Category: walkabout mini golf

Posted on

VR’s Favorite Mini Golf Game is Getting a ‘Wallace & Gromit’ Course This Summer

Mighty Coconut, developer of indie VR hit Walkabout Mini Golf (2020), announced it’s partnering with Wallace & Gromit creators Aardman to bring a course inspired by the very same British boffin and canine pair.

The course is set to feature 18 easy mode and hard mode holes, and commemorative in-game putter and themed avatars all set in the world of Wallace & Gromit, the studio says in a blog post.

There’s no trailer out yet, although Aardman and Mighty Coconut say it will take players to duo’s 62 West Wallaby Street and pack in plenty of “humor, and the clever contraptions that generations have come to love.”

Mighty Coconut has however given us a brief glimpse at the course’s blueprints in a post via X (formerly Twitter), which appears to how the house’s ground floor, top floor, and basement laboratory:

Image courtesy Mighty Coconut

The studio hasn’t announced precisely when it’s launching the Wallace & Gromit-inspired course beyond its ‘Summer 2024’ release window, however we can expect it to come to all supported platforms when it does, including Quest 2/3/Pro, PSVR 2, SteamVR headsets, Pico platforms, as well as iOS devices via Walkabout Mini Golf: Pocket Edition.

This isn’t the first high-profile partnership for the plucky mini golf game, which include courses based on Jim Henson’s Labyrinth, Cyan’s Myst and interactive art installation Meow Wolf. The addition of its Wallace & Gromit paid DLC will make for the studio’s 27th course, following its latest ‘Ice Lair’ course released last week.

The post VR’s Favorite Mini Golf Game is Getting a ‘Wallace & Gromit’ Course This Summer appeared first on Road to VR.

Posted on

Egyptian DLC Course Coming To Walkabout Mini Golf On April 20

A new Egyptian-themed DLC course is coming to Walkabout Mini Golf on April 20.

A tweet from the Walkabout account revealed the new course, called ‘Temple at Zerzura’:

The ultimate sand trap—the Sahara Desert—recedes after a thousand years, revealing a mini golf course fit for an Egyptian king and queen! Putt through the dunes, vast throne room, and great pyramids as you search for clues and lost balls within the forgotten temple.

The course follows on from the Upside Town course in March, which featured interesting mechanics that shifted the behavior of the ball across a gravity playground without affecting the gravity of the player.

While that course was one of the more out there options in the Walkabout line-up, the game’s creator Lucas Martell told UploadVR that the next few DLC courses would be “more in that classic mini-golf vein.” Temple at Zerzura looks to be just that, promising sand dunes, pyramids and typical Egyptian fare across 18 holes.

Walkabout Mini Golf is one of the best multiplayer VR experiences available across several headset platforms including Quest, PC VR, Pico and soon PSVR 2. A ‘Pocket Edition‘ version of the game is also coming soon to iPhone with full cross-play support with VR platforms, allowing players on mobile devices to experience Walkabout alongside those playing in VR.

Posted on

Walkabout Mini Golf iPhone Pocket Edition Coming Soon

Walkabout Mini Golf will soon offer a Pocket Edition for iPhones with cross-play supported across existing versions of the game.

Walkabout Mini Golf: Pocket Edition is planned for launch in Q2 of 2023 on iPhones first this summer. The game turns the phone itself into a kind of AR putter and features full cross-play against Walkabout players on Quest, Steam VR, PSVR 2, Pico, and HTC Viveport.

Austin-based development studio Mighty Coconut revealed the release plan alongside other announcements during a private media event held on a physical mini golf course late last week. The studio is also planning a new paid add-on course for the fall partnering with Meow Wolf, an arts and entertainment company with locations in cities like Las Vegas, Santa Fe, and Denver.

“The course will be based on a central world in the Meow Wolf Denver location called Numina— a sentient universe attempting to communicate in the peculiar language of mini golf,” according to Mighty Coconut. 

