Minigolf Revolution: Pirate Park

Where has the summer gone? Floods in the North, a Wimbledon that's had more rain stoppages than any year in recent memory and winds that are blowing across the south western counties with enough strength to uproot trees.

No wonder we're all dreaming of sun-soaked Caribbean shores and the piratical inhabitants therein, not to mention the third nautical knave-based mobile game to be released in as many months. Or is that just us?

Regardless, Minigolf Revolution: Pirate Park has tied its flag firmly to Cap'n Jack Sparrow's mast, even if the infamous movie character isn't actually officially involved in this, a themed take on crazy golf.

Set over four rum-soaked nine-hole courses, the game follows the usual format – finish the hole in the lowest number of strokes – but with a slight twist. The Pirate Park scorecard places just as much emphasis on picking up booty in the form of gold coins and emeralds, so you need to balance your approach on each hole between staying under par and collecting treasure.

Aiming and making your shots is simplicity itself. Taking a leaf out of the Midnight Pool school of ball battering, you get an aiming line along which your ball will travel and a power gauge that is employed with two presses of your handset's '5' key or centre button of the D-pad.

Manage to come in under par despite all the obstacles and you'll find your treasure is multiplied; come in over and it'll be reduced. It's a tricky compromise to make and, time and again, you find yourself wondering if it really is worth taking an extra stroke to collect every piece of eight littering the green.

The loot is critical, though, because unless you collect enough to reach a certain rank after each course, you won't proceed to the next one. Thankfully, the status you'll need to attain isn't too far out of reach – we completed the game without having to repeat any of the courses – but it does serve to focus your mind.

The monetary demands aren't the only potential barrier to your progress, mind, because in an original touch for a minigolf game, Minigolf Revolution: Pirate Park features end-of-level (well, end-of-course) boss characters that you have to overcome.

A boss crops up after each of the first three courses and it's up to you to see them off with little more than your putter and ball. For instance the giant monkey that appears after the second course can be defeated by destroying the barrels that he leaps onto, by hitting them with your ball; another boss, a giant squid, tests your timing as you try to fit your shot through its moving tentacles and into its mouth.

Unlockable characters and clothes repay all this effort for your virtual self, who's a contemporary teen with the standard issue edgy hairstyle and street attitude, though Derek and Ginny (yes, those really are their names) are drawn in such a cute style that you can forgive them almost anything.

A winnable pirate costume is a given, but you can also spend your hard-earned gold on different coloured balls, ball traces and flags, and there's a genuine desire to replay the game to make sure you open everything. More could have been done to improve the long-term prospects, though, with a pass-the-handset multiplayer mode being the most obvious.

It's inevitable that you'd want to find a way to keep playing a game that's so much fun and has been put together with such evident care and attention to detail – take a look at the screenshots and you'll see what we mean. The packed and busy scenery might not have any direct influence on your score, but it does evoke a desert island spirit that's sunny enough to brighten up even Britain's summer weather.