Updates & Acquisitions

May 27, 2025

Proof that I should really update this website more frequently (thus remaining in the hearts and minds of my dear, valued readers) - only a little while after posting the previous Acquisitions Update, I was contacted by a friend going by RiotVision, who said she had a couple of Amazon gift cards that she did not intend to use. As much as I have my own thoughts about Amazon as an entity, I figure they already have their money from when the cards were issued. RiotVision was specifically interested in gifting me a copy of one of the Wishlist's more unusual items, so I accepted this generous offer and added the item to the cart - along with a couple of other things to use up the balance. Thank you immensely, RiotVision - this update's for you.

The Tantalizing Trio!

In this shipment, Golfshrine has now acquired copies of Sports Illustrated Golf Classic for the Game Boy, Butch Harmon's Golf Manager which isn't really a game but I'll cover that in a bit, and an item that may now be struck from the wishlist - Ninja Golf for Atari 7800.

Ninjas are mammals. Ninjas golf all the time.

Ninja Golf has been on the wishlist almost since I started Golfshrine, because it's a strange game in general. It is, somehow, not the only golf game for Atari 7800. The other is a port of Mean 18, which Golfshrine has yet to own on any platform. Admittedly, I still don't own a console that can play Atari 7800 games (neither a real 7800 nor the modern reproduction consoles Atari has put out), and this copy is itself a reproduction, but it beats wasting $100+ of someone else's money. Plus, it's not like I can't play it anyway; it's one of the games included in Atari 50, which I have owned on Steam since its release.

A product of Ninjamania, and one of the last Atari 7800 games published during its original run.	The purpose of the Ninja is to flip out and kill people. (And gophers.)

The fact that Ninja Golf postdates the likes of Double Dragon, Final Fight, and Bad Dudes may make it seem somewhat archaic. But I feel like the concept is original enough to at least warrant a quick play. And, if I'm honest, I've been asked multiple times if Golfshrine has Ninja Golf in it in the past, and it always disappoints me that I've had to tell people "no." But now I do! And no longer shall Aqua Teen Hunger Force: Zombie Ninja Pro-Am be the only golf game in Golfshrine with combat. (Y'know, unless you count the boss fight at the end of Kirby's Dream Course.)

What do you do when you can't license pro players, real courses, or pro events? License a magazine instead!

Sports Illustrated Golf Classic hails from 1994, from Unexpected Developments. What makes this humble little Game Boy game so special, in my increasingly crowded shelf? Well, it is one of only a small handful of games that do something Very Weird Indeed with the Super Game Boy: it plays the SGB's built-in menu sounds over the game's UI.

Sports Illustrated Golf Classic tries to make its beeps and bloops more palatable by playing slightly nicer beeps and bloops that are already loaded into memory.

I would almost go so far as to say that this is the only Super Game Boy game that does this, except that there is one other game that does - the Game Boy port of EA Sports PGA European Tour, also developed by Unexpected Developments, and based on the same engine. Weirdly, the Game Boy PGA Tour '96, despite also being made at Unexpected Developments, does not pull this trick at all.

But with both of these covered, it's time to cover the shipment's cheapest - and weirdest - item.

At first glance, I thought it was going to be like a Football Manager or Baseball Mogul game.	The back of case description almost makes it seem like a tycoon game instead? But it's not that either.

This is Butch Harmon's Golf Manager - Gold Edition from 1999, by Golf Manager Enterprises. I paid 70 cents for it. It is not a golf game of any sort. Rather, this seems to be a kind of advanced stat tracking and note-taking software, for actual golfers.

In "Driving Range" mode, you pick a club from the left panel, then click on the map to mark where your ball went. The software crunches the yardage numbers for you.	The default course included with the program shows what a well-drawn course map should look like.	It can very easily turn into a complete mess, though.

Golf Manager does not contain any simulation or gameplay elements whatsoever. The purpose of this software is for you to draw maps of the golf course you're playing, annotate them with stamps of trees, buildings, bunkers, etc., and write in the course yardages. Then all you need to do is click somewhere on the hole overview to log a shot. The program attempts to figure out your distances mathematically, and if you're diligent enough about your note-taking, it can also - supposedly - help you to figure out what your weaknesses are and where to focus your training.

The biggest flaws in this as a concept, in my opinion, are that you'd need to wholly dedicate yourself to using this program. Which means you'd want to prepare your course maps ahead of time, and collect enough data to fill in your player card. Because when you create your player profile, Golf Manager asks you to fill in your average shot distance per club... out of a list of roughly 23. Collecting that kind of data would mean a lot of time at the range. Taking notes about that kind of data would almost be a whole job in itself. Indeed, the testimony section on Golf Manager Enterprises' website indicates that the software would have been used by golf schools. If one were to buy Golf Manager for personal use, they would probably be best served delegating the task of actually using it to their caddie. Because if, in 1999, you were rich enough to buy a laptop computer (with a CD-ROM drive!) to bring to your local golf course, you probably had a caddie on retainer that knew how to use it. Another thought that serves to remind me that people who play Real Golf are worlds away from me.

Through my own non-exhaustive research, I believe Golf Manager Enterprises to have ceased to exist after the year 2000, so I suppose I don't need to feel too shy about distributing the software. I've uploaded a CD-ROM image of it to Internet Archive in case anybody wants to goof around with it, or otherwise has some legit use for the software.

As for Ninja Golf - it occupies the most appropriate place: watching from the shadows on high, waiting for its opportunity to strike.