appears to be based on this game, even using a cover of the title screen as the music.
 * Donkey Kong 64: Some of Diddy Kong's voice clips are recycled from this game.
 * Mario Golf: Toadstool Tour: The four yearly major tournaments, which are the Castle Tournament, Star Open, Moon Open, and World Championship, function much like the Star Tournaments in this game.
 * Mario Golf: Advance Tour: The Castle Club has a similar layout to the Marion Clubhouse from this game.
 * Mario Power Tennis: Many voice clips are reused from this game.
 * Mario Kart DS: The music of Peach Gardens is a cover of the theme used in this game's Peach Gardens.
 * Super Mario Galaxy and Super Mario Galaxy 2: Mario's Star has elements from these games, and various Luma characters appear in Rosalina's post-hole animations. The music used in Wiggler Park is a cover of the Honeyhive Galaxy music. Bee Mario and Cloud Mario costumes appear, with golf clubs and balls to go with them.
 * New Super Mario Bros. Wii: A Propeller Mario costume appears, with golf clubs and a ball to go with it.
 * Donkey Kong Country Returns: The DK Jungle course is heavily based on this game. Donkey Kong's Eagle/Albatross/Hole-In-One animation features him in a silhouetted jungle setting referencing the silhouette levels that originated from this game.
 * Super Mario 3D Land: A Boomerang Flower clothing set and Boomerang Mario costume appear, with golf clubs and balls to go with them. A Tail Goomba appears along with regular Goombas on hole 13 of Mario's Star as terrain.
 * Mario Kart 7: Rosalina's voice clips are recycled from this game.
 * Mario Tennis Open: Mii customization returns from this game. The overall structure of the game is like this one, with sound effects and icons borrowed from it.
 * New Super Mario Bros. 2: Gold Mario appears as a playable character. Moon Coins reappear. A Fox Luigi costume appears, with golf clubs and a ball to go with it. The background of Mario's Eagle/Albatross/Hole-In-One animation is the same as that of World Star.
 * New Super Mario Bros. U: Layer-Cake Desert, Sparkling Waters, and Rock-Candy Mines are downloadable golf courses of places that originated in this game. A Boss Sumo Bro costume appears, with golf clubs and a ball to go with it. Nabbit appears as a playable character. His Eagle/Albatross/Hole-In-One animation features him running through a series of levels based on this game, complete with HUD.
 * Super Mario 3D World: Mario and Luigi's character icons appear as terrain on hole 18 of Mario's Star, while Toad's appears on hole 12.

Regional differences
In PAL versions of Mario Golf: World Tour, the exclamation marks are missing from the animation for Birdie, Eagle, and Albatross. One is present in the Hole-in-One animation, however. Also, the Hole-in-One words that appear are different, the PAL having "HOLE-IN-ONE!", wheras the NTSC version has "HOLE IN ONE!!", leaving out the dashes.

The character select screen also has multiple differences in the distance for each character, as the letters size vary for different versions, with the PAL letters being bigger than the NTSC letters. The abbreviation for "Yards" is also different, with the NTSC version having "yd." and leaves a space between it and the number, whereas the PAL region uses a "yd" abbreviation with no space between the numbers and letters.

Pre-release and unused content
In some pre-release screenshots, the animations for "Birdie" or "Bogey" had orange circles and letters, whereas in the final game, they're blue. The letters and wording was also different in the final version, with different colours, fonts and sizes. Many holes where different, either moved or changed completely. Dark transparent boxes were also added behind the wording of certain course information, and some things were moved to different parts of the screen.

Staff
Mario Golf: World Tour was created by staff at both Camelot and Nintendo, with localization teams from both Nintendo of America and Nintendo of Europe also involved, the latter organization involving sixteen translators to bring the game to a variety of languages. Both Shigeru Miyamoto and Koji Kondo were involved as supervisors. Finally, while she was not listed in the game's credits, Kerri Kane portrayed Rosalina via recycled and previously unused voice clips from her earlier work on Mario Kart 7.

Announcer

 * "Nice on!"
 * "Wow! Nice Albatross!"
 * "Congratulations!"

Trivia

 * Cheep Cheep Lagoon and Koopa Park are the only courses whose greens do not have square designs; instead, they use a wavy design and a hexagonal design respectively.
 * The course (and mode) music for this game continues after shots on the green and post-hole animations, unlike in previous games, where the music restarts when entering a new hole (there even being a tune for hole overviews).
 * Strangely, it still rains on Sky Island and Mario's Star, even though these courses are set above the clouds.