Mini Golf is a game for the 5th generation iPod video (only). It's moderately challenging and, at least in my humble opinion, a lot of fun to play.

It includes three different courses as shown below -- Tropical Tiki (top right), Ancient Egypt (bottom left), and Freaky Circus Side Show (bottom right):

You start out with only one course -- Tropical Tiki -- available and unlock the next course by scoring par or better. I found it relatively easy to do so and unlocked both locked courses before the end of my first day playing the game.

The holes on all three courses mimic real mini golf holes with moving targets, ramps, chutes, and obstacles galore. It takes practice but in time you should be able to score par or better on most holes.

The music and sound effects are nice in the beginning but I found that the music soon became annoying, so I found myself playing without my earphones most of the time.

Mini Golf has three modes of play -- single player, pass 'n' play, and practice hole -- which do what they sound like. My family flew to Florida a few weeks ago and I had a great time playing this game with my son in the pass 'n' play mode.

Alas, therein lies the rub... playing games on your iPod video runs the battery down as fast as or even faster than watching video. In other words, the battery lasted well under 4 hours (vs. 10 or 12 for music-only).

Another bugaboo is that the aiming control can be awkward at times. You can't see where the ball is going to go from certain angles and it's easy to swing too hard or too soft by accident. With practice you can overcome these traits but the swing and camera controls could have been better.

Finally, three courses isn't enough. I got bored playing the same 54 holes over and over. It would have been nice if there were one or two more courses or if there were additional add-on courses available.

The Bottom Line

Even with its nits, Mini Golf is a lot of fun and well worth its low price. If you want a fun game to play on your iPod video, you won't be disappointed with Mini Golf.