Monster Jam Showdown Review

ign.com:

If you’re on the hunt for an impractically large, American truck that doesn’t run on conventional fuel and looks ridiculous, are you going to go with a stainless steel Tesla triangle that wants to eat your fingers, or would you opt for an 11-foot tall, methanol-powered brute that can do literal backflips? I know which one I’d choose. If my friends and family are going to dunk on me for driving a truck that looks deeply unserious, it’s going to be because it’s dressed like a spooky pirate.

Monster Jam Showdown is equally devoted to these five-ton doofuses shaped like dogs and dinosaurs. While it’s very modest in scope, developer Milestone has injected this family-friendly racer with an enjoyably drift-heavy driving feel, a wild range of stunts, and great damage effects.

Monster Jam Showdown ditches the open world approach of the otherwise mediocre Steel Titans games. It’s not something I miss personally, but this may come as a disappointment to anybody that previously relished rampaging around those open environments between curated events.

The maps in Showdown may look like open worlds with races and events scattered across them, but they’re not. In fact, the map screens could have just been a bar of event thumbnails, or an ordered list; Showdown doesn’t gain anything from having us shuffling around and zooming into maps within maps seeking out the next available event. It actually feels like a waste of time.

The driving feel, however, is very good. I found it particularly nice to have all the handling aids off, and I enjoy the sensation of slinging these huge vehicles into drifts and seeing them squat back and powerslide through bends on the throttle. As with Steel Titans and 2020’s Monster Truck Championship, Showdown features independent rear-wheel steering controlled by the right stick. It’s a great point of difference with these sorts of racers, and it’s a very satisfying extra element of racing to master. My 10-year-old, on the other hand, was more comfortable