{"id":42851,"date":"2025-08-04T12:50:53","date_gmt":"2025-08-04T12:50:53","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/42851\/"},"modified":"2025-08-04T12:50:53","modified_gmt":"2025-08-04T12:50:53","slug":"the-happy-gilmore-2-golf-game-is-real-and-its-better-than-the-movie","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/42851\/","title":{"rendered":"The Happy Gilmore 2 golf game is real, and it&#8217;s better than the movie"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Having always held a place in my heart for Lee Carvallo&#8217;s Putting Challenge, the Bonestorm killer from The Simpsons&#8217; golden age and undisputed king of fictional golfing games, it was my duty to give it a try.<\/p>\n<p>I also have a lot of spare time, but that&#8217;s beside the point.<\/p>\n<p><img decoding=\"async\" class=\"image__img\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/08\/happy-gilmore-golf-mayhem-98-heckler-5774dbf.png\" alt=\"Adam Sandler as Happy Gilmore throttling a man from behind in Happy Gilmore: Golf Mayhem '98 Demo.\" data-item-name=\"Adam Sandler as Happy Gilmore throttling a man from behind in Happy Gilmore: Golf Mayhem '98 Demo.\" title=\"happy-gilmore-golf-mayhem-98-heckler\" style=\"aspect-ratio:1 \/ 0.5625;object-fit:contain\" loading=\"lazy\" width=\"700\" height=\"393.75\"\/><\/p>\n<p>The PlayStation can produce mind-boggling effects.\u00a0Netflix<\/p>\n<p>Now, following my brief stint in Golf Mayhem &#8217;98, I have to say that I was pleasantly surprised \u2013 not only is it actually quite fun, but it&#8217;s probably better than the film it&#8217;s based on.<\/p>\n<p>The game takes place across a single hole, which is apparently a par 4, but based on my experience is about a par 10. Your job is to get the ball in the hole; in case you are new to the game of golf.<\/p>\n<p>It&#8217;s a short game, really earning that &#8216;Demo&#8217; in the title, and based on its graphics alone it certainly wouldn&#8217;t look out of place playing on an old CRT through your PS1.<\/p>\n<p>It has the same kind of surreal atmosphere about it that you used to get from those CD demos you got as part of some kind of McDonald&#8217;s promo 20+ years ago \u2013 close enough, welcome back Pepsiman.<\/p>\n<p>During your sojourn from tee to green, there are all sorts of floating icons to encounter. Many of these are simply collectibles, but a few of them spawn short minigames.<\/p>\n<p>If you give the golf a rest long enough to enjoy some of these minigames, you&#8217;ll have the chance to drive a golf cart with incredibly janky physics through a series of checkpoints or beat the snot out of some hecklers in a janky beat-&#8217;em-up. You may be sensing a theme here.<\/p>\n<p class=\"newsletter-sign-up__disclaimer body-copy-extra-small\">By entering your details you are agreeing to our <a class=\"link link--styled\" data-component=\"Link\" href=\"https:\/\/www.immediate.co.uk\/terms-and-conditions\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\">terms and conditions<\/a> and <a class=\"link link--styled\" data-component=\"Link\" href=\"https:\/\/policies.immediate.co.uk\/privacy\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\">privacy policy<\/a>. You can unsubscribe at any time.<\/p>\n<p id=\"recaptcha-copy\" class=\"recaptcha-copy body-copy-extra-small recaptcha-copy--center\">This site is protected by reCAPTCHA and the Google <a class=\"link recaptcha-copy__link link--styled\" href=\"https:\/\/policies.google.com\/privacy\" target=\"_blank\" data-component=\"Link\" aria-label=\"privacy policy\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\">Privacy Policy<\/a> and <a class=\"link recaptcha-copy__link link--styled\" href=\"https:\/\/policies.google.com\/terms\" target=\"_blank\" data-component=\"Link\" aria-label=\"terms of service\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\">Terms of Service<\/a> apply.<\/p>\n<p>There&#8217;s a timer on your shots, after which you&#8217;re heckled, causing you to slice your shot before a short cutscene where PS1-era Adam Sandler throttles the heckler on the fairway.<\/p>\n<p>As you inch closer to the green, more brief, almost hallucinatory cutscenes appear where Shooter McGavin or the ghost of Chubbs Peterson talk to you.<\/p>\n<p>Eventually, once you do land your ball on the green, you are of course treated to a boss fight, where Happy and the late great Bob Barker slug it out one last time.<\/p>\n<p>Beloved deceased media personality dispatched, Happy slots the ball into the hole, and you get to plug your initials into the high scores like an arcade machine.<\/p>\n<p><img decoding=\"async\" class=\"image__img\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/08\/HG22024092617639R2b-be1ca67.jpg\" alt=\"Christopher McDonald as Shooter McGavin and Adam Sandler as Happy Gilmore in Happy Gilmore 2 staring each other down in a graveyard\" data-item-name=\"Christopher McDonald as Shooter McGavin and Adam Sandler as Happy Gilmore in Happy Gilmore 2 staring each other down in a graveyard\" title=\"Christopher McDonald as Shooter McGavin and Adam Sandler as Happy Gilmore in Happy Gilmore 2\" style=\"aspect-ratio:1 \/ 0.6666666666666666;object-fit:contain\" loading=\"lazy\" width=\"700\" height=\"466.66666666666663\"\/><\/p>\n<p>Christopher McDonald as Shooter McGavin and Adam Sandler as Happy Gilmore in Happy Gilmore 2.\u00a0Netflix<\/p>\n<p>I won&#8217;t lie; there were some pretty good gags in there. Certainly, enough to elicit more than a few wry chuckles.<\/p>\n<p>Maybe it&#8217;s the fact I haven&#8217;t played a PS1-era game in so long, or maybe it&#8217;s the fact that I am, at the time of writing, quite tired, but I found Golf Mayhem &#8217;98 to be a surreal, almost hypnotic experience.<\/p>\n<p>There were times where, bouncing between golf cart explosions and apparent hallucinations, I started to think that maybe Happy Gilmore: Golf Mayhem &#8217;98 Demo was more than it led on \u2013 some kind of avant-garde, postmodern audiovisual art piece.<\/p>\n<p>Then, I remembered that I was playing a 10-minute video game tie-in to the sequel to a 30-year-old Adam Sandler movie.<\/p>\n<p>Sadly, I&#8217;m not sure that Golf Mayhem &#8217;98 will be landing on many Game of the Year lists come December, but then, I&#8217;m not sure how many Film of the Year lists Happy Gilmore 2 will be on either, so let&#8217;s just call it even.<\/p>\n<p>Check out more of our <a href=\"https:\/\/www.radiotimes.com\/technology\/gaming\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Gaming<\/a> coverage or visit our <a href=\"https:\/\/www.radiotimes.com\/tv\/tv-listings\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">TV Guide<\/a> and <a href=\"https:\/\/www.radiotimes.com\/streaming-guide\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Streaming Guide<\/a> to find out what&#8217;s on. For more TV recommendations and reviews, listen to<a href=\"https:\/\/www.radiotimes.com\/audio\/podcasts\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\"> The Radio Times Podcast<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Having always held a place in my heart for Lee Carvallo&#8217;s Putting Challenge, the Bonestorm killer from The&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":42852,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[566],"tags":[64,63,755,85],"class_list":["post-42851","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-golf","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-golf","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/42851","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=42851"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/42851\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/42852"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=42851"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=42851"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=42851"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}