Golf App Review : Golf Quiz 2014

If you have a smartphone or a tablet device, then you will have been inundated over the last couple of years by a number of games where a picture is displayed and you have to guess either what the picture is, or what the link between them is.

Indeed, there are a vast number of these games now, across a wide variety of subject areas and perhaps unsurprisingly, golf has now got its own version.

It’s called Golf Quiz 2014 and we took a look at it on the iPad over the last week.

Let’s see how it checks out:

Golf Quiz 2014

• Cost – Free of Charge
• Compatible with – iPhone, iPod Touch, iPad (optimised for iPhone 5)
• Developer – Ludobros
• App Store – Yes
• Download link: https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/golf-quiz-2014/id918934670?mt=8

Golf Quiz 2014 Review

Picture games have been hugely popular downloads over the last few years. Whether you are guessing the company logo, who the famous TV personality, film star or sports star is from a portion of a photograph, or whether you are finding the link between four different pictures, these games have enjoyed enduring popularity with smartphone and tablet users.

Now, Ludobros have brought us a new golf-themed quiz along the very same lines and having taken a look at it, there’s not an awful lot that quizzers and golf enthusiasts will like.

Unfortunately, to call the game a ‘quiz’ is a bit of an over-statement. In effect what you have to do is identify the famous golfer from the picture shown. Nothing is done to make this process any more difficult than looking at his face. Nothing is obscured in the photograph and the first few levels are so easy (I defy any golfer not to know who Tiger Woods, Jack Nicklaus and Phil Mickelson are) as to be somewhat meaningless.

Of course, I do understand that non-golf users may use this app so this may be a nice way of gently easing them into the game, but for any golf fan, the first few rounds are less of a quiz and more of a chore.

The good thing is that as the quiz rumbles on, the pictures do get harder to identify in that the golfers in the picture are not quite as famous as those preceding them.

As a quiz game, Golf Quiz 2014 is pretty basic but enjoyable but unfortunately the enjoyment you get from it is diminished quite considerably by two key things.

The first are the persistent in-game advertisements, which crop up after every single picture and which drive you slowly mad over time. This is very much a case of overkill here as it totally ruins the flow of the game.

In addition, occasionally an advert will load up and if you don’t click exactly on the X to close it down, you are transported out of the app and to the app store to download the app that you do not want. This again can drive you mad after a while.

The other issue which is annoying is the responsiveness of the app. Many times you’ll start spelling out a golfers name from the letters only to find that one letter or two hasn’t registered and instead of Jack Nicklaus, you have Jacn Icklas**, which you then have to delete and redo.

Again, this happens all too frequently to be ignored and it certainly doesn’t happen on other similar games I’ve played.

There are some neat touches, the universal leaderboard gives the game an added challenge and gives you added focus when you play.

But then this is offset by minor niggles, such as having accented words in the selection, which need to be put in the correct place, or the fact that the bottom five letters of the grid can be discarded as they are seemingly never used when making up a name.

Golf Quiz 2014 is a neat diversion though if you have a few spare minutes and when you do get stuck, you do find yourself mulling over who the golfer could be.

It’s not a must have app by any means, but it certainly keeps your golf knowledge sharp, while testing your patience at times too.

Rating 7/10 – Good , but could have been much better.