One, two, three... FORE!
- "Ah... the good ol' days, when minature golf was a quaint, but risky pastime. The problem was, either it was too hot, or too wet, or too cold, or too dangerous. But, that was then... and this is now!"
The Wacky World of Miniature Golf is a golfing video game released in 1993 for the Philips CD-i, developed by Philips under their Philips Sidewalk Studio label. The game prominently features the voice of famous actor and comedian Eugene Levy, who narrates the game as the character Rollo the Golf Ball. The game takes place in Wacky Golf, a miniature golf theme park featuring eighteen holes all themed after a variety of wacky situations.
Gameplay is very different from most other golf video games. As the game is primarily rendered through full-motion animated video, the game does not give the player control over the power of their shot. Instead, players can choose one of three directions to hit their ball, then they must time the shot in a way that the ball will avoid the obstacles in front of them. If the player hits with the correct timing, the ball will pass by safely. If not, it will be blocked, or worse, destroyed by something, forcing you to start the hole from the beginning.
The Wacky World of Miniature Golf contains the following tropes:
- All Bikers are Hells Angels: The Don't Mess With My Bike hole features a gang of brutish bikers wearing leather jackets and bandanas that get in the way by driving their bikes across the road you're trying to putt across.
- Anti-Frustration Features: If your score goes over 9 on any hole, you reach the Stroke Limit and are given the option to give up on the current hole and move on to the next one. You can take additional strokes if you want, but your score will not go up as long as you do so.
- Ash Face: In The Golf War, after the enemy base explodes, the person inside waving the White Flag is left covered in soot, reducing them to a black silhouette.
- Atlantis: One hole takes place in a parody of the underwater city of Atlantis, which depicts it as a series of buildings built from boats.
- Big Boo's Haunt: Ghost of a Chance takes place in a creepy cemetery with the putting path leading to a haunted house, where the player must get their ball past ghosts, an arm reaching out from one of the graves, and a giant animal skull that tries to eat the ball.
- Big Fancy Castle: The Hole-y Grail takes the player through a castle with several rooms in search of the titular Hole-y Grail. To get inside, you have to putt the ball past the opening and closing drawbridge outside, after which the ball travels through some hallways adorned with various weapons and tapestry, and the castle is also home to a sleeping dragon you have to bypass.
- Big Red Devil: Clearing the secret heaven hole in the Hole on the Wrong Side of the Tracks triggers a different ending cutscene where the ball falls through the hole in the sky and lands on Satan's head, represented by a red guy with horns reading "Liar Digest" and smoking a cigar.
- Build Like an Egyptian: King Putt's Tomb sees the player golfing in an Egyptian-inspired pyramid out in the desert. The goal is to putt the ball into a sarcophagus containing the mummified King Putt.
- Chekhov's Volcano: A volcano appears in the background of 1,000,000 Years B.G., and the hole ends with your ball rolling underground and uncapping a pit of lava, which subsequently rises to the surface and erupts, causing all the dinosaurs to run away.
- Color-Coded Multiplayer: In a multiplayer game, each player uses a different-colored golf ball, with colors including pink, blue, red, and yellow.
- Damsel in Distress: The Perils of Pollyanna hole features the titular Pollyanna, who has been kidnapped by the evil Dr. Cretin, who has tied her up above a pool of battery acid. The player has to complete the hole in order to save her.
- Eternal Engine: The Made in the U.S.A. Hole takes place inside a toy factory where you have to get your ball past rows of toys as they move around on conveyor belts. Failure to do so can result in the ball stopping on one of the belts, where it will get taken away and destroyed within one of the quality control machines.
- Family-Unfriendly Violence: While the game is presented as an all-ages golf game for the most part, 1,000,000 Years B.G. has a moment during its ending where a T-Rex's skeleton tears out of its skin in order to escape from the volcanic eruption, with visible blood on the discarded skin.
- Fluffy Cloud Heaven: The Hole on the Wrong Side of the Tracks has an optional sequence where hitting the ball at a specific time can result in it stopping in the middle of the train tracks. Failing the following shot will result in your character being hit by an oncoming train, after which they end up in miniature golf heaven, a simple hole placed atop some white clouds in an open blue sky.
- The Fourth Wall Will Not Protect You: The Lost Hole of Atlantis ends with the screen being covered in a hypnotic swirling effect as the game tries to hypnotize the player into forgetting that Atlantis exists.
- Gameplay Randomization: The order in which the holes are played is selected at random every time the game is played.
- Instant Bandages: The bikers in the Don't Mess With My Bike Hole instantly gain casts and bandages after they crash their bikes.
- Laughing at Your Own Jokes: Rollo regularly follows his one-liners with varying degrees of laughter.
- Major Injury Underreaction: After getting trampled and broken to pieces of scrap metal, the robot cowboy in Hole on the Range continues taunting you.
- Oh, Crap!: The outlaw in Hole on the Range stops trash talking the player after he sees the buffalo stampede heading his way, his face changing to a look of pure terror.
- Oil Slick: The target on the Don't Mess With My Bike Hole is a conveniently-labeled oil can which, upon getting the ball inside, spits out oil all over the road that the biker gang proceeds to run over, slipping and crashing their bikes.
- Prehistoria: 1,000,000 Years B.G. (Before Golf) is a dinosaur-themed hole taking place in a vast desert with tar pits, and featuring a T-Rex that blocks the putting path with his tail, along with other dinosaurs.
- Prison Episode: Swing Along at Sing-Sing is a hole located in a prison surrounded by high walls with guards on watch. The player has to get their ball past a group of prisoners as they hammer away at the putting path.
- Punch-Clock Villain: Clearing the Shark Soup hole triggers a scene where a whistle is blown, after which the sharks that tried to eat your ball go on coffee break and talk about their family lives. After that, the whistle is blown a second time, and they go right back to Threatening Shark mode.
- Slippy-Slidey Ice World: The Hole in the Ozone Layer takes place in the Arctic, and the goal is to get the ball into an igloo. The putting path includes obstacles such as a sleeping polar bear that initially looks like a hill, a penguin with a hockey stick, and a pool of water with a submarine going back and forth.
- Squashed Flat: Certain holes have obstacles that can squish your ball into a pancake, such as the prisoner's hammers in Swing Along at Sing-Sing. If the ball gets crushed, you will be sent back to the start.
- 13 Is Unlucky: One obstacle on the Hole in the Ozone Layer is a submarine marked with the number 13 that tries to block your ball from passing.
- Threatening Shark: The Shark Soup hole challenges you to get your ball past hungry sharks that repeatedly jump from pools of water and attempt to eat it.
- Trial-and-Error Gameplay: The success of your putt is dictated entirely by the timing of when you press the button, and the timing is very specific, so the only way to figure it out is to fail the shots until you get lucky and find the right frame.
- Video Game Tutorial: The main menu includes an option to play a Practice Hole to learn how the game works. Rollo will explain the game's controls before letting you give the hole a shot.
- White Flag: Once the player's ball reaches the enemy base in The Golf War, a white flag is waved, after which soldiers rise from the tanks and celebrate their apparent victory.
- The Wild West: Hole on the Range is staged as a quick draw between you and a cowboy outlaw (played by a robot). The hole is located in a desert with obstacles such as a groundhog that runs across the putting path, and cowboy that repatedly tries to lasso the ball as it passes him. There's also a herd of buffalo that can be seen in the background, and stampede over the outlaw after the player succeeds.
