Monster Jam: Showdown Review

thesixthaxis.com:

Monster Trucks are absolute beasts. Take El Toro as an example – who is a literal beast, being custom clad in a raging bull motif – who weighs in at a bonkers 12,000 pounds, yet has enough bull-power to go from zero to thirty miles per hour in only 1.52 seconds. Then there’s Megalodon, who, despite have a non-aerodynamic, extremely enormous blue shark stuffed on its chassis, can reach top speeds of 70mph. Just the tyres of these things alone is awe-inspiring – an immense 66 inches tall and 44 inches wide – yet somehow significantly less-inflated than the tires of my humble Nissan Micra. Apparently, it’s all to do with truck bounce.

Considering all these admirable qualities, it’s a shame that the monster trucks of the brand-new official Monster Jam game offer an absolutely pathetic driving experience. They handle like lubed up bricks, have the consistency of paper mâché, ignore physics – not in a fun way – and go about as fast as me in my Micra up a hill on a windy day.

Perhaps I’m getting ahead of myself, Monster Jam: Showdown is the latest game featuring vehicles from the world-leading Monster Truck league. This outing has been developed by racing game specialists Milestone; so, it’s understandable that expectations are high. From a looks point-of-view, Monster Jam Showdown certainly delivers.

The 40 unlockable Monster Trucks you’ll find all look resplendent, rendered to an exhausting level of detail in Unreal Engine 5. All the crowd favourites are ultimately available to race; including, Grave Digger, MAX-D, and Zombie. Thing is, most of them are hidden behind a tedious check list of challenges that you must tick off. Unlike the Monster Jam Steel Titans series, there are no puzzles to solve to find new trucks. Instead, you’ll engage in thrilling activities, such as… do the same race several times. As such, unlocking new trucks to gawp at is quite the chore.

Amazingly, even more uninspiring is the actual racing. The AI trucks are likely the most boring opponents you