The course marks Walkabout’s third licensing partnership for the mini golf game following Myst island from Cyan and Labyrinth from Jim Henson. The studio has also been releasing new courses based on public domain ideas like Atlantis or the 1800s works of Jules Verne, beginning with his story 20,000 Leagues Under The Sea. The studio’s most recent original course, Upside Town, messes with gravity in ways that are reminiscent of Portal, Inception, and Doctor Strange.

Might Coconut’s head Lucas Martell said the Meow Wolf course will be the game’s 21st course with three others releasing after Upside Town but before Meow Wolf.

“Meow Wolf is obviously going to break the mold a little bit about what mini golf is,” Martell said. “But we’ve also got three coming before then that are also for the folks who are really into the classic stuff.”

Might Coconut also announced it is partnering with location-based entertainment companies to expand Walkabout into arcade chains as well.

We’ll have the latest on Walkabout as we continue to build out tours of every course as we track the developer’s growing ambition and design skill.

Walkabout Mini Golf released in September 2020, just weeks before the Quest 2, and benefitted from the very large number of people who bought into the system in the years afterward. With the iPhone version of the game debuting in the same rough time frame that’s been associated with Apple’s forthcoming mixed reality headset, we’ll be extremely curious to see whether Walkabout is able to find a large audience among Apple customers as well.

Posted on

Upside Town: See Walkabout’s Wild New Gravity Mini Golf Course

The developers of Walkabout Mini Golf are taking a bigger swing with their latest Upside Town course design toying with gravity.

In a city that seems drawn from Inception, Doctor Strange, or even The Matrix, Walkabout’s new course is now available for $3.99 as an add-on to the game on Quest, Pico, Steam, and soon PSVR 2.

Like all Walkabout courses, if you score under par during the day you unlock a harder version of the course that plays very differently. We walked through the course during the day with Mighty Coconut’s head and original Walkabout creator Lucas Martell pointing to highlights of the design.

Upside Town Course Design

Gravity shifts for the ball in Upside Town but not for the player, Martell explains in our tour video embedded above. When combined with art choices like sunlight casting at a consistent angle across the buildings, the effect is a comfortable gravity playground with a continuous “walkabout path” from hole 1 in the subway to hole 18 on a crane overlooking the city.

“You’re always standing on the ground,” Martell says. “So the entire level, even though the holes might be up above you or on walls, it’s always something that you’ll still have your feet on solid ground and you can still walkabout this course and explore it just like you would any other course.”

Upside Town features rectilinear spaces to move through from a courtyard at the ground level to a hole in a museum gallery and a cafe that might bring to mind Central Perk from Friends. Like Walkabout’s last DLC Atlantis this course also includes interactive animals, though they aren’t rideable here.

“We love this course. We also know that it’s not going to be for everyone,” Martell says. “The next couple of courses are gonna be more in that classic mini-golf vein, but it also feels like we’re getting to that point now where we’ve got enough courses out that we feel like it’s okay to take a couple of big swings and try something that’s totally new.”

We’re continuing to tour through the design evolution in Walkabout Mini Golf with its creators. We’ll have coverage of the latest updates with the game and if you want to follow along with future tour videos be sure to bookmark the playlist embedded below or subscribe to our YouTube channel.

Posted on

VR’s Favorite Mini-Golf Game is Coming to PSVR 2 Soon

Indie VR studio Mighty Coconut announced its smash success VR mini-golfing game Walkabout Mini Golf is making its way to PSVR 2.

Arguably one of VR’s most favorite social gaming experiences, Walkabout Mini Golf is said to arrive on PSVR 2 “soon”, which is set to include cross-play with all supported versions of the game; this includes versions available through Steam, Meta Quest Store, Viveport, and Pico’s European-facing digital store.

Ranking consistently as one of the most highly-rated games on the Quest Store, Walkabout Mini Golf supports both single-player and up to four-player multiplayer, offering up a wide selection of mini-golfing courses.

We don’t know precisely when the hit mini-golfing game is coming to PSVR 2, although Mighty Coconut says it’s set to bring all of the main content at launch, including eight easy and eight hard mode courses, and paid access to all DLC courses and bundles.

We’ll be keeping our eyes out for a more precise launch date in the coming weeks, as Sony’s next-gen VR headset is launching on February 22nd. PlayStation VR 2’s so-called “launch window” content extends into March, so we’ll be keeping our fingers crossed that we’ll see it on PSVR 2 sooner rather than later.

Posted on

‘Walkabout Mini Golf’ Studio Says Half of Users Regularly Play Until Their Battery Runs Out

Walkabout Mini Golf developer Mighty Coconut is soon to release its fifth and largest new DLC course to date—a strategy that seems to be working well considering what the studio claim’s is a level of player engagement that’s 10 times the average.

As terrestrial as it may be compared to a glut of VR action games, there’s no doubt that Walkabout Mini Golf is one of Quest’s top VR games on the headset.

At our last check it ranked as the #3 best rated game in the Quest library, boasting an average user review of 4.86 out of 5 over 7,300 reviews.

That’s thanks in no small part to its straightforward gameplay and easy to use multiplayer functionality which allows cross-platform play, direct invites, Quest Invite Links, and room code lobbies.

Not only is the game keeping players coming back, it’s also keeping them in the headset for what the studio claims is 10 times the average length for a Quest game.

The studio recently shared that 50% of Walkabout Mini Golf’s active Quest players are staying in the game for two hour sessions on average… and it could be longer still, but that’s approaching the limit of Quest’s battery life.

The impressive claim demonstrates the power of multiplayer & social VR applications—especially those with user-friendly implementations—to not only get players into the headset, but to keep them there.

With a large portion of their playerbase so engaged with the game, Mighty Coconut’s strategy of selling new courses as affordable, paid DLC appears to be an ongoing success. Doubling down on that front, the studio is expanding the game’s lobbies from five players to eight with its next update, and adding a new DLC course which will be its largest yet (and its based on licensed IP).

While extensive paid DLC add-ons have steadily fallen out of style in the broader gaming market—because of their propensity to splinter the active player base into those who own DLC and those who do not—Mighty Coconut has smartly implement a ‘friend-pass’ system for its DLC which allows anyone to play on the paid courses as long as one person in the lobby owns the course, thus keeping friends playing together instead of putting a DLC wall between them.

Posted on

Walkabout Mini Golf’s Labyrinth Collab Launches This Month, First Footage Here

Walkabout Mini Golf’s much anticipated Labyrinth DLC is coming this month, and we’ve got a first look at it.

The DLC — first announced in March — will launch on July 28, bringing scenes and characters from the iconic Jim Henson movie to VR for the first time. In the video below, developer Mighty Coconut joins members of the Jim Henson company to talk about the creation of the course.

Walkabout Mini Golf Labyrinth DLC Release Date Revealed

The video shows how some of the ideas and concepts from the movie are translating into VR. You’ll notice a lot of famous scenes that have almost been renovated in VR to become golf courses. As Game Director Lucas Martell puts it in the clip: “This is definitely going to be one of the biggest, most ambitious courses that we’ve ever done.”

Meanwhile, a tweet confirmed that the DLC will feature 18 holes with easy and hard versions as well as new Labryrinth-themed avatar customization options, and an original soundtrack. It will also feature eight player groups. Previously the limit had been for up to five players, though it’s unclear if the new player count will be supported across other levels.

Further down the line, Walkabout is also getting tie-in DLC for Myst along with a steady stream of original courses, too.

Are you going to be picking up the Labyrinth DLC for Walkabout? Let us know in the comments below!

Posted on

Big ‘Walkabout Mini Golf’ Update Will Expand Multiplayer Lobbies, Add New Course Later This Month

Walkabout Mini Golf, one of Quest’s top multiplayer games will get its next update come July 28th, a release date which was revealed alongside a new trailer for the next DLC course.

Walkabout Mini Golf developer Mighty Coconut today revealed a July 28th release date for its next DLC mini golf course which is based on the cult classic ’80s film Labyrinth. The release date comes alongside a new trailer showing off the course for the first time.

The studio has announced the DLC course, which includes 18 holes with ‘easy’ and ‘hard’ variants, will be price at $3. Like other courses, it will include new music, 18 ‘lost balls’ to find, and a scavenger hunt which will unlock a unique putter. And like the game’s other paid DLC courses, we expect the new course to offer a ‘friend pass’, which means anyone can play the course for free as long as one person in the group owns it.

Might Coconuts says the Labyrinth course is their largest and most complex to date, and has also teased “expansive mazes and gardens to explore,” along with animated characters from the film. Further, the update will include new avatars inspired by the film for players to use.

The Labyrinth course will be the game’s 5th DLC course and its 13th course overall.

Image courtesy Mighty Coconut

Beyond the new DLC course, the update will also expand Walkabout Mini Golf’s multiplayer lobbies from five to eight players—a nice bonus given the game’s easy room-code lobby system and cross-platform support between Quest, Rift, and Steam.

And just as a reminder, Walkabout Mini Golf is one of the games that support Quest ‘Invite Links’, which are the easiest way to jump into VR with a friend!

Posted on

Walkabout Mini Golf Releases New El Dorado DLC Course

Mighty Coconut launched the latest DLC course for Walkabout Mini Golf this week centered around the mythical city of El Dorado.

El Dorado is the 12th course available in the game and the latest installment in the Lost Cities series of DLC maps released over the last few months.

Here’s a description of the new El Dorado map from Mighty Coconut:

In the highland jungles of South America lies the mythical city of gold: El Dorado. Putt your way through the ruins of an ancient civilization in the search for lost treasures, lost balls, putters, and just maybe the perfect game of Walkabout Mini Golf.

Mighty Coconut is currently targeting a release of one new map per month. Previous releases include the Gardens of Babylon and Shangri-La maps, as part of Lost Cities, and the Sweetopia course filled with sugary goodness.

Walkabout also received a free update in April adding a new welcome island that essentially acts as a re-imagined and interactive main menu area.

walkabout mini golf el dorado

There’s lots more on the horizon for Walkabout Mini Golf as well, including upcoming licensed DLC packs. The first licensed pack will introduce a course based on the 1986 Jim Henson film Labyrinth, to be followed by another pack that will breathe new life into the island from classic puzzle game Myst, re-imagined as a minigolf course.

Walkabout Mini Golf’s El Dorado DLC course is available now on Quest and SteamVR platforms for $2.99

Posted on

‘Walkabout Mini Golf’ is Getting a Course Based on ‘MYST’ This Fall

Walkabout Mini Golf (2020) has been tempting us lately with the upcoming release of a course based on Jim Henson’s ’80s fantasy film LABYRINTH (1986), which is coming at some point this summer. Now developers Mighty Coconut say they’ve inked a deal with MYST (1993) studio Cyan to create a course based on the classic ’90s adventure game.

Mighty Coconut says it’s releasing the 36-hole VR course in Walkabout Mini Golf sometime in Fall of 2022, releasing on Meta Quest, Steam, and what it calls “forthcoming VR platforms.”

The studio says the MYST course will feature “immersive gameplay with realistic physics, and iconic settings, objects, and the spirit of puzzles from the Myst saga,” and will be “vivid, challenging, puzzle-filled, and beautiful.”

Image courtesy Mighty Coconut, Cyan

This isn’t the first time MYST takes a dip into virtual reality. Cyan has been a pioneering developer in the medium since the beginning, having not only brought original puzzle adventure Obduction (2016) to the first generation of consumer VR headsets, but also MYST itself to Quest and PC VR headsets in mid-2021.

“Our generations of players have discovered the starkly beautiful and now iconic Myst island, so it now only feels natural that we open this virtual mini golf attraction where fans can connect and explore,” said Hannah Gamiel, Development Director at Cyan. “People will be able to explore the world the Miller brothers, Robyn and Rand, created, and have friends from all over the world join them in the fun—all around the whimsical game of mini golf.”

Like all of its mini golf courses, Walkabout Mini Golf: MYST will include support for single-player and four-player multiplayer. It’s said to include 18 easy mode and 18 hard mode holes, contain 18 lost balls to collect, and what the studio calls a “fox hunt scavenger expedition” along with a collectable commemorative putter.

The post ‘Walkabout Mini Golf’ is Getting a Course Based on ‘MYST’ This Fall appeared first on Road to VR